This appeared in the column “Your House” by Dominique Francon, a week after the party at the home of Kiki Holcombe.
On the morning of its appearance Ellsworth Toohey walked into Dominique’s office. He held a copy of the Banner, with the page bearing her column turned toward her. He stood silently, rocking a little on his small feet. It seemed as if the expression of his eyes had to be heard, not seen: it was a visual roar of laughter. His lips were folded primly, innocently.
“Well?” she asked.
“Where did you meet Roark before that party?”
She sat looking at him, one arm flung over the back of her chair, a pencil dangling precariously between the tips of her fingers. She seemed to be smiling. She said:
“I had never met Roark before that party.”
“My mistake. I was just wondering about…” he made the paper rustle, “…the change of sentiment.”
“Oh, that? Well, I didn’t like him when I met him–at the party.”
“So I noticed.”
“Sit down, Ellsworth. You don’t look your best standing up.”
“Do you mind? Not busy?”
“Not particularly.”
He sat down on the corner of her desk. He sat, thoughtfully tapping his knee with the folded paper.
“You know, Dominique,” he said, “it’s not well done. Not well at all.”
“Why?”
“Don’t you see what can be read between the lines? Of course, not many will notice that. He will. I do.”
“It’s not written for him or for you.”
“But for the others?”
“For the others.”
“Then it’s a rotten trick on him and me.”
“You see? I thought it was well done.”
“Well, everyone to his own methods.”
“What are you going to write about it?”
“About what?”
“About the Enright House.”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
He threw the paper down on the desk, without moving, just flicking his wrist forward. He said:
“Speaking of architecture, Dominique, why haven’t you ever written anything about the Cosmo-Slotnick Building?”
“Is it worth writing about?”
“Oh, decidedly. There are people whom it would annoy very much.”
“And are those people worth annoying?”
“So it seems.”
“What people?”
“Oh, I don’t know. How can we know who reads our stuff? That’s what makes it so interesting. All those strangers we’ve never seen before, have never spoken to, or can’t speak to–and here’s this paper where they can read our answer, if we want to give an answer. I really think you should dash off a few nice things about the Cosmo-Slotnick Building.”
“You do seem to like Peter Keating very much.”
“I? I’m awfully fond of Peter. You will be, too–eventually, when you know him better. Peter is a useful person to know. Why don’t you take time, one of these days, to get him to tell you the story of his life? You’ll learn many interesting things.”
“For instance?”
“For instance, that he went to Stanton.”
“I know that.”
“You don’t think it’s interesting? I do, Wonderful place, Stanton. Remarkable example of Gothic architecture. The stained-glass window in the Chapel is really one of the finest in this country. And then, think, so many young students. All so different. Some graduating with high honors. Others being expelled.”
“Well?”
“Did you know that Peter Keating is an old friend of Howard Roark?”
“No. Is he?”
“He is.”
“Peter Keating is an old friend of everybody.”
“Quite true. A remarkable boy. But this is different. You didn’t know that Roark went to Stanton?”
“No.”
“You don’t seem to know very much about Mr. Roark.”
“I don’t know anything about Mr. Roark. We weren’t discussing Mr. Roark.”
“Weren’t we? No, of course, we were discussing Peter Keating. Well, you see, one can make one’s point best by contrast, by comparison. As you did in your pretty little article today. To appreciate Peter as he should be appreciated, let’s follow up a comparison. Let’s take two parallel lines. I’m inclined to agree with Euclid, I don’t think these two parallels will ever meet. Well, they both went to Stanton. Peter’s mother ran a sort of boardinghouse and Roark lived with them for three years. This doesn’t really matter, except that it makes the contrast more eloquent and–well–more personal, later on. Peter graduated with high honors, the highest of his class. Roark was expelled. Don’t look like that. I don’t have to explain why he was expelled, we understand, you and I. Peter went to work for your father and he’s a partner now. Roark worked for your father and got kicked out. Yes, he did. Isn’t that funny, by the way?–he did, without any help from you at all–that time. Peter has the Cosmo-Slotnick Building to his credit–and Roark has a hot-dog stand in Connecticut. Peter signs autographs–and Roark is not known even to all the bathroom fixtures manufacturers. Now Roark’s got an apartment house to do and it’s precious to him like an only son–while Peter wouldn’t even have noticed it had he got the Enright House, he gets them every day. Now, I don’t think that Roark thinks very much of Peter’s work. He never has and he never will, no matter what happens. Follow this a step further. No man likes to be beaten. But to be beaten by the man who has always stood as the particular example of mediocrity in his eyes, to start by the side of this mediocrity and to watch it shoot up, while he struggles and gets nothing but a boot in his face, to see the mediocrity snatch from him, one after another, the chances he’d give his life for, to see the mediocrity worshipped, to miss the place he wants and to see the mediocrity enshrined upon it, to lose, to be sacrificed, to be ignored, to be beaten, beaten, beaten–not by a greater genius, not by a god, but by a Peter Keating–well, my little amateur, do you think the Spanish Inquisition ever thought of a torture to equal this?”
“Ellsworth!” she screamed. “Get out of here!”
She had shot to her feet. She stood straight for a moment, then she slumped forward, her two palms flat on the desk, and she stood, bent over; he saw her smooth mass of hair swinging heavily, then hanging still, hiding her face.
“But, Dominique,” he said pleasantly, “I was only telling you why Peter Keating is such an interesting person.”
Her hair flew back like a mop, and her face followed, she dropped down on her chair, looking at him, her mouth loose and very ugly.
“Dominique,” he said softly, “you’re obvious. Much too obvious.”
“Get out of here.”
“Well, I’ve always said that you underestimated me. Call on me next time you need some help.”
At the door, he turned to add:
“Of course, personally, I think Peter Keating is the greatest architect we’ve got.”
That evening, when she came home, the telephone rang.
“Dominique, my dear,” a voice gulped anxiously over the wire, “did you really mean all that?”
“Who is this?”
“Joel Sutton. I…”
“Hello, Joel. Did I mean what?”
“Hello, dear, how are you? How is your charming father? I mean, did you mean all that about the Enright House and that fellow Roark? I mean, what you said in your column today. I’m quite a bit upset, quite a bit. You know about my building? Well, we’re all ready to go ahead and it’s such a bit of money, I thought I was very careful about deciding, but I trust you of all people, I’ve always trusted you, you’re a smart kid, plenty smart, if you work for a fellow like Wynand I guess you know your stuff. Wynand knows buildings, why, that man’s made more in real estate than on all his papers, you bet he did, it’s not supposed to be known, but I know it. And you working for him, and now I don’t know what to think. Because, you see, I had decided, yes, I had absolutely and definitely decided–almost–to have this fellow Roark, in fact I told him so, in fact he’s coming over tomorrow afternoon to sign the contract, and now…Do you really think it will look like a feather boa?”
“Listen, Joel,” she said, her teeth set tight together, “can you have lunch with me tomorrow?”
She met Joel Sutton in the vast, deserted dining room of a distinguished hotel. There were few, solitary guests among the white tables, so that each stood out, the empty tables serving as an elegant setting that proclaimed the guest’s exclusiveness. Joel Sutton smiled broadly. He had never escorted a woman as decorative as Dominique.
“You know, Joel,” she said, facing him across a table, her voice quiet, set, unsmiling, “it was a brilliant idea, your choosing Roark.”
“Oh, do you think so?”
“I think so. You’ll have a building that will be beautiful, like an anthem. A building that will take your breath away–also your tenants. A hundred years from now they will write about you in history–and search for your grave in Potter’s Field.”