第 112 页

poured concrete, were a complex modeling of simple structural features; there

was no ornament; none was needed; the shapes had the beauty of sculpture.

Ellsworth Toohey did not look at the plans which Keating had spread out on his

desk. He stared at the perspective drawings. He stared, his mouth open.

Then he threw his head back and howled with laughter.

"Peter," he said, "you’re a genius."

He added: "I think you know exactly what I mean." Keating looked at him blankly,

without curiosity. "You’ve succeeded in what I’ve spent a lifetime trying to

achieve, in what centuries of men and bloody battles behind us have tried to

achieve. I take my hat off to you, Peter, in awe and admiration."

"Look at the plans," said Keating listlessly. "It will rent for ten dollars a

unit."

"I haven’t the slightest doubt that it will. I don’t have to look. Oh yes,

Peter, this will go through. Don’t worry. This will be accepted. My

congratulations, Peter."

#

"You God-damn fool!" said Gail Wynand. "What are you up to?"

He threw to Roark a copy of the Banner, folded at an inside page. The page bore

a photograph captioned: "Architects’ drawing of Cortlandt Homes, the $15,000,000

Federal Housing Project to be built in Astoria, L. I., Keating & Dumont,

architects."

522

Roark glanced at the photograph and asked: "What do you mean?"

"You know damn well what I mean. Do you think I picked the things in my art

gallery by their signatures? If Peter Keating designed this, I’ll eat every copy

of today’s Banner."

"Peter Keating designed this, Gail."

"You fool. What are you after?"

"If I don’t want to understand what you’re talking about, I won’t understand it,

no matter what you say."

"Oh, you might, if I run a story to the effect that a certain housing project

was designed by Howard Roark, which would make a swell exclusive story and a

joke on one Mr. Toohey who’s the boy behind the boys on most of those damn

projects."

"You publish that and I’ll sue hell out of you."

"You really would?"

"I would. Drop it, Gail. Don’t you see I don’t want to discuss it?"

Later, Wynand showed the picture to Dominique and asked:

"Who designed this?"

She looked at it. "Of course," was all she answered.

#

"What kind of ’changing world,’ Alvah? Changing to what? From what? Who’s doing

the changing?"

Parts of Alvah Scarret’s face looked anxious, but most of it was impatient, as

he glanced at the proofs of his editorial on "Motherhood in a Changing World,"

which lay on Wynand’s desk.

"What the hell, Gail," he muttered indifferently.

"That’s what I want to know--what the hell?" He picked up the proof and read

aloud: "’The world we have known is gone and done for and it’s no use kidding

ourselves about it. We cannot go back, we must go forward. The mothers of today

must set the example by broadening their own emotional view and raising their

selfish love for their own children to a higher plane, to include everybody’s

little children. Mothers must love every kid in their block, in their street, in

their city, county, state, nation and the whole wide, wide world--just exactly

as much as their own little Mary or Johnny.’" Wynand wrinkled his nose

fastidiously. "Alvah?...It’s all right to dish out crap. But--this kind of

crap?"

Alvah Scarret would not look at him.

"You’re out of step with the times, Gail," he said. His voice was low; it had a

tone of warning--as of something baring its teeth, tentatively, just for future

reference.

This was so odd a behavior for Alvah Scarret that Wynand lost all desire to

pursue the conversation. He drew a line across the editorial, but the blue

523

pencil stroke seemed tired and ended in a blur. He said: "Go and bat out

something else, Alvah."

Scarret rose, picked up the strip of paper, turned and left the room without a

word.

Wynand looked after him, puzzled, amused and slightly sick.

He had known for several years the trend which his paper had embraced gradually,

imperceptibly, without any directive from him. He had noticed the cautious

"slanting" of news stories, the half-hints, the vague allusions, the peculiar

adjectives peculiarly placed, the stressing of certain themes, the insertion of

political conclusions where none was needed. If a story concerned a dispute

between employer and employee, the employer was made to appear guilty, simply

through wording, no matter what the facts presented. If a sentence referred to

the past, it was always "our dark past" or "our dead past." If a statement

involved someone’s personal motive, it was always "goaded by selfishness" or

"egged by greed." A crossword puzzle gave the definition of "obsolescent

individuals" and the word came out as "capitalists."

Wynand had shrugged about it, contemptuously amused. His staff, he thought, was

well trained: if this was the popular slang of the day, his boys assumed it

automatically. It meant nothing at all. He kept it off the editorial page and

the rest did not matter. It was no more than a fashion of the moment--and he had

survived many changing fashions.

He felt no concern over the "We Don’t Read Wynand" campaign. He obtained one of

their men’s-room stickers, pasted it on the windshield of his own Lincoln, added

the words: "We don’t either," and kept it there long enough to be discovered and

snapped by a photographer from a neutral paper. In the course of his career he

had been fought, damned, denounced by the greatest publishers of his time, by

the shrewdest coalitions of financial power. He could not summon any

apprehension over the activities of somebody named Gus Webb.

He knew that the Banner was losing some of its popularity. "A temporary fad," he

told Scarret, shrugging. He would run a limerick contest, or a series of coupons

for victrola records, see a slight spurt of circulation and promptly forget the

matter.

He could not rouse himself to full action. He had never felt a greater desire to

work. He entered his office each morning with important eagerness. But within an

hour he found himself studying the joints of the paneling on the walls and

reciting nursery rhymes in his mind. It was not boredom, not the satisfaction of

a yawn, but more like the gnawing pull of wishing to yawn and not quite making

it. He could not say that he disliked his work. It had merely become

distasteful; not enough to force a decision; not enough to make him clench his

fists; just enough to contract his nostrils.

He thought dimly that the cause lay in that new trend of the public taste. He

saw no reason why he should not follow it and play on it as expertly as he had

played on all other fads. But he could not follow. He felt no moral scruples. It

was not a positive stand rationally taken; not defiance in the name of a cause

of importance; just a fastidious feeling, something pertaining almost to

chastity: the hesitation one feels before putting one’s foot down into muck. He

thought: It doesn’t matter--it will not last--I’ll be back when the wave swings

on to another theme--I think I’d rather sit this one out.

He could not say why the encounter with Alvah Scarret gave him a feeling of

uneasiness, sharper than usual. He thought it was funny that Alvah should have

524

switched to that line of tripe. But there had been something else; there had

been a personal quality in Alvah’s exit; almost a declaration that he saw no

necessity to consider the boss’s opinion any longer.

I ought to fire Alvah, he thought--and then laughed at himself, aghast: fire

Alvah Scarret?--one might as well think of stopping the earth--or--of the

unthinkable--of closing the Banner.

But through the months of that summer and fall, there were days when he loved

the Banner. Then he sat at this desk, with his hand on the pages spread before

him, fresh ink smearing his palm, and he smiled as he saw the name of Howard

Roark in the pages of the Banner.

The word had come down from his office to every department concerned: Plug

Howard Roark. In the art section, the real-estate section, the editorials, the

columns, mentions of Roark and his buildings began to appear regularly. There

were not many occasions when one could give publicity to an architect, and

buildings had little news value, but the Banner managed to throw Roark’s name at

the public under every kind of ingenious pretext. Wynand edited every word of

it. The material was startling on the pages of the Banner: it was written in

good taste. There were no sensational stories, no photographs of Roark at

breakfast, no human interest, no attempts to sell a man; only a considered,

gracious tribute to the greatness of an artist.

He never spoke of it to Roark, and Roark never mentioned it. They did not

discuss the Banner.

Coming home to his new house in the evening, Wynand saw the Banner on the living

room table every night. He had not allowed it in his home since his marriage. He

smiled, when he saw it for the first time, and said nothing.

Then he spoke of it, one evening. He turned the pages until he came to an

article on the general theme of summer resorts, most of which was a description

of Monadnock Valley. He raised his head to glance at Dominique across the room;

she sat on the floor by the fireplace. He said:

"Thank you, dear."

"For what, Gail?"

"For understanding when I would be glad to see the Banner in my house."

He walked to her and sat down on the floor beside her. He held her thin

shoulders in the curve of his arm. He said:

"Think of all the politicians, movie stars, visiting grand dukes and sash weight

murderers whom the Banner has trumpeted all these years. Think of my great

crusades about street-car companies, red-light districts and home-grown

vegetables. For once, Dominique, I can say what I believe."

"Yes, Gail..."

"All this power I wanted, reached and never used.,. Now they’ll see what I can

do. I’ll force them to recognize him as he should be recognized. I’ll give him

the fame he deserves. Public opinion? Public opinion is what I make it."

"Do you think he wants this?"

"Probably not. I don’t care. He needs it and he’s going to get it. I want him to

525

have it. As an architect, he’s public property. He can’t stop a newspaper from

writing about him if it wants to."

"All that copy on him--do you write it yourself?"

"Most of it."

"Gail, what a great journalist you could have been."

The campaign brought results, of a kind he had not expected. The general public

remained blankly indifferent. But in the intellectual circles, in the art world,

in the profession, people were laughing at Roark. Comments were reported to

Wynand: "Roark? Oh yes, Wynand’s pet."

"The Banner’s glamour boy."

"The genius of the yellow press."

"The Banner is now selling art--send two box tops or a reasonable facsimile."

"Wouldn’t you know it? That’s what I’ve always thought of Roark--the kind of

talent fit for the Wynand papers."

"We’ll see," said Wynand contemptuously--and continued his private crusade.

He gave Roark every commission of importance whose owners were open to pressure.

Since spring, he had brought to Roark’s office the contracts for a yacht club on

the Hudson, an office building, two private residences. "I’ll get you more than

you can handle," he said. "I’ll make you catch up with all the years they’ve

made you waste."

Austen Heller said to Roark one evening: "If I may be so presumptuous, I think

you need advice, Howard. Yes, of course, I mean this preposterous business of

Mr. Gail Wynand. You and he as inseparable friends upsets every rational concept

I’ve ever held. After all, there are distinct classes of humanity--no, I’m not

talking Toohey’s language--but there are certain boundary lines among men which

cannot be crossed."

"Yes, there are. But nobody has ever given the proper statement of where they

must be drawn."

"Well, the friendship is your own business. But there’s one aspect of it that

must be stopped--and you’re going to listen to me for once."

"I’m listening."

"I think it’s fine, all those commissions he’s dumping on you. I’m sure he’ll be

rewarded for that and lifted several rungs in hell, where he’s certain to go.

But he must stop that publicity he’s splashing you with in the Banner. You’ve

got to make him stop. Don’t you know that the support of the Wynand papers is

enough to discredit anyone?" Roark said nothing. "It’s hurting you

professionally, Howard."

"I know it is."

"Are you going to make him stop?"

"No."

526

"But why in blazes?"

"I said I’d listen, Austen. I didn’t say I’d speak about him."

Late one afternoon in the fall Wynand came to Roark’s office, as he often did at

the end of a day, and when they walked out together, he said: "It’s a nice

evening. Let’s go for a walk, Howard. There’s a piece of property I want you to

see."

He led the way to Hell’s Kitchen. They walked around a great rectangle--two

blocks between Ninth Avenue and Eleventh, five blocks from north to south. Roark

saw a grimy desolation of tenements, sagging hulks of what had been red brick,

crooked doorways, rotting boards, strings of gray underclothing in narrow air

shafts, not as a sign of life, but as a malignant growth of decomposition.

"You own that?" Roark said.

"All of it."

"Why show it to me? Don’t you know that making an architect look at that is