第 49 页

He’ll beat you there."

"No one’s got her," snapped Keating.

"No, undoubtedly not. Not yet. That’s rather astonishing. Oh, I suppose it will

take an extraordinary kind of man."

"Look here, what in hell are you doing? You don’t like Dominique Francon. Do

you?"

"I never said I did."

A little later Keating heard Toohey saying solemnly in the midst of some earnest

discussion: "Happiness? But that is so middle-class. What is happiness? There

are so many things in life so much more important than happiness."

Keating made his way slowly toward Dominique. She stood leaning back, as if the

air were a support solid enough for her thin, naked shoulder blades. Her evening

gown was the color of glass. He had the feeling that he should be able to see

the wall behind her, through her body. She seemed too fragile to exist; and that

very fragility spoke of some frightening strength which held her anchored to

existence with a body insufficient for reality.

When he approached, she made no effort to ignore him; she turned to him, she

answered; but the monotonous precision of her answers stopped him, made him

helpless, made him leave her in a few moments.

When Roark and Heller entered, Kiki Holcombe met them at the door. Heller

presented Roark to her, and she spoke as she always did, her voice like a shrill

rocket sweeping all opposition aside by sheer speed.

"Oh, Mr. Roark, I’ve been so eager to meet you! We’ve all heard so much about

you! Now I must warn you that my husband doesn’t approve of you--oh, purely on

artistic grounds, you understand--but don’t let that worry you, you have an ally

in this household, an enthusiastic ally!"

"It’s very kind, Mrs. Holcombe," said Roark. "And perhaps unnecessary."

"Oh, I adore your Enright House! Of course, I can’t say that it represents my

own esthetic convictions, but people of culture must keep their minds open to

anything, I mean, to include any viewpoint in creative art, we must be

broad-minded above all, don’t you think so?"

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"I don’t know," said Roark. "I’ve never been broad-minded."

She was certain that he intended no insolence; it was not in his voice nor his

manner; but insolence had been her first impression of him. He wore evening

clothes and they looked well on his tall, thin figure, but somehow it seemed

that he did not belong in them; the orange hair looked preposterous with formal

dress; besides, she did not like his face; that face suited a work gang or an

army, it had no place in her drawing room. She said:

"We’ve all been so interested in your work. Your first building?"

"My fifth."

"Oh, indeed? Of course. How interesting."

She clasped her hands, and turned to greet a new arrival. Heller said:

"Whom do you want to meet first?...There’s Dominique Francon looking at us. Come

on."

Roark turned; he saw Dominique standing alone across the room. There was no

expression on her face, not even an effort to avoid expression; it was strange

to see a human face presenting a bone structure and an arrangement of muscles,

but no meaning, a face as a simple anatomical feature, like a shoulder or an

arm, not a mirror of sensate perception any longer. She looked at them as they

approached. Her feet stood posed oddly, two small triangles pointed straight and

parallel, as if there were no floor around her but the few square inches under

her soles and she were safe so long as she did not move or look down. He felt a

violent pleasure, because she seemed too fragile to stand the brutality of what

he was doing; and because she stood it so well.

"Miss Francon, may I present Howard Roark?" said Heller.

He had not raised his voice to pronounce the name; he wondered why it had

sounded so stressed; then he thought that the silence had caught the name and

held it still; but there had been no silence: Roark’s face was politely blank

and Dominique was saying correctly:

"How do you do, Mr. Roark."

Roark bowed: "How do you do, Miss Francon."

She said: "The Enright House..."

She said it as if she had not wanted to pronounce these three words; and as if

they named, not a house, but many things beyond it.

Roark said: "Yes, Miss Francon."

Then she smiled, the correct, perfunctory smile with which one greets an

introduction. She said:

"I know Roger Enright. He is almost a friend of the family."

"I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting many friends of Mr. Enright."

"I remember once Father invited him to dinner. It was a miserable dinner. Father

is called a brilliant conversationalist, but he couldn’t bring a sound out of

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Mr. Enright. Roger just sat there. One must know Father to realize what a defeat

it was for him."

"I have worked for your father"--her hand had been moving and it stopped in

midair--"a few years ago, as a draftsman."

Her hand dropped. "Then you can see that Father couldn’t possibly get along with

Roger Enright."

"No. He couldn’t."

"I think Roger almost liked me, though, but he’s never forgiven me for working

on a Wynand paper."

Standing between them, Heller thought that he had been mistaken; there was

nothing strange in this meeting; in fact, there simply was nothing. He felt

annoyed that Dominique did not speak of architecture, as one would have expected

her to do; he concluded regretfully that she disliked this man, as she disliked

most people she met.

Then Mrs. Gillespie caught hold of Heller and led him away. Roark and Dominique

were left alone. Roark said:

"Mr. Enright reads every paper in town. They are all brought to his office--with

the editorial pages cut out."

"He’s always done that. Roger missed his real vocation. He should have been a

scientist. He has such a love for facts and such contempt for commentaries."

"On the other hand, do you know Mr. Fleming?" he asked.

"No."

"He’s a friend of Heller’s. Mr. Fleming never reads anything but editorial

pages. People like to hear him talk."

She watched him. He was looking straight at her, very politely, as any man would

have looked, meeting her for the first time. She wished she could find some hint

in his face, if only a hint of his old derisive smile; even mockery would be an

acknowledgment and a tie; she found nothing. He spoke as a stranger. He allowed

no reality but that of a man introduced to her in a drawing room, flawlessly

obedient to every convention of deference. She faced this respectful formality,

thinking that her dress had nothing to hide from him, that he had used her for a

need more intimate than the use of the food he ate--while he stood now at a

distance of a few feet from her, like a man who could not possibly permit

himself to come closer. She thought that this was his form of mockery, after

what he had not forgotten and would not acknowledge. She thought that he wanted

her to be first to name it, he would bring her to the humiliation of accepting

the past--by being first to utter the word recalling it to reality; because he

knew that she could not leave it unrecalled.

"And what does Mr. Fleming do for a living?" she asked.

"He’s a manufacturer of pencil sharpeners."

"Really? A friend of Austen’s?"

"Austen knows many people. He says that’s his business."

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"Is he successful?"

"Who, Miss Francon? I’m not sure about Austen, but Mr. Fleming is very

successful. He has branch factories in New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode

Island."

"You’re wrong about Austen, Mr. Roark. He’s very successful. In his profession

and mine you’re successful if it leaves you untouched."

"How does one achieve that?"

"In one of two ways: by not looking at people at all or by looking at everything

about them."

"Which is preferable, Miss Francon?"

"Whichever is hardest."

"But a desire to choose the hardest might be a confession of weakness in

itself."

"Of course, Mr. Roark. But it’s the least offensive form of confession."

"If the weakness is there to be confessed at all."

Then someone came flying through the crowd, and an arm fell about Roark’s

shoulders. It was John Erik Snyte.

"Roark, well of all people to see here!" he cried. "So glad, so glad! Ages,

hasn’t it been? Listen, I want to talk to you! Let me have him for a moment,

Dominique."

Roark bowed to her, his arms at his sides, a strand of hair falling forward, so

that she did not see his face, but only the orange head bowed courteously for a

moment, and he followed Snyte into the crowd.

Snyte was saying: "God, how you’ve come up these last few years! Listen, do you

know whether Enright’s planning to go into real estate in a big way, I mean, any

other buildings up his sleeve?"

It was Heller who forced Snyte away and brought Roark to Joel Sutton. Joel

Sutton was delighted. He felt that Roark’s presence here removed the last of his

doubts; it was a stamp of safety on Roark’s person. Joel Sutton’s hand closed

about Roark’s elbow, five pink, stubby fingers on the black sleeve. Joel Sutton

gulped confidentially:

"Listen, kid, it’s all settled. You’re it. Now don’t squeeze the last pennies

out of me, all you architects are cutthroats and highway robbers, but I’ll take

a chance on you, you’re a smart boy, snared old Rog, didn’t you? So here you’ve

got me swindled too, just about almost, that is, I’ll give you a ring in a few

days and we’ll have a dogfight over the contract!"

Heller looked at them and thought that it was almost indecent to see them

together: Roark’s tall, ascetic figure, with that proud cleanliness peculiar to

long-lined bodies, and beside him the smiling ball of meat whose decision could

mean so much.

Then Roark began to speak about the future building, but Joel Sutton looked up

at him, astonished and hurt. Joel Sutton had not come here to talk about

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buildings; parties were given for the purpose of enjoying oneself, and what

greater joy could there be but to forget the important things of one’s life? So

Joel Sutton talked about badminton; that was his hobby; it was a patrician

hobby, he explained, he was not being common like other men who wasted time on

golf. Roark listened politely. He had nothing to say.

"You do play badminton, don’t you?" Joel Sutton asked suddenly.

"No," said Roark.

"You don’t?" gulped Joel Sutton. "You don’t? Well, what a pity, oh what a rotten

pity! I thought sure you did, with that lanky frame of yours you’d be good,

you’d be a wow, I thought sure we’d beat the pants off of old Tompkins anytime

while that building’s being put up."

"While that building’s being put up, Mr. Sutton, I wouldn’t have the time to

play anyway."

"What d’you mean, wouldn’t have the time? What’ve you got draftsmen for? Hire a

couple extra, let them worry, I’ll be paying you enough, won’t I? But then, you

don’t play, what a rotten shame, I thought sure...The architect who did my

building down on Canal Street was a whiz at badminton, but he died last year,

got himself cracked up in an auto accident, damn him, was a fine architect, too.

And here you don’t play."

"Mr. Sutton, you’re not really upset about it, are you?"

"I’m very seriously disappointed, my boy."

"But what are you actually hiring me for?"

"What am I what?"

"Hiring me for?"

"Why, to do a building of course."

"Do you really think it would be a better building if I played badminton?"

"Well, there’s business and there’s fun, there’s the practical and there’s the

human end of it, oh, I don’t mind, still I thought with a skinny frame like

yours you’d surely...but all right, all right, we can’t have everything...."

When Joel Sutton left him, Roark heard a bright voice saying: "Congratulations,

Howard," and turned to find Peter Keating smiling at him radiantly and

derisively.

"Hello, Peter. What did you say?"

"I said, congratulations on landing Joel Sutton. Only, you know, you didn’t

handle that very well."

"What?"

"Old Joel. Oh, of course, I heard most of it--why shouldn’t I?--it was very

entertaining. That’s no way to go about it, Howard. You know what I would have

done? I’d have sworn I’d played badminton since I was two years old and how it’s

the game of kings and earls and it takes a soul of rare distinction to

appreciate it and by the time he’d put me to the test I’d have made it my

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business to play like an earl, too. What would it cost you?"

"I didn’t think of it."

"It’s a secret, Howard. A rare one. I’ll give it to you free of charge with my

compliments: always be what people want you to be. Then you’ve got them where

you want them. I’m giving it free because you’ll never make use of it. You’ll

never know how. You’re brilliant in some respects, Howard, I’ve always said

that--and terribly stupid in others."

"Possibly."

"You ought to try and learn a few things, if you’re going in for playing the

game through the Kiki Holcombe salon. Are you? Growing up, Howard? Though it did

give me a shock to see you here of all places. Oh, and yes, congratulations on

the Enright job, beautiful job as usual--where have you been all summer?--remind

me to give you a lesson on how to wear a tux, God, but it looks silly on you!

That’s what I like, I like to see you looking silly, we’re old friends, aren’t

we, Howard?"

"You’re drunk, Peter."

"Of course I am. But I haven’t touched a drop tonight, not a drop. What I’m