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temple. I built it. Nothing else can seem very important."

"You shouldn’t have built it. You shouldn’t have delivered it to the sort of

thing they’re doing."

"That doesn’t matter. Not even that they’ll destroy it. Only that it had

existed."

She shook her head. "Do you see what I was saving you from when I took

commissions away from you?...To give them no right to do this to you....No right

to live in a building of yours...No right to touch you...not in any way...."

#

When Dominique walked into Toohey’s office, he smiled, an eager smile of

welcome, unexpectedly sincere. He forgot to control it while his eyebrows moved

into a frown of disappointment; the frown and the smile remained ludicrously

together for a moment. He was disappointed, because it was not her usual

dramatic entrance; he saw no anger, no mockery; she entered like a bookkeeper on

a business errand. She asked:

"What do you intend to accomplish by it?"

He tried to recapture the exhilaration of their usual feud. He

"Sit down, my dear. I’m delighted to see you. Quite frankly and helplessly

delighted. It really took you too long. I expected you here much sooner. I’ve

had so many compliments on that little article of mine, but, honestly, it was no

fun at all, I wanted to hear what you’d say."

"What do you intend to accomplish by it?"

"Look, darling, I do hope you didn’t mind what I said about that uplifting

statue of yours. I thought you d understand I just couldn’t pass up that one."

"What is the purpose of that lawsuit?"

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"Oh well, you want to make me talk. And I did so want to hear you. But half a

pleasure is better than none. I want to talk. I’ve waited for you so

impatiently. But I do wish you’d sit down, I’ll be more comfortable....No? Well,

as you prefer, so long as you don’t run away. The lawsuit? Well, isn’t it

obvious?"

"How is it going to stop him?" she asked in the tone one would use to recite a

list of statistics. "It will prove nothing, whether he wins or loses. The whole

thing is just a spree for great number of louts, filthy but pointless. I did not

think you wasted your time on stink bombs. All of it will be forgotten before

Christmas."

"My God, but I must be a failure! I never thought of myself as such a poor

teacher. That you should have learned so little in two years of close

association with me! It’s really discouraging. Since you are the most

intelligent woman I know, the fault must be mine. Well, let’s see, you did learn

one thing: that I don’t waste my time. Quite correct. I don’t. Right, my dear,

everything will be forgotten by next Christmas. And that, you see, will be the

achievement. You can fight a live issue. You can’t fight a dead one. Dead

issues, like all dead things, don’t just vanish, but leave some decomposing

matter behind. A most unpleasant thing to carry on your name. Mr. Hopton

Stoddard will be thoroughly forgotten. The Temple will be forgotten. The lawsuit

will be forgotten. But here’s what will remain: ’Howard Roark? Why, how could

you trust a man like that? He’s an enemy of religion. He’s completely immortal.

First thing you know, he’ll gyp you on your construction costs.’ ’Roark? He’s no

good--why, a client had to sue him because he made such a botch of a building.’

’Roark? Roark? Wait a moment, isn’t that the guy who got into all the papers

over some sort of a mess? Now what was it? Some rotten kind of scandal, the

owner of the building--I think the place was a disorderly house--anyway the

owner had to sue him. You don’t want to get involved with a notorious character

like that. What for, when there are so many decent architects to choose from?’

Fight that, my dear. Tell me a way to fight it. Particularly when you have no

weapons except your genius, which is not a weapon but a great liability."

Her eyes were disappointing; they listened patiently, an unmoving glance that

would not become anger. She stood before his desk, straight, controlled, like a

sentry in a storm who knows that he has to take it and has to remain there even

when he can take it no longer.

"I believe you want me to continue," said Toohey. "Now you see the peculiar

effectiveness of a dead issue. You can’t talk your way out of it, you can’t

explain, you can’t defend yourself. Nobody wants to listen. It is difficult

enough to acquire fame. It is impossible to change its nature once you’ve

acquired it. No, you can never ruin an architect by proving that he’s a bad

architect. But you can ruin him because he’s an atheist, or because somebody

sued him, or because he slept with some woman, or because he pulls wings off

bottleflies. You’ll say it doesn’t make sense? Of course it doesn’t. That’s why

it works. Reason can be fought with reason. How are you going to fight the

unreasonable? The trouble with you, my dear, and with most people, is that you

don’t have sufficient respect for the senseless. The senseless is the major

factor in our lives. You have no chance if it is your enemy. But if you can make

it become your ally--ah, my dear!...Look, Dominique, I will stop talking the

moment you show a sign of being frightened."

"Go on," she said.

"I think you should now ask me a question, or perhaps you don’t like to be

obvious and feel that I must guess the question myself? I think you’re right.

The question is, why did I choose Howard Roark? Because--to quote my own

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article--it is not my function to be a fly swatter. I quote this now with a

somewhat different meaning, but we’ll let that pass. Also, this has helped me to

get something I wanted from Hopton Stoddard, but that’s only a minor side-issue,

an incidental, just pure gravy. Principally, however, the whole thing was an

experiment. Just a test skirmish, shall we say? The results are most gratifying.

If you were not involved as you are, you’d be the one person who’d appreciate

the spectacle. Really, you know, I’ve done very little when you consider the

extent of what followed. Don’t you find it interesting to see a huge,

complicated piece of machinery, such as our society, all levers and belts and

interlocking gears, the kind that looks as if one would need an army to operate

it--and you find that by pressing your little finger against one spot, the one

vital spot, the center of all its gravity, you can make the thing crumble into a

worthless heap of scrap iron? It can be done, my dear. But it takes a long time.

It takes centuries. I have the advantage of many experts who came before me. I

think I shall be the last and the successful one of the line, because--though

not abler than they were--I see more clearly what we’re after. However, that’s

abstraction. Speaking of concrete reality, don’t you find anything amusing in my

little experiment? I do. For instance, do you notice that all the wrong people

are on the wrong sides? Alvah Scarret, the college professors, the newspaper

editors, the respectable mothers and the Chambers of Commerce should have come

flying to the defense of Howard Roark--if they value their own lives. But they

didn’t. They are upholding Hopton Stoddard. On the other hand I heard that some

screwy bunch of cafeteria radicals called ’The New League of Proletarian Art’

tried to enlist in support of Howard Roark--they said he was a victim of

capitalism--when they should have known that Hopton Stoddard is their champion.

Roark, by the way, had the good sense to decline. He understands. You do. I do.

Not many others. Oh, well. Scrap iron has its uses."

She turned to leave the room.

"Dominique, you’re not going?" He sounded hurt. "You won’t say anything? Not

anything at all?"

"No."

"Dominique, you’re letting me down. And how I waited for you! I’m a very

self-sufficient person, as a rule, but I do need an audience once in a while.

You’re the only person with whom I can be myself. I suppose it’s because you

have such contempt for me that nothing I say can make any difference. You see, I

know that, but I don’t care. Also, the methods I use on other people would never

work on you. Strangely enough, only my honesty will. Hell, what’s the use of

accomplishing a skillful piece of work if nobody knows that you’ve accomplished

it? Had you been your old self, you’d tell me, at this point, that that is the

psychology of a murderer who’s committed the perfect crime and then confesses

because he can’t bear the idea that nobody knows it’s a perfect crime. And I’d

answer that you’re right. I want an audience. That’s the trouble with

victims--they don’t even know they’re victims, which is as it should be, but it

does become monotonous and takes half the fun away. You’re such a rare treat--a

victim who can appreciate the artistry of its own execution....For God’s sake,

Dominique, are you leaving when I’m practically begging you to remain?"

She put her hand on the doorknob. He shrugged and settled back in his chair.

"All right," he said. "Incidentally, don’t try to buy Hopton Stoddard out. He’s

eating out of my hand just now. He won’t sell." She had opened the door, but she

stopped and pulled it shut again. "Oh, yes, of course I know that you’ve tried,

it’s no use. You’re not that rich. You haven’t enough to buy that temple and you

couldn’t raise enough. Also, Hopton won’t accept any money from you to pay for

the alterations. I know you’ve offered that, too. He wants it from Roark. By the

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way, I don’t think Roark would like it if I let him know that you’ve tried."

He smiled in a manner that demanded a protest. Her face gave no answer. She

turned to the door again. "Just one more question, Dominique. Mr. Stoddard’s

attorney wants to know whether he can call you as a witness. An expert on

architecture. You will testify for the plaintiff, of course?"

"Yes. I will testify for the plaintiff."

#

The case of Hopton Stoddard versus Howard Roark opened in February of 1931.

The courtroom was so full that mass reactions could be expressed only by a slow

motion running across the spread of heads, a sluggish wave like the ripple under

the tight-packed skin of a sea lion.

The crowd, brown and streaked with subdued color, looked like a fruitcake of all

the arts, with the cream of the A.G.A. rich and heavy on top. There were

distinguished men and well-dressed, tight-lipped women; each woman seemed to

feel an exclusive proprietorship of the art practiced by her escort, a monopoly

guarded by resentful glances at the others. Almost everybody knew almost

everybody else. The room had the atmosphere of a convention, an opening night

and a family picnic. There was a feeling of "our bunch,"

"our boys,"

"our show."

Steven Mallory, Austen Heller, Roger Enright, Kent Lansing and Mike sat together

in one corner. They tried not to look around them. Mike was worried about Steven

Mallory. He kept close to Mallory, insisted on sitting next to him and glanced

at him whenever a particularly offensive bit of conversation reached them.

Mallory noticed it at last, and said: "Don’t worry, Mike. I won’t scream. I

won’t shoot anyone."

"Watch your stomach, kid," said Mike, "just watch your stomach. A man can’t get

sick just because he oughta."

"Mike, do you remember the night when we stayed so late that it was almost

daylight, and Dominique’s car was out of gas, and there were no busses, and we

all decided to walk home, and there was sun on the rooftops by the time the

first one of us got to his house?"

"That’s right. You think about that, and I’ll think about the granite quarry."

"What granite quarry?"

"It’s something made me very sick once, but then it turned out it make no

difference at all, in the long run."

Beyond the windows the sky was white and flat like frosted glass. The light

seemed to come from the banks of snow on roofs and ledges, an unnatural light

that made everything in the room look naked.

The judge sat hunched on his high bench as if he were roosting. He had a small

face, wizened into virtue. He kept his hands upright in front of his chest, the

fingertips pressed together. Hopton Stoddard was not present. He was represented

by his attorney a handsome gentleman, tall and grave as an ambassador.

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Roark sat alone at the defense table. The crowd had stared at him and given up

angrily, finding no satisfaction. He did not look crushed and he did not look

defiant. He looked impersonal and calm. He was not like a public figure in a

public place; he was like a man alone in his own room, listening to the radio.

He took no notes; there were no papers on the table before him, only a large

brown envelope. The crowd would have forgiven anything, except a man who could

remain normal under the vibrations of its enormous collective sneer. Some of

them had come prepared to pity him; all of them hated him after the first few

minutes.

The plaintiff’s attorney stated his case in a simple opening address; it was

true, he admitted, that Hopton Stoddard had given Roark full freedom to design

and build the Temple; the point was, however, that Mr. Stoddard had clearly

specified and expected a temple; the building in question could not be

considered a temple by any known standards; as the plaintiff proposed to prove

with the help of the best authorities in the field.

Roark waived his privilege to make an opening statement to the jury.

Ellsworth Monkton Toohey was the first witness called by the plaintiff. He sat

on the edge of the witness chair and leaned back, resting on the end of his

spine: he lifted one leg and placed it horizontally across the other. He looked

amused--but managed to suggest that his amusement was a well-bred protection

against looking bored.

The attorney went through a long list of questions about Mr. Toohey’s

professional qualifications, including the number of copies sold of his book