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evening gown only by being so flagrantly unsuited to that purpose. She wore no

jewelry. Her gold hair looked like a hood. The dull white silk moved in angular

planes with the movements of her body, revealing it in the manner of cold

innocence, the body of a sacrificial object publicly offered, beyond the need of

concealment or desire. Keating found it unattractive. He noticed that Wynand

seemed to admire it.

Someone at a distant table stared in their direction insistently, someone tall

and bulky. Then the big shape rose to its feet--and Keating recognized Ralston

Holcombe hurrying toward them.

"Peter, my boy, so glad to see you," boomed Holcombe, shaking his hand, bowing

to Dominique, conspicuously ignoring Wynand. "Where have you been hiding? Why

don’t we see you around any more?" They had had luncheon together three days

ago.

Wynand had risen and stood leaning forward a little, courteously. Keating

hesitated; then, with obvious reluctance, said:

"Mr. Wynand--Mr. Holcombe."

"Not Mr. Gail Wynand?" said Holcombe with splendid innocence.

"Mr. Holcombe, if you saw one of the cough-drop Smith brothers in real life,

would you recognize him?" asked Wynand.

"Why--I guess so," said Holcombe, blinking.

"My face, Mr. Holcombe, is just as much of a public bromide."

Holcombe muttered a few benevolent generalities and escaped.

Wynand smiled affectionately. "You didn’t have to be afraid of introducing Mr.

Holcombe to me, Mr. Keating, even though he is an architect."

"Afraid, Mr. Wynand?"

"Unnecessarily, since it’s all settled. Hasn’t Mrs. Keating told you that

Stoneridge is yours?"

"I...no, she hasn’t told me...I didn’t know...." Wynand was smiling, but the

smile remained fixed, and Keating felt compelled to go on talking until some

sign stopped him. "I hadn’t quite hoped...not so soon...of course, I thought

this dinner might be a sign...help you to decide..." He blurted out

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involuntarily: "Do you always throw surprises like that--just like that?"

"Whenever I can," said Wynand gravely.

"I shall do my best to deserve this honor and live up to your expectations, Mr.

Wynand."

"I have no doubt about that," said Wynand.

He had said little to Dominique tonight. His full attention seemed centered on

Keating.

"The public has been kind to my past endeavors," said Keating, "but I shall make

Stoneridge my best achievement."

"That is quite a promise, considering the distinguished list of your works."

"I had not hoped that my works were of sufficient importance to attract your

attention, Mr. Wynand."

"But I know them quite well. The Cosmo-Slotnick Building, which is pure

Michelangelo." Keating’s face spread in incredulous pleasure; he knew that

Wynand was a great authority on art and would not make such comparisons lightly.

"The Prudential Bank Building, which is genuine Palladio. The Slottern

Department Store, which is snitched Christopher Wren." Keating’s face had

changed. "Look what an illustrious company I get for the price of one. Isn’t it

quite a bargain?"

Keating smiled, his face tight, and said:

"I’ve heard about your brilliant sense of humor, Mr. Wynand."

"Have you heard about my descriptive style?"

"What do you mean?"

Wynand half turned in his chair and looked at Dominique, as if he were

inspecting an inanimate object.

"Your wife has a lovely body, Mr. Keating. Her shoulders are too thin, but

admirably in scale with the rest of her. Her legs are too long, but that gives

her the elegance of line you’ll find in a good yacht. Her breasts are beautiful,

don’t you think?"

"Architecture is a crude profession, Mr. Wynand," Keating tried to laugh. "It

doesn’t prepare one for the superior sort of sophistication."

"You don’t understand me, Mr. Keating?"

"If I didn’t know you were a perfect gentleman, I might misunderstand it, but

you can’t fool me."

"That is just what I am trying not to do."

"I appreciate compliments, Mr. Wynand, but I’m not conceited enough to think

that we must talk about my wife."

"Why not, Mr. Keating? It is considered good form to talk of the things one

has--or will have--in common."

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"Mr. Wynand, I...I don’t understand."

"Shall I be more explicit?"

"No, I..."

"No? Shall we drop the subject of Stoneridge?"

"Oh, let’s talk about Stoneridge! I..."

"But we are, Mr. Keating."

Keating looked at the room about them. He thought that things like this could

not be done in such a place; the fastidious magnificence made it monstrous; he

wished it were a dank cellar. He thought: blood on paving stones--all right, but

not blood on a drawing-room rug....

"Now I know this is a joke, Mr. Wynand," he said.

"It is my turn to admire your sense of humor, Mr. Keating."

"Things like...like this aren’t being done..."

"That’s not what you mean at all, Mr. Keating. You mean, they’re being done all

the time, but not talked about."

"I didn’t think..."

"You thought it before you came here. You didn’t mind. I grant you I’m behaving

abominably. I’m breaking all the rules of charity. It’s extremely cruel to be

honest."

"Please, Mr. Wynand, let’s...drop it. I don’t know what...I’m supposed to do."

"That’s simple. You’re supposed to slap my face." Keating giggled. "You were

supposed to do that several minutes ago."

Keating noticed that his palms were wet and that he was trying to support his

weight by holding on to the napkin on his lap. Wynand and Dominique were eating,

slowly and graciously, as if they were at another table. Keating thought that

they were not human bodies, either one of them; something had vanished; the

light of the crystal fixtures in the room was the radiance of X-rays that ate

through, not the bones, but deeper; they were souls, he thought, sitting at a

dinner table, souls held with evening clothes, lacking the intermediate shape of

flesh, terrifying in naked revelation--terrifying, because he expected to see

torturers, but saw a great innocence. He wondered what they saw, what his own

clothes contained if his physical shape had gone.

"No?" said Wynand. "You don’t want to do that, Mr. Keating? But of course you

don’t have to. Just say that you don’t want any of it. I won’t mind. There’s Mr.

Ralston Holcombe across the room. He can build Stoneridge as well as you could."

"I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Wynand," whispered Keating. His eyes were fixed

upon the tomato aspic on his salad plate; it was soft and shivering; it made him

sick.

Wynand turned to Dominique.

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"Do you remember our conversation about a certain quest, Mrs. Keating? I said it

was a quest at which you would never succeed. Look at your husband. He’s an

expert--without effort. That is the way to go about it. Match that, sometime.

Don’t bother to tell me that you can’t. I know it. You’re an amateur, my dear."

Keating thought that he must speak again, but he couldn’t, not as long as that

salad was there before him. The terror came from that plate, not from the

fastidious monster across the table; the rest of the room was warm and safe. He

lurched forward and his elbow swept the plate off the table.

He made a kind of sound expressing regrets. Somebody’s shape came up, there were

polite voices of apology, and the mess vanished from the carpet.

Keating heard a voice saying: "Why are you doing this?" saw two faces turned to

him and knew that he had said it.

"Mr. Wynand is not doing it to torture you, Peter," said Dominique calmly. "He’s

doing it for me. To see how much I can take."

"That’s true, Mrs. Keating," said Wynand. "Partly true. The other part is: to

justify myself."

"In whose eyes?"

"Yours. And my own, perhaps."

"Do you need to?"

"Sometimes. The Banner is a contemptible paper, isn’t it? Well, I have paid with

my honor for the privilege of holding a position where I can amuse myself by

observing how honor operates in other men."

His own clothes, thought Keating, contained nothing now, because the two faces

did not notice him any longer. He was safe; his place at that table was empty.

He wondered, from a great, indifferent distance, why the two were looking at

each other quietly, not like enemies, not like fellow executioners, but like

comrades.

#

Two days before they were to sail, Wynand telephoned Dominique late in the

evening.

"Could you come over right now?" he asked, and hearing a moment’s silence,

added: "Oh, not what you’re thinking. I live up to my agreements. You’ll be

quite safe. I just would like to see you tonight."

"All right," she said, and was astonished to hear a quiet: "Thank you."

When the elevator door slid open in the private lobby of his penthouse, he was

waiting there, but did not let her step out. He joined her in the elevator.

"I don’t want you to enter my house," he said. "We’re going to the floor below."

The elevator operator looked at him, amazed.

The car stopped and opened before a locked door. Wynand unlocked it and let her

step out first, following her into the art gallery. She remembered that this was

the place no outsider ever entered. She said nothing. He offered no explanation.

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Four hours she walked silently through the vast rooms, looking at the incredible

treasures of beauty. There was a deep carpet and no sound of steps, no sounds

from the city outside, no windows. He followed her, stopping when she stopped.

His eyes went with hers from object to object. At times his glance moved to her

face. She passed, without stopping, by the statue from the Stoddard Temple.

He did not urge her to stay nor to hurry, as if he had turned the place over to

her. She decided when she wished to leave, and he followed her to the door. Then

she asked:

"Why did you want me to see this? It won’t make me think better of you. Worse,

perhaps."

"Yes, I’d expect that," he said quietly, "if I had thought of it that way. But I

didn’t. I just wanted you to see it."

4.

THE SUN had set when they stepped out of the car. In the spread of sky and sea,

a green sky over a sheet of mercury, tracings of fire remained at the edges of

the clouds and in the brass fittings of the yacht. The yacht was like a white

streak of motion, a sensitive body strained against the curb of stillness.

Dominique looked at the gold letters--I Do--on the delicate white bow.

"What does that name mean?" she asked.

"It’s an answer," said Wynand, "to people long since dead. Though perhaps they

are the only immortal ones. You see, the sentence I heard most often in my

childhood was ’You don’t run things around here.’"

She remembered hearing that he had never answered this question before. He had

answered her at once; he had not seemed conscious of making an exception. She

felt a sense of calm in his manner, strange and new to him, an air of quiet

finality.

When they went aboard, the yacht started moving, almost as if Wynand’s steps on

deck had served as contact. He stood at the rail, not touching her, he looked at

the long, brown shore that rose and fell against the sky, moving away from them.

Then he turned to her. She saw no new recognition in his eyes, no beginning, but

only the continuation of a glance--as if he had been looking at her all the

time.

When they went below he walked with her into her cabin. He said: "Please let me

know if there’s anything you wish," and walked out through an inside door. She

saw that it led to his bedroom. He closed the door and did not return.

She moved idly across the cabin. A smear of reflection followed her on the

lustrous surfaces of the pale satinwood paneling. She stretched out in a low

armchair, her ankles crossed, her arms thrown behind her head, and watched the

porthole turning from green to a dark blue. She moved her hand, switched on a

light; the blue vanished and became a glazed black circle.

The steward announced dinner. Wynand knocked at her door and accompanied her to

the dining salon. His manner puzzled her: it was gay, but the sense of calm in

the gaiety suggested a peculiar earnestness.

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She asked, when they were seated at the table:

"Why did you leave me alone?"

"I thought you might want to be alone."

"To get used to the idea?"

"If you wish to put it that way."

"I was used to it before I came to your office."

"Yes, of course. Forgive me for implying any weakness in you. I know better. By

the way, you haven’t asked me where we’re going."

"That, too, would be weakness."

"True. I’m glad you don’t care. Because I never have any definite destination.

This ship is not for going to places, but for getting away from them. When I

stop at a port, it’s only for the sheer pleasure of leaving it. I always think:

Here’s one more spot that can’t hold me."

"I used to travel a great deal. I always felt just like that. I’ve been told

it’s because I’m a hater of mankind."

"You’re not foolish enough to believe that, are you?"

"I don’t know."

"Surely you’ve seen through that particular stupidity. I mean the one that

claims the pig is the symbol of love for humanity--the creature that accepts

anything. As a matter of fact, the person who loves everybody and feels at home

everywhere is the true hater of mankind. He expects nothing of men, so no form