The Fountainhead Part 28

And Toohey was laughing suddenly, laughing quite obviously, quite insultingly, at Keating and at himself; it was as if he were underscoring the falseness of the whole procedure. Keating sat aghast for an instant; and then he found himself laughing easily in answer, as if at home with a very old friend.

"That's better," said Toohey. "Don't you find it advisable not to talk too seriously in an important moment? And this might be a very important moment-who knows?-for both of us. And, of course, I knew you'd be a little afraid of me and-oh, I admit-I was quite a bit afraid of you, so isn't this much better?"

"Oh, yes, Mr. Toohey," said Keating happily. His normal a.s.surance in meeting people had vanished; but he felt at ease, as if all responsibility were taken away from him and he did not have to worry about saying the right things, because he was being led gently into saying them without any effort on his part. "I've always known it would be an important moment when I met you, Mr. Toohey. Always. For years."

"Really?" said Ellsworth Toohey, the eyes behind the gla.s.ses attentive. "Why?"

"Because I'd always hoped that I would please you, that you'd approve to me ... of my work ... when the time came ... why, I even ..."

"Yes?"

"... I even thought, so often, when drawing, is this the kind of a building that Ellsworth Toohey would say is good? I tried to see it like that, through your eyes ... I ... I've ..." Toohey listened watchfully. "I've always wanted to meet you because you're such a profound thinker and a man of such cultural distinc-"

"Now," said Toohey, his voice kindly but a little impatient; his interest had dropped on that last sentence. "None of that. I don't mean to be ungracious, but we'll dispense with that sort of thing, shall we? Unnatural as this may sound, I really don't like to hear personal praise."

It was Toohey's eyes, thought Keating, that put him at ease. There was such a vast understanding in Toohey's eyes and such an unfastidious kindness-no, what a word to think of-such an unlimited kindness. It was as if one could hide nothing from him, but it was not necessary to hide it, because he would forgive anything. They were the most unaccusing eyes that Keating had ever seen.

"But, Mr. Toohey," he muttered, "I did want to ..."

"You wanted to thank me for my article," said Toohey and made a little grimace of gay despair. "And here I've been trying so hard to prevent you from doing it. Do let me get away with it, won't you? There's no reason why you should thank me. If you happened to deserve the things I said-well, the credit belongs to you, not to me. Doesn't it?"

"But I was so happy that you thought I'm ..."

"... a great architect? But surely, my boy, you knew that. Or weren't you quite sure? Never quite sure of it?"

"Well, I ..."

It was only a second's pause. And it seemed to Keating that this pause was all Toohey had wanted to hear from him; Toohey did not wait for the rest, but spoke as if he had received a full answer, and an answer that pleased him.

"And as for the Cosmo-Slotnick Building, who can deny that it's an extraordinary achievement? You know, I was greatly intrigued by its plan. It's a most ingenious plan. A brilliant plan. Very unusual. Quite different from what I have observed in your previous work. Isn't it?"

"Naturally," said Keating, his voice clear and hard for the first time, "the problem was different from anything I'd done before, so I worked out that plan to fit the particular requirements of the problem."

"Of course," said Toohey gently. "A beautiful piece of work. You should be proud of it."

Keating noticed that Toohey's eyes stood centered in the middle of the lenses and the lenses stood focused straight on his pupils, and Keating knew suddenly that Toohey knew he had not designed the plan of the Cosmo-Slotnick Building. This did not frighten him. What frightened him was that he saw approval in Toohey's eyes.

"If you must feel-no, not grat.i.tude, grat.i.tude is such an embarra.s.sing word-but, shall we say, appreciation?" Toohey continued, and his voice had grown softer, as if Keating were a fellow conspirator who would know that the words used were to be, from now on, a code for a private meaning, "you might thank me for understanding the symbolic implications of your building and for stating them in words as you stated them in marble. Since, of course, you are not just a common mason, but a thinker in stone."

"Yes," said Keating, "that was my abstract theme, when I designed the building-the great ma.s.ses and the flowers of culture. I've always believed that true culture springs from the common man. But I had no hope that anyone would ever understand me."

Toohey smiled. His thin lips slid open, his teeth showed. He was not looking at Keating. He was looking down at his own hand, the long slender, sensitive hand of a concert pianist, moving a sheet of paper on the desk. Then he said: "Perhaps we're brothers of the spirit, Keating. The human spirit. That is all that matters in life"-not looking at Keating, but past him, the lenses raised flagrantly to a line over Keating's face.

And Keating knew that Toohey knew he had never thought of any abstract theme until he'd read that article, and more: that Toohey approved again. When the lenses moved slowly to Keating's face, the eyes were sweet with affection, an affection very cold and very real. Then Keating felt as if the walls of the room were moving gently in upon him, pus.h.i.+ng him into a terrible intimacy, not with Toohey, but with some unknown guilt. He wanted to leap to his feet and run. He sat still, his mouth half open.

And without knowing what prompted him, Keating heard his own voice in the silence: "And I did want to say how glad I was that you escaped that maniac's bullet yesterday, Mr. Toohey."

"Oh? ... Oh, thanks. That? Well! Don't let it upset you. Just one of the minor penalties one pays for prominence in public life."

"I've never liked Mallory. A strange sort of person. Too tense. I don't like people who're tense. I've never liked his work either."

"Just an exhibitionist. Won't amount to much."

"It wasn't my idea, of course, to give him a try. It was Mr. Slotnick's. Pull, you know. But Mr. Slotnick knew better in the end."

"Did Mallory ever mention my name to you?"

"No. Never."

"I haven't even met him, you know. Never saw him before. Why did he do it?"

And then it was Toohey who sat still, before what he saw on Keating's face; Toohey, alert and insecure for the first time. This was it, thought Keating, this was the bond between them, and the bond was fear, and more, much more than that, but fear was the only recognizable name to give it. And he knew, with unreasoning finality, that he liked Toohey better than any man he had ever met.

"Well, you know how it is," said Keating brightly, hoping that the commonplace he was about to utter would close the subject. "Mallory is an incompetent and knows it and he decided to take it out on you as on a symbol of the great and the able."

But instead of a smile, Keating saw the shot of Toohey's sudden glance at him; it was not a glance, it was a fluoroscope, he thought he could feel it crawling searchingly inside his bones. Then Toohey's face seemed to harden, drawing together again in composure, and Keating knew that Toohey had found relief somewhere, in his bones or in his gaping, bewildered face, that some hidden immensity of ignorance within him had given Toohey rea.s.surance. Then Toohey said slowly, strangely, derisively: "You and I, we're going to be great friends, Peter."

Keating let a moment pa.s.s before he caught himself to answer hastily: "Oh, I hope so, Mr. Toohey!"

"Really, Peter! I'm not as old as all that, am I? 'Ellsworth' is the monument to my parents' peculiar taste in nomenclature."

"Yes ... Ellsworth."

"That's better. I really don't mind the name, when compared to some of the things I've been called privately-and publicly-these many years. Oh, well. Flattering. When one makes enemies one knows that one's dangerous where it's necessary to be dangerous. There are things that must be destroyed-or they'll destroy us. We'll see a great deal of each other, Peter." The voice was smooth and sure now, with the finality of a decision tested and reached, with the certainty that never again would anything in Keating be a question mark to him. "For instance, I've been thinking for some time of getting together a few young architects-I know so many of them-just an informal little organization, to exchange ideas, you know, to develop a spirit of co-operation, to follow a common line of action for the common good of the profession if necessity arises. Nothing as stuffy as the A.G.A. Just a youth group. Think you'd be interested?"

"Why, of course! And you'd be the chairman?"

"Oh dear, no. I'm never chairman of anything, Peter. I dislike t.i.tles. No, I rather thought you'd make the right chairman for us, can't think of anyone better."

"Me?"

"You, Peter. Oh, well, it's only a project-nothing definite-just an idea I've been toying with in odd moments. We'll talk about it some other time. There's something I'd like you to do-and that's really one of the reasons why I wanted to meet you."

"Oh, sure, Mr. Too-sure, Ellsworth. Anything I can do for you ..."

"It's not for me. Do you know Lois Cook?"

"Lois ... who?"

"Cook. You don't. But you will. That young woman is the greatest literary genius since Goethe. You must read her, Peter. I don't suggest that as a rule except to the discriminating. She's so much above the heads of the middle-cla.s.s who love the obvious. She's planning to build a house. A little private residence on the Bowery. Yes, on the Bowery. Just like Lois, She's asked me to recommend an architect. I'm certain that it will take a person like you to understand a person like Lois. I'm going to give her your name-if you're interested in what is to be a small, though quite costly, residence."

"But of course! That's . . . very kind of you, Ellsworth! You know, I thought when you said ... and when I read your note, that you wanted -well, some favor from me, you know, a good turn for a good turn, and here you're ..."

"My dear Peter, how naive you are!"

"Oh, I suppose I shouldn't have said that! I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you, I ..."

"I don't mind. You must learn to know me better. Strange as it may sound, a totally selfless interest in one's fellow men is possible in this world, Peter."

Then they talked about Lois Cook and her three published works-"Novels? No, Peter, not exactly novels.... No, not collections of stories either ... that's just it, just Lois Cook-a new form of literature entirely ..."-about the fortune she had inherited from a long line of successful tradesmen, and about the house she planned to build.

It was only when Toohey had risen to escort Keating to the door-and Keating noted how precariously erect he stood on his very small feet-that Toohey paused suddenly to say: "Incidentally, it seems to me as if I should remember some personal connection between us, though for the life of me I can't quite place ... oh, yes, of course. My niece. Little Catherine."

Keating felt his face tighten, and knew he must not allow this to be discussed, but smiled awkwardly instead of protesting.

"I understand you're engaged to her?"

"Yes."

"Charming," said Toohey. "Very charming. Should enjoy being your uncle. You love her very much?"

"Yes," said Keating. "Very much."

The absence of stress in his voice made the answer solemn. It was, laid before Toohey, the first bit of sincerity and of importance within Keating's being.

"How pretty," said Toohey. "Young love. Spring and dawn and heaven and drugstore chocolates at a dollar and a quarter a box. The prerogative of the G.o.ds and of the movies.... Oh, I do approve, Peter. I think it's lovely. You couldn't have made a better choice than Catherine. She's just the kind for whom the world is well lost-the world with all its problems and all its opportunities for greatness-oh, yes, well lost because she's innocent and sweet and pretty and anemic."

"If you're going to ..." Keating began, but Toohey smiled with a luminous sort of kindliness.

"Oh, Peter, of course I understand. And I approve. I'm a realist. Man has always insisted on making an a.s.s of himself. Oh, come now, we must never lose our sense of humor. Nothing's really sacred but a sense of humor. Still, I've always loved the tale of Tristan and Isolde. It's the most beautiful story ever told-next to that of Mickey and Minnie Mouse."

IV

"... TOOTHBRUSH IN THE JAW TOOTHBRUSH BRUSH BRUSH tooth jaw foam dome in the foam Roman dome come home home in the jaw Rome dome tooth toothbrush toothpick pickpocket socket rocket ..."

Peter Keating squinted his eyes, his glance unfocused as for a great distance, but put the book down. The book was thin and black, with scarlet letters forming: Clouds and Shrouds by Lois Cook. Clouds and Shrouds by Lois Cook. The jacket said that it was a record of Miss Cook's travels around the world. The jacket said that it was a record of Miss Cook's travels around the world.

Keating leaned back with a sense of warmth and well-being. He liked this book. It had made the routine of his Sunday morning breakfast a profound spiritual experience; he was certain that it was profound, because he didn't understand it.

Peter Keating had never felt the need to formulate abstract convictions. But he had a working subst.i.tute. "A thing is not high if one can reach it; it is not great if one can reason about it; it is not deep if one can see its bottom"-this had always been his credo, unstated and unquestioned. This spared him any attempt to reach, reason or see; and it cast a nice reflection of scorn on those who made the attempt. So he was able to enjoy the work of Lois Cook. He felt uplifted by the knowledge of his own capacity to respond to the abstract, the profound, the ideal. Toohey had said: "That's just it, sound as sound, the poetry of words as words, style as a revolt against style. But only the finest spirit can appreciate it, Peter." Keating thought he could talk of this book to his friends, and if they did not understand he would know that he was superior to them. He would not need to explain that superiority-that's just it, "superiority as superiority"-automatically denied to those who asked for explanations. He loved the book.

He reached for another piece of toast. He saw, at the end of the table, left there for him by his mother, the heavy pile of the Sunday paper. He picked it up, feeling strong enough, in this moment, in the confidence of his secret spiritual grandeur, to face the whole world contained in that pile. He pulled out the rotogravure section. He stopped. He saw the reproduction of a drawing: the Enright House by Howard Roark.

He did not need to see the caption or the brusque signature in the comer of the sketch; he knew that no one else had conceived that house and he knew the manner of drawing, serene and violent at once, the pencil lines like high-tension wires on the paper, slender and innocent to see, but not to be touched. It was a structure on a broad s.p.a.ce by the East River. He did not grasp it as a building, at first glance, but as a rising ma.s.s of rock crystal. There was the same severe, mathematical order holding together a free, fantastic growth; straight lines and clean angles, s.p.a.ce slashed with a knife, yet in a harmony of formation as delicate as the work of a jeweler; an incredible variety of shapes, each separate unit unrepeated, but leading inevitably to the next one and to the whole; so that the future inhabitants were to have, not a square cage out of a square pile of cages, but each a single house held to the other houses like a single crystal to the side of a rock.

Keating looked at the sketch. He had known for a long time that Howard Roark had been chosen to build the Enright House. He had seen a few mentions of Roark's name in the papers; not much, all of it to be summed up only as "some young architect chosen by Mr. Enright for some reason, probably an interesting young architect." The caption under the drawing announced that the construction of the project was to begin at once. Well, thought Keating, and dropped the paper, so what? The paper fell beside the black and scarlet book. He looked at both. He felt dimly as if Lois Cook were his defense against Howard Roark.

"What's that, Petey?" his mother's voice asked behind him.

He handed the paper to her over his shoulder. The paper fell past him back to the table in a second.

"Oh," shrugged Mrs. Keating. "Huh ..."

She stood beside him. Her trim silk dress was fitted too tightly, revealing the solid rigidity of her corset; a small pin glittered at her throat, small enough to display ostentatiously that it was made of real diamonds. She was like the new apartment into which they had moved: conspicuously expensive. The apartment's decoration had been Keating's first professional job for himself. It had been furnished in fresh, new mid-Victorian. It was conservative and stately. Over the fireplace in the drawing room hung a large old painting of what was not but looked like an ill.u.s.trious ancestor.

"Petey sweetheart, I do hate to rush you on a Sunday morning, but isn't it time to dress up? I've got to run now and I'd hate you to forget the time and be late, it's so nice of Mr. Toohey asking you to his house!"

"Yes, Mother."

"Any famous guests coming too?"

"No. No guests. But there will be one other person there. Not famous." She looked at him expectantly. He added: "Katie will be there."

The name seemed to have no effect on her whatever. A strange a.s.surance had coated her lately, like a layer of fat through which that particular question could penetrate no longer.

"Just a family tea," he emphasized. "That's what he said."

"Very nice of him. I'm sure Mr. Toohey is a very intelligent man."

"Yes, Mother."

He rose impatiently and went to his room.

It was Keating's first visit to the distinguished residential hotel where Catherine and her uncle had moved recently. He did not notice much about the apartment, beyond remembering that it was simple, very clean and smartly modest, that it contained a great number of books and very few pictures, but these authentic and precious. One never remembered the apartment of Ellsworth Toohey, only its host. The host, on this Sunday afternoon, wore a dark gray suit, correct as a uniform, and bedroom slippers of black patent leather trimmed with red; the slippers mocked the severe elegance of the suit, yet completed the elegance as an audacious anti-climax. He sat in a broad, low chair and his face wore an expression of cautious gentleness, so cautious that Keating and Catherine felt, at times, as if they were insignificant soap bubbles.

Keating did not like the way Catherine sat on the edge of a chair, hunched, her legs drawn awkwardly together. He wished she would not wear the same suit for the third season, but she did. She kept her eyes on one point somewhere in the middle of the carpet. She seldom looked at Keating. She never looked at her uncle. Keating found no trace of that joyous admiration with which she had always spoken of Toohey, which he had expected to see her display in his presence. There was something heavy and colorless about Catherine, and very tired.

Toohey's valet brought in the tea tray.

"You will pour, won't you please, my dear?" said Toohey to Catherine. "Ah, there's nothing like tea in the afternoon. When the British Empire collapses, historians will find that it had made but two invaluable contributions to civilization-this tea ritual and the detective novel. Catherine, my dear, do you have to grasp that pot handle as if it were a meat axe? But never mind, it's charming, it's really what we love you for, Peter and I, we wouldn't love you if you were graceful as a d.u.c.h.ess -who wants a d.u.c.h.ess nowadays?"

Catherine poured the tea and spilled it on the gla.s.s table top, which she had never done before.

"I did want to see you two together for once," said Toohey, holding a delicate cup balanced nonchalantly. "Perfectly silly of me, isn't it? There's really nothing to make an occasion of, but then I'm silly and sentimental at times, like all of us. My compliments on your choice, Catherine. I owe you an apology, I never suspected you of such good taste. You and Peter make a wonderful couple. You'll do a great deal for him. You'll cook his Cream of Wheat, launder his handkerchiefs and bear his children, though of course the children will all have measles at one time or another, which is a nuisance."

"But, after all, you ... you do approve of it?" Keating asked anxiously.

"Approve of it? Of what, Peter?"

"Of our marriage ... eventually."

"What a superfluous question, Peter! Of course, I approve of it. But how young you are! That's the way of young people-they make an issue where none exists. You asked that as if the whole thing were important enough to disapprove of."

"Katie and I met seven years ago," said Keating defensively.

"And it was love at first sight of course!"