Ayn Rand - The Early Ayn Rand

"No."

"I always think of how you'll react to everything I do."

"Don't. I don't like it."

"But it is hard for me, Howard."

"Leave me then."

"You want me to?"

"No. Not yet."

"But you'd let me go, rather than do anything for me?"

"Yes."

"Howard!"

"But you haven't asked me to do anything for you."

"Well... oh, God damn you, Howard, it's so difficult to speak to you! I know what I want to say and I don't know how to say it!"

"That's because you don't want to know what you're really trying to say. Not yet. But I know it and I'm not going to help you say it. Because when you do say it, I'll throw you out of here. Only it won't be necessary. You won't want to be here then... Is that of any help?"

He had said it evenly, quietly, without emphasis or concern. She felt cold with panic. It had suddenly been too near, that possibility of losing him, and she was not prepared to face it. She stood, her hands clutching the shirt at her sides, moving convulsively through the cloth, hanging on, because she wanted to reach for him, to grasp him, to hold him. But she could not trust herself to touch him, not then, because she would betray too much. After a while, she walked to him, and then she could slip her arms gently about him and put her chin on his shoulder, her head against his.

"All right, Howard," she whispered, "I won't say anything... Can I... can I congratulate you on the job, at least? I'm really terribly glad you got it."

"Thanks."

"Look, Howard, are you going to move out of here? I'd hate to see you go, but you can get a better place somewhere close by or maybe right in the building."

"No. I'm staying here."

"But on fifty a week you can afford not to live in this horrible dump. And we'll see each other just as often."

"I'll need every cent of that money."

"But why?"

"Because I won't last there."

She looked at him in consternation.

"Howard, why do you start in with an attitude like that? Are you planning to quit already?"

"No. They'll fire me." "When?" "Sooner or later." "Why will they fire you?"

"That would take much too long to explain."

"You're not awfully glad of the job, are you?"

"I expected it."

"It's pretty grand, though, isn't it? I've heard of them vaguely — Francon & Heyer. They're really awfully big and famous, aren't they?"

"They are."

"You could really get somewhere with them."

"I doubt it."

"But isn't it going to be better than that hopeless place where you worked? Won't you be happier in a real, important office, successful and respected and..."

"We'll keep still about that, Vesta, and we'll do it damn fast."

"Oh, Howard!" she cried, losing all control. "I can't talk to you at all! What's the matter with you tonight?"

"Why tonight?"

"No, that's true! It's not tonight! It's always! I can't stand it, Howard!"

He looked at her without moving. He asked:

"What do you want?"

"Listen, Howard..." she whispered gently. Her fingers were rolled together in a little ball at her throat, her eyes were wide and pleading and defenseless; she had never looked lovelier. "Listen, my darling, my dearest one, I love you. I'm not reproaching you. I'm only begging you. I want you. I've never really had you, Howard. I want to know you. I want to understand. I'm... lonely."

"I'm not a crutch, Vesta."

"But I want you to help me! I want to know that you want to help me!"

"I wouldn't, if I were you. If I come to wanting to help a person, I'll not want that person nor to help any longer."

"Howard!" she screamed. "Howard, how can you say a thing like that!"

And then she was sobbing suddenly, before she could stop it, sobbing openly, convulsively, not trying to hide the single, shameful fact of pain, sobbing with her head against the crook of his elbow. He said nothing and did not move. Her head slipped down to his hand, she pressed her face against it, she could feel her tears on the skin of his hand. The hand did not move; it did not seem alive. When she raised her head, at last, empty of tears, of sounds, even of pain, the pain swallowed under a numb stupor, only her throat still jerking silently, when she looked at him, she saw a face that had not changed, had not been reached, had no answer to give her. He asked:

"Can you go now?"

She nodded, humbly, almost indifferently, indifferent to her own pain and to the lack of answer which was such an eloquent answer. She backed slowly to the door, she went out silently, her eyes fastened to the last moment, incredulous and bewildered, upon his face, upon the vast, incomprehensible cruelty of his face.

At the end of March, a new play opened in New York and on the following morning the dramatic reviews dedicated most of their space to Vesta Dunning.

Her part was described officially as the second feminine lead, but for those who saw the opening performance there had been no leads and no other actors in the cast and hardly any play: there had been only a miracle, the impossible made real, a woman no one had ever met, yet everyone knew and recognized and believed boundlessly for two and a half hours. It was the part of a wild, stubborn, sparkling, dreadful girl who drove to despair her family and all those approaching her. Vesta Dunning streaked across the stage with her swift, broken, contorted gait; or she stood still, her body an arc, her arms flung out, her voice a whisper; or she destroyed a profound speech with one convulsed shrug of her thin shoulders; or she laughed and all the words on that stage were wiped off by her laughter. She did not hear the applause afterwards. She bowed to it, not knowing that anyone applauded her, not knowing that she bowed.

She did not hear what was said to her in the dressing room that night. She did not wait for the reviews. She ran away to find Roark, who was waiting for her at the stage door, and she seized his arm to help her stand up, but she said nothing, and they rode home in a cab, silently, not touching each other. Then, in his room, she stood before him, she looked at him, she was speaking, not knowing that she spoke aloud, words like fragments of the thing that was bursting within her:

"Howard... that was it... there it was... you see, I liked her... she's the first one I ever liked doing... it was right... oh, Howard, Howard! It was right... I don't care what they'll say... I don't care about the reviews... whether it runs or not, I've done it once... I've done it... and that's the way now, Howard... it's open... to Joan d'Arc... they'll let me do it... they'll let me do it someday..."

He drew her close to him, and she stood while he sat, his arms tight about her, his face buried against her stomach, holding her, holding something that was not to be lost. In that moment, she forgot the fear that had been following her for days, the fear of the slow, open, inevitable growth of his indifference.

He did not tell Vesta about it for several days. He had seen her seldom in the last few months; her success was working a change in her, which he did not want to see. When he told her at last that he had lost his job, she looked at him coldly and shrugged: "It may teach you a few things for the future."

"It did," said Roark.

"Don't expect me to sympathize. Whatever it was that you did, I'm sure you jolly well deserved it."

"I did."

"For God's sake, Howard, when are you going to come down to earth? You can't think that you're the only one who's always right and everybody else wrong!"

"I'm too tired to quarrel with you tonight, Vesta."

"You've got to learn to curb yourself and cooperate with other people. That's it, cooperate. People aren't as stupid as you think. They appreciate real worth when there's any to appreciate."

"I don't doubt it."