Mrs. Keating knew that when she had recovered she would hate her daughter-in-law. She could have accepted snubbing. She could not forgive Dominique's grave politeness.
The telephone rang. Keating's chief designer at the office delivered his congratulations and said: "We just heard it, Peter, and Guy's pretty stunned. I really think you ought to call him up or come over here or something."
Keating hurried to the office, glad to escape from his house for a while. He entered the office like a perfect figure of a radiant young lover. He laughed and shook hands in the drafting room, through noisy congratulations, gay shouts of envy and a few smutty references. Then he hastened to Francon's office.
For an instant he felt oddly guilty when he entered and saw the smile on Francon's face, a smile like a blessing. He tugged affectionately at Francon's shoulders and he muttered: "I'm so happy, Guy, I'm so happy ... "
"I've always expected it," said Francon quietly, "but now I feel right. Now it's right that it should be all yours, Peter, all of it, this room, everything, soon."
"What are you talking about?"
"Come, you always understand. I'm tired, Peter. You know, there comes a time when you get tired in a way that's final and then ... No, you wouldn't know, you're too young. But hell, Peter, of what use am I around here? The funny part of it is that I don't care any more even about pretending to be of any use ... I like to be honest sometimes. It's a nice sort of feeling ... Well, anyway, it might be another year or two, but then I'm going to retire. Then it's all yours. It might amuse me to hang on around here just a little longer — you know, I actually love the place — it's so busy, it's done so well, people respect us — it was a good firm, Francon & Heyer, wasn't it? — What the hell am I saying? Francon & Keating. Then it will be just Keating ... Peter," he asked softly, "why don't you look happy?"
"Of course I'm happy, I'm very grateful and all that, but why in blazes should you think of retiring now?"
"I don't mean that. I mean — why don't you look happy when I say that it will be yours? I ... I'd like you to be happy about that, Peter."
"For God's sake, Guy, you're being morbid, you're ... "
"Peter, it's very important to me — that you should be happy at what I'm leaving you. That you should be proud of it. And you are, aren't you, Peter? You are?"
"Well, who wouldn't be?" He did not look at Francon. He could not stand the sound of pleading in Francon's voice.
"Yes, who wouldn't be? Of course ... And you are, Peter?"
"What do you want?" snapped Keating angrily.
"I want you to feel proud of me, Peter," said Francon humbly, simply, desperately. "I want to know that I've accomplished something. I want to feel that it had some meaning. At the last summing up, I want to be sure that it wasn't all — for nothing."
"You're not sure of that? You're not sure?" Keating's eyes were murderous, as if Francon were a sudden danger to him.
"What's the matter, Peter?" Francon asked gently, almost indifferently.
"God damn you, you have no right — not to be sure! At your age, with your name, with your prestige, with your ... "
"I want to be sure, Peter. I've worked very hard."
"But you're not sure!" He was furious and frightened, and so he wanted to hurt, and he flung out the one thing that could hurt most, forgetting that it hurt him, not Francon, that Francon wouldn't know, had never known, wouldn't even guess: "Well, I know somebody who'll be sure, at the end of his life, who'll be so God-damn sure I'd like to cut his damn throat for it!"
"Who?" asked Francon quietly, without interest. "Guy! Guy, what's the matter with us? What are we talking about?"
"I don't know," said Francon. He looked tired.
That evening Francon came to Keating's house for dinner. He was dressed jauntily, and he twinkled with his old gallantry as he kissed Mrs. Keating's hand. But he looked grave when he congratulated Dominique and he found little to say to her; there was a pleading look in his eyes when he glanced up at her face. Instead of the bright, cutting mockery he had expected from her, he saw a sudden understanding. She said nothing, but bent down and kissed him on the forehead and held her lips pressed gently to his head a second longer than formality required. He felt a warm flood of gratitude — and then he felt frightened. "Dominique," he whispered — the others could not hear him — "how terribly unhappy you must be ... " She laughed gaily, taking his arm: "Why, no, Father, how can you say that!"
"Forgive me," he muttered, "I'm just stupid ... This is really wonderful ... "
Guests kept coming in all evening, uninvited and unannounced, anyone who had heard the news and felt privileged to drop in. Keating did not know whether he was glad to see them or not. It seemed all right, so long as the gay confusion lasted. Dominique behaved exquisitely. He did not catch a single hint of sarcasm in her manner.
It was late when the last guest departed and they were left alone among the filled ash trays and empty glasses. They sat at opposite ends of the living room, and Keating tried to postpone the moment of thinking what he had to think now.
"All right, Peter," said Dominique, rising, "let's get it over with."
When he lay in the darkness beside her, his desire satisfied and left hungrier than ever by the unmoving body that had not responded, not even in revulsion, when he felt defeated in the one act of mastery he had hoped to impose upon her, his first whispered words were: "God damn you!"
He heard no movement from her.
Then he remembered the discovery which the moments of passion had wiped off his mind.
"Who was he?" he asked.
"Howard Roark," she answered.
"All right," he snapped, "you don't have to tell me if you don't want to!"
He switched on the light. He saw her lying still, naked, her head thrown back. Her face looked peaceful, innocent, clean. She said to the ceiling, her voice gentle: "Peter, if I could do this ... I can do anything now ... "
"If you think I'm going to bother you often, if that's your idea of ... "
"As often or as seldom as you wish, Peter."
Next morning, entering the dining room for breakfast, Dominique found a florist's box, long and white, resting across her plate.
"What's that?" she asked the maid.
"It was brought this morning, madam, with instructions to be put on the breakfast table."
The box was addressed to Mrs. Peter Keating. Dominique opened it. It contained a few branches of white lilac, more extravagantly luxurious than orchids at this time of the year. There was a small card with a name written upon it in large letters that still held the quality of a hand's dashing movement, as if the letters were laughing on the pasteboard: "Ellsworth M. Toohey."
"How nice!" said Keating. "I wondered why we hadn't heard from him at all yesterday."
"Please put them in water, Mary," said Dominique, handing the box to the maid.
In the afternoon Dominique telephoned Toohey and invited him for dinner.
The dinner took place a few days later. Keating's mother had pleaded some previous engagement and escaped for the evening; she explained it to herself by believing that she merely needed time to get used to things. So there were only three places set on the dining-room table, candles in crystal holders, a centerpiece of blue flowers and glass bubbles.
When Toohey entered he bowed to his hosts in a manner proper to a court reception. Dominique looked like a society hostess who had always been a society hostess and could not possibly be imagined as anything else.
"Well, Ellsworth? Well?" Keating asked, with a gesture that included the hall, the air and Dominique.
"My dear Peter," said Toohey, "let's skip the obvious."