"I have foisted upon my readers a contemptible blackguard whose spiritual stature is my only excuse. I had not reached a degree of contempt for society such as would have permitted me to consider him dangerous. I am still holding on to a respect for my fellow men sufficient to let me say that Ellsworth Toohey cannot be a menace."
They say sound never dies, but travels on in space — what happens to a man's heartbeats? — so many of them in fifty-six years — could they be gathered again, in some sort of condenser, and put to use once more? If they were re-broadcast, would the result be the beating of those presses?
"But I have sponsored him under the masthead of my paper, and if public penance is a strange, humiliating act to perform in our modern age, such is the punishment I impose upon myself hereby."
Not fifty-six years of those soft little drops of sound a man never hears, each single and final, not like a comma, but like a period, a long string of periods on a page, gathered to feed those presses — not fifty-six, but thirty-one, the other twenty-five went to make me ready — I was twenty-five when I raised the new masthead over the door — Publishers don't change the name of a paper — This one does — The New York Banner — Gail Wynand's Banner ...
"I ask the forgiveness of every man who has ever read this paper."
A healthy animal — and that which comes from me is healthy — I must bring that doctor here and have him listen to those presses — he'll grin in his good, smug, satisfied way, doctors like a specimen of perfect health occasionally, it's rare enough — I must give him a treat — the healthiest sound he ever heard — and he'll say the Banner is good for many years ...
The door of his office opened and Ellsworth Toohey came in.
Wynand let him cross the room and approach the desk, without a gesture of protest. Wynand thought that what he felt was curiosity — if curiosity could be blown into the dimensions of a thing from the abyss — like those drawings of beetles the size of a house advancing upon human figures in the pages of the Banner's Sunday supplement — curiosity, because Ellsworth Toohey was still in the building, because Toohey had gained admittance past the orders given, and because Toohey was laughing.
"I came to take my leave of absence, Mr. Wynand," said Toohey. His face was composed; it expressed no gloating; the face of an artist who knew that overdoing was defeat and achieved the supreme of offensiveness by remaining normal. "And to tell you that I'll be back. On this job, on this column, in this building. In the interval you will have seen the nature of the mistake you've made. Do forgive me, I know this is in utterly bad taste, but I've waited for it for thirteen years and I think I can permit myself five minutes as a reward. So you were a possessive man, Mr. Wynand, and you loved your sense of property? Did you ever stop to think what it rested upon? Did you stop to secure the foundations? No, because you were a practical man. Practical men deal in bank accounts, real estate, advertising contracts and gilt-edged securities. They leave to the impractical intellectuals, like me, the amusements of putting the gilt edges through a chemical analysis to learn a few things about the nature and the source of gold. They hang on to Kream-O Pudding, and leave us such trivia as the theater, the movies, the radio, the schools, the book reviews and the criticism of architecture. Just a sop to keep us quiet if we care to waste our time playing with the inconsequentials of life, while you're making money. Money is power. Is it, Mr. Wynand? So you were after power, Mr. Wynand? Power over men? You poor amateur! You never discovered the nature of your own ambition or you'd have known that you weren't fit for it. You couldn't use the methods required and you wouldn't want the results. You've never been enough of a scoundrel. I don't mind handing you that, because I don't know which is worse: to be a great scoundrel or a gigantic fool. That's why I'll be back. And when I am, I'll run this paper."
Wynand said quietly:
"When you are. Now get out of here."
The city room of the Banner walked out on strike.
The Union of Wynand Employees walked out in a body. A great many others, non-members, joined them. The typographical staff remained.
Wynand had never given a thought to the Union. He paid higher wages than any other publisher and no economic demands had ever been made upon him. If his employees wished to amuse themselves by listening to speeches, he saw no reason to worry about it. Dominique had tried to warn him once: "Gail, if people want to organize for wages, hours or practical demands, it's their proper right. But when there's no tangible purpose, you'd better watch closely."
"Darling, how many times do I have to ask you? Keep off the Banner."
He had never taken the trouble to learn who belonged to the Union. He found now that the membership was small — and crucial; it included all his key men, not the big executives, but the rank below, expertly chosen, the active ones, the small, indispensable spark plugs: the best leg men, the general assignment men, the rewrite men, the assistant editors. He looked up their records: most of them had been hired in the last eight years; recommended by Mr. Toohey.
Non-members walked out for various reasons: some, because they hated Wynand; others, because they were afraid to remain and it seemed easier than to analyze the issue. One man, a timid little fellow, met Wynand in the hall and stopped to shriek: "We'll be back, sweetheart, and then it'll be a different tune!" Some left, avoiding the sight of Wynand. Others played safe. "Mr. Wynand, I hate to do it, I hate it like hell, I had nothing to do with that Union, but a strike's a strike and I can't permit myself to be a scab." "Honest, Mr. Wynand, I don't know who's right or wrong, I do think Ellsworth pulled a dirty trick and Harding had no business letting him get away with it, but how can one be sure who's right about anything nowadays? And one thing I won't do is I won't picket line. No, sir. The way I feel is, pickets right or wrong."
The strikers presented two demands: the reinstatement of the four men who had been discharged; a reversal of the Banner's stand on the Cortlandt case.
Harding, the managing editor, wrote an article explaining his position; it was published in the New Frontiers. "I did ignore Mr. Wynand's orders in a matter of policy, perhaps an unprecedented action for a managing editor to take. I did so with full realization of the responsibility involved. Mr. Toohey, Alien, Falk and I wished to save the Banner for the sake of its employees, its stockholders and its readers. We wished to bring Mr. Wynand to reason by peaceful means. We hoped he would give in with good grace, once he had seen the Banner committed to the stand shared by most of the press of the country. We knew the arbitrary, unpredictable and unscrupulous character of our employer, but we took the chance, willing to sacrifice ourselves to our professional duty. While we recognize an owner's right to dictate the policy of his paper on political, sociological or economic issues, we believe that a situation has gone past the limits of decency when an employer expects self-respecting men to espouse the cause of a common criminal. We wish Mr. Wynand to realize that the day of dictatorial one-man rule is past. We must have some say in the running of the place where, we make our living. It is a fight for the freedom of the press.
Mr. Harding was sixty years old, owned an estate on Long Island, and divided his spare time between skeet-shooting and breeding pheasants. His childless wife was a member of the Board of Directors of the Workshop for Social Study; Toohey, its star lecturer, had introduced her to the Workshop. She had written her husband's article.
The two men off the copy desk were not members of Toohey's Union. Alien's daughter was a beautiful young actress who starred in all of Ike's plays. Falk's brother was secretary to Lancelot Clokey.
Gail Wynand sat at the desk in his office and looked down at a pile of paper. He had many things to do, but one picture kept coming back to him and he could not get rid of it and the sense of it clung to all his actions — the picture of a ragged boy standing before the desk of an editor: "Can you spell cat?" — "Can you spell anthropomorphology?" The identities cracked and became mixed, it seemed to him that the boy stood here, at his desk, waiting, and once he said aloud: "Go away!" He caught himself in anger, he thought: You're cracking, you fool, now's not the time. He did not speak aloud again, but the conversation went on silently while he read, checked and signed papers: "Go away! We have no jobs here." I'll hang around. Use me when you want to. You don't have to pay me."