When he heard the knock at the door, he said: "Come in," without rising.

Dominique came in. She entered as if she had entered this room before. She wore a black suit of heavy cloth, simple like a child's garment, worn as mere protection, not as ornament; she had a high masculine collar raised to her cheeks, and a hat cutting half her face out of sight. He sat looking at her. She waited to see the derisive smile, but it did not come. The smile seemed implicit in the room itself, in her standing there, halfway across that room. She took her hat off, like a man entering a house, she pulled it off by the brim with the tips of stiff fingers and held it hanging down at the end of her arm. She waited, her face stern and cold; but her smooth pale hair looked defenseless and humble. She said:

"You are not surprised to see me."

"I expected you tonight."

She raised her hand, bending her elbow with a tight economy of motion, the bare minimum needed, and flung her hat across to a table. The hat's long flight showed the violence in that controlled jerk of her wrist.

He asked: "What do you want?"

She answered: "You know what I want," her voice heavy and flat.

"Yes. But I want to hear you say it. All of it."

"If you wish." Her voice had the sound of efficiency, obeying an order with metallic precision. "I want to sleep with you. Now, tonight, and at any time you may care to call me. I want your naked body, your skin, your mouth, your hands. I want you — like this — not hysterical with desire — but coldly and consciously — without dignity and without regrets — I want you — I have no self-respect to bargain with me and divide me — I want you — I want you like an animal, or a cat on a fence, or a whore."

She spoke on a single, level tone, as if she were reciting an austere catechism of faith. She stood without moving, her feet in flat shoes planted apart, her shoulders thrown back, her arms hanging straight at her sides. She looked impersonal, untouched by the words she pronounced, chaste like a young boy.

"You know that I hate you, Roark. I hate you for what you are, for wanting you, for having to want you. I'm going to fight you — and I'm going to destroy you — and I tell you this as calmly as I told you mat I'm a begging animal. I'm going to pray that you can't be destroyed — I tell you this, too — even though I believe in nothing and have nothing to pray to. But I will fight to block every step you take. I will fight to tear every chance you want away from you. I will hurt you through the only thing that can hurt you — through your work. I will fight to starve you, to strangle you on the things you won't be able to reach. I have done it to you today — and that is why I shall sleep with you tonight."

He sat deep in his chair, stretched out, his body relaxed, and taut in relaxation, a stillness being filled slowly with the violence of future motion.

"I have hurt you today. I'll do it again. I'll come to you whenever I have beaten you — whenever I know that I have hurt you — and I'll let you own me. I want to be owned, not by a lover, but by an adversary who will destroy my victory over him, not with honorable blows, but with the touch of his body on mine. That is what I want of you, Roark. That is what I am. You wanted to hear it all. You've heard it. What do you wish to say now?"

"Take your clothes off."

She stood still for a moment; two hard spots swelled and grew white under the corners of her mouth. Then she saw a movement in the cloth of his shirt, one jolt of controlled breath — and she smiled in her turn, derisively, as he had always smiled at her.

She lifted her two hands to her collar and unfastened the buttons of her jacket, simply, precisely, one after another. She threw the jacket down on the floor, she took off a thin white blouse, and she noticed the tight black gloves on the wrists of her naked arms. She took the gloves off, pulling at each finger in turn. She undressed indifferently, as if she were alone in her own bedroom.

Then she looked at him. She stood naked, waiting, feeling the space between them like a pressure against her stomach, knowing that it was torture for him also and that it was as they both wanted it. Then he got up, he walked to her, and when he held her, her arms rose willingly and she felt the shape of his body imprinted into the skin on the inside of her arm as it encircled him, his ribs, his armpit, his back, his shoulder blade under her fingers, her mouth on his, in a surrender more violent than her struggle had been.

Afterward, she lay in bed by his side, under his blanket, looking at his room, and she asked:

"Roark, why were you working in that quarry?"

"You know it."

"Yes. Anyone else would have taken a job in an architect's office."

"And then you'd have no desire at all to destroy me."

"You understand that?"

"Yes. Keep still. It doesn't matter now."

"Do you know that the Enright House is the most beautiful building in New York?"

"I know that you know it."

"Roark, you worked in that quarry when you had the Enright House in you, and many other Enright Houses, and you were drilling granite like a ... "

"You're going to weaken in a moment, Dominique, and then you'll regret it tomorrow."

"Yes."

"You're very lovely, Dominique."

"Don't."

"You're lovely."

"Roark, I ... I'll still want to destroy you."

"Do you think I would want you if you didn't?"

"Roark ... "

"You want to hear that again? Part of it? I want you, Dominique. I want you. I want you."

"I ... " She stopped, the word on which she stopped almost audible in her breath.

"No," he said. "Not yet. You won't say that yet. Go to sleep.

"Here? With you?"

"Here. With me. I'll fix breakfast for you in the morning. Did you know that I fix my own breakfast? You'll like seeing that. Like the work in the quarry. Then you'll go home and think about destroying me. Good night, Dominique."

THE BLINDS raised over the windows of her living room, the lights of the city rising to a black horizon halfway up the glass panes, Dominique sat at her desk, correcting the last sheets of an article, when she heard the doorbell. Guests did not disturb her without warning — and she looked up, the pencil held in midair, angry and curious. She heard the steps of the maid in the hall, then the maid came in, saying: "A gentleman to see you, madam," a faint hostility in her voice explaining that the gentleman had refused to give his name.

A man with orange hair? — Dominique wanted to ask, but didn't; the pencil jerked stiffly and she said: "Have him come

Then the door opened; against the light of the hall she saw a long neck and sloping shoulders, like the silhouette of a bottle; a rich, creamy voice said, "Good evening, Dominique," and she recognized Ellsworth Toohey whom she had never asked to her house. ,

She smiled. She said: "Good evening, Ellsworth. I haven't seen you for such a long time."

"You should have expected me now, don't you think so?" He turned to the maid: "Cointreau, please, if you have it, and I'm sure you do."

The maid glanced at Dominique, wide-eyed; Dominique nodded silently, and the maid went out, closing the door.

"Busy, of course?" said Toohey, glancing at the littered desk. "Very becoming, Dominique. Gets results, too. You've been writing much better lately."

She let the pencil fall, and threw an arm over the back of her chair, half turning to him, watching him placidly. "What do you want, Ellsworth?"

He did not sit down, but stood examining the place with the unhurried curiosity of an expert.

"Not bad, Dominique. Just about as I'd expect you to have it. A little cold. You know, I wouldn't have that ice-blue chair over there. Too obvious. Fits in too well. Just what people would expect in just that spot. I'd have it carrot red. An ugly, glaring, outrageous red. Like Mr. Howard Roark's hair. That's quite en passant — merely a convenient figure of speech — nothing personal at all. Just one touch of the wrong color would make the whole room. The sort of thing that gives a place elegance. Your flower arrangements are nice. The pictures, too — not bad."