Atlas Shrugged – Day 016 – pp. 154-163
Dagny questions the story… Can’t imagine why. However Francisco walks up and says he believes the story. The storyteller walks away in a huff — Nobody likes Francisco anymore…
He chuckled at her bursque departure. Dagny asked coldly, “What’s the joke?”
“The joke’s on that fool woman. She doesn’t know that she was tellling you the truth”
“Do you expect me to believe that””
“No.”
“Then what do you find so amusing?”
“Oh, a great many things here. Don’t you?”
“No.”
“Well, that’s one of the things I find amusing.”
This guy is just full of riddles.
Dagny’s had enough too. As she walks away, she again hears the strains of Halley’s 4th. Only this time it’s different…
“Then the notes broke. It was as if a handful of mud and pebbles had been flung at the music, and what followed was the sound of the rolling and dripping. It was Halley’s Concerto swung into a popular tune. It was Halley’s melody torn apart…”
(One of the freeloading illuminati has adapted it for a movie score.)
That’s about ruined what’s left of Dagny’s evening. What else can go wrong? She starts to leave when she passes Lillian Rearden talking about her Rearden Metal bracelet.
“Why no, it’s not from a hardware store, it’s a very special gift from my husband. On yes, of course it’s hideous. But don’t you see? Its’s supposed to be priceless. Of course, I’d exchange it for a common diamond bracelet any time, but somehow nobody will offer me one for it…”
That’s about all she needs to hear. Overhwelmed by the … what’s the word I want… absurdity of the evening? By being surrounded by so many, so useless, so inept, who screw everything they touch up and yet still so blindly confident to think they can tell everyone how life should be … Dagny rips off her own diamond bracelet and in front of God and everybody, confronts Lillian offering to trade…
“If you are not the coward that I think you are, you will exchange it.”
Them’s almost fightin’ words. Lillian, modestly accepts, as the crowd gasps in horror at Dagny’s affront to her. Dutifully Hank strolls to his wife to put the bracelet on. Dagny apologizes to Hank as she leaves.
Later, after the party, Hank “entered his wife’s bedroom.”
Separate bedrooms. More Puritan than even Rob and Laura Petrie. I’m kidding. Obviously on the outs.
As he enters her room — ostensibly with the object of romance on the table — we’ll enter back into his head and watch the moral thrashing he gives himself. Guilt over the marriage this time. (This guy is the most guilty guy on earth.) She wasn’t the richest, or the prettiest of the girls, but something about her made her seem unattainable. Apparently he wanted that unattainable prize. Unfortunately…
“His desire for her had died in the first week of their marriage.”
As she chatters on about the party, he leaves the room.
Oh, well. None for Hank tonite…
And we get to start Chapter VII — The Exploters and the Exploited.
(There’s an sound of irony somewhere in that title I can’t put my finger on…)
Anyway, it’s only two pages of quick exposition. Taggart Transcontinental is busy laying rail lines of Rearden Metal to Colorado. Dagny’s found a suitable (barely) replacement contractor for McNamara — Ben Nealy. And she’s gotten Mr Mowen, maker of rail switches to adapt to working with Rearden Metal at enromous expense.
Dagny’s takin’ care of bidness….