The Early Ayn Rand

Society had taken us back, even with more appreciation than before, perhaps. Henry became the most popular, the most eagerly expected guest everywhere. He had made a rapid career. He was not very rich yet, but his name began to be mentioned among those of the most brilliant engineers. When a man is so interesting, so fascinating as he was, lack of money will never mean much to society...

Then it happened... I have had the strength to live through it, I shall have the strength to write it down...

A new woman came to our town and appeared in our society. Her name was Claire Van Dahlen. She was divorced and had come from New York after a trip to Europe to rest in our little town, where she had some distant relatives. I saw her on the first evening she appeared in our society, at a dancing party.

She had the body of an antique statuette. She had golden skin and dark-red lips. Her black hair was parted in the middle, combed straight and brilliant, and she wore long, hanging perfume-earrings. She had slow, soft, fluent movements; it seemed that her body had no bones at all. Her arms undulated like velvet ribbons. She was dressed very simply, but it was the simplicity that costs thousands of dollars... She was gorgeously, stunningly beautiful.

Our society was amazed with admiration; they had never seen a woman like this... She was perfectly charming and gracious with everybody, but she had that haughty, disinterested smile of women accustomed to and tired of admiration.

Henry looked at her... he looked too long and too fixedly. The glance with which he followed her every movement was full of a strange admiration, too intense for him. He danced with her several times.

At the end of the party, a crowd of young men rushed to ask the favor of bringing Mrs. Van Dahlen home. "I will have to choose," she said, with a charming, indulgent smile.

"Choose from everyone present!" proposed one of her eager new admirers.

"From everyone?" she repeated, with her smile. She paused, then: "Well, it will be Mr. Stafford."

Henry had not asked for the favor; he was astonished. But it was impossible to refuse. Mr. Barnes brought me home.

When Henry came back and I asked his opinion of her, he said shortly and indifferently: "Yes, very interesting." I had seen that he was much more impressed than this, but I did not pay any attention to it.

The next time we had to go to a party, Henry had no desire to go out that evening. He was tired, he had work to do. "Why, Henry, they expect us," I said. "There will be many persons tonight: Mr. and Mrs. Harwings, Mr. and Mrs. Hughes, Mrs. Brooks, Mrs. Van Dahlen, Mr. Barnes..."

"Well, yes, I think we might go," he said suddenly.

He danced with Claire Van Dahlen that evening more than anyone else. Her dress had a very low neck in back, and I saw his fingers sometimes touch her soft silken skin. The look in her eyes, which were fixed straight into his, between her long, dark lashes, astonished me... At the table, they were placed near one another: the hostess wanted to please Mrs. Van Dahlen.

After this Henry missed no party where she appeared. He took her for rides in his automobile. He called at her relatives', where she lived. He managed to be in theaters the evenings she was there. He had a strange look, eager and excited. At home, he was always busy, working with an unusual speed, then hurrying somewhere.

I saw it, I was astonished; that was all. I had no suspicion whatever. The thing I could have suspected was so horrible, so unbelievably atrocious, that it simply could not slip into my mind. I could not think of it.

Then, suddenly, he broke off every relation with her. He did not want to go out. He refused sternly every invitation.

He was dark, and beneath his darkness I distinguished one thing — fear.

Then I understood. His courtship had meant nothing to me; his break told me everything. Oh, not immediately, of course. These things never happen immediately. First, a vague, uncertain thought, a supposition, that made my blood cold. Then a doubt. A desperate fight against this doubt, which only made it stronger. Then an attentive, frightful study. Then — certainty. Henry loved Claire Van Dahlen... Yes, it is my own hand that writes this sentence.

There are things, there are moments in life, which you must not speak about. That was what I felt when I told this sentence to myself for the first time. I found some gray hair on my head that day.

Then came a madness. I could not believe it. It was there and it could not enter into my brain. Oh, that awful feeling of everything falling, falling down, everything around me and in me!... There were days when I was calm, hysterically calm, and I cried it was impossible. There were nights when I bit my hands till blood... And then I resolved to fight.