Atlas Shrugged [295]
The silverware, which bore the initials LR in Empire wreaths of laurels, had cost $3,000. But it was held to be unspiritual to think of money and of what that money represented.
A peasant's wooden shoe, gilded, stood in the center of the table, filled with marigolds, grapes and carrots. The candles were stuck into pumpkins that were cut as open-mouthed faces drooling raisins, nuts and candy upon the tablecloth.
It was Thanksgiving dinner, and the three who faced Rearden about the table were his wife, his mother and his brother.
"This is the night to thank the Lord for our blessings," said Rearden's mother. "God has been kind to us. There are people all over the country who haven't got any food in the house tonight, and some that haven't even got a house, and more of them going jobless every day.
Gives me the creeps to look around in the city. Why, only last week, who do you suppose I ran into but Lucie Judson-Henry, do you remember Lucie Judson? Used to live next door to us. up in Minnesota, when you were ten-twelve years old. Had a boy about your age. I lost track of Lucie when they moved to New York, must have been all of twenty years ago. Well, it gave me the creeps to see what she's come to-just a toothless old hag, wrapped in a man's overcoat, panhandling on a street corner. And I thought: That could've been me, but for the grace of God."
"Well, if thanks are in order," said Lillian gaily, "I think that we shouldn't forget Gertrude, the new cook. She's an artist."
"Me, I'm just going to be old-fashioned," said Philip. "I'm just going to thank the sweetest mother in the world."
"Well, for the matter of that," said Rearden's mother, "we ought to . thank Lillian for this dinner and for all the trouble she took to make it so pretty. She spent hours fixing the table. It's real quaint and different."
"It's the wooden shoe that does it," said Philip, bending his head sidewise to study it in a manner of critical appreciation. "That's the real touch. Anybody can have candles, silverware and junk, that doesn't take anything but money-but this shoe, that took thought."
Rearden said nothing. The candlelight moved over his motionless face as over a portrait; the portrait bore an expression of impersonal courtesy.
"You haven't touched your wine," said his mother, looking at him.
"What I think is you ought to drink a toast in gratitude to the people of this country who have given you so much."
"Henry is not in the mood for it, Mother," said Lillian. "I'm afraid Thanksgiving is a holiday only for those who have a clear conscience."
She raised her wine glass, but stopped it halfway to her lips and asked, "You're not going to make some sort of stand at your trial tomorrow, are you, Henry?"
"I am."
She put the glass down. "What are you going to do?"
"You'll see it tomorrow."
"You don't really imagine that you can get away with it!"
"I don't know what you have in mind as the object I'm to get away with."
"Do you realize that the charge against you is extremely serious?"
"I do."
"You've admitted that you sold the Metal to Ken Danagger."
"I have."
"They might send you to jail for ten years,"
"I don't think they will, but it's possible."
"Have you been reading the newspapers, Henry?" asked Philip, with an odd kind of smile.
"No."
"Oh, you should!"
"Should I? Why?"
"You ought to see the names they call you!"
"That's interesting," said Rearden; he said it about the fact that Philip's smile was one of pleasure.
"I don't understand it," said his mother. "Jail? Did you say jail, Lillian? Henry, are you going to be sent to jail?"
"I might be."
"But that's ridiculous' Do something about it."
"What?"
"I don't know. I don't understand any of it. Respectable people don't go to jail. Do something. You've always known what to do about business."
"Not this kind of business."
"I don't believe it." Her voice