Atlas Shrugged [355]
Holding the newspaper in her hand, she walked out of her office and on toward the hall. She knew, crossing the anteroom, that the faces of her staff were turned to her, but they seemed to be many years away.
She walked down the hall, moving swiftly but without effort, with the same sensation of knowing that her feet were probably touching the ground but that she did not feel it. She did not know how many rooms she crossed to reach Jim's office, or whether there had been any people in her way, she knew the direction to take and the door to pull open to enter unannounced and walk toward his desk.
The newspaper was twisted into a roll by the time she stood before him. She threw it at his face, it struck his cheek and fell down to the carpet.
"There's my resignation, Jim," she said. "I won't work as a slave or as a slave-driver."
She did not hear the sound of his gasp; it came with the sound of the door closing after her.
She went back to her office and, crossing the anteroom, signaled Eddie to follow her inside.
She said, her voice calm and clear, "I have resigned."
He nodded silently.
"I don't know as yet what I'll do in the future. I'm going away, to think it over and to decide. If you want to follow me, I'll be at the lodge in Woodstock." It was an old hunting cabin in a forest of the Berkshire Mountains, which she had inherited from her father and had not visited for years.
"I want to follow," he whispered, "I want to quit, and . . . and I can't. I can't make myself do it."
"Then will you do me a favor?"
"Of course."
"Don't communicate with me about the railroad. I don't want to hear it. Don't tell anyone where I am, except Hank Rearden. If he asks, tell him about the cabin and how to get there. But no one else. I don't want to see anybody."
"AU right."
"Promise?"
"Of course."
"When I decide what's to become of me, I'll let you know."
"Ill wait."
"That's all, Eddie."
He knew that every word was measured and that nothing else could be said between them at this moment. He inclined his head, letting it say the rest, then walked out of the office.
She saw the chief engineer's report still lying open on her desk, and thought that she had to order him at once to resume the work on the Winston section, then remembered that it was not her problem any longer. She felt no pain. She knew that the pain would come later and that it would be a tearing agony of pain, and that the numbness of this moment was a rest granted to her, not after, but before, to make her ready to bear it. But it did not matter. If that is required of me, then I'll bear it-she thought.
She sat down at her desk and telephoned Rearden at his mills in Pennsylvania.
"Hello, dearest," he said. He said it simply and clearly, as if he wanted to say it because it was real and right, and he needed to hold on to the concepts of reality and Tightness.
"Hank, I've quit."
"I see." He sounded as if he had expected it.
"Nobody came to get me, no destroyer, perhaps there never was any destroyer, after all. I don't know what I'll do next, but I have to get away, so that I won't have to see any of them for a while. Then I'll decide. I know that you can't go with me right now."
"No. I have two weeks in which they expect me to sign their Gift Certificate. I want to be right here when the two weeks expire."
"Do you need me-for the two weeks?"
"No. It's worse for you than for me. You have no way to fight them. I have. I think I'm glad they did it. It's clear and final. Don't worry about me. Rest. Rest from all of it, first."
"Yes."
"Where are you going?"
"To the country. To a cabin I own in the Berkshires. If you want to see me, Eddie Willers will tell you the way to get there. I'll be back in two weeks."
"Will you do me a favor?"
"Yes."
"Don't come back until I come