Atlas Shrugged [88]
He saw Francisco d'Anconia enter, bow to Lillian, then walk into the crowd as if he owned the room which he had never entered before.
Heads turned to watch him, as if he pulled them on strings in his wake.
Approaching Lillian once more, Rearden said without anger, the contempt becoming amusement in his voice, "I didn't know you knew that one."
"I've met him at a few parties."
"Is he one of your friends, too?"
"Certainly not!" The sharp resentment was genuine.
"Then why did you invite him?"
"Well, you can't give a party-not a party that counts-while he's in this country, without inviting him. It's a nuisance if he comes, and a social black mark if he doesn't."
Rearden laughed. She was off guard; she did not usually admit things of this kind. "Look," he said wearily, "I don't want to spoil your party. But keep that man away from me. Don't come around with introductions. I don't want to meet him. I don't know how you'll work that, but you're an expert hostess, so work it."
Dagny stood still when she saw Francisco approaching. He bowed to her as he passed by. He did not stop, but she knew that he had stopped the moment in his mind. She saw him smile faintly in deliberate emphasis of what he understood and did not choose to acknowledge. She turned away. She hoped to avoid him for the rest of the evening.
Balph Eubank had joined the group around Dr. Pritchett, and was saying sullenly, ". . . no, you cannot expect people to understand the higher reaches of philosophy. Culture should be taken out of the hands of the dollar-chasers. We need a national subsidy for literature. It is disgraceful that artists are treated like peddlers and that art works have to be sold like soap."
"You mean, your complaint is that they don't sell like soap?" asked Francisco d'Anconia.
They had not noticed him approach; the conversation stopped, as if slashed off; most of them had never met him, but they all recognized him at once.
"I meant-" Balph Eubank started angrily and closed his mouth; he saw the eager interest on the faces of his audience, but it was not interest in philosophy any longer.
"Why, hello, Professor!" said Francisco, bowing to Dr. Pritchett.
There was no pleasure in Dr. Pritchett's face when he answered the greeting and performed a few introductions.
"We were just discussing a most interesting subject," said the earnest matron. "Dr. Pritchett was telling us that nothing is anything."
"He should, undoubtedly, know more than anyone else about that,"
Francisco answered gravely.
"I wouldn't have supposed that you knew Dr. Pritchett so well, Senor d'Anconia," she said, and wondered why the professor looked displeased by her remark.
"I am an alumnus of the great school that employs Dr. Pritchett at present, the Patrick Henry University. But I studied under one of his predecessors-Hugh Akston."
"Hugh Akston!" the attractive young woman gasped. "But you couldn't have, Senor d'Anconia! You're not old enough. I thought he was one of those great names of . . . of the last century."
"Perhaps in spirit, madame. Not in fact."
"But I thought he died years ago."
"Why, no. He is still alive."
"Then why don't we ever hear about him any more?"
"He retired, nine years ago."
"Isn't it odd? When a politician or a movie star retires, we read front page stories about it. But when a philosopher retires, people do not even notice it."
"They do, eventually."
A young man said, astonished, "I thought Hugh Akston was one of those classics that nobody studied any more, except in histories of philosophy. I read an article recently which referred to him as the last of the great advocates of reason."
"Just what did Hugh Akston teach?" asked the earnest matron.
Francisco answered, "He taught that everything is something."
"Your loyalty to your teacher is laudable, Senior d'Anconia," said Dr.
Pritchett dryly. "May we take it that