WEBVTT NOTE III. Galt 1 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:30.000 Chapter 3. Galt 1. It was true of Galt, as Harbinger said, that he had no friends. It was not, therefore, true that his world was full of enemies. He had many acquaintances, and no intimates. He was a solitary worker in the money vineyards, keeping neither feud nor tryst with any clan. His reputation in Wall Street was formless and cloudy. Everybody knew 2 00:00:30.000 --> 00:00:54.000 for 20 years he had been a pestiferous gadfly on the stock exchange, lighting here and there, turning up suddenly in situations where he had to be settled with or bought off, swaggering, bluffing, baiting, playing the greatest of all games of wit with skill and daring, and apparently getting nowhere in the end. 3 00:00:54.000 --> 00:01:06.000 Once he had engaged in a lone-handed fight with a powerful banking group over the reorganization of a railroad, demanding to be elected to the directorate as the largest minority stockholder. 4 00:01:06.000 --> 00:01:19.000 The bankers were indignant. The audacity of a stock market gambler wanting to sit on a railroad board. What would anybody think? He took his case to the courts and was beaten. 5 00:01:19.000 --> 00:01:30.000 Another time he unexpectedly appeared with actual control of a small railroad, having bought it surreptitiously during many months in the open marketplace. 6 00:01:30.000 --> 00:01:36.000 But as he held it mostly with credit borrowed from the banks, his position was vulnerable. 7 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:41.000 It would not do for a gambler like this to own a railroad, the bankers said. 8 00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:47.000 So his loans were called away from him and he had to sell out at a heartbreaking loss. 9 00:01:47.000 --> 00:01:49.560 He was beaten again. 10 00:01:49.560 --> 00:01:55.400 He took his defeats grimly and returned each time to the practice of freelance speculation 11 00:01:55.400 --> 00:01:58.480 with private brokerage on the side. 12 00:01:58.480 --> 00:02:03.660 The unsuccessful of these two adventures caused him to be thought of as a man whose ambitions 13 00:02:03.660 --> 00:02:06.140 exceeded his powers. 14 00:02:06.140 --> 00:02:11.680 There were a great many facts about him, facts of record and facts of hearsay, but when they 15 00:02:11.680 --> 00:02:15.080 were brought together, the man was lost. 16 00:02:15.080 --> 00:02:20.600 Although he talked a great deal to anyone who would listen, he revealed nothing of himself. 17 00:02:20.600 --> 00:02:26.080 His office was one dark little room full of telephones, and he was never there. 18 00:02:26.080 --> 00:02:29.000 He carried his business in his head. 19 00:02:29.000 --> 00:02:35.000 Nobody positively spoke ill of him, or if one did, it was on ground of free suspicion, 20 00:02:35.000 --> 00:02:40.000 with nothing more specific to be alleged than that he turned a sharp corner. 21 00:02:40.000 --> 00:02:41.680 That is nothing to say. 22 00:02:41.680 --> 00:02:46.800 To go wide around corners in Wall Street is a mark of self-display. 23 00:02:46.800 --> 00:02:49.440 People neither liked nor disliked him. 24 00:02:49.440 --> 00:02:52.720 They simply had no place in their minds to put him. 25 00:02:52.720 --> 00:02:57.560 So they said, oh yes, Harry Galt, and shook their heads. 26 00:02:57.560 --> 00:03:03.400 They might say he was unsafe and take it back, remarking that he had never been insolvent. 27 00:03:03.400 --> 00:03:05.920 What they meant was that he was visionary. 28 00:03:05.920 --> 00:03:12.360 Generally, on the stock exchange, there is a shrewd consensus as to what a man is worth. 29 00:03:12.360 --> 00:03:16.360 Nobody had the remotest notion of what Galt was worth. 30 00:03:16.360 --> 00:03:21.920 It was believed that his fortune went up and down erratically. 31 00:03:21.920 --> 00:03:27.000 Between Galt and the President of the Great Midwestern, there was a strange relationship. 32 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:32.640 Harbinger had said it was not one of friendship, perhaps not, yet it would be difficult to 33 00:03:32.640 --> 00:03:35.120 find any other name for it. 34 00:03:35.120 --> 00:03:37.800 Their association was constant. 35 00:03:37.800 --> 00:03:43.400 Galt did all of Valentine's private stock exchange business, as Harbinger said. 36 00:03:43.400 --> 00:03:48.320 What Harbinger did not know was that they were engaged in joint speculations under Galt's 37 00:03:48.320 --> 00:03:50.760 advice and direction. 38 00:03:50.760 --> 00:03:55.840 All of this, of course, could be without personal liking on either side. 39 00:03:55.840 --> 00:03:59.920 Galt was an excellent broker and an adroit speculator. 40 00:03:59.920 --> 00:04:05.360 Valentine never spoke of him without a kind of awe and a certain unease of manner. 41 00:04:05.360 --> 00:04:11.680 Galt's references to Valentine were oblique, sometimes irreverent to the verge of disrespect, 42 00:04:11.680 --> 00:04:13.100 but that was Galt. 43 00:04:13.100 --> 00:04:16.580 It did not imply dislike. 44 00:04:16.580 --> 00:04:21.020 On the President's return from Chicago, I mentioned the fact of having refused to give 45 00:04:21.020 --> 00:04:22.720 Galt the earnings. 46 00:04:22.720 --> 00:04:23.720 Quite right, he said. 47 00:04:23.720 --> 00:04:26.740 I ought to have told you about Mr. Galt. 48 00:04:26.740 --> 00:04:29.760 Is it all right to give him anything he wants, I asked. 49 00:04:29.760 --> 00:04:34.380 Remembering what Harbinger had said and wishing to test it for myself? 50 00:04:34.380 --> 00:04:37.840 He did not answer at once, nor directly. 51 00:04:37.840 --> 00:04:40.760 After walking about for several minutes, he said, 52 00:04:40.760 --> 00:04:45.680 Mr. Galt is becoming a large stockholder in the Great Midwestern Railroad. 53 00:04:45.680 --> 00:04:47.560 Why, I don't know. 54 00:04:47.560 --> 00:04:50.540 I cannot follow his process of thought. 55 00:04:50.540 --> 00:04:52.240 Our stock is very low. 56 00:04:52.240 --> 00:04:56.960 I don't know when, if ever, we shall be able to pay dividends on it again. 57 00:04:56.960 --> 00:04:59.080 But I cannot keep him from buying it. 58 00:04:59.080 --> 00:05:02.120 He is obstinate in his opinions. 59 00:05:02.120 --> 00:05:05.600 Is his judgment good in such matters, I asked? 60 00:05:05.600 --> 00:05:08.120 It isn't judgment, he said slowly. 61 00:05:08.120 --> 00:05:10.640 It isn't anything you can touch by reason. 62 00:05:10.640 --> 00:05:13.940 I suppose it is intuition. 63 00:05:13.940 --> 00:05:17.160 Do his intuitions prove in the sequel? 64 00:05:17.160 --> 00:05:22.160 He grew more restless and then stood for a long time gazing out of the window. 65 00:05:22.160 --> 00:05:26.160 It's queer, he said, speaking to himself. 66 00:05:26.160 --> 00:05:28.560 He has extraordinary foresight. 67 00:05:28.560 --> 00:05:35.240 I wish I could see with him now. If he is right, then everybody else is wrong. No, he 68 00:05:35.240 --> 00:05:40.040 cannot be right. He cannot be. Conditions are too plain. 69 00:05:40.040 --> 00:05:43.560 He doesn't see conditions as they are, I said. 70 00:05:43.560 --> 00:05:49.200 As they are, he repeated, starting, and then staring at me out of focus with recollected 71 00:05:49.200 --> 00:05:56.920 astonishment. He doesn't see them at all. They don't exist. What he sees is, is, well, 72 00:05:56.920 --> 00:06:02.460 Well no matter, he said, letting down suddenly and returning to his desk with a large gesture 73 00:06:02.460 --> 00:06:05.860 of sweeping something behind him. 74 00:06:05.860 --> 00:06:08.920 It was difficult to be friends with Henry Galt. 75 00:06:08.920 --> 00:06:11.960 His power of irritation was impish. 76 00:06:11.960 --> 00:06:17.620 None escaped its terrors, least of all those upon whom he bestowed his liking. 77 00:06:17.620 --> 00:06:21.520 He knew all their tender spots and kept them sore. 78 00:06:21.520 --> 00:06:27.740 No word of satire, derision, or petulance was ever restrained or missed its mark. 79 00:06:27.740 --> 00:06:32.560 His aim was unerring, and if you were not the victim, you wickedly understood the strength 80 00:06:32.560 --> 00:06:34.520 of the temptation. 81 00:06:34.520 --> 00:06:39.480 He not only made people feel little, he made them look little. 82 00:06:39.480 --> 00:06:44.740 What saved it, or made it utterly intolerable according to the point of view, was that having 83 00:06:44.740 --> 00:06:51.320 done this, he was scornful of his own ego's achievement, as to say, I may be greater than 84 00:06:51.320 --> 00:06:55.520 2, but that's no sign I am anything to speak of. 85 00:06:55.520 --> 00:07:01.080 There was a curious fact about his exhibitions of ungoverned feeling, either ecstasies or 86 00:07:01.080 --> 00:07:02.240 tantrums. 87 00:07:02.240 --> 00:07:08.080 He had no sense of physical dignity, and therefore no sensation ever of losing it. 88 00:07:08.080 --> 00:07:13.320 For that reason, he could bring off a most undignified scene in a manner to humiliate 89 00:07:13.320 --> 00:07:15.800 everyone but himself. 90 00:07:15.800 --> 00:07:21.280 Having behaved incorrigibly, he would suddenly stalk off in majestic possession of himself 91 00:07:21.280 --> 00:07:27.280 and leave others in a ludicrous plight with a sense of having suffered an unanswerable indignity. 92 00:07:27.280 --> 00:07:34.280 It delighted him to seize you up on some simple declaration of opinion, demand the reason, 93 00:07:34.280 --> 00:07:40.280 then the grounds of the reason, and run you off your wits with endless nagging questions. 94 00:07:40.280 --> 00:07:46.280 On handing him the weekly earnings one afternoon, I passed a word of unconsidered comment. 95 00:07:46.280 --> 00:07:55.280 He impeached it with a question. I defended it foolishly. He impeached the defense with another question. And this went on until I said, 96 00:07:55.280 --> 00:08:03.280 It was nothing in the beginning. I merely meant it to be civil, like passing the time of day. I'm sorry I spoke at all. 97 00:08:03.280 --> 00:08:13.280 Sorry spoils it, he said, otherwise very handsome. And he passed into the president's office for the long conference, which now was a daily fixture. 98 00:08:13.280 --> 00:08:19.780 They went away together, as usual. Presently, Galt alone returned, and said, in a very nice way, 99 00:08:19.780 --> 00:08:22.780 Come and have dinner with me, Coxie. 100 00:08:22.780 --> 00:08:28.280 When we were seated in the 6th Avenue L train, he resumed the inquisitive manner. 101 00:08:28.280 --> 00:08:33.280 Only now he flattered me by showing genuine interest in my answers. 102 00:08:33.280 --> 00:08:37.280 Had I seen the Board of Directors in action? How was I impressed? 103 00:08:37.280 --> 00:08:41.280 Who was the biggest man in the lot at a guess? Why so? 104 00:08:41.280 --> 00:08:46.280 What did I think of Valentine, of this and that one? Why? 105 00:08:46.280 --> 00:08:53.280 He not only made me recall my impressions, he obliged me to account for them, and he listened attentively. 106 00:08:53.280 --> 00:08:58.280 When we descended at 50th Street, he seemed not to notice that it was drizzling rain. 107 00:08:58.280 --> 00:09:06.280 There was no umbrella. We walked slowly south to 48th Street and turned east, talking all the time. 108 00:09:06.280 --> 00:09:12.280 The Galt house was tall, brown and conventional, lying safe within the fringe. 109 00:09:12.280 --> 00:09:14.280 It was near the middle of the block. 110 00:09:14.280 --> 00:09:20.280 Eastward, toward Fifth Avenue, as the scale of wealth ascended, there were several handsome houses. 111 00:09:20.280 --> 00:09:27.280 Westward, toward Sixth Avenue, at the extreme end of the block, you might suspect high-class board. 112 00:09:27.280 --> 00:09:32.280 But it is a long block. One end does not know the other. 113 00:09:32.280 --> 00:09:41.280 About the entrance, especially at the front door as Galt admitted us with a latch key, there was an effective stinted upkeep. 114 00:09:41.280 --> 00:09:49.280 Inside we were putting off our things with no sign of a servant, when suddenly a black and white cyclone swept down the hall, 115 00:09:49.280 --> 00:09:55.280 imperiling in its passage a number of things and threatening to overwhelm its own object, 116 00:09:55.280 --> 00:10:07.280 But instead, at the miraculous moment, it became rigid, gracefully executed, a flying slide on the tiled floor, and came to a perfect stop, with Galt in its arms. 117 00:10:07.280 --> 00:10:12.280 Safe, I shouted, filled with excitement and admiration. 118 00:10:12.280 --> 00:10:15.280 Natalie, said Galt, introducing her. 119 00:10:15.280 --> 00:10:24.280 She shook hands in a free, roguish manner, smiling with me at herself, without really, for an instant, taking her attention off Galt. 120 00:10:24.280 --> 00:10:27.160 You're wet, she said severely. 121 00:10:27.160 --> 00:10:28.160 No I'm not. 122 00:10:28.160 --> 00:10:33.600 You're soaking wet, she insisted, feeling and pinching him at the same time. 123 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:35.320 You've got to change. 124 00:10:35.320 --> 00:10:37.680 I've got to do nothing of the kind, he said. 125 00:10:37.680 --> 00:10:38.800 We want to talk. 126 00:10:38.800 --> 00:10:40.400 Let us alone. 127 00:10:40.400 --> 00:10:44.720 To me, he said, come up to my room, and made for the stairway. 128 00:10:44.720 --> 00:10:48.980 Natalie, getting ahead of him, barred the way. 129 00:10:48.980 --> 00:10:51.560 You won't have a minute to talk, she said. 130 00:10:51.560 --> 00:10:52.640 Dinner is ready. 131 00:10:52.640 --> 00:10:53.640 Go in there. 132 00:10:53.640 --> 00:10:59.080 Oh, all right, all right, he growled, turning into the parlour. 133 00:10:59.080 --> 00:11:03.800 Almost before he could sit down, she was at him with a dry coat, holding it. 134 00:11:03.800 --> 00:11:09.280 Grumbling and pretending to be churlish, yet secretly much pleased, he changed garments, 135 00:11:09.280 --> 00:11:12.060 saying, Will that do you? 136 00:11:12.060 --> 00:11:17.480 For now, she said, smoothing the collar and giving him a little whack to finish. 137 00:11:17.480 --> 00:11:19.540 Mrs. Galt appeared. 138 00:11:19.540 --> 00:11:25.740 When Galt's mother, introduced simply and sweetly by her nursery name, Grandma Galt, 139 00:11:25.740 --> 00:11:27.620 there was an embarrassing pause. 140 00:11:27.620 --> 00:11:29.500 Where is Vera? 141 00:11:29.500 --> 00:11:30.500 Galt asked. 142 00:11:30.500 --> 00:11:34.540 Vera, I supposed, was the ferryboat girl. 143 00:11:34.540 --> 00:11:36.820 Nobody answered his question. 144 00:11:36.820 --> 00:11:42.780 Mrs. Galt, by an effort of strong intention, moved us silently toward the dining room. 145 00:11:42.780 --> 00:11:48.460 The house seemed bare, no pictures to look at, a few pieces of fine old furniture mixed 146 00:11:48.460 --> 00:11:55.180 with modern things, good rugs worn shabby, and no artistry of design or effect whatever, 147 00:11:55.180 --> 00:12:00.940 except in the middle room, between parlor and dining room, which contained a grand piano, 148 00:12:00.940 --> 00:12:04.540 some art objects, and a thought of color. 149 00:12:04.540 --> 00:12:09.700 Nothing in the house was positively ugly or in bad taste, nor in the total impression 150 00:12:09.700 --> 00:12:14.380 was there any uncomfortable suggestion of genteel poverty. 151 00:12:14.380 --> 00:12:20.580 What the environment seemed to express, all save that one middle room, was indifference. 152 00:12:20.580 --> 00:12:27.780 You will want to talk, said Mrs. Galt, placing me at the left of Galt, so that I faced Natalie, 153 00:12:27.780 --> 00:12:29.700 who sat at his right. 154 00:12:29.700 --> 00:12:31.660 This was the foot of the table. 155 00:12:31.660 --> 00:12:36.740 Mrs. Galt sat at the head of it, with Grandma Galt at her right and a vacant place at her 156 00:12:36.740 --> 00:12:37.740 left. 157 00:12:37.740 --> 00:12:39.620 Where is Vera? 158 00:12:39.620 --> 00:12:43.020 Galt asked again, beginning to develop symptoms. 159 00:12:43.020 --> 00:12:47.620 She isn't coming down, said Mrs. Galt, in a horizontal voice. 160 00:12:47.620 --> 00:12:48.620 Why not? 161 00:12:48.620 --> 00:12:50.580 asked Galt, beating the table. 162 00:12:50.580 --> 00:12:52.180 Why not? 163 00:12:52.180 --> 00:12:58.280 T-U-W, said Natalie, significantly, trying to catch his eye. 164 00:12:58.280 --> 00:13:02.900 But he either didn't hear, or purposely ignored her, and went on. 165 00:13:02.900 --> 00:13:04.940 She does this to spite me. 166 00:13:04.940 --> 00:13:07.740 She does it every time I bring anybody home. 167 00:13:07.740 --> 00:13:09.180 I won't have it. 168 00:13:09.180 --> 00:13:10.180 She's a monkey. 169 00:13:10.180 --> 00:13:11.180 She's a snob. 170 00:13:11.180 --> 00:13:15.180 I'll call her till she comes. Hey, Vera! 171 00:13:15.180 --> 00:13:23.180 Natalie had been shaking him by the arm, desperately trying to make him look at a figure formed with the fingers of her right hand. 172 00:13:23.180 --> 00:13:31.180 Evidently there was a code between them. She had already tried the cipher T-O-W, whatever that meant. 173 00:13:31.180 --> 00:13:37.180 And now this was the sign. If he would only look. But of course he wouldn't. 174 00:13:37.180 --> 00:13:41.980 Suddenly the girl threw herself around him, and though he resisted, she smothered him 175 00:13:41.980 --> 00:13:44.980 powerfully and whispered in his ear. 176 00:13:44.980 --> 00:13:47.740 Instantly the scene dissolved. 177 00:13:47.740 --> 00:13:51.660 She returned to her place, slightly flushed with the exertion. 178 00:13:51.660 --> 00:13:56.460 He sat up to the table, and dinner began to be served as if nothing unusual had taken 179 00:13:56.460 --> 00:13:58.580 place. 180 00:13:58.580 --> 00:14:04.320 Mrs. Galt addressed polite inquiries at me, spoke to the butler, conversed with Natalie, 181 00:14:04.320 --> 00:14:09.700 Not feverishly or in haste, but placidly, in a calm, level voice. 182 00:14:09.700 --> 00:14:14.860 She was a magnificent brunette woman, turning grey at a time of life and in a manner to 183 00:14:14.860 --> 00:14:19.040 make her look even younger and more striking than before. 184 00:14:19.040 --> 00:14:24.940 Her expression was trained, impersonal and weary, as that of one who knows the part too 185 00:14:24.940 --> 00:14:30.660 well to be surprised or taken unawares, and had forgotten what it was like to be interested 186 00:14:30.660 --> 00:14:32.540 without effort. 187 00:14:32.540 --> 00:14:35.480 There were lines suitable to every occasion. 188 00:14:35.480 --> 00:14:41.740 She knew them all and spoke them well, omitting nothing, slurring nothing, adding nothing. 189 00:14:41.740 --> 00:14:46.020 Her conversation, like her expression, was a guise. 190 00:14:46.020 --> 00:14:49.660 Back of that, there dwelt a woman. 191 00:14:49.660 --> 00:14:51.700 No one spoke to the old mother. 192 00:14:51.700 --> 00:14:53.440 I tried to talk to her. 193 00:14:53.440 --> 00:14:58.900 She became instantly rigid and remained so until I turned away, embarrassed. 194 00:14:58.900 --> 00:15:02.160 As I did so, Natalie was looking at me. 195 00:15:02.160 --> 00:15:32.160 Don't mind Grandma 196 00:15:32.160 --> 00:15:34.080 Wolf is truly impervious. 197 00:15:34.080 --> 00:15:35.780 The girl did not mind. 198 00:15:35.780 --> 00:15:40.480 She returned the look with a smile, just a little too winsome, as everything about her 199 00:15:40.480 --> 00:15:47.600 seemed a little too high in key or color, too extraordinary, too unexpected, or, like 200 00:15:47.600 --> 00:15:53.260 the girl in the perfumer's advertisement, a little too much to be true, not in any sense 201 00:15:53.260 --> 00:15:59.800 of being unreal, but as an entity altogether and unfortunately improbable. 202 00:15:59.800 --> 00:16:04.760 She had learned how to get what she wanted, and her way of getting it, one could imagine, 203 00:16:04.760 --> 00:16:09.160 was all that made life bearable in that household. 204 00:16:09.160 --> 00:16:14.520 Its sky was low and ominous, charged with a sense of psychic stress. 205 00:16:14.520 --> 00:16:20.000 I felt two conditions of conflict, one chronic and one acute. 206 00:16:20.000 --> 00:16:24.360 The feeling of there being something acute was suddenly deepened when the old mother 207 00:16:24.360 --> 00:16:27.720 spoke for the first and only time. 208 00:16:27.720 --> 00:16:32.360 Her voice was clear, precise, and commanded undivided attention. 209 00:16:32.360 --> 00:16:36.560 The question, she asked, gave me a queer start. 210 00:16:36.560 --> 00:16:39.280 What is the price of Great Midwestern today? 211 00:16:39.280 --> 00:16:43.600 Eight, said Galt, amid profound silence. 212 00:16:43.600 --> 00:16:45.160 That was all. 213 00:16:45.160 --> 00:16:49.840 Yet it was as if a spark had passed through inflammable gas. 214 00:16:49.840 --> 00:16:53.720 The same feeling was deepened further by another incident. 215 00:16:53.720 --> 00:16:59.980 Coxie, said Galt, addressing me rhetorically, what one thing has impressed you most in Wall 216 00:16:59.980 --> 00:17:01.400 Street? 217 00:17:01.400 --> 00:17:07.360 The unbelief of people in themselves, in each other, and in what they are doing, I replied. 218 00:17:07.360 --> 00:17:08.360 What's that? 219 00:17:08.360 --> 00:17:09.360 Say it again. 220 00:17:09.360 --> 00:17:16.320 I said it again, whereat he burst forth with shrill, discordant, exulting sounds, beating 221 00:17:16.320 --> 00:17:21.880 the china with a spoon and making for one person an incredible uproar. 222 00:17:21.880 --> 00:17:26.960 At the same time, he looked about him with a high air, especially at his wife, whose 223 00:17:26.960 --> 00:17:29.680 expression was perfectly blank. 224 00:17:29.680 --> 00:17:31.800 Natalie smiled grimly. 225 00:17:31.800 --> 00:17:33.480 The old mother was oblivious. 226 00:17:33.480 --> 00:17:38.640 I don't see anything in that, I said, when the racket subsided. 227 00:17:38.640 --> 00:17:40.080 There is, though, he said. 228 00:17:40.080 --> 00:17:45.920 You didn't mean to do it, but you hit him in the eye that time, square in the eye. 229 00:17:45.920 --> 00:17:47.240 Wow! 230 00:17:47.240 --> 00:17:51.560 He was very agreeably excited, and got up from the table. 231 00:17:51.560 --> 00:17:54.200 Come on, he said, we'll talk in my room. 232 00:17:54.200 --> 00:17:59.900 I'll send your coffee up, Mrs. Galt called after us as he bore me off. 233 00:17:59.900 --> 00:18:06.240 This is where I live and play, he said, applying a latch key to a door at the top of the stairway. 234 00:18:06.240 --> 00:18:11.520 He went in first to get the light on, saying, I don't let anybody in here but Natalie. 235 00:18:11.520 --> 00:18:14.740 She can dust it up without touching anything. 236 00:18:14.740 --> 00:18:20.820 The room was a workshop in that state of involved disorder, tools all scattered about, which 237 00:18:20.820 --> 00:18:24.940 which is sign and measure of the craftsman's engrossment. 238 00:18:24.940 --> 00:18:31.340 There was an enormous table piled high at both ends with papers, briefs, maps, charts, 239 00:18:31.340 --> 00:18:35.880 blueprints, files, pamphlets and stuffed envelopes. 240 00:18:35.880 --> 00:18:41.180 Books were everywhere, on the table, on the chairs, on the floor, many of them open, faces 241 00:18:41.180 --> 00:18:47.520 up and faces down, straddled one upon another leapfrog fashion, arranged in series with 242 00:18:47.520 --> 00:18:55.480 with Weights to Hold Them Flat, Books Sprawling, Leaning, Prone, Poors Manual of Railway Statistics, 243 00:18:55.480 --> 00:19:00.960 The Financial Chronicle, Statistical Abstract of the United States, Economics of Railroad 244 00:19:00.960 --> 00:19:06.600 Construction, History of the Erie Railroad, The Yardmaster's Assistant, such were the 245 00:19:06.600 --> 00:19:08.480 titles. 246 00:19:08.480 --> 00:19:13.080 Against the right wall, to a height of six feet, were bookshelves filled with all the 247 00:19:13.080 --> 00:19:19.960 to Contemporary Financial and Commercial Periodicals in Bound Volumes, Almanacs, Endless Books 248 00:19:19.960 --> 00:19:26.120 of Statistical Reference and the Annual Reports of Various Railway Corporations running back 249 00:19:26.120 --> 00:19:28.340 for many years. 250 00:19:28.340 --> 00:19:34.120 On top of the shelves was the only decorative thing in the room, a beautiful working model 251 00:19:34.120 --> 00:19:40.720 of a locomotive, perfect in every intricate part, mounted in brass and set upon a nickel-plated 252 00:19:40.720 --> 00:19:43.640 Section of Railway. 253 00:19:43.640 --> 00:19:48.400 One could have guessed without seeing him that the occupant of this room was restless, 254 00:19:48.400 --> 00:19:54.320 never at physical ease, and worked all over the place, sitting here and there, lying down 255 00:19:54.320 --> 00:19:56.320 and walking about. 256 00:19:56.320 --> 00:20:02.080 On the left side of the room was a couch, and close beside it at one end a Morris chair, 257 00:20:02.080 --> 00:20:04.660 a reading light between them. 258 00:20:04.660 --> 00:20:09.920 Both the couch and the chair showed nervous wear and tear, and beyond the table in the 259 00:20:09.920 --> 00:20:14.640 The clear space, the rug, had been pasted threadbare. 260 00:20:14.640 --> 00:20:19.560 Most of the available wall area was covered with maps and colored charts. 261 00:20:19.560 --> 00:20:22.040 I walked about looking at them. 262 00:20:22.040 --> 00:20:27.800 Galt removed his shoes, put on slippers, got into a ragged lounging jacket and threw himself 263 00:20:27.800 --> 00:20:34.040 on the couch, where he lay for some time watching me with the air of one who waits only to pop 264 00:20:34.040 --> 00:20:37.440 open at the slightest touch in the right place. 265 00:20:37.440 --> 00:21:00.440 What is this? I asked, staring at a large map which showed the Great Midwestern in heavy red lines, as I fairly well knew it, but with such ramified extensions in blue lines as to make it look like a gigantic double-ended animal with its body lying across the continent and its tentacles flung wide in the east and west. 266 00:21:00.440 --> 00:21:04.440 That's crystal gazing, he said. It's what? 267 00:21:04.440 --> 00:21:09.400 What may be, he said, coming off the couch with a spring. 268 00:21:09.400 --> 00:21:13.720 As he passed the table, he snatched up a ruler to point with. 269 00:21:13.720 --> 00:21:20.580 See, there was the Great Midwestern alone, all there was of it, from there to there. 270 00:21:20.580 --> 00:21:26.740 It was like a desert bridge from east to west, or, better still, like a strait connecting 271 00:21:26.740 --> 00:21:29.860 two vast oceans of freight. 272 00:21:29.860 --> 00:21:36.180 It was not so placed as to be able to originate traffic for itself, not profitably, yet that 273 00:21:36.180 --> 00:21:41.660 is what it had always been trying to do instead of attending exclusively to its own unique 274 00:21:41.660 --> 00:21:43.140 function. 275 00:21:43.140 --> 00:21:48.260 Its opportunity was to become the Dardanelles of transcontinental traffic. 276 00:21:48.260 --> 00:21:53.300 To realize its destiny, it must control traffic at both ends. 277 00:21:53.300 --> 00:21:54.300 How? 278 00:21:54.300 --> 00:22:00.360 Why, by controlling railroads east and west that developed and originated freight as a 279 00:22:00.360 --> 00:22:05.780 river gathers water by a system of branches reaching up to the springs. 280 00:22:05.780 --> 00:22:07.900 And those blue lines, see? 281 00:22:07.900 --> 00:22:14.480 They were those other roads which the Great Midwestern should control in its own interest. 282 00:22:14.480 --> 00:22:20.100 He turned to a chart ten feet long by four feet deep, hung level with the eyes on the 283 00:22:20.100 --> 00:22:21.960 opposite wall. 284 00:22:21.960 --> 00:22:27.560 The heavy black line erratically rising and falling against a background of graduated 285 00:22:27.560 --> 00:22:33.120 horizontal lines was an accurate profile of the Great Midwestern for the whole of its 286 00:22:33.120 --> 00:22:34.120 length. 287 00:22:34.120 --> 00:22:39.440 That is, a cross-section of the earth showing the configuration of its surface under the 288 00:22:39.440 --> 00:22:42.920 GM Railroad's ties and rails. 289 00:22:42.920 --> 00:22:44.920 It was unique, he said. 290 00:22:44.920 --> 00:22:49.240 Never had such a thing been done on this scale before. 291 00:22:49.240 --> 00:22:53.400 The purpose was to exhibit the grades in a graphic manner. 292 00:22:53.400 --> 00:22:57.860 There were many bad grades, each one like a hole in the pocket. 293 00:22:57.860 --> 00:22:59.960 His knowledge was minute. 294 00:22:59.960 --> 00:23:07.360 Now from here to here, he said, indicating 100 miles of profile with low grades, it costs 295 00:23:07.360 --> 00:23:12.840 half a cent to move a ton of freight one mile, and that pays. 296 00:23:12.840 --> 00:23:19.560 But from here to here, indicating a sudden rise in the next fifty miles, it costs three 297 00:23:19.560 --> 00:23:25.640 cents per tonne per mile, and all the profit made in the preceding one hundred miles is 298 00:23:25.640 --> 00:23:28.160 lost on that one grade. 299 00:23:28.160 --> 00:23:31.560 What can be done about it, I asked. 300 00:23:31.560 --> 00:23:37.360 Cut that grade down from one hundred fifty to fifty feet in the mile, he said, slicing 301 00:23:37.360 --> 00:23:46.160 It would take a lot of labor and money, wouldn't it? 302 00:23:46.160 --> 00:23:51.840 Well, what of all this unemployment, bellyache you and old bubbly jock are writing pieces 303 00:23:51.840 --> 00:23:53.680 about, he retorted. 304 00:23:53.680 --> 00:23:56.000 You say there is more labor than work. 305 00:23:56.000 --> 00:24:01.240 I'll show you more work to be done on the railroads than you can find labor in a generation 306 00:24:01.240 --> 00:24:02.240 for. 307 00:24:02.240 --> 00:24:04.920 All right, you say, but then it's the money. 308 00:24:04.920 --> 00:24:09.180 The Great Midwestern hasn't got the money to spend on that grade. 309 00:24:09.180 --> 00:24:10.180 True. 310 00:24:10.180 --> 00:24:13.980 Like all other roads with bad grades, it's hard up. 311 00:24:13.980 --> 00:24:18.120 But it could borrow the money and earn big dividends on it. 312 00:24:18.120 --> 00:24:21.840 Track leveling pays better than gold mining. 313 00:24:21.840 --> 00:24:24.400 You and Coxie ought to confer, I said. 314 00:24:24.400 --> 00:24:26.260 You are not so far apart. 315 00:24:26.260 --> 00:24:30.720 He wants the government to create work by the simple expedient of borrowing money to 316 00:24:30.720 --> 00:24:32.360 build good roads. 317 00:24:32.360 --> 00:24:37.080 And here you say the railroads, if they would borrow money to reduce their grades, might 318 00:24:37.080 --> 00:24:40.880 employ all the idle labor there is. 319 00:24:40.880 --> 00:24:45.920 He gave me a queer look, as if undecided whether to answer in earnest. 320 00:24:45.920 --> 00:24:50.360 Coxie is technically crazy, he said, and I'm technically sane. 321 00:24:50.360 --> 00:24:52.360 That may be the principal difference. 322 00:24:52.360 --> 00:24:56.000 Besides, it isn't the government's business. 323 00:24:56.000 --> 00:24:59.240 This diversion gave his thoughts a more general character. 324 00:24:59.240 --> 00:25:05.520 For three hours he walked about talking railroads, how they got built so badly in the first place, 325 00:25:05.520 --> 00:25:11.840 why so many were bankrupt, errors of policy, capital cost, upkeep, the relative merits 326 00:25:11.840 --> 00:25:17.720 of different kinds of equipment, new lines of development, problems of operation. 327 00:25:17.720 --> 00:25:20.200 For this was the stuff of his dreams. 328 00:25:20.200 --> 00:25:21.600 He devoured it. 329 00:25:21.600 --> 00:25:27.520 The idea of a railroad as a means to power filled the whole of his imagination. 330 00:25:27.520 --> 00:25:30.160 It was man's most dynamic tool. 331 00:25:30.160 --> 00:25:33.440 No one had yet imagined its possibilities. 332 00:25:33.440 --> 00:25:35.200 He became romantic. 333 00:25:35.200 --> 00:25:39.960 His feeling for a locomotive was such as some men have for horses. 334 00:25:39.960 --> 00:25:45.360 The locomotive, he said, suddenly breaking off another thought to let that one through, 335 00:25:45.360 --> 00:25:52.080 the locomotive was more wonderful than any automotive thing God had placed on earth. 336 00:25:52.080 --> 00:25:55.280 According to the book of Job, God boasted of the horse. 337 00:25:55.280 --> 00:25:58.080 Well, look at it alongside of a locomotive. 338 00:25:59.200 --> 00:26:04.320 He never went back to finish what he was saying when the image of a locomotive interrupted his 339 00:26:04.320 --> 00:26:10.480 thought. Instead, he became absent and began to look slowly about the room as if he had lost 340 00:26:10.480 --> 00:26:16.720 something. I understood what had happened. He was seized with the premonition of an idea. 341 00:26:16.720 --> 00:26:23.840 He felt it before he could see it. It had to be helped out of the fog. I made gestures of going, 342 00:26:23.840 --> 00:26:37.800 2. 343 00:26:37.800 --> 00:26:39.700 He did not come down with me. 344 00:26:39.700 --> 00:26:42.900 He did not even come to the door of his own room. 345 00:26:42.900 --> 00:26:45.840 As I closed it, I saw his back. 346 00:26:45.840 --> 00:26:51.460 He was leaning over the table in a humped posture, his head sideways and his left hand 347 00:26:51.460 --> 00:26:55.940 Writing or ciphering rapidly on a sheet of yellow paper. 348 00:26:55.940 --> 00:27:00.380 Good for the rest of the night, I thought, as I went down the dimly lighted stairs, got 349 00:27:00.380 --> 00:27:04.580 my things, and let myself into the vestibule. 350 00:27:04.580 --> 00:27:10.020 The inner door came too behind me with a bang, because the outer door was partly open and 351 00:27:10.020 --> 00:27:12.940 a strong draft swept through. 352 00:27:12.940 --> 00:27:18.180 At the same instant I became aware of a woman's figure in the darkness of the vestibule. 353 00:27:18.180 --> 00:27:24.180 She was dry, therefore she could not be just coming in, for a cold rain was falling. 354 00:27:24.180 --> 00:27:28.880 And if she had just come out, why hadn't I seen her in the hallway? 355 00:27:28.880 --> 00:27:31.900 But why was I obliged to account for her at all? 356 00:27:31.900 --> 00:27:33.640 It was unimportant. 357 00:27:33.640 --> 00:27:37.500 Probably she had been hesitating to take the plunge into the nasty night. 358 00:27:37.500 --> 00:27:39.700 I felt rather silly. 359 00:27:39.700 --> 00:27:45.060 First I had been startled and then I had hesitated, and now it was impossible to speak in a natural 360 00:27:45.060 --> 00:27:46.060 manner. 361 00:27:46.060 --> 00:27:49.100 My impulse was to bolt it in silence. 362 00:27:49.100 --> 00:27:55.220 Then to my surprise she moved ahead of me, stood outside, and handed me her umbrella. 363 00:27:55.220 --> 00:27:57.480 I raised it and held it over her. 364 00:27:57.480 --> 00:27:59.340 We descended the steps together. 365 00:27:59.340 --> 00:28:02.620 I'm going toward Fifth Avenue, I said. 366 00:28:02.620 --> 00:28:07.140 She turned with me in that direction, saying, I was waiting for you. 367 00:28:07.140 --> 00:28:08.460 You are Vera? 368 00:28:08.460 --> 00:28:09.460 Yes. 369 00:28:09.460 --> 00:28:11.700 The ferryboat girl, I added. 370 00:28:11.700 --> 00:28:12.700 The what? 371 00:28:12.700 --> 00:28:13.700 Nothing. 372 00:28:13.700 --> 00:28:14.700 Go on. 373 00:28:14.700 --> 00:28:19.100 She did not answer immediately. 374 00:28:19.100 --> 00:28:24.340 We walked in silence to the next light, where she turned and gave me a frankly inquisitive 375 00:28:24.340 --> 00:28:25.340 look. 376 00:28:25.340 --> 00:28:30.460 Oh, she said, oh what, said I, you don't remember me? 377 00:28:30.460 --> 00:28:34.740 Nothing, she answered, giving me a second look, glance-wise. 378 00:28:34.740 --> 00:28:38.060 Two nothings make it even, she added. 379 00:28:38.060 --> 00:28:40.220 There was an awkward pause. 380 00:28:40.220 --> 00:28:41.760 May I ask you something? 381 00:28:41.760 --> 00:28:45.760 You are with the Great Midwestern, in Mr. Valentine's office? 382 00:28:45.760 --> 00:28:46.760 Yes. 383 00:28:46.760 --> 00:28:49.200 I have no one else to ask, she said. 384 00:28:49.200 --> 00:28:50.900 You will be surprised. 385 00:28:50.900 --> 00:28:51.940 It is this. 386 00:28:51.940 --> 00:28:56.060 Do you think Great Midwestern stock a good investment? 387 00:28:56.060 --> 00:28:58.580 I was angry and uncomfortable. 388 00:28:58.580 --> 00:29:00.540 Why was she asking me? 389 00:29:00.540 --> 00:29:02.000 But she wasn't really. 390 00:29:02.000 --> 00:29:04.520 She was coming at something else. 391 00:29:04.520 --> 00:29:09.420 I haven't any opinion, I said, and that isn't what you mean. 392 00:29:09.420 --> 00:29:14.260 We were now in Fifth Avenue and had stopped in the doorway of a lighted shop to be out 393 00:29:14.260 --> 00:29:15.980 of the rain. 394 00:29:15.980 --> 00:29:20.460 She blushed at my answer and at the same time gave me a look of scrutiny. 395 00:29:20.460 --> 00:29:23.420 I had to admire the way she held to her purpose. 396 00:29:23.420 --> 00:29:28.460 I am very anxious to know what Mr. Valentine's opinion is, she said. 397 00:29:28.460 --> 00:29:30.500 That's better, I replied. 398 00:29:30.500 --> 00:29:32.940 But why should you want even his opinion? 399 00:29:32.940 --> 00:29:36.380 Your father knows more about grade Midwestern than its president. 400 00:29:36.380 --> 00:29:38.300 More than any other one person. 401 00:29:38.300 --> 00:29:41.300 Why Not Get His Opinion 402 00:29:41.300 --> 00:29:47.620 Until that moment she had perfectly disguised a state of anxiety verging upon hysteria. 403 00:29:47.620 --> 00:29:50.780 Suddenly her powers of self-repression failed. 404 00:29:50.780 --> 00:29:54.280 My reference to her father caused the strings to snap. 405 00:29:54.280 --> 00:29:57.740 Her expression changed as if a mask had fallen. 406 00:29:57.740 --> 00:30:02.340 The grief muscles all at once relaxed and the pretty frown they had been holding in 407 00:30:02.340 --> 00:30:04.280 the forehead disappeared. 408 00:30:04.280 --> 00:30:05.780 Her eyes flamed. 409 00:30:05.780 --> 00:30:10.220 Her upper lip retracted on one side, showing the canine tooth. 410 00:30:10.220 --> 00:30:15.540 Her giving way to strong emotion in this manner was a kind of pagan revelation. 411 00:30:15.540 --> 00:30:19.380 It did not in the least distort her beauty, but made it terrible. 412 00:30:19.380 --> 00:30:25.180 This, as I learned in time, was the only one of her effects of which she was altogether 413 00:30:25.180 --> 00:30:26.180 unconscious. 414 00:30:26.180 --> 00:30:29.300 We know his opinion, she said. 415 00:30:29.300 --> 00:30:31.000 We take it with our food. 416 00:30:31.000 --> 00:30:34.880 He is putting everything we have into great Midwestern stock. 417 00:30:34.880 --> 00:30:40.880 his own money, the family's money, mother's, Natalie's, grandma's, and now mine. 418 00:30:40.880 --> 00:30:41.880 Without your consent? 419 00:30:41.880 --> 00:30:44.880 I don't understand it, I said. 420 00:30:44.880 --> 00:30:47.120 The money in our family is divided. 421 00:30:47.120 --> 00:30:48.900 Each of us has a little. 422 00:30:48.900 --> 00:30:51.500 Most of it is from mother's side of the house. 423 00:30:51.500 --> 00:30:56.500 My father and grandma are trustees of a sum that will come to me from my uncle's estate 424 00:30:56.500 --> 00:30:58.460 when I am 21. 425 00:30:58.460 --> 00:31:01.320 It is enough to make me independent for life. 426 00:31:01.320 --> 00:31:04.320 They are putting that into this stock. 427 00:31:04.320 --> 00:31:08.520 Is it a proper investment for trust funds, I ask you? 428 00:31:08.520 --> 00:31:10.840 I felt I ought not to be listening. 429 00:31:10.840 --> 00:31:14.560 Still, I had not encouraged these intimate disclosures. 430 00:31:14.560 --> 00:31:19.640 She was old enough to know what she was doing, and most of all, the information was dramatically 431 00:31:19.640 --> 00:31:20.640 interesting. 432 00:31:20.640 --> 00:31:26.160 I was obliged to say that by all the rules, great Midwestern stock would not be considered 433 00:31:26.160 --> 00:31:28.760 a proper investment for trust funds. 434 00:31:28.760 --> 00:31:31.280 I've protested, she said. 435 00:31:31.280 --> 00:31:33.280 I've threatened to take steps. 436 00:31:33.280 --> 00:31:34.280 Poo! 437 00:31:34.280 --> 00:31:50.720 It may turn out well, I said. 438 00:31:50.720 --> 00:31:54.080 It isn't as if this were the first time, she continued. 439 00:31:54.080 --> 00:31:56.640 Twice he has had us on the rocks. 440 00:31:56.640 --> 00:32:02.000 Twice he has lost all our money, all that he could get his hands on in the same way, 441 00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:07.060 Getting it into a railroad that he hoped to get control of or something, and going smash 442 00:32:07.060 --> 00:32:08.800 at the end. 443 00:32:08.800 --> 00:32:14.000 Once when I was a little girl, and again three years ago, today on the train I heard two 444 00:32:14.000 --> 00:32:19.600 men talking about a receiver ship for the Great Midwestern as if it were inevitable. 445 00:32:19.600 --> 00:32:21.440 What would that mean? 446 00:32:21.440 --> 00:32:24.240 It would be very disagreeable, I said. 447 00:32:24.240 --> 00:32:27.240 That's almost the same as bankruptcy, isn't it? 448 00:32:27.240 --> 00:32:33.260 It is bankruptcy, I said, but I added that rumors just then were very wild in Wall Street 449 00:32:33.260 --> 00:32:38.500 and so false in general that the worse they were, the less they were heeded, people reacting 450 00:32:38.500 --> 00:32:42.080 to them in a disbelieving, contrary manner. 451 00:32:42.080 --> 00:32:44.280 She shook her head doubtfully. 452 00:32:44.280 --> 00:32:48.340 Are you going to tell me what Mr. Valentine's opinion is? 453 00:32:48.340 --> 00:32:51.960 He would not recommend anyone to buy the stock just now, I said. 454 00:32:51.960 --> 00:32:54.800 He makes no secret of seeing darkly. 455 00:32:54.800 --> 00:32:59.600 The Rocks again, she said, and no more legacies to save us. 456 00:32:59.600 --> 00:33:03.440 Nearly all of our rich relatives are already dead. 457 00:33:03.440 --> 00:33:05.600 The Realism of Youth 458 00:33:05.600 --> 00:33:09.720 I could not resist the opportunity to ask one question. 459 00:33:09.720 --> 00:33:14.840 I can understand your case, I said, but the others, your mother and grandmother, they 460 00:33:14.840 --> 00:33:16.060 are not helpless. 461 00:33:16.060 --> 00:33:19.840 Why do they hand over their money for these adventures in high finance? 462 00:33:19.840 --> 00:33:23.200 Or perhaps they believe in your father's star? 463 00:33:23.200 --> 00:33:28.940 No more than I believe in it, she replied. No, it isn't that. They can't help it. 464 00:33:28.940 --> 00:33:33.240 She looked at me from afar through a haze of recollections, and repeated the thought 465 00:33:33.240 --> 00:33:40.640 to herself, wondering. They cannot help it. We cannot say no. Even I cannot say it. What 466 00:33:40.640 --> 00:33:45.240 he wants, he gets. She shivered. 467 00:33:45.240 --> 00:33:47.940 Will you walk back with me, please? 468 00:33:47.940 --> 00:33:49.580 It was still raining. 469 00:33:49.580 --> 00:33:52.220 We walked all the way back in silence. 470 00:33:52.220 --> 00:33:56.940 At the step, she reached for her umbrella, said thank you, and stepped inside. 471 00:33:56.940 --> 00:33:59.540 The door closed with a slam. 472 00:33:59.540 --> 00:34:04.860 That could have been the draft again, provided the inner door stood open, which seemed very 473 00:34:04.860 --> 00:34:06.940 improbable. 474 00:34:06.940 --> 00:34:12.420 What left me furious, gave me once more that hot, humiliated feeling which resulted from 475 00:34:12.420 --> 00:34:17.060 our first encounter on the ferry boat, was the same thing again. 476 00:34:17.060 --> 00:34:22.200 She had spoken my name, she had solicited a favor, she had employed blandishments, she 477 00:34:22.200 --> 00:34:28.040 had exposed the family's closet of horrors, and all the time I might have been a person 478 00:34:28.040 --> 00:34:33.280 in a play, a non-existent giraffe, or one of Cleopatra's eunuchs.