by Ayn Rand
“Why, Mr. Barnes,” I answered calmly, “I don’t think there could be any mistake: I am divorced, just today.”
“But . . . but . . . but is it really your fault? Are you really guilty?”
“Well, if you call it guilty . . . I love Gerald Gray, that’s all.”
His face grew red, purple, then white. He could not speak for some long minutes. “You . . . you don’t love your husband?” he muttered at last.
“Henry Stafford, you mean? He is not my husband any longer. . . . No, I don’t love him.”
“Irene . . .” He tried to speak calmly and there was a strange solemn strength in his voice. “Irene, it is not true. I will tell everybody that you could not have done it.”
“I’m no saint.”
He stepped back and his grayish old head shook piteously. “Irene,” he said again, and there was almost a plea in his voice, “you could not have traded a man like your husband for that silly snob.”
“I did.”
“You, Irene, you? I cannot believe it!”
“Don’t. Who cares?”
This was too much. He raised his head. “Then,” he said slowly, “I have nothing more to say. . . . Farewell, Irene.”
“Bye-bye!” I answered with an indifferent insolence.
I looked through the window, when he was going away. His poor old figure seemed more bent and heavy than ever. “Farewell, Mr. Barnes,” I whispered. “Farewell . . . and forgive me.”
That night, the last night I spent in my home, I awoke very late. When all was silent in the house, I went noiselessly downstairs. I thought that I could not say farewell to Henry, tomorrow, and I wanted to say it. I cautiously opened the bedroom door: he was sleeping. I entered. I raised slightly the window curtain, to see him. I stood by his bed, that had been mine also. I looked at him. His face was calm and serene. The dark lashes of his closed eyes were immobile on his cheeks. His beautiful lips seemed carved of marble on his face, pale in the darkness. I did not dare to touch him. I put my hand slowly and cautiously on the pillow, near his head.
Then I knelt down, by the bed. I could not kiss his lips; it would have awakened him. I took his hand cautiously and pressed it to my lips. “Henry,” I whispered, “you shall never know. And you must not know. Be happy, very happy. . . . And I shall go through life with one thing, one right only left to me: the right to say that I loved you, Henry . . . and the right to love you . . . till the end.” I kissed his hand with a long, long kiss.
Then I arose, closed the curtain, and went out.
It was a cold, gray day, the next and the last. There was a little chilly rain sometimes, and a wind that carried gray smoky clouds in the sky.
The train was leaving our town at ten-fifteen P.M. Mr. Gray called me in the morning. He was radiant with joy. He wanted to come in the evening to bring me to the station. I refused. “Wait for me there,” I said shortly. “I shall come myself.”
It was already dark and I sat in my room waiting. Waiting with such a despair that it astonished me, for I thought that I was unable to feel anything now. I waited for Henry. He was not at home. He must have gone to Claire, to spend with her the first day of his freedom. I could not say farewell to him, no; but I wanted to take a last look at him, the last one before going forever. And he was not there. . . . I sat by the window. It was cold, but I opened it. I watched the street. The roofs and pavement were wet and glittering. There were few passersby that walked rarely, with a nervous hurry, lonely, hopeless shadows in glittering raincoats. . . .
It was nine-thirty. Henry had not come.
I closed the window and took a little bag. I had not much to pack. I put some linen in it and one dress—my wedding dress, with the veil; I put in Henry’s photograph. It was all I took with me.
When I was closing the bag, I heard a key turn in the entrance door and footsteps, his footsteps. He had come!
I put on my hat and overcoat, took my bag. “I shall pass through the hall and open the door of his study a little. He will not notice and I shall take a look, just one look,” I thought.
I went downstairs. I entered the hall and opened his door: the study was empty; he was not there. I took a deep breath and walked to the entrance door. I put my hand on the knob.
“Irene, are you not going to say farewell to me?” I turned. It was Henry. His voice was calm and sad.
I was so stricken that I almost lost all my self-possession in the first second. “Yes . . . yes . . .” I muttered incoherently.
We entered his study. There was a fire in the fireplace. He looked at me with his dark eyes, and they were very clear and very sad.
“We are parting forever, perhaps, Irene,” he said, “and we had meant much to one another.”
I nodded. My voice would have betrayed me, if I spoke.
“I cannot blame or judge you, Irene. . . . That evening, in the restaurant, it was a sudden madness, perhaps, that you did not realize yourself. . . . I do not think you are really the woman you were then.”
“No, Henry . . . perhaps not.” I could not help whispering.
“You are not. I shall always think of you as the woman I loved.” He paused. I had never seen him so quiet and hopeless.
“Life goes on,” he continued. “I shall marry another woman and you—another man. . . . And everything is over.” He took my hands in his and there was a sudden light in his eyes when he said: “But we were so happy, Irene!”
“Yes, Henry, we were,” I answered firmly and calmly.
“Did you love me then, Irene?”
“I did, Henry.”
“That time has gone. . . . But I could never forget you, Irene. I cannot. I shall think about you.”
“Yes, Henry, think about me . . . sometimes.”
“You will be happy, Irene, won’t you? I want you to be happy.”
“I will be, Henry.”
“I will be also. . . . Maybe even as happy as I was with you. . . . But we cannot look behind now. One has to go on. . . . Will you think about me a little, Irene?”
“I will, Henry.”
His eyes were dark and there was a deep sorrow in them. I raised my head. I put my hand on his shoulder. I spoke with a great calm, with a majesty, perhaps, to which I had the right now.
“Henry, you must be happy, and strong, and glorious. Leave suffering to those that cannot help it. You must smile at life. . . . And never think about those that cannot. They are not worthwhile.”
“Yes . . . you are right. . . . Everything finished well. It could have broken the life of one of us. I am so happy it did not!”
“Yes, Henry, it did not. . . .”
We were silent. Then he said: “Farewell, Irene. . . . We shall never meet on this earth again. . . .”
“Life is not so long, Henry.” I trembled when I said this, but happily he did not understand. “Who knows?” I added quickly. “We shall meet, perhaps . . . when we are sixty.”
He smiled. “Yes, perhaps . . . and then we shall laugh at all this.”
“Yes, Henry, we shall laugh. . . .”
He bent his head and kissed my hand. “Go now,” he whispered, and added, in a very low voice: “You were the greatest thing in my life, Irene.” He raised his head and looking into my eyes: “Will you not say something to me . . . for the last time?” he asked.
I looked straight into his eyes. All my soul was in my answer: “I loved you, Henry.”
He kissed my hand again. His voice was a very faint whisper when he said: “I shall be happy. But there are moments when I wish I would never have met that woman. . . . There is nothing to do. . . . Life is hard, sometimes, Irene.”
“Yes, Henry,” I answered.
He took me in his arms and kissed me. His lips were on mine; my arms—around his neck. It was for the last time, but it was. And no one can deprive me of it now.
He went with me outside. I called a taxi and entered it. I looked through the window: he was standing on the steps. The wind blew his hair and he was immobile
like a statue. It was the last time I ever saw him.
I closed my eyes and when I opened them—the taxi was stopped before the station. I paid the driver, took my bag, and went to the train.
Gerald Gray was waiting for me. He had a brilliant traveling costume, a radiant smile, and a gigantic bouquet of flowers, which he presented to me. We entered the car.
At ten-fifteen there was a crackling, metallic sound, the wheels turned, the car shook and moved. The pillars of the station slipped faster and faster beyond us, then some lanterns, on corners of the dark streets, some lights in the windows. And the town remained behind us. . . . The wheels were knocking quickly and regularly.
We were alone in our part of the car. Mr. Gray looked at me and smiled. Then he smiled again, as though to make me smile in answer. I sat motionless. “We are free and alone at last,” he whispered and tried to put his arm around me. I moved from him.
“Wait, Mr. Gray,” I said coldly. “We shall have time enough for that.”
“What is the matter with you, Mrs. Stafford . . . Miss Wilmer, I mean?” he muttered. “You are so pale!”
“Nothing,” I answered. “I am a little tired.”
For two hours we sat, silent and motionless. There was nothing but the noise of the wheels around us.
After two hours’ ride, there was the first station. I took my bag and rose. “Where are you going?” asked Mr. Gray, surprised. Without answer, I left the train. I approached the open window of the car where he sat looking at me anxiously, and I said slowly: “Listen, Mr. Gray: there is a millionaire in San Francisco waiting for me. You were only a means to get rid of my husband. I thank you. And don’t ever say a word about this to anybody—they will laugh at you terribly.”
He was stricken, furious and disappointed, oh, terribly disappointed. But as a perfect gentleman, he did not show it. “I am happy to have rendered you that service,” he said courteously. The train moved at this moment. He took off his hat, with the most gracious politeness.
I remained alone on the little platform. There was an immense black sky around me, with slow, heavy clouds. There was an old fence and a wretched tree, with some last, wet leaves. . . . I saw a dim light in the little window of the ticket office.
I had not much money, only what was left in my pocketbook. I approached the lighted window. “Give me a ticket, please,” I said, handing over all my money, with nickels and pennies, all.
“To which station?” asked the employee shortly.
“To . . . to . . . That is all the same,” I answered.
He looked at me and even moved a little back. “Say . . .” he began.
“Give me to the end of the line,” I said. He handed me a ticket and pushed back some of my money. I moved from the window, and he followed me with a strange look.
“I shall get out at some station or other,” I thought. A train stopped at the platform and I went in. I sat down at a window. Then I moved no more.
I remember it was dark beyond the window, then light, then dark again. I must have traveled more than twenty-four hours. Perhaps. I don’t know.
It was dark when I remembered that I must alight at some station. The train stopped and I got out. On the platform I saw that it was night. I wanted to return to the car. But the train moved and disappeared into the darkness. I remained.
There was nobody on the wet wooden platform. I saw only a sleepy employee, a dim lantern, and a dog rolled under a bench, to protect himself from the rain. I saw some little wooden houses beyond the station, and a narrow street. The rails glittered faintly and there was a poor little red lantern in the distance.
I looked at the clock: it was three A.M. I sat on the bench and waited for the morning.
All was finished. . . . I had done my work. . . . Life was over. . . .
I live in that town now. I am an employee in a department store and I work from nine to seven. I have a little flat—two rooms—in a poor, small house, and a separate staircase—nobody notices me when I go out or return home.
I have no acquaintances whatever. I work exactly and carefully. I never speak. My fellow workers hardly know my name. My landlady sees me once a month, when I pay my rent.
I never think when I work. When I come home—I eat and I sleep. That is all.
I never cry. When I look into a looking glass—I see a pale face, with eyes that are a little too big for it; and with the greatest calm, the greatest quietness, the deepest silence in the world.
I am always alone in my two rooms. Henry’s picture stands on my table. He has a cheerful smile: a little haughty, a little mocking, very gay. There is an inscription: “To my Irene—Henry—Forever.” When I am tired, I kneel before the table and I look at him.
People say that time rubs off everything. This law was not for me. Years have passed. I loved Henry Stafford. I love him. He is happy now—I gave him his happiness. That is all.
They were right, perhaps, those who said that I bought my husband. I bought his life. I bought his happiness. I paid with everything I had. I love him. . . . If I could live life again—I would live it just as I did. . . .
Women, girls, everyone that shall hear me, listen to this: don’t love somebody beyond limits and consciousness. Try to have always some other aim or duty. Don’t love beyond your very soul . . . if you can. I cannot.
One has to live as long as one is not dead. I live on. But I know that it will not be long now. I feel that the end is approaching. I am not ill. But I know that my strength is going and that life simply and softly is dying away in me. It has burned out. It is well.
I am not afraid and I am not sorry. There is only one thing more that I dare to ask from life: I want to see Henry once again. I want to have one look more, before the end, at him that has been my whole life. Just one look only. That is all I ask.
I cannot return to our town, for I will be seen and recognized at once. I wait and I hope. I hope hopelessly. There is not much time left. When I walk in the street—I look at every face around me, searching for him. When I come home—I say to his picture: “It is not today, Henry. . . . But it will be tomorrow, perhaps. . . .”
Shall I see him again? I tell myself that I shall. I know that I shall not. . . .
Now I have written my story. I gathered all my courage and I wrote it. If he reads it—he will not be unhappy. But he will understand all. . . .
And then, perhaps, after reading it, he will . . . oh, no! not come to see me, he will understand that he must not do it . . . he will just pass by me in the street, seeming not to notice me, so that I might see him once again, once more . . . and for the last time.
The Night King
c. 1926
Editor’s Preface
This story represents the writing of the very early Ayn Rand. She wrote the story, probably in 1926, while living at the Hollywood Studio Club. She was still learning English—especially the use of American slang and how to re-create the same on the printed page.
“The Night King” clearly reflects her admiration of O. Henry. (See Leonard Peikoff’s preface to “Escort.”)
This story is being published here with minimal editing in order accurately to convey her literary and linguistic starting point, and thus her development as a writer both of fiction and of English in the ensuing years.
—R.E.R.
The Night King
That one was to be the best crime I ever pulled off, if I say so myself, it was to be a masterpiece. And a masterpiece it was, all right, but every time I think of it my blood boils with fury and I wonder if I’m not going to be a murderer instead of a mild, harmless hold-up man.
Some people may be so heartless as to feel a certain lack of respect for me, when they hear of this memorable affair. But I defy anyone to tell me that he would have acted differently, that he would have been able to act differently in this strange case.
I’m not an average crook and my mind is the best in the business. I sacrificed two years of my valuable life to that one job. Believe it
or not, for two whole years I was as straight as a telegraph pole and earned my modest living by holding the honorable, respectable position of a valet. The cops back in Chicago would never believe that of me, Steve Hawkins, the great Steve Hawkins who used to pull stick-up jobs faster than the crime reporters could write down in short-hand. Me—to become a valet! Yet that’s just what I had been doing—for two years. For, you see, I was after the most precious thing and against the most dangerous man in New York.
The thing was the Night King; the man—Winton Stokes.
Winton Stokes had a nasty smile, sixteen million dollars and no fear whatsoever.
He also had the Night King.
He was one of those wealthy loafers that spend their lives looking for danger and never getting enough of it. Big-game hunting, aviation, jungle-exploring, mountain-peak climbing—there wasn’t a thing that man hadn’t had time to do in the thirty-four years of his life. And he always took a particular pleasure in doing the things that would shock people, that nobody could expect or think of. Some brain, too! The keenest, sharpest and, damn it!, queerest brain I ever came across. I often thought it was too bad he was born a millionaire, for he would have made a perfect crook—just the type for it.
His smile? I hated it. I hated almost everything about him: his slow, soft movements that looked as though his bones were of velvet, and with it his tanned skin that looked as though his body were of bronze; and then, his grey eyes, the eyes of a tamed tiger, that you weren’t so sure whether it’s tamed or not. But his smile was the worst of all. He always had it when he looked at people—just two little wrinkles in the corners of his mouth, which seemed to say you were terribly funny, but that he was too polite to laugh.
The Night King was a black diamond; one of those perfect gems that have a world-renown, and their owners—a world-envy. A marvelous stone, famous like a movie star, but different from one in that it never had a double.