Antitrust law -- United States -- Fiction; Capitalists and financiers -- Fiction; Railroad stories
For a while they hardly dared to believe it. The habit of not being
rich is something to break. Galt’s revenge for their unbelief, past and
present, was to overwhelm them with money. First he returned to them
severally all that he had borrowed or taken from them to put into Great
Midwestern. This, he said, was not their principal back. It was the
profit. It was only the beginning of their profit. Their investments
were left whole. Presently they began to receive dividends. Besides,
he settled large sums upon them as gifts, and kept increasing them
continually.
“What shall we do with it?” asked Natalie.
“Do with it?” said Galt. “What do people do with money? Anything they
like. Spend it.”
He encouraged them to be extravagant, especially Natalie. She had a
passion for horses. He gave her a stable full on her birthday, all show
animals, one of which, handled by Natalie, took first prize in its
class at Madison Square Garden the next month. Galt, strutting about
the ring, was absurd with wonder and excitement. He wished to clap the
judge on the back. Mrs. Galt restrained him as much as she could. She
could not keep him from shouting when the ribbon was handed out. It was
more a victory for Natalie than for the horse. She was tremendously
admired. People looked at their cards to find her name, then at her
again, asking, “Who is she?”
She was nobody. In the papers the next morning her name was mentioned
and that was all, except that one paper referred to her as the daughter
of a Wall Street broker. Other girls, neither so beautiful nor so
expert as Natalie, were daintily praised.
Galt was furious. Yet he had no suspicion of what was the matter. There
was gloom in his household when he expected gaiety. His efforts to
discover the reasons were met with evasive, cryptic sentences.
“What have you been doing today?” he asked Natalie one hot June evening
at dinner.
“Nothing,” she answered.
This exchange was followed as usual by a despondent silence which
always contained an inaudible accusation of Galt. Everyone would have
denied it sweetly. He couldn’t turn it on them. He could only take it
out in irritability.
“All fuss and feathers and nothing to do,” he said. “You make me sick.
I can’t see why you don’t do what other girls do. There’s nothing
they’ve got that you can’t have. Go some place. Go to Newport. That’s
where they all go, ain’t it?”
“Papa, dear,” said Natalie, “what should we do at Newport?”
“Do! Do! How the--how do I know? Swim, dance, flirt, whatever the rest
of them do. Take a house ... make a splurge ... cut in with the crowd.
I don’t know. Your mother does. That’s her business. Ask her.”
“Oh, but you don’t understand,” said Natalie. “We’d not be taken in.
Mother does know.”
“What does that mean?” Galt asked.
“You can’t just dress up and go where you want to go,” said Natalie.
“You have to be asked. We’d look nice at Newport with a house, wouldn’t
we?”
“Go on,” said Galt, in a dazed kind of way.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account