Mr. Peikoff, a former professor of philosophy at the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn, sat on a red plush couch in the corner of the parlor and patiently answered questions. One woman said: ''The Boston study group would like to know if you will be issuing a statement about the end. Many of us are starved for news now.'' Mr. Peikoff reassured her that a memorial newsletter would be distributed.

Many of the people there greeted each other by name; they were part of a circle that met to discuss Miss Rand's ideas. Some of them said they had taken courses at the Nathaniel Branden Institute in New York, which offered courses from 1958 to 1968 on Objectivism that were taped and distributed to 70 cities. Others had met at Miss Rand's annual speech at the Ford Hall Forum in Boston, a gathering that has been termed the ''Objectivist Easter.''

As he outlined Miss Rand's philosophy of Objectivism, Mr. Peikoff sounded themes that others would repeat throughout the evening: the appeal of her fictional heroes and their championship of individualism, the significance of her defense of capitalism and the cohesiveness of her philosophical system.

Miss Rand was widely credited with influencing most of the current leaders of the libertarian movement in the United States, although she disassociated herself from libertarianism. Her advocacy of individuality, rationality and free-market capitalism are reflected to some degree in such publications as Reason and Inquiry magazines and in the opinions of some staff members at such public policy groups as the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace at Stanford University and the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research in New York.

Like others of Miss Rand's followers, Mr. Peikoff said he first read her novels as an adolescent, at a time when he was ''lost,'' searching for his values.