" (what a liar I am!)
Then I assumed my best poker face and calmly continued:
"I don't know, and do not care to know, what you are after, Frank.
Personally--I cannot find anything in the old regime that I would
regret to any important extent. On the other hand--I honestly do
not see anything attractive, or particularly elegant, about the new
regime. Practically there is no regime whatsoever in this present
concoction of kuvaka and elevated ideas. So, finally, damn it all! I
would be grateful to a friend who would advise me how to get out of
any activity, and of course, would not consider any suggestion leading
me into it. My decision is plain. I resign. Then I realize all I can
and disappear from this rich field of political life. That's all,
Frank."
He looked at me. He was very grave. And then suddenly his face changed
and he again became the chap that amused Maroossia and myself in
Marienbad a few years ago.
"So I feel, old man, exactly so," he laughed,--"aren't all of them the
rottenest types one ever saw? Trash, my dear sir, trash. And I greet
your decision."
The tension which I felt at the beginning of the dinner disappeared
completely, and we began to talk about different things, remembering
the time when we met, and recollecting our mutual impressions of
1912-1913, when things and people seemed to be so very different. I
could not help, however, asking Frank at the end of our dinner:
"Are there any especial reasons to try and be foxy with me, or any
reasons to frighten me with mysteries?"
He answered:.
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