"My name is Stoss."

"Mine, Von Kammacher."

"It's very good of you to keep me company. That Hahlström and his
henchman are disgusting. Though I have been an actor for twenty years,
I can't stand the sight of such weedy weaklings, who don't do anything
themselves and exploit their daughters. They have the effect of an emetic
on me. For all that, he plays the great man. He has no talent, so he is
going to boil soup from his daughter's bones. Yet he goes about nose up
in the air. If he sees a dollar in the dirt and somebody of distinction
is looking, he will let it lie. He won't pick it up. There is no denying
he has an attractive appearance. He has the stuff in him for a very
clever, fashionable swindler. But he would rather take it easy and live
off his daughter and his daughter's admirers. It's astonishing how
many people are willing to make asses of themselves. There's that
Achleitner--look at the condescension with which Hahlström treats him
and the lofty way Hahlström plays the rôle of benefactor! He used to be
a riding-master. Then he got mixed up in some quack cure, a combination
of Swedish gymnastics and hydrotherapeutics, and his wife left him, a
fine, hard-working woman, now doing splendidly as head of a department
at Worth's in Paris."

Frederick felt drawn up-stairs to Hahlström. The man's past as Stoss
described it was at that moment a matter of indifference to him. But
Stoss's remark about the asses some people are willing to make of
themselves sent a fleeting red to his face.

Arthur Stoss grew more and more communicative. He sat like an ape, a
resemblance impossible to avoid when a man uses his feet instead of his