"He didn't seem to be worrying about his own future," Abe continued, "but he seemed to think that if the old man got tried by the Allies, Mawruss, the shock would kill him."
"Many a murderer got tried by the Court of General Sessions, even, and subsequently the shock killed them, Abe," Morris said. "What is electric chairs for, anyway?"
"But he told the reporter that you wouldn't have any idea how old the old man is looking," Abe went on.
"He shouldn't take so much wood-cutting exercise," Morris said. "The first thing you know, he would injure himself for life, even if he ain't going to live long."
"Don't fool yourself, Mawruss," Abe said, "the Kaiser ain't going to die from nothing more violent than a rich, unbalanced diet, y'understand, and as for the Crown Prince, he's got it all figured out that he will return to Germany and go into the farming business, and there ain't no provided-I-beat-the-indictment about it, neither, because he knows as well as you do that the Allies would never have the nerve to try either one of them crooks."
"Nobody seems to have the nerve to do anything nowadays, except the Bolshevists, Abe," Morris said, with a sigh. "Here up to a few days ago the Bolshevist government of Russia had been running a New York office on West Forty-second Street, with gold lettering on the door, a staff of stenographers, and a private branch exchange, and the New York police didn't pay no more attention to them than if they would of been running a poolroom with a roulette-wheel in the rear office. The consequence was that when them Bolshevists finally got pulled, Abe, they beefed so terrible about how they were being prosecuted in violation of the Constitution and the Code of Civil Procedure, y'understand, that you would think the bombs which Mr. Palmer and them judges nearly got killed with was being exploded pursuant to Section 4244 of the United States Revised Statutes and the acts amendatory thereof, Abe."
"And we let them cutthroats do business yet!" Abe exclaimed.
"Well, in a way, I don't blame the Bolshevists for not knowing how to take the behavior of the American government towards them, Abe," Morris declared. "If we only had one way of treating them and stick to it, Abe, it would help people like this here ex-custom-house feller Dudley Field Malone and this ex-Red Cross feller Robins to know where they stood in the matter of Bolshevism. But when even the United States army itself don't know whether it is for the Bolshevists or against them, Abe, how could you expect this here Robins to know, either, let alone the Bolshevists?"
"But I thought this country was against Bolshevism," Abe said.
"As far as I can gather, Abe, the United States is against Bolshevism officially on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and on Saturday from nine to twelve, and it is for Admiral Kolchak on Tuesday and Thursday," Morris said. "At any rate, that's what one would think from reading the newspapers. Fiume is the same way, Abe. The United States is in favor of ceding Fiume to the Italians during three days in the week of eight working-hours each, except in the sporting five-star edition, when Fiume is going to be internationalized. However, Abe, the United States wants to be quite fair about preserving the rights of small nationalities, so we concede Fiume to the Jugo-Slobs in at least two editions of the pink evening papers and in the special magazine section of the Sunday papers."