“So much as that?” he said. “So much as that, Augustus?”
He covered his eyes for a moment with his gloved hands. Then he suddenly remembered that he had dropped his umbrella.
“It’s here,” I said, “under my foot.”
“Oh, thank you,” he said, “thank you.”
Then he held out his hands to me with frank contrition.
“Oh, my dear friend,” he said, “forgive me for misjudging you. But as your President, I could never permit it.”
“But why not?” I said, trying to release my hands.
“Why, because as President,” he cried, “it is clearly the sort of sacrifice that I ought to make myself.”
“But I don’t see why,” I said, again trying to release myself.
“But don’t you see,” he cried, still holding my hands, “how symbolic it would then become—the marriage of one of the most prominent of our younger ex-actresses with the Anti-Dramatic and Saltatory Union?”