He led the way through a narrow court and entered a large, dimly-lighted room. Blank white walls stared at them. Von Stinnes picked out a table in a corner and ordered two flasks of wine from a stout woman with a large wooden ring of keys at her black waist. They drank in silence. Dorn observed an unusual air about his friend. He thought of Mathilde's suspicions, and smiled. Yet there was something inexplicable about von Stinnes. There had been from the first. "Inexplicable because he is ... nothing," Dorn thought. "A chevalier of excitements, a Don Quixote of disillusion...." "You are thinking of me," the baron smiled over his wine-glass, "as I am thinking of you. Here's to our unimportant healths, Erik." Dorn swallowed more wine. To be called Erik by his friend pleased him. He looked inquiringly at the humorous eyes of the man, and spoke: "You are cut after my pattern." The Baron nodded. "Only I have had more opportunities to exercise the pattern," he replied. "For the pattern, dear friend, is scoundrelism. And I, God bless me ..." He paused and gestured as if in a hopelessness of words. "There is quality as well as quantity in scoundrelism," Dorn suggested. He was thinking without emotion of Anna. "I have decided to remain in Munich," von Stinnes spoke, "and that means that I will die here." "The day's melodrama has gone to your head," Dorn laughed. "No. There are people in Munich who know me quite well--too well. And among their virtues they number a desire for my death. In Berlin it is otherwise. Then too, this business of to-day can't last. It is already topheavy with thinkers, and will eventually evaporate in a dozen executions. It may come back, though. I cannot forget the workingmen who stormed the Banhoff." He paused and drank. "Yes, I have decided to stay and play awhile. There will be a few weeks more. One will find extravagant diversions in Munich during the next few weeks. I am already Egelhofer's right-hand man. I will organize the Soviet army, assist in the conduct of the government, try to buy coal from Rathenau in Berlin, make speeches, compose earth-shaking proclamations, and end up smoking a cigarette in front of a Noske firing-squad.... Do not interrupt. I feel it is a program I owe to humanity. And in addition, I am growing weary of myself." Dorn shook his head. "Romantics, friend. I do not argue against them." "I wonder," von Stinnes continued, "if you realize I am a scoundrel. I have thought at times that you did, because of the way you smile when I talk." "Scoundrels are creatures I do not like. And I like you. Ergo, you are not a scoundrel, von Stinnes." The Baron laughed.