Page 258 - tender-is-the-night

the clinic at hand.’ Dick’s expression did not encourage this
note so Franz dropped it with the punctuation of his tongue
leaving his lip quickly. ‘We could be partners. I the execu-
tive manager, you the theoretician, the brilliant consultant
and all that. I know myself—I know I have no genius and
you have. But, in my way, I am thought very capable; I am
utterly competent at the most modern clinical methods.
Sometimes for months I have served as the practical head
of the old clinic. The professor says this plan is excellent, he
advises me to go ahead. He says he is going to live forever,
and work up to the last minute.’
Dick formed imaginary pictures of the prospect as a pre-
liminary to any exercise of judgment.
‘What’s the financial angle?’ he asked.
Franz threw up his chin, his eyebrows, the transient
wrinkles of his forehead, his hands, his elbows, his shoul-
ders; he strained up the muscles of his legs, so that the cloth
of his trousers bulged, pushed up his heart into his throat
and his voice into the roof of his mouth.
‘There we have it! Money!’ he bewailed. ‘I have little
money. The price in American money is two hundred thou-
sand dollars. The innovation—ary—‘ he tasted the coinage
doubtfully, ‘—steps, that you will agree are necessary, will
cost twenty thousand dollars American. But the clinic is a
gold mine—I tell you, I haven’t seen the books. For an in-
vestment of two hundred and twenty thousand dollars we
have an assured income of—‘
Baby’s curiosity was such that Dick brought her into the
conversation.

258 Tender is the Night