Ives chucked one of his pennies across the table to Forster.
"Match for which of us gives the order," he said.
Forster lost.
Ives laughed and began to name liquids and viands to the waiter with the
absorbed but calm deliberation of one who was to the menu born. Forster,
listening, gave his admiring approval of the order.
"I am a man," said Ives, during the oysters, "Who has made a lifetime
search after the to-be-continued-in-our-next. I am not like the ordinary
adventurer who strikes for a coveted prize. Nor yet am I like a gambler
who knows he is either to win or lose a certain set stake. What I want
is to encounter an adventure to which I can predict no conclusion.
It is the breath of existence to me to dare Fate in its blindest
manifestations. The world has come to run so much by rote and
gravitation that you can enter upon hardly any footpath of chance in
which you do not find signboards informing you of what you may expect
at its end. I am like the clerk in the Circumlocution Office who always
complained bitterly when any one came in to ask information. 'He wanted
to _know_, you know!' was the kick he made to his fellow-clerks. Well,
I don't want to know, I don't want to reason, I don't want to guess--I
want to bet my hand without seeing it.
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