- Franz next feels rage. He wishes, like Stalin's son, to throw himself at the border, to go out in a blaze of gunfire.
- Franz is having trouble reconciling the glory of the Grand March with the vanity of its members, like the actress who fights to be up front.
- He wants to prove, with a glorious death, that the Grand March is worth everything.
- But man can never prove anything like this, says the narrator. The death of Stalin's son proved that the scales can't be tipped.
- Instead of getting himself shot, Franz returns to the busses with the others.