"That happens all too frequently also, I am afraid," Anton agreed. "It is easy to presume to speak for others; even governments who mean well do so. That is why I built the Hotel--the governments created after the war are perhaps better than the ones before, but even then they began by compromising with evil. I could not trust that they would speak for those who had no voice."

The Hotel didn't precisely take that role, but it was a place where those with no voice could go and not be judged. The only drawback was that it did mean Anton had to treat with his enemies as he did his friends, but that was a matter of self-respect more than it was politics.