Chapter XXX
The End of Everything
Many years went by. Brych the stoker, now the proprietor of a locksmith's business, was sitting in the Damohorsky tavern, reading a copy of the People's Journal.
"The liver sausages will be ready in a minute," announced the landlord, emerging from the kitchen. And bless me if it wasn't old Jan Binder, who used to own the merry-go-round. He had grown fat and no longer wore his striped jersey; nevertheless it was he!
"There's no hurry," Mr. Brych answered slowly. "Father Jost hasn't turned up yet. Nor Rejzek either."
"And—how is Mr. Kuzenda getting along?" Jan Binder inquired.
"Oh, well, you know. He's not very grand. He's one of the best men breathing, Mr. Binder."
"He is, indeed," assented the innkeeper. "I don't know . . . Mr. Brych . . . what about taking him a few liver saugages with my compliments? They're first class, Mr. Brych, and if you'd be so kind . . ."
"Why, with pleasure, Mr. Binder. He'll be delighted to think you remember him. Of course I will. With pleasure!"
"Praise be the Lord!" came a voice from the doorway, and Canon Jost stepped into the room, his cheeks ruddy with the cold, and hung up his hat and fur coat.
"Good evening, your Reverence," responded Mr. Brych. "We've waited for you—we've waited."
Father Jost pursed his lips contentedly and rubbed his stiffened hands. "Well, sir, what's in the papers, what have they got to say to-day?"
"I was just reading this: 'The President of the Republic has appointed that youthful savant, Dr. Blahous, Lecturer at the University, to be Assistant Professor.' You remember, Canon, it's that Blahous who once wrote an article about Mr. Kuzenda."
"Aha, aha," said Father Jost, wiping his little spectacles. "I know, I know, the atheist. They are a lot of infidels at the University. And you're another, Mr. Brych."
"Come, his Reverence will pray for us, I know," said Mr. Binder. "He'll want us in heaven to make up the card-party. Well, your Reverence, two and one?"
"Yes, of course, two and one."
Mr. Binder opened the kitchen door and shouted:
"Two liver sausages and one blood-sausage."
"'Evening!" growled Rejzek, the journalist, entering the room. "It's cold, friends."
"It's a very pleasant evening," chirped Mr. Binder. "We don't get company like this every day."
"Well, what's the news?" inquired Father Jost gaily. "What's going on in the editorial sanctum? Ah, yes, I used to write for the papers myself in my young days."
"By the way, that fellow Blahous mentioned me in the paper too that time," said Mr. Brych. "I've still go the cutting somewhere: 'The Apostle of Kuzenda's Sect,' or something like that, he called me. Yes, yes, those were the days!"
"Let's have supper," ordered Mr. Rejzek. Mr. Binder and his daughter were already setting sausages on the table. They were still sizzling, covered with frothing bubbles of fat, and they reclined upon crisp sauerkraut like Turkish odalisques on cushions. Father Jost clicked his tongue resoundingly and cut into the first beauty before him.
"Splendid," said Mr. Brych after a while.
"Mhm," came from Mr. Rejzek after a lengthier interval.
"Binder, these do you credit," said the Canon approvingly.
A silence ensued, full of appreciation and pious meditations.
"Allspice," contributed Mr. Brych. "I love the smell of it."
"But it mustn't be too much in evidence."
"No, this is just as it should be."
"And the skin must be just crisp enough."
"Mhm." And again conversation ceased for a space.
"And the sauerkraut must be nice and white."
"In Moravia," said Mr. Brych, "they make the sauerkraut like a sort of porridge. I was there as an apprentice. It's quite runny."
"Oh, come," exclaimed Father Jost. "Sauerkraut has to be strained. Don't talk such nonsense. Why, the stuff wouldn't be fit to eat."
"Well, there you are . . . they do eat it that way down there. With spoons."
"Horrible!" cried the Canon, marvelling. "What extraordinary people they must be, friends! Why, sauerkraut should only just be greased, shouldn't it, Mr. Binder? I don't understand how anyone could have it any other way."
"Well, you know," said Mr. Brych meditatively, "it's just the same with sauerkraut as it is with religion. One man can't understand how another can believe anything different."
"Oh, enough of that!" protested Father Jost. "Why, I'd sooner believe in Mahomet than eat sauerkraut made any other way. After all, reason teaches one that sauerkraut ought only to be greased."
"And don't reason teach one one's religion."
"Our religion, certainly," said the Canon decisively. "But the others are not based on reason."
"Now we've got back again to just where we were before the war," sighed Mr. Brych.
"People are always getting back just where they used to be," observed Mr. Binder. "That's what Mr. Kuzenda is always saying. 'Binder,' he often says, 'the truth can never be defeated. You know, Binder,' he says, 'that God of ours on the dredge in those days wasn't so bad, nor was yours on the merry-go-round, and yet, you see, they've both of them vanished. Everyone believes in his own superior God, but he doesn't believe in another man, or credit him with believing in something good. People should first of all believe in other people, and the rest would soon follow.' That's what Mr. Kuzenda always says."
"Yes, yes," assented Mr. Brych. "A man may certainly think that another religion is a bad one, but he oughtn't to think that the man who follows it is a low, vile, and treacherous fellow. And the same applies to politics and everything."
"And that's what so many people have hated and killed each other for," Father Jost declared. "You know, the greater the things are in which a man believes, the more fiercely he despises those who do not believe in them. And yet the greatest of all beliefs would be belief in one's fellow-men."
"Everyone has the best of feelings towards mankind in general, but not towards the individual man. We'll kill men, but we want to save mankind. And that isn't right, your Reverence. The world will be an evil place as long as people don't believe in other people."
"Mr. Binder," said Father Jost thoughtfully, "I wonder if you would make me some of that Moravian sauerkraut to-morrow. I'd like to try it."
"It has to be partly stewed and then steamed, and done like that with a fried sausage it's very good. Every religion and every truth has something good in it, if it's only the fact that it suits somebody else."
The door was opened from outside, and a policeman stepped in. He was chilled to the bone and wanted a glass of rum.
"Ah, it's you, is it, Sergeant Hruska," said Brych. "Well now, where have you come from?"
"Oh, we've been up in Zizkov," answered the policeman, pulling off his enormous gloves. "There was a raid on."
"What did you catch?"
"Oh, a couple of roughs, and a few undesirables. And then at number 1006—in the cellar of the house, I mean—there was a den."
"What sort of den?" inquired Mr. Rejzek.
"A Karburator den, sir. They had set up a tiny Karburator down there out of an old pre-war motor. A very low crowd has been going down there and holding orgies."
"What kind of orgies do you mean?"
"Oh, disorderly behaviour. They pray and sing and have visions and prophesy and perform miracles, and all that sort of business."
"And isn't that allowed?"
"No, it's forbidden by the police. You see, it's something like those dens where they smoke opium. We found one of them in the Old Town. We've routed out seven of these Karburator caverns already. An awful gang used to collect there: vagrants, loose women, and other doubtful characters. That's why it's forbidden. It's a breach of the peace."
"And are there many haunts of this kind?"
"Not now. I think this one was the last of the Karburators."