“Wait a minute,” interrupted Captain Trouble, and aimed a shot into the mangrove thicket. “There, I think that’s one less of them.”
“He died for his faith,” whispered Bondy dreamily. “You have forcibly restrained him from devouring me. He fell for the national ideal of cannibalism. In Europe people have been devouring each other from time immemorial out of idealism. You are a decent man, Captain, but it’s quite possible that you’d devour me on behalf of any fundamental principle of navigation. I’ve lost confidence even in you.”
“You’re quite right,” the Captain grumbled. “When I look at you, I feel that I’m …”
“… a violent anti-Semite. I know. That doesn’t matter, I had myself baptized. But do you know, Captain, what’s got hold of those black idiots? The night before last they fished out of the sea a Japanese atomic torpedo. They’ve set it up over there under the coconut palms, and now they are bowing down before it. Now they have a God of their own. That’s why they must devour us.”
War-cries sounded from the mangrove thicket.
“Do you hear them?” muttered the Captain. “On my soul, I’d rather … go through the geometry examination all over again …”
“Listen,” Bondy whispered. “Couldn’t we go over to their religion? As far as I’m concerned …”
At that moment a gun boomed out from the Papeete.
The Captain uttered a low cry of joy.
XXVIII
At Seven Cottages
And while the world shook with the clash of armies, while the boundaries of States writhed to and fro like earthworms, and the whole earth was crumbling into a field of ruins, old Mrs. Blahous was peeling her potatoes in Seven Cottages, Grandfather Blahous was sitting on the doorstep smoking beech-leaves, and their neighbour, Mrs. Prouzova, was leaning on the fence, repeating meditatively, “Yes, yes.”
“Aye, yes,” returned Blahous after a while.
“My word, yes,” observed Mrs. Blahous.
“That’s how ’tis,” Mrs. Prouzova answered.
“Oh, what’s the use?” said Grandfather Blahous.
“Yes, that’s it,” added Mrs. Blahous, peeling another potato.
“They say the Italians got a good hiding,” Blahous announced.
“Who from?”
“From the Turks, I expect.”
“Then I suppose that’ll be the end of the war?”
“What d’you mean? The Prussians’ll start off now.”
“What, against us?”
“Against the French, they say.”
“Good heavens above, everything will be dear again.”
“Yes, yes.”
“Aye, yes.”
“What’s the use?”
“They say that the Swiss wrote not long ago that the others might give it up soon.”
“That’s what I say.”
“Yes. Why, the day before yesterday I paid fifteen hundred crowns for a candle. I tell you, Blahous, it was one of those miserable things only fit for the stable.”
“And you mean to say it cost you fifteen hundred?”
“Not far off. There’s a rise for you, friends!”
“Aye, yes.”
“My word, yes.”
“Who’d ever have thought it? Fifteen hundred!”
“You could get a fine candle for two hundred at one time.”
“Yes, auntie, but that’s years ago. Why, even an egg only cost five hundred in those days.”
“And you could get a pound of butter for three thousand.”
“And lovely butter, too!”
“And boots for eight thousand.”
“Yes, yes, Mrs. Blahous, things were cheap in those days.”
“But now—”
“Yes, yes.”
“If only it was all over and done with!”
There was silence. Old Blahous rose, straightened his back, and went into the yard for a wisp of straw.
“Oh, what’s the use?” he said, unscrewing the head of his pipe in order to pull the straw through.
“It wasn’t half smelling before,” remarked Mrs. Blahous, full of interest.
“Smelling,” said Blahous, nodding.
“How can it help smelling? There’s no tobacco left in the world now. The last packet I had was the one my son the Professor sent me—let me see, that was in ’49, wasn’t it?”
“That was just four years ago come Easter.”
“So ’twas,” said Grandfather Blahous. “We’re getting an old man now. Very, very old.”
“And what I want to know,” began Mrs. Prouzova, “is what’s all this awful to-do about nowadays?”
“What to-do?”
“Well, this war, I mean.”
“Aye, yes, Heaven knows what it’s about,” said Blahous, blowing down his pipe until it gurgled. “That’s what nobody knows, aunt. They say it’s about religion—that’s what they tell me.”
“What sort of religion?”
“Oh, ours or the Swiss—nobody knows which. It’s so as there’ll be only one religion, they say.”
“Well, we used to have only one religion before.”
“But other places had a different one, aunt. They say there was orders from above that there must be only one.”
“What sort of orders? Where from?”
“Nobody knows. They say there were once machines that had religion inside them. It was hidden in a sort of long boiler.”
“And what were the boilers for?”
“Nobody knows. Just a sort of boilers. And they say that God appeared to people to make them believe. There was a lot in those days, aunt, that didn’t believe. One has to believe in something; what’s the use? If people had only believed, God wouldn’t have appeared to them. So it was only their godlessness that made Him come into the world, see, aunt?”
“Well, yes, but what did this awful war begin for?”
“Nobody knows. People say that the Chinese or the Turks began it. They say that they brought their own God with them in those boilers. They’re supposed to be terrible religious, the Turks and the Chinese. And so they wanted us to believe the way they did.”
“But why should we?”
“That’s it, nobody knows. If you ask me, the Prussians started it. And the Swedes, too.”
“Lord, Lord!” lamented Mrs. Prouzova. “And the
