1

GOOD SOLDIER ŠVEJK ACTS TO INTERVENE IN
THE WORLD WAR

In addition to this occupation he was plagued by rheumatism and was just now rubbing his knees with camphor ice.

“Which Ferdinand, missis Müller?” asked Švejk, continuing to massage his knees, “I know two Ferdinands. One is the pharmacist Průša’s¹⁰ servant and he once drank up a bottle of some hair potion there by mistake, and then I also know the one Ferdinand Kokoška, who collects those dog turds. Neither one would be of any loss.”

“But merciful Sir, the lord Archduke Ferdinand, the one from Konopiště¹¹, the fat one, the pious one.”

“Jesusmaria,” yelled Švejk, “that’s good. And where did it befall him, the lord Archduke?”

“They whacked him in Sarajevo, merciful Sir, with a revolver, you know. He was riding there with that Archduchess¹² of his in an automobile.”

“There you have it, missis Müller, in an automobile. Yeah, a lord like that can afford it, and it doesn’t even cross his mind how such a ride in an automobile can have an unfortunate ending. And in Sarajevo on top of it, that’s in Bosnia, missis Müller. The Turks probably did it. In short, we shouldn’t have taken that Bosnia and Hercegovina¹³ from them. So see, missis Müller. He is then, the lord Archduke, resting in the truth of the Lord¹⁴ already. Did he suffer long?”

“The lord Archduke was done for right away, merciful Sir. They¹⁵ know that with a revolver it’s no child’s play. Not long ago, a man in our Nusle neighborhood¹⁶ was also playing with a revolver and blasted away the whole family, even the custodian, who went to take a look to see who’s shooting there on the third floor.”

“Some revolvers, missis Müller, won’t go bang, even if you were to lose your mind trying to make them. There are many such systems. But for the lord Archduke they surely bought something better, and I would also like to bet, missis Müller, that the man who did it to him, dressed nicely for it. You know, taking a shot at the lord Archduke is a very tough job. It’s not like a poacher taking a shot at the game warden. Here the problem is how to get to him, you can’t go hunting a lord like that in some rags. You have to go with a top hat on so a cop wouldn’t pinch you beforehand.”

“There were more of them, they say, merciful Sir.”

“That goes without saying, missis Müller,” said Švejk, as he finished massaging his knees, “if you wanted to kill the lord Archduke or the lord Emperor¹⁷, then you would surely consult somebody. More people means more brains. This one will advise this, that one that, and then the job will succeed, as it says in our anthem¹⁸. The main thing is to lie in wait for that moment, at which such lord is riding by. Like, if they recall that mister Lucheni¹⁹, who ran that file through our late Elizabeth²⁰. He was strolling with her. Then go trust somebody; since that time no empress goes out for a stroll. And this awaits many others. You’ll see, missis Müller, that they’ll even get to that Czar and Czarina²¹, and could be, God forbid, even lord Emperor, since they have already started it with his nephew. He has, the old man, a lot of enemies. Even more than that Ferdinand. Just like the other day a man at the pub was saying, that the time will come, that those emperors will be dropping dead, one after the other, and that even all the state prosecutors won’t be able to help. Then he didn’t have enough to cover his tab, so the pubkeeper had to get him pinched. And he slapped him across the face once and the patrolman twice. Then they drove him away in a košatinka²², so he’d come to. Yeah, missis Müller, the things that happen nowadays. It’s again a big loss for Austria. When I was in the military service, an infantryman there shot a captain dead. He loaded a rifle and went to the office. There they told him that he had no business there, but he kept insisting that he needed to talk to mister captain. That captain came out and right away slapped him with confinement to the barracks. He raised the rifle and plugged him right in the heart. The bullet flew out of the captain’s back and still managed to do damage in the office. It broke a bottle of ink, which spilled onto official documents.”

“And what happened to that soldier?” asked after a while missis Müller, as Švejk was dressing.

“He hanged himself on suspenders,” said Švejk, cleaning his bowler. “And the suspenders weren’t even his. He borrowed them from the prison guard, that his pants were falling down. Was he to wait until they shoot him dead? They know missis Müller that in a situation like that everyone’s head spins. The prison guard was demoted for it and they gave him six months. But he didn’t do all of his time. He ran off to Switzerland²³ and today he is a preacher of some church denomination there. Nowadays there are few honest people, missis Müller. I imagine that the lord Archduke Ferdinand over there in Sarajevo misjudged the man, who shot him²⁴. He saw some man and thought: There’s an upright man, since he’s chanting glory to me. And instead that mister plugged him. Did he give him one or several?”

“The newspaper writes, merciful Sir, that the lord Archduke was like a sieve. He emptied the gun and hit him with all the bullets.”

“It goes extremely fast, missis Müller, terribly fast. For something like that, I’d buy a Browning²⁵. It looks like a toy, but in two minutes you can mow down twenty archdukes, thin or fat ones. Although between you and me, missis Müller, you’ll hit a fat lord archduke more likely than a thin one. If they recall how that time in Portugal they mowed down their own king²⁶. He too was such a fat one. You know that a king is not going to be skinny, after all. I’m now going to The Chalice pub then, and should somebody come for that little ratter, which I took a down payment for, they tell him it’s in my kennel in the country, that I recently clipped its ears and that it can’t be transported until the ears heal, so they wouldn’t catch cold. The key you leave with the custodian woman.”

At The Chalice pub there was sitting only one guest. He was the plainclothes patrolman Bretschneider, standing in service for the State Police²⁷. The pubkeeper Palivec was washing porcelain coasters and Bretschneider was in vain trying to engage him in a serious conversation.

Palivec was a well-known foul mouth, every other word of his was butt or shit. Still, he was well-read and urged everyone to read what wrote about the last item Victor Hugo²⁸ when describing the last answer Napoleon’s Old Guard gave the English in the battle at Waterloo²⁹.

“That’s a nice summer we’re having,” initiated his serious conversation Bretschneider.

“It’s all worth shit,” replied Palivec, putting his coasters away among the glassware.

“They sure did it to us nicely over there in Sarajevo,” piped up with a weak hope Bretschneider.

“In what Sarajevo?” asked Palivec, “that wine bar in Nusle? There they fight every day, you know, Nusle.”

“In the Bosnian Sarajevo, mister pubkeeper. They shot there the lord Archduke Ferdinand dead. What do you say to that?”

“I don’t get myself mixed up in such things; regarding that everybody can kiss my ass,” answered politely mister Palivec, lighting up his pipe, “nowadays getting mixed up in it could break anybody’s neck. I’m a small businessman, when somebody comes in and orders a beer, then I draw it for him. But some Sarajevo, politics or the late Archduke, that’s nothing for us, it holds no promise, but Pankrác³⁰.”

Bretschneider turned silent and was in disappointment looking around the deserted pub.

“There used to hang a picture of our lord Emperor here,” he let himself be heard again after a while, “right where the mirror hangs now.”

Yeah, you’re right,” answered mister Palivec, “it used to hang there and the flies kept shitting on it, so I put it in the attic. You know well, somebody could dare to make some remark and it could result in unpleasant difficulties. Do you think I need that?”

“Over there in that Sarajevo it must had been probably ugly, mister pubkeeper.”

To this sneakily direct question mister Palivec replied with unusual caution:

“Around this time in Bosnia and Hercegovina it is usually terribly hot. When I served there, they used to have to put ice on our senior lieutenant’s head.”

“Which regiment did you serve with, mister pubkeeper?”

“I don’t recall such trifle, I was never interested in such bullshit and couldn’t be less curious about it,” replied mister Palivec, “too much curiosity is detrimental.”

The plainclothes patrolman became definitely silent and his gloomy expression improved only upon the arrival of Švejk, who, having entered the pub, ordered himself a dark beer with this remark:

“In Vienna today they are also in mourning,” said Švejk. Bretschneider’s eyes lit up with full hope; he said succinctly:

“At Konopiště there are ten black pennants.”

“There should be twelve of them,” said Švejk, when he took a swig.

“Why do you think twelve?” asked Bretschneider.

“To make it fit the count, the dozen, it’s easier to count and by dozens one always gets it more cheaply,” answered Švejk.

Silence reigned, which Švejk himself broke with a sigh:

“So he is there already, in the truth of the Lord, give him eternal glory Lord God. He didn’t even live to be Emperor. When I was serving in the military, then one of our generals fell off his horse and got himself killed quite calmly. They wanted to help him back into the saddle, give him a boost, and were surprised that he was totally dead. And he was also to be promoted to Field Marshal. It happened during a parade review of the troops. These reviews never lead to any good. In Sarajevo there was also some kind of parade review. I remember that at one time, I was missing during such a parade review twenty buttons on my uniform and that they locked me up because of it in solitary for two weeks, and for two days I was lying still like lazar³¹, hogtied. But there has to be discipline in the military, otherwise nobody would take anything seriously or fear anything. Our Senior Lieutenant, Makovec, he would always tell us: ‘Discipline, you stupid boys, must be enforced, otherwise you would be climbing trees like monkeys, but military service will turn you into humans, you stupid idiots.’ And isn’t that the truth? Imagine a park, let’s say Charlie’s³², and in every tree one soldier without discipline. That’s what I always feared most.”

“Over there in that Sarajevo,” returned to the thread Bretschneider, “it was the Serbs, who did it.”

“You are mistaken,” retorted Švejk, “the Turks did it, on account of Bosnia and Hercegovina.”

And Švejk expounded his opinion of Austria’s international policy in the Balkans. The Turks lost in 1912 to Serbia, Bulgaria and Greece. They had wanted Austria to help them, and when that didn’t happen, they shot Ferdinand.

“Do you like Turks?” Švejk asked, turning to Palivec, “do you like those pagan dogs? You don’t, right?”

“A guest is a guest,” said Palivec, “even a Turk. For us, who are in business for ourselves, politics has no currency. Pay for your beer and sit in the pub, and babble all you want. That is my principle. Whether it was a Serb or a Turk, who did it to our Ferdinand, or a Catholic, Mohammedan, anarchist, or Young Czech³³, it’s all the same to me.”

“Alright, mister pubkeeper,” let himself be heard Bretschneider, who was again losing hope that either of the two could be caught, “but you will admit, that it is a great loss for Austria.”

Instead of the pubkeeper answered Švejk:

“A loss it is, that cannot be denied. A terrible loss. Ferdinand can’t be replaced by some dimwit. Only he should had been still fatter.”

“How do you mean that?” said the revived Bretschneider.

“How do I mean that?” answered contentedly Švejk. “Altogether only like this. Had he been fatter, then he would surely had been hit with a stroke before this, when he was chasing after those broads at Konopiště, when they were collecting twigs and mushroom in his forest district there, and he didn’t have to die such a shameful death. When I think about it, a nephew of the lord Emperor, and they shoot him dead. Now that’s scandalous, the newspapers are full of it. Years ago, in our Budějovice, they stabbed during one of those petty arguments in the marketplace a livestock dealer, some Břetislav Ludvík. He had a son Bohuslav, and wherever he came to sell pigs, nobody bought anything from him and everyone would say: ‘That’s the son of the one, who was stabbed, he too is probably quite a scoundrel.’ He had to jump from that bridge in Krumlov³⁴ into the Vltava³⁵ and they had to pull him out, they had to try reviving him, had to be pumping water out of him and he had to die in the doctor’s arms, when he gave him some injection.”

“You sure come up with odd comparisons,” said Bretschneider meaningfully, “you speak first about Ferdinand and then about a livestock dealer.”

“But I don’t,” was Švejk defending himself, “God spare me from wanting to compare anybody to somebody else. Mister pubkeeper knows me. Say that I have never compared anybody to somebody else, right? I just wouldn’t want to be in the skin of the widow left by the Archduke. What now is she going to do? The children are orphans, the lord’s estate at Konopiště without its master. And to be marrying again some new archduke? What’s in it for her? She’ll go with him to Sarajevo again, and she’ll be widowed the second time. There was in Zliv³⁶ by Hluboká years ago a gamekeeper, he had such an ugly name, Littlepecker. Poachers shot him dead and he left a widow with two little children and a year later she again married a gamekeeper, the Šavels’ Pepík from Mydlovary³⁷. And they shot him dead for her too. Then she married for the third time and again took a gamekeeper for husband and said: ‘Third time lucky. If it doesn’t work out this time, I don’t know any more what I’ll do.’ It figures that they shot him dead for her again, and by now she had had six children altogether with those gamekeepers. She went all the way to the office of the Prince of Hluboká³⁸ and complained that she had had torment with those gamekeepers. So they recommended fishpond warden Jareš from the Ražice³⁹ pond ward cottage. And what would you say, they drowned him for her while fishing out the pond, and she’d had two children with him. Then she married a gelder from Vodňany, and he whacked her with an ax one night and went to turn himself in voluntarily. When they were then hanging him at the district courthouse in Písek⁴⁰, he bit off the priest’s nose and said that he had no remorse for anything, and he also said something very ugly about the lord Emperor.”

“And would you know what he said about him?” asked Bretschneider in a voice full of hope.

“That I cannot tell you, because no one dared to repeat it. But it was, it is said, something so terrible and dreadful that a councilor of the court, who was there, lost his mind over it and until this day they keep him in isolation so that it won’t come out. It was not just a common insult to the lord Emperor, the kind made while drunk.”

“And what kind of insults to the lord Emperor are made while drunk?” asked Bretschneider.

“I beg you, gentlemen, turn the page,” sounded up the pubkeeper Palivec, “you know, I don’t like it. This or that is blabbered out and then man regrets it.”

“What kind of insults to the lord Emperor are made while drunk?” repeated Švejk. “All kinds. Get drunk, have them play the Austrian anthem and you’ll see what you start saying. You will make up so much about the lord Emperor, that if only half of it were true, it would be enough for him to live in shame for the rest of his life. But the old man really doesn’t deserve it. Let’s take this. He lost his son Rudolf⁴¹ at a very young age, full of manly vitality. His wife Elizabeth they ran through with a file, then he lost Johann Orth⁴², and the brother, Mexican Emperor⁴³, they shot dead in some fortress by some wall. Now again, in his old age, they blew away his nephew. Given all that, a man better have nerves of steel. And then out of the blue some drunk decides to start calling him names. If something were to break out today, I would volunteer and serve the lord Emperor until my body was torn to pieces.”

Švejk took a thorough swig and continued:

“You think that the lord Emperor will let this go? Then you know him very little. There must be a war with the Turks. You’ve killed my nephew, so here comes your kickass beatdown. A war is guaranteed. Serbia and Russia will help us in that war. It will be a rumble.”

Švejk appeared beautiful in that prophetic moment. His simple-minded face, smiley like a full moon, shone with enthusiasm. To him everything was clear.

“May be,” he continued his exposition of Austria’s future, “that in case of a war with Turkey, the Germans will attack us, because Germans and Turks stick together. They’re such bitches, that they don’t have an equal in the world. However, we can join with France, which has it in for Germany since 1871. And that’ll get it going already. There will be war, I’ll say no more to you.”

Bretschneider stood up and said ceremonially:

“You don’t have to say any more, come with me to the hallway, I’ll tell you something there.”

Švejk followed the plainclothes patrolman into the hallway, where a small surprise awaited him, as the beer drinking companion showed him the little eagle badge and proclaimed that he was arresting him and would immediately take him to the police headquarters. Švejk tried to explain that the gentleman was probably mistaken, that he was totally innocent, that he had not uttered even one word, which could have offended anyone.

Bretschneider however told him, that he had really committed several criminal offenses, among which was numbered even the crime of high treason.

Then they returned to the pub and Švejk said in the direction of mister Palivec:

“I’ve had five beers and one roll with a sausage. Now give me a shot of slivovitz to boot and I have to go already, because I’m under arrest.”

Bretschneider showed mister Palivec the little eagle, for a moment was looking at mister Palivec and then asked:

“Are you married?”

“I am.”

“And can your wife run the business in your place during your absence?”

“She can.”

“So it’s all right mister pubkeeper,” cheerfully said Bretschneider, “call your wife here, turn it over to her and we’ll drive by tonight to pick you up.”

“Don’t let it make you feel bad,” Švejk was consoling him, “I’m being taken in only for high treason.”

“But what for I?” lamented mister Palivec. “I was so careful, after all.”

Bretschneider flashed a smile and triumphantly said:

“For having said that the flies kept shitting on the lord Emperor. They will, no doubt, knock that lord Emperor out of your head.”

And Švejk left The Chalice pub under the escort of the plainclothes patrolman, whom, having followed his face with his good-hearted smile, he asked, once they walked out into the street:

“Should I get off the sidewalk?”

“Why so?”

“I’m thinking that, since I’m under arrest, I don’t have the right to walk on the sidewalk.”

As they were entering the gate of the police headquarters, Švejk said:

“The time went by quite nicely for us. Do you come often to The Chalice?”

And while they were taking Švejk to the arraignment office, at The Chalice mister Palivec was handing over the pub to his weeping wife, soothing her in his own peculiar way:

“Don’t cry, don’t bawl, what can they do to me on account of a shitty picture of the lord Emperor?”

And so the good soldier Švejk intervened in the World War in his lovable, charming manner. Historians will be interested to know that he saw far into the future. If the situation later developed differently from how he was expounding it at The Chalice, we have to keep in mind that he hadn’t had preparatory education in diplomacy