Sheer physical exhaustion brought the Burgomaster to an end, and the Minister of Public Works began speaking. He was obviously cutting his sentences down unmercifully to shorten his address. The Chief of State was now holding the lever in his left hand. Old Billington, the doyen of the Diplomatic Corps, had passed away on his feet, preserving even in death the expression of an attentive listener. Then the Minister put an end to his speech as though with an axe.

G. H. Bondy raised his head, looked about with heavy eyes, and said a few words, apparently something to the effect that the M.E.C. was handing over its work to the public for the use and benefit of our metropolis, and so concluded. The Chief of State drew himself erect and pressed the lever. Then, in an instant, the whole of Prague shone out as a vast expanse of light, the crowds cheered, the bells in all the steeples began to swing, and from the Marianske fort there sounded the first boom of the cannon.

Still hanging to his grating, Keval looked around towards the city. Flaming rockets shot up from Střelecky Island; Hradčany, Petřin, and even Letna, were aglow with garlands of electric lamps, distant bands began competing with each other, illuminated biplanes circled above Stvanice, while the immense V 16 soared up from Vyšehrad all bedecked with lanterns. The crowds removed their hats, the police stood like statues, their hands raised to their helmets in salute. Two batteries boomed out from the bastions, answered by the monitors from near Karlín.

Keval again pressed his face to the bars to see the conclusion of the ceremonies over the Karburator taking place inside. The next instant he uttered a hoarse cry, rolled his eyes, and once more squeezed himself still closer to the window. Then he uttered something like “Oh, God!”, loosened his hold on the grating, and dropped heavily to the earth. Before he had actually reached the ground, someone rushing away from the place knocked into him. Keval seized him by the coat, and the man looked round. It was G. H. Bondy; he was as pale as death.

“What has happened, sir?” Keval stammered. “What are they doing in there?”

“Let go of me,” Bondy panted. “For Christ’s sake, let go. And get out of here, as quick as you can.”

“But what has happened to them in there?”

“Let me go,” shouted Bondy; and knocking Keval back with his fist, he disappeared among the trees.

Trembling all over, Keval supported himself against the trunk of a tree. From the interior of the concrete building came sounds as of savages chanting a hymn.

A few days later the Czechoslovak Press Bureau published the following obscure statement: