“Mhm,” said Mr. Rejzek, “but now you might have a look at the post.”

“Well, I don’t care,” cried Cyril Keval. “A man can get used even to a God, can’t he? What’s the latest from the Press Bureau?”

“Nothing special,” growled Mr. Rejzek. “Bloodshed at demonstrations in Rome. They’re going for each other in Ulster—you know, the Irish Catholics. The St. Kilda agreement is being repudiated all round. Pogroms in Budapest; a schism in France—the Waldenses have bobbed up there again, and the Anabaptists in Münster. At Bologna an Anti-Pope has been elected, one Father Martin of the Barefoot Friars. And so on. Nothing of local interest. Have a look at the letters, will you.”

Cyril Keval stopped talking and began opening the letters. There were a few hundred of them, but he had hardly read half a dozen when he was off once more.

“Look here, Rejzek,” he began, “it’s the same tale all the way through. Take this one for instance: From Chrudim. Dear Sir,—As an old subscriber to your esteemed journal, your readers and the whole of the public who are now being harassed by unprofitable disputes”—(“He’s left out ‘will be interested,’” interpolated Mr. Keval)—“ ‘in the remarkable miracle performed by our local pastor, the Rev. Father Zakoupil.’ And so on. In Jicin it was the storekeeper of the Co-operative Society, and in Benesov it was the superintendent of schools. In Chotěboř it was even the widow Jirák, who keeps a tobacco shop. Have I to read all this stuff?”

Work went on again in silence for a while.

“Damn it, Rejzek,” Keval burst out again, “I say, do you know what would be a real sensation? A giant gooseberry? A lovely canard? Why, if something were to happen quite in the natural way, without any miracle about it. But I don’t think anyone would believe us. Wait a bit, I’ll try to think up something natural.”

Again there was a brief period of quiet.

“Rejzek,” cried Keval mournfully, “I simply can’t think up anything natural. When I think it over, everything is a miracle really. Whatever is, is a sort of magic.”

Just then the editor-in-chief entered.

“Who did the cuttings from the Tribune? Here’s a story in it that we haven’t got.”

“What sort of a story,” asked Mr. Rejzek.

“In the Finance and Commerce Section. An American combine has bought up the Pacific Islands and is subletting them. A tiny coral atoll costs fifty thousand dollars a year. Big demand even from the Continent of Europe. Shares have gone up to two thousand seven hundred already. G. H. Bondy interested to the extent of one hundred and twenty millions. And we haven’t got a word about it,” said the editor-in-chief angrily, and slammed the door behind him.