IT HAPPENED IN PRAGUE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 3, Issue 76, 6 December 1940, Page 12

IT HAPPENED IN PRAGUE

Written for "The Listener" io

FRANK

AWOD

€ J T was a cold October evening in Prague, 1938. A fortnight before, the Czechoslovakian Government had been compelled to cede without fighting a part of the country to Germany. The Czechoslovakian army, standing on the frontier and prepared to defend the Republic, retired. There is no sadder sight than an army defeated without being able to fire a shot. The former high spirited soldiers returned without arms, spiritually demoralised, their faith and hope shattered. Into one of the overcrowded automatic buffets on the Wenceslas Square went a soldier. His uniform was clean and sober, but in his belt were no arms. He sat down at a table and drank a glass of beer. His eyes were fixed on the table before him-the tears ran down his cheeks. He started to cry: "I can’t live it down, I can’t live it down!" People gathered around him. Most of them didnot know if they should laugh or cry with him. Nobody spoke a word and. the glaring lights around made this scene still sadder. The waiter brought a second glass of beer. The soldier emptied the glass at one draught and started to cry again: "I can’t live it down. Give me a revolver, I want to shoot myself." Suddenly a little man in a black coat stepped out from the crowd, laid a revolver on the table, saying: " Here is a revolver," and disappeared among the crowd. The soldier looked glassily at the revolver. In a fraction of a second, before anybody could prevent it, he took the revolver, placed it to his forehead and shot himself. A tumult broke loose, the ambulance arrived and took the soldier to the hospital. Not one of us believed in the devil, but here we had the feeling that Mephistopheles was at large.