Page:Karel Čapek - The Absolute at Large (1927).djvu/239

 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 prices things are now! Fifteen hundred for a candle!"

"And what I say," maintained old Blahous, "is the Jews started the war so as to make money out of it. That's what I say."

"We could do with some rain," observed Mrs. Blahous. "The potatoes are far too small. Like nuts."

"It's my belief," Blahous went on, "that people just invented that about the Lord God, so as to have someone to blame things on. That was all made up. They wanted a war and they wanted an excuse. It was all a put-up job."

"Who did it, then?"

"Nobody knows. What I say is, it was all fixed up with the Pope and the Jews and the whole lot of them. Those those  !" shouted Grandfather Blahous, in great excitement. "I'd like to say it to their faces! Why, did anybody need a new Lord God? The old one was good enough for us country people. There was just enough of Him, and He was good, and honest and