Well, sorry, dear Fathers, but our rites are more important!”
With that, Bender entered the gate and, walking through a group of kids who were playing hopscotch, climbed the imposing granite steps to the cathedral entrance.
The thick door panels were enforced with iron hoops and decorated with reliefs of saints, each one in his own little square. The saints were blowing kisses at each other, or waved their hands in various directions, or amused themselves by reading thick little books in which the meticulous woodcarver had even cut tiny Roman letters.
The grand strategist pulled the door, but it didn’t move.
The gentle sounds of a harmonium wafted through the door.
“The spells are being cast!” reported Ostap loudly, coming down the steps. “They’re hard at it as we speak!
To the sweet sound of the mandolin.”
“Maybe we’d better leave?” asked Panikovsky, fiddling with the hat in his hands. “This is God’s temple, you know.
It’s not right.”
Ignoring him, Ostap walked up to the Antelope and started squeezing the horn impatiently.
He played the maxixe until they heard keys jingling behind the thick doors.
The Antelopeans raised their heads.
The door panels opened, and the jolly saints slowly rode back in their little oak squares.
Adam Kazimirovich stepped out of the dark portal onto the tall, bright porch.
He was pale.
His long train conductor’s mustache had grown damp and drooped dejectedly from his nostrils.
He had a prayer book in his hands.
The priests were propping him up on both sides.
On his left was Father Kuszakowski, on his right—Father Aloisius Moroszek.
Their eyes were awash in saccharine piety.
“Hey, Kozlevich!” shouted Ostap from below. “Haven’t you had enough of that already?”
“Good afternoon, Adam Kazimirovich,” said Panikovsky brashly, ducking behind the captain’s back, just in case.
Balaganov raised his hand in a greeting and made a face, which must have meant:
“Stop fooling around, Adam!”
The body of the Antelope’s driver took a step forward, but his soul lurched back under the piercing stares of both Kuszakowski and Moroszek.
Kozlevich looked at his friends with anguish and lowered his eyes.
And then the great battle for the driver’s soul began.
“Hey, you, cherubim and seraphim!” said Ostap, challenging his opponents to a debate. “There is no God!”
“Yes, there is,” countered Father Aloisius Moroszek, shielding Kozlevich with his body.
“This is outrageous,” mumbled Father Kuszakowski.
“No, there isn’t,” continued the grand strategist, “and there never has been.
It’s a medical fact.”
“I think this conversation is highly inappropriate,” declared Kuszakowski angrily.
“And taking the car away—is that appropriate?” shouted the tactless Balaganov. “Adam!
They just want to take the Antelope.”
Hearing this, the driver raised his head and looked at the holy fathers inquiringly.
The priests began to get nervous and tried to take Kozlevich back inside, their silk robes rustling about.
But he wouldn’t budge.
“So, on the subject of God?” persisted the grand strategist.
The priests were forced into a debate.
The children stopped hopping and came closer.
“How can you say there is no God,” started Aloisius Moroszek earnestly, “when He created all living things!”
“Yeah, yeah,” said Ostap, “I am an old Catholic and Latinist myself.
Puer, socer, vesper, gener, liber, miser, asper, tener.”
These Latin exceptions, which Ostap had to learn by heart in the third grade of Iliadi’s private gymnasium, and which his brain still retained for no reason, made a powerful impression on Kozlevich.
His soul rejoined his body, and as a consequence of this reunion, the driver inched tentatively forward.
“My son,” said Kuszakowski, looking at Bender furiously, “you are confused, my son.
God’s miracles demonstrate . . .”
“Quit yapping, Father!” said the grand strategist sternly. “I have performed miracles myself.
Just four years ago in some God-forsaken town, I was Jesus Christ for a few days.