'Suppose I've lost it. Then we'll get the sports cup from Lieutenant Wittinger of the 75th regiment.
Years ago he ran in races and won it for " Sport-Favorit".
He used to be a good runner.
He did the forty-kilometre stretch from Vienna to Modling in r hour 48 minutes, as he always boasted about it.
I arranged this with him already yesterday. I'm a bloody fool leaving everything till the last moment.
Why didn't I look inside that sofa? Bloody ass!'
Under the influence of the grog, prepared after the recipe of the debauched sailor, he began torpidly to swear at himself and explained in the most diverse maxims where he really belonged.
'Well, we'd better go and have a look for that field altar,' suggested Svejk.
'It's already daybreak.'
'I still have to put on my uniform and drink another grog.'
At last they went out.
On their way to the wife of the furniture-dealer the chaplain told Svejk that the day before he had won a lot of money gambling at 'God's blessing' and that if all went well he'd buy the piano back from the pawnbroker.
It was rather like when heathens promise to bury an offering.
From the sleepy wife of the furniture-dealer they learnt the address of the teacher in Vrsovice, the new owner of the sofa.
The chaplain displayed unusual generosity. He pinched her cheek and tickled her under the chin.
They went to Vrsovice on foot, as the chaplain avowed that he must have a turn in the fresh air to distract his thoughts.
An unpleasant surprise awaited them in the apartment of the teacher at Vrsovice who was a pious old gentleman.
Finding the field altar in the sofa the old gentleman had thought that this must be some divine dispensation and had given it to the vestry of the local church in Vrsovice, stipulating that on the other side of the folding altar there should be the inscription:
'Presented for the honour and praise of God by Mr Kolarik, retired teacher, in the year of our Lord 1914 '.
He displayed great embarrassment because they came on him in his underclothes.
From their conversation with him it was clear that he attributed to the discovery the significance of a miracle and a divine direction.
He said that when he bought the sofa an inner voice said to him:
'Look at what's in the drawer of the sofa.'
He claimed he had also had a vision of an angel who gave him the direct command:
'Open the drawer of the sofa.'
He obeyed.
And when he saw the miniature folding altar in three sections with a recess for a tabernacle he had knelt down in front of the sofa and prayed long and fervently and praised God.
Regarding it as a direction from heaven he adorned the church in Vrsovice with it.
'We don't think this at all funny,' said the chaplain.
'An object of this kind which didn't belong to you, you should at once have taken to the police and not to any blasted vestry.'
'Because of that miracle,' added Svejk, 'you may face a lot of trouble.
You bought a sofa and not the altar, which belongs to the army authorities.
A divine dispensation like that can cost you dear.
You ought not to have paid any attention to the angels.
There was a man in Zhor who dug up a chalice in a field. It had been stolen from a church and kept there for better times until it was forgotten.
He also took it as a divine dispensation and instead of melting it down \vent to the vicar with it and said he wanted to present it to the church.
And the vicar thought that he had been moved by pangs of conscience and sent for the mayor. The mayor sent for the gendarmerie and, although he was innocent, he was sentenced for stealing church property, just because he kept on babbling about some miracle.
He wanted to defend himself and also talked about an angel, but he mixed the Virgin Mary into it and got ten years.
You'd do best to come with us to the local vicar here and get him to return us the army property.
A field altar isn't a cat or a sock that you can give away to anyone you like.'
The old gentleman trembled all over and his teeth chattered as he put on his clothes:
'I really meant no harm.
I thought that with a divine dispensation like that I could use it for the adornment of our poor Church of our Lord in Vrsovice.'
'At the expense of the army authorities, no doubt,' Svejk said sternly and harshly.
'Thank God for a divine dispensation like that!
A fellow called Pivonka of Chotcbor also thought it was a divine dispensation when a halter with somebody else's cow in it got into his hand by accident.'
The poor old gentleman was quite confused by these remarks and made no further attempts to defend himself, trying to dress as quickly as possible and settle the whole business.
The vicar at Vrsovice was still asleep and when he was awoken by the noise started to swear, because in his drowsiness he thought that he had to go and administer the last rites to somebody.
'They shouldn't bother people with this extreme unction,' he growled, dressing himself unwillingly.
'People take it into their heads to die when a chap's having a really good sleep.