Free I Served the King of England by Bohumil Hrabal Page B

headwaiter and at me: What is this you’re giving me? Are you trying to poison
     me? Do you want me to die, you swine? But then he’d drink another bottle of
     Armagnac, and Zden ě k would lecture him on why the best
     brandy is called Armagnac and not cognac, because cognac comes only from the region
     called Cognac, and even though the best cognac comes from two kilometers outside the
     border of Cognac it still has to be called brandy, not cognac. By three in the
     morning—when the general predicted he wouldn’t last because at two
     o’clock we had killed him by offering him an apple—he had eaten and drunk
     enough for five men, but still he complained that it wasn’t filling him up, that
     he probably had cancer without knowing it, or stomach ulcers at least, that his liver
     was shot and he was sure to have kidney stones. It was around three in the morning that
     he reallystarted to get drunk and he pulled out his service pistol
     and shot at a glass standing on the windowsill, and the bullet went right through the
     window, but the boss came gliding up on his rubber wheels, smiling and congratulating
     him, and asked if the general would like to try for the cut-glass teardrops on the
     Venetian chandelier and said that the last great feat of marksmanship he’d seen
     here was when Prince Schwartzenberg tossed a five-crown piece in the air, shot at it
     with a hunting rifle, and hit it just before it fell to the table. The boss rolled away,
     fetched a pointer, and pointed to a hole above the fireplace where the bullet had
     entered the wall after ricocheting off the silver coin. But the general said his
     specialty was cordial glasses and fired away, and no one got upset about it, and when he
     shot through the window and the bullet whistled past the porter, who was still bent over
     his block chopping wood, the porter just gave his ear a good shake with his little
     finger and went on working. Next the general had Turkish coffee, and he placed his hand
     over his heart and swore he wasn’t supposed to drink this coffee at all, but then
     he had another cup and announced that if there was a roast capon in the house he’d
     like to have it before he died. So the boss bowed and whistled and a moment later the
     chef appeared, looking fresh in his white cap, and brought out the whole roasting pan.
     When the general saw the capon, he took off his tunic, unbuttoned his shirt and after
     saying wistfully that he wasn’t supposed to eat chicken, took the capon, tore it
     to pieces, and ate it. After each mouthful he bemoaned the state of his health and said
     that he wasn’t supposed to overeat, that he’d never eaten anything so
     disgusting. Zden ě k told him that in Spain they drank
     champagnewith chicken, and that some El Córdoba might be nice,
     and the general nodded, then sipped away and nibbled at the chicken, complaining and
     making a face at each mouthful of food and drink:
Diesen Pulard auch diesen
     Champagner kann man nicht essen und trinken
. At four o’clock, after
     he’d complained his fill, he seemed greatly unburdened, and he asked for the bill.
     The headwaiter brought it to him with everything itemized and presented it on a small
     tray in a napkin, but the general made him read out loud how much he’d spent,
     every item, so Zden ě k read it to him, every item, and the
     general began to smile, and his smile grew broader and broader until at last he was
     laughing outright, cackling in delight, and he was quite sober now, he’d even got
     rid of his cough and seemed to be standing more erect. He spent a while adjusting his
     shoulders in his tunic and then, looking more handsome than before, his eyes sparkling,
     he ordered a parcel of food for his chauffeur, paid the boss in thousand-crown notes,
     rounding it off to the nearest thousand, which seemed to be the custom here, added a
     thousand for the shooting and the holes in the roof and the window, and asked the boss
     if that