CHAPTER 4
The examination period flew by as quickly as if it had never happened. The academic classes began. It should be noted that the weather had prepared a surprise for us and brought cold and grey clouds to Prague, which gave me the opportunity to visit the university every day. The guests who came to the castle left, and I breathed a sigh of relief. The presence of numerous relatives every time broke my plans and made me angry, besides, they were sloppy: after their arrival there was a wave of panic in Prague – people disappeared without a trace. By the dozens. Almost every day.
After the last meeting with the girl from Nusle Bridge, I never met her at the university, but now I attended it every day and sat in on all my classes, which was an extraordinary heroism for me. It is not clear from where, in me suddenly again suddenly appeared interest in observing the life of a huge organism, or, better to say, a huge anthill, which was Charles University in Prague. But there was something strange in my behaviour: one day I caught myself thinking that I was looking for a black coat among the bright colours, looking for that girl in the noisy crowd of students, but I didn't find her… Realising that I was looking for that stranger on purpose, I mentally cursed and forced my mind to suppress this stupid, completely alien and unnecessary desire to encounter that mortal again.
Every evening I went to the Nusle Bridge and watched the sunset, and then watched the sky and the clouds flying across it. But, once again, after a period of spiritual uplift, melancholy and boredom took possession of me, and now the days passed boringly, each was similar to the previous one, and my boredom could not kill neither the events taking place at the university, nor the events taking place in the country and the world in general. Studying was boring, hunting two centuries ago had turned into a routine. Nothing interesting was happening in my life. But on Monday the second of October something went wrong.
The day passed routinely, and I looked with indifference at the lecturer, who, waving his hands vigorously, extolled his subject and his capacity for rational thought. The lecture would have ended the same way as it did every time, but suddenly, at the end of the pair, the lecturer loudly announced to the audience that the students should not disperse, but must come to the assembly hall. Naturally, the students immediately started whispering and laughing. For them, it was fun. For me, it was another fuss and minutes of wasted time.