chocolat au lait on the wrapper, and each time the chocolate bar would disappear and I never knew who Francin had given it to, as a friendly gesture perhaps, a small gift … Any time I saw one of the maids chewing something, I’d squeeze her cheeks together and force her to open her mouth, but each time she was only chewing a bit of dried apple or a crust of bread, and each time those maids would laugh at me, sometimes they tried to make me pry open their mouths, they even wrestled with me, those girls, they fought me tooth and nail until I was forced to open their mouths myself, completely convinced I’d find chocolat au lait inside, but once again it would only be a bit of dried apple … And so I never got a single bar of the chocolate, which disappeared every month, year in year out, and to this day, here in the retirement home, I still don’t know who Francin was giving away the milk chocolate to all those years. One night I came home from my rehearsal earlier than usual, Anka from Budečko was sitting in the cellar cutting up apples for the goats, the light in the cellar was going on and off, the maid shrieked with laughter, I quietly unlocked the front door, and in the hallway Francin was standing next to the cellar door switching the light on and off and he was laughing with his mouth full of chocolat au lait, Anka from Budečko was in the cellar howling with laughter, Francin kept flipping the light on and off and nearly choked on the chocolate, he was as happy as a child … Quietly, I went outside again, to the front of the brewery, I walked back and forth for a while, so as not to intrude on Francin’s happiness, because if I had walked in and surprised him, Francin would’ve immediately begun making up his bed for the night, his body would’ve started hurting all over, he would’ve fired up the tall stove and crawled into bed and swallowed a few aspirins and begged me to kneel down so he could say his last good-byes, because he’d be dead by morning … Whatever happened to Anka from Budečko, that maid of ours with her one tooth? Now I think it was probably Anka who got all that chocolate, that chocolat au lait … I’m walking down the footpath in the castle park, it’s a good thing there are no more maids, the two old lady pensioners in flowered dresses are sitting on a bench, I can’t see them anymore, but I can hear them through the shrubbery … Yes, yes, says the voice of one old lady, so that night he came around with his daughter’s urn in my shopping net. The ample bosom of the other woman rises and she exclaims … Good heavens! I walk on, past the statues, which I hardly notice anymore, it’s a good thing that there are no more maids, that they disappeared along with the golden days, it’s a good thing that there are no maids, it’s a good thing that they’re not … Now I’m standing in front of the statue of Winter, a fur cloak billows around the gaunt, naked old man, the cloak floats three inches above his chilled body, his fur cap looms against the sky like a bishop’s miter, but the old man is warming his hands over small flames that rise up through a bucket full of holes, which is being held up to him by a chubby cupid. The two old lady pensioners drag themselves along on their stiff legs, now they’ve turned the corner and are walking through the tunnel of pruned red beeches, leaving only a trail of sand behind them, as if someone has been walking along dragging two sacks of grain, two dead deer … What a shock! cries a voice from the red foliage … But why would anyone go swimming in the Adriatic? And the other voice cries, in a heartrending tone … Heaven help us …