So here I was, home again after all those years. Standing in the main square (which I had crossed countless times as a child, as a boy, as a young man), I felt no emotion whatsoever; all I could think was that the flat space, with the spire of the town hall (like a soldier in an ancient helmet) rising above the rooftops, looked like a huge parade ground and that the military past of the Moravian town, once a bastion against Magyar and Turk invaders, had engraved an irrevocable ugliness on its face.

We had stood there with him like this for about ten minutes when the second fiddle reappeared and signaled us to help Jaroslav to his feet; supporting him under the arms, we slowly led him through the noisy, drunken adolescents out into the street, where an ambulance stood waiting, all its lights ablaze.