There Will Be No Money to Pay My Taxes

The most free-thinking men gathered in Fastr's coffee house, and one should not forget a figure then mysterious in Prague, the French emissary Tourné, who often sang Czech songs here — he learned the language quickly. The police had endless trouble with that notorious establishment and sent whole regiments of informers there, who were soon recognised and thrown out into the street without ceremony. One of those prying hounds resisted being thrown out and began to make threats. Petr Fastr paid no heed and answered him directly and briefly, as was his habit: “I have to pay the emperor his taxes, but if you keep sniffing about here I shall have an empty house, and there will be no money to pay my taxes.”