IN May it was necessary to make a final trip to the factories, and on the twenty-first Milada and I set out. We drove to Carlsbad first, then on to the Bohemian Works, which were some forty-five minutes by motor in the direction of the German border. We had been too absorbed in our plans to notice anything untoward in the atmosphere on the way to Carlsbad, but now our attention was forced outside ourselves.

My chauffeur, Anton, surprised me by complaining that he had been unable to get any lunch in Carlsbad while we were eating at one of the hotels. Whenever he had entered a restaurant and asked for food in Czech, the waiters refused to serve him. When he spoke to a policeman on the street, the man told him with tears in his eyes that he would soon forget himself and strike someone if he had to endure any more of the insults that had been hurled at him all day. I told Anton I was sorry about the lack of lunch, but I felt he must be exaggerating. We were expected at the Bohemian Works and I couldn’t delay the trip. He could eat when we got there.

We talked to Gründlich and Fischer in a strained atmosphere which I took to be caused by the terms of the contract before us. The telephone rang. Gründlich picked it up, spoke shortly, listened to a rasping voice at the other end of the wire, and then hung up without a word. He passed a significant glance to Fischer before he turned to us and said, “I’m afraid all this we’re talking about is senseless. Prague has just announced partial mobilization. Here’s your signed contract, but I doubt if you’ll ever have any use for it.”

Milada and I looked at each other. I picked up the document and folded it carefully before I put it in my pocket. “If you’ll pardon us,” I said, “we’ll have to get back to Prague. Instead of going to New York I’ll probably soon be back in the trenches.”

“There are better places than a trench for a man like yourself,” Gründlich said. “Whatever may happen, Germany will surely be glad to use your knowledge and skill for more important work.”

I stared at him, then at Fischer’s back where the man stood motionless looking through the window toward the border, then I turned on my heel and followed Milada to the car.

Now in every village through which we passed we found crowds of women, children and old men lining the road, staring blankly toward the direction from which we had come. When they saw the letter P on the license plate of our car and knew we were from Prague, they shook their fists at us and sometimes growled curses. Anton told us he had discovered while we were in the office that they were expecting the German army to cross the border that day and they wanted to be on the road to welcome it. I felt in the side pocket of the car for the revolver I always carried there and put it on the seat under my right hand. It was a grim situation. Still in our own country, we were no longer of it so far as this section was concerned.

The great highroad from Carlsbad to Prague climbs in sweeping curves through fields of grain to a wide upland. Here the farms are divided into strips of hops, rye, wheat, oats, hay, turnips, potatoes and beets. Now in May some of the fields were plowed and drying under the sun and many were already sown. The land rises to forests on the horizon, and now and again tall firs slope down almost to the road.

As we approached a cross highway which came into our road through one of these dense woodlands, we saw a cavalcade of huge army trucks appearing from the shadows of the trees. It was late in the afternoon and the light was in our eyes. All the old sensations of my first days of battle came over me again. My concern was acute because Milada was with me. The army trucks rumbled and roared toward us, and at last when they were clear of the shadows we saw that they were filled with Czech soldiers. They looked to us like helmeted angels.

For a time we followed them after they had turned into our path. Now the villages we passed through were bare of human beings. Even Henlein’s followers in their white socks and black oilcloth raincoats had disappeared as the Czech troops came in sight. Then the trucks turned off for the German border and we went on toward Prague, passing nothing but truckloads of Czech soldiers, all singing and wearing flowers that had been thrown to them earlier as they moved through Bohemia.

It was late in the night when we finally reached the city. Women and children were following their men through the streets to the barracks. There were no tears and no one was drunk, as I remembered the recruits had been in the last war. Women tried to carry their husbands’ luggage and children carried bundles for their fathers and brothers. Wherever trucks had passed, taking soldiers out of town, the road was strewn with flowers.

The following morning I reported to the Ministry of National Defense, asking permission to join my regiment at once. I informed the bank and the two factories that the New York project was canceled as far as I was concerned. My regimental headquarters answered by wire that my age class had not been called and that I must wait before reporting. Then the economic division of the Foreign Office called me, to say that I must continue with my plans to leave for the United States. My private project had become a mission, not only to present our native products to the American market, but also to make known wherever possible the true story of Czechoslovakia. They considered my trip to New York twice as important now because I could implement the promises of the government to do everything within their power for the Sudetenland.

The course laid out for me was plain enough but I had no heart to go on with it. Then Hitler announced that he had no designs on Czechoslovakia, our mobilized troops were disbanded, and Milada and I settled down to put our affairs in order.

There was a tremendous amount of work to be done. All our possessions had to be divided, for we intended to have two homes in the future, one in New York and one in Prague. Twice a year at least I would have to return to Czechoslovakia to inspect the output for America in the factories. I also had to go through all the products we handled, checking every shape and color and design of every article. I had to pick out the ones I wanted for my sample collection in New York. I had to compile a list of the names and addresses of every American customer we had ever served. Furthermore, I had to break in a new manager for the Prague branch.

In the midst of this turbulence, the Foreign Office called me one morning to say that two distinguished American visitors were stopping at the Hotel Alcron. Their names were Mr. and Mrs. Henry Luce. The Foreign Office wanted me to invite them to our showroom to see our glass and china. I sent a messenger with a note at once and received word that they would come that same afternoon. In the meantime they would be received by President Beneš.

When they arrived I found them a charming American couple, he rather grave and she extraordinarily beautiful. I had no notion of the place they held in American life, nor did it occur to me that Mrs. Luce was the author of a successful play which I had seen in Prague shortly before, called “The Women.” I had been told that he was a magazine publisher, but even though I had heard of Time, Life and Fortune, I was unfamiliar with the part they played in American affairs. My acquaintance with American publications was confined to one magazine, the New Yorker.

They inspected our entire establishment with keen interest and Mr. Luce decided he must have a set of crystal glasses. He chose the same pattern Lord Louis Mountbatten had liked: a handsome modern glass that flared out from the stem to the rim in shining rays. Unfortunately, the order never reached him.

They went on to my office and our conversation flowed into wider channels. They wanted to see our movie studios on Barandov and I offered to call the office of the Chief of Protocol to get someone to take them out. But no one was available. Americans can be fascinating to the point of making one forget the most pressing duties when they are around so I offered my services.

During the afternoon on Barandov, I chanced to remark that I would be in New York within the next few months. When I explained my mission, they both showed a gratifying enthusiasm and predicted certain success for the venture. Mrs. Luce began to discuss with her husband the best place for our showroom. Should it be Fifth Avenue, Madison or Park? They argued the matter while I listened with keen interest but little intelligence.

We spent a pleasant afternoon on the terraces in the sunshine. The colored umbrellas were up and the rock gardens that separated rows and rows of tables were rich with bloom. I pointed out domes and spires and castles and bridges as they queried their names, and we noticed with amusement a group of soldiers who were lying about on the grass beside two antiaircraft batteries which had been set up several feet from the terrace where we sat. I promised to get in touch with Mr. and Mrs. Luce when we reached New York, and after I dropped them at the hotel I saw them no more in Prague.

The days left to us were growing shorter now and none of them contained enough hours for all the things we wanted to do.