"That's only on Thursdays."

"Well, bring along the deviled ham," Mephistopheles said. To Michael he remarked, "Can't let the side down, can we?"

"Certainly not. But isn't it time we got down to business?"

"I'm ready," Mephistopheles said. "Did you bring along an agenda?"

"No need," Michael said. "It's all in my head. It has fallen to our lot to decide upon the next Millennial contest. Hopefully, also, we will settle the question of the Goodness or Badness of cities this time around."

"How quickly time passes when you're immortal!" said Mephistopheles. "Being a master of one-pointed concentration has something to do with it too, of course. Well then, let the cities rise like mushrooms." "Like flowers is an apter image," Michael said. "Which is the truer image remains to be seen," Mephistopheles said. "So, trot out one of your urban saints and my merry crew of demons and I will have him foreswearing Good in no time."

"No, he needn't be a saint," Michael said, demonstrating again Good's irresistible tendency to give up advantages. "And anyhow, we have something more elaborate in mind. Something with a bit of sweep and grandeur to it to be held in a variety of times and places throughout the new millennium. But I'll tell you about that later. For now, are you acquainted with our servant Faust?" "Of course," Mephistopheles said, though here he committed a typical error of the Dark side, pretending to knowledge that he didn't have. "You mean Johann Faust, of course, the well-known magician and mountebank who resides in—where was it now?—Koenigsberg?" "Whether or not Faust is a mountebank is still under discussion," Michael said. "But he's not in Koenigsberg. You'll find him in Cracow."

"Of course, I knew that all along," Mephistopheles said. "He's got a little place near the Jagiellonian University, does he not?" "Not at all," Michael said. "He resides in chambers in Little Casimir Street near the Florian Gate." "It was on the tip of my tongue," Mephistopheles said. "I'll go to him at once and put the scheme to him.