Questions
1. What is for sale at the stand with the sign “Beer and Soft Drinks”?

2. Why is Berlioz upset with Ivan Homeless’ poem about Jesus Christ?

3. What nations do Berlioz and Ivan think the Professor comes from?

4. Who does the Professor predict will kill Berlioz?

5. How does the Professor describe himself?

Answers
1. The stand has no seltzer or beer for sale, only warm apricot soda.

2. Berlioz says the poem presents Jesus as a living person when it should present him as someone who never existed.

3. Berlioz thinks the Professor comes from Germany, then France, and Ivan thinks he comes from England, then Poland.

4. The Professor predicts a Russian woman who belongs to the Komsomol will kill Berlioz.

5. The Professor describes himself as a polyglot who knows “a great number of languages,” “a specialist in black magic,” a historian, and perhaps a German.