The Thrill Of Agony And The Victory Of Defeat

This is it! The controversial baby throwing chapter!

Weisshaupt has a similar reaction to Powers when he is informed of Cerebus' attitude and actions. Of course being angry at Cerebus and actually doing something about it are two very different things.

Cerebus is out the front of the hotel haranguing the crowd about their lack of generosity. A lady is continually holding her squalling infant out, begging Cerebus to bless the child. Eventually Cerebus interrupts his speech and takes the baby. He says that he will bless the child and teach a valuable life lesson at the same time. He blesses the baby, and then holds it out in one arm before flinging it savagely away. The lesson is that you can get what you want and still not be very happy. It's a masterfully drawn sequence. The baby is wailing in every single drawing of it, except where Cerebus draws his arm back to throw, then a wide eyed look of horror crosses the child's face. This softens and makes amusing what is a shocking scene.

Across town a wealthy businessman is liquidating all his assets into gold to avoid a hellish fate in the afterlife. Being a pragmatic, humourless man, without a shred of imagination the Vice President of the bank doesn't believe that Cerebus can guarantee anyone's afterlife fate and takes action.

Weisshaupt is walking in his gardens (beautifully drawn by night they are too) with Theresa discussing the baby throwing incident. Theresa really seems to have it in for her old mentor. She believes that the throwing of the baby is an essentially Kevillist action and this means that Astoria must be pulling Cerebus' strings. Weisshaupt has calmed down and believes everything will work out as long as no one panics. That's when a messenger tells the statesman that the Vice President of the Bank of Iest is threatening to suspend trading on United Feldwar States Bond Issues.

Meanwhile Cerebus is bouncing ideas for future speeches off Posey, he guages the effectiveness of his threats by how sickened Posey becomes. A mysterious glowing light appears, hovers for a while and then disappears, scaring Posey and angering Cerebus. The Elf?

In the hotel Boobah finds an unattended meal in the hall, so sits down and eats it. Unfortunately for the food oriented mercenary, it was Henrot's meal he ate. I wonder if we'll ever see Boobah again.