Goodbye to Budapest

by Margarita Morris

  Katalin looks at Zoltán, but he’s staring into the middle distance with a glazed look on his face. She wonders what he saw at the radio station that is haunting him so.

  ‘Sit still and let me put a bandage on you,’ she says to Sándor.

  She finds a length of gauze bandage in the first aid box and wraps it inexpertly around his head, fixing it in place with a safety pin. Róza would know how to do this sort of thing properly, but if what Sándor says is true, Róza will be dealing with worse cases at the hospital right now.

  When Sándor is bandaged up, Katalin pours everyone a glass of Pálinka which they’ve had in the cupboard for years and hardly ever touch. It’s been such a momentous day that it seems to call for something a little stronger than coffee.

  As the smooth, sweet liquid hits her throat, she says a silent prayer of thanks that everyone is home safe. But what the next few days will bring, nobody knows.

  Chapter Twelve

  Wednesday, 24 October 1956

  Katalin stirs at the sound of distant rumbling, like thunder. It’s still dark outside and the children are both fast asleep. She doesn’t want to get up yet. Last night, they fell into bed late, having drunk more of the Pálinka than they’d intended. Sándor went to sleep on the sofa in the living room. She rolls over, wanting to snuggle up close to Zoltán, to breathe in his scent and feel safe in his arms. But his side of the bed is empty.

  Now she’s properly awake and she sits up, whispering his name in the dark. There’s no reply.

  The rumbling is getting louder and she doesn’t think it can be thunder after all. Thunder comes in short bursts, but this sound is continuous. Suddenly she knows. She’s heard that sound before, during the war. She sees herself as a little girl, watching the arrival of the Red Army and her mother telling her it’s going to be all right. But of course, it wasn’t all right. And now she’s a mother herself with a family to care for. And the tanks are returning to the streets of Budapest.

  She slips out of bed and pulls on a dressing gown. In the living room Márton, Zoltán, Sándor and András are huddled around the radio, their faces drawn. The clock on the mantelpiece says it’s half past four.

  Counter-revolutionary, fascist and reactionary elements have attacked our public buildings and AVO organisation in an attempt to overturn the forces of law and order. To restore law and order, all meetings, assemblies and demonstrations are forbidden. The AVO organisation will enforce the law rigorously. This is an announcement of the Hungarian People’s Advisory Board.

  ‘We’re not fascists!’ cries Sándor. ‘How dare they make those accusations!’ His bandage has slipped off overnight, exposing a patch of dried blood on his hair.

  Soviet soldiers are risking their lives to protect the citizens of Budapest and the whole nation. Welcome our Soviet friends and allies!

  Márton turns off the radio with a shake of his head and a look of indescribable disappointment in his eyes.

  ‘The authorities are lying,’ says Zoltán. ‘The Russians aren’t here to protect us. They’re here to destroy the revolution.’

  ‘But…’ Katalin has so many questions she doesn’t know where to start. What can you do about it? Where’s this all going to end? What’s going to happen to me and the children if you are killed fighting?

  ‘We have to stand up to the Russians,’ says Sándor. ‘And this time we’re going to win.’

  A look passes between the three younger men as if they’ve already decided on their course of action.

  ‘What are you going to do?’ asks Katalin. Her mouth is dry and there’s a tight knot of fear in the pit of her stomach.

  Zoltán takes her hands in his. ‘What started yesterday is the beginning of real change. But we shouldn’t have expected it to be so easy. It’s going to take more than just a march and toppling a statue. We can’t give up now.’

  She nods her head, unable to speak. She wants to tell Zoltán to stay at home, let other people risk their lives fighting for freedom, but every mother and wife in the city will be thinking the same thing. And then where would they be? Back to square one.

  He strokes her hair. ‘Stay here with your father and the children. I’m doing this for us and for our children’s future.’ He kisses her on the lips. ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you, too.’

  *

  Armed with the rifles they acquired at the radio station the previous evening, Zoltán and Sándor set off in search of a group they can join. On the grand sweep of Erzsébet Boulevard, signs of yesterday’s demonstration are everywhere. The elegant nineteenth-century façades are daubed in red paint with the words Russians Out! The charred remains of bonfires to burn Soviet books smoulder in the breeze. Hungarian flags with the Soviet star cut out of the centre flutter from windows. But the mood of joyous liberation has been replaced with a palpable sense of fear and expectation. Pockets of armed men and women cluster on street corners, preparing to defend their city to the death.

  ‘Soviet tanks coming!’ A cry goes up that the enemy is on its way. In fact Zoltán can feel their approach in the vibrations of the cobbles under his feet, although he can’t yet see them.

  ‘Over here,’ shouts Sándor, grabbing Zoltán’s arm and pulling him into the porticoed entrance of a building. All around them, armed civilians take cover in doorways and behind trees, holding their weapons at the ready. Zoltán hears a click as Sándor releases the safety catch on his rifle. Across the street, upstairs windows are flung open and youngsters lean out holding bottles with rags hanging out of the tops.

  They are getting closer now, their caterpillar tracks making a racket on the cobblestones, setting every fibre of Zoltán’s being vibrating. He peers out from their hiding place and sees a convoy of three Russian tanks rounding the bend in the boulevard. They are coming straight down the middle of the road, big, ugly and faceless, their guns swivelling left and right, ready to fire.

  Suddenly all hell breaks out as those in the upstairs windows lob their lighted bottles of petrol at the tanks and those on the ground fire their weapons. Exploding Molotov cocktails quickly engulf the tanks in balls of flame, but the Russians are not defeated yet. The front tank aims its gun at the building where Zoltán and Sándor are taking cover.

  ‘Run!’ yells Zoltán.

  The two friends sprint down the street just as an explosion behind them blows the front off the building. A shower of masonry and glass crashes to the ground, missing them by inches.

  ‘Bloody hell,’ says Sándor once they’re clear of the danger zone. ‘That was close.’

  Zoltán doesn’t have words to describe what he’s just experienced. When he turns and looks back up the road, he sees bodies lying where once civilians stood. The only consolation is that the tanks are now blazing infernos and the Russians inside will never fire on Hungarians again.

  As they continue on down the road, it becomes clear to him that if they are going to have any chance of succeeding against the Russians, they need to organise themselves into strong fighting units with a strategy. They can’t simply wander the streets in twos and threes, hoping to pick off a Red Army tank here and there.

  At the junction between József Boulevard and Üllői Avenue an armoured vehicle is driving cautiously. Hungarians hiding in doorways open fire on the vehicle on top of which is mounted a machine gun. The vehicle skids to a halt as its tyres burst and the driver slumps in his seat, blood running from a bullet wound to his temple. One of the freedom fighters runs from a doorway and tosses a bottle at the stranded vehicle. Zoltán smells petrol fumes at once. Everyone holds their breath, waiting for something to happen. Two other Russians inside the vehicle must know that if they so much as try to escape, someone will shoot them dead.

  Then an old man totters out from behind one of the large advertising cylinders that line the pavement. He’s wearing an old coat that reaches almost to his ankles. With shuffling steps he approaches the petrol-doused vehicle, takes a box of matches from his coat pocket and strikes a flame
. Quite calmly, he tosses the lit match into the petrol which ignites in an instant, sending up a wall of flame around the vehicle and its doomed occupants. The old man turns and walks calmly back to the advertising cylinder as the crowd erupts with shouts of ‘Long live freedom!’ and ‘Russians go home!’

  The Russians flee from their burning vehicle and a hail of gunfire finishes them off.

  ‘Save the machine gun!’ shouts a man’s voice. The Russians are dead but the machine gun is valuable. They shouldn’t let it go to waste.

  People run towards the burning vehicle, trying to put the fire out with their coats. It’s a dangerous thing to do.

  ‘Get the sand!’ shouts Zoltán, pointing to the large boxes of sand used to grit the icy roads in the winter.

  Leading the way, he takes off his trench coat which is still damp and blood-stained from the night before and uses it like a sack to scoop up armfuls of sand. Others follow his example and do likewise. Soon the flames are doused and the prized machine gun is lifted from the roof of the burnt-out vehicle. They also find ten submachine guns, a couple of pistols and boxes of ammunition. A small treasure trove of weaponry which they can use in the fight.

  ‘Good idea about the sand,’ says the man who first shouted that they should save the machine gun. He holds out a hand. ‘The name’s Bandi.’

  Zoltán shakes his hand and introduces himself and Sándor.

  ‘Come and join our group,’ says Bandi. ‘We need people like you.’

  *

  András can’t help feeling as if he’s partially to blame for the violence that has broken out across the city. He was part of the student meeting that organised the march, he helped type up the posters and he roamed the streets late at night, sticking them on trees and lamp posts, encouraging his fellow citizens to rise up against the government. And now look what has happened. When Zoltán and Sándor came home last night covered in blood, he felt sick to the pit of his stomach. He doesn’t want anything bad to happen to his new friends. He doesn’t want to lose them the way he lost people at Recsk – Horváth crushed by the rock, or Béla shot by the guard. He pours his heart out to Anna when they meet that morning at the university.

  ‘It’s normal to feel the way you’re feeling,’ she says, taking his hand in hers and stroking the side of his face. ‘I wouldn’t love you if you didn’t feel like this.’

  ‘But I don’t think I can kill anyone,’ says András, wondering what sort of a freedom fighter that makes him. On the other side of the hall student volunteers are arming themselves with weapons from a nearby barracks. The mood amongst them is ebullient and defiant. ‘If that’s what it’s going to take to make the revolution successful, then I’m useless here.’

  ‘You’re not useless. I feel exactly the same way as you about using a gun. But there’s something else we can do. They’re setting up a first aid centre at the Práter Street School near the Corvin cinema. They need people to look after the wounded and also cook food for the freedom fighters. I’ve said I’ll help out. Will you come with me?’

  ‘Of course,’ says András, relieved that there’s something useful he can do. But mostly he’s just happy to be with Anna and know that she’s all right. He’ll do anything to keep her safe.

  *

  Everything that Ilona Novák has worked so hard to achieve is going to be destroyed: their nice house; their comfortable life; their good standing with the Party; her husband’s job as a university professor. She’s afraid, and who can blame her?

  Woken at dawn by the thunder of Russian tanks entering the city, she and her husband, Károly, listened to the radio broadcasts with a growing sense of dread. Talk of counter-revolutionaries and a breakdown in law and order frightens Ilona. She’s always found that the best way to get on in this society is to co-operate with those in power. It makes for an easier life. But now it seems as if everyone else in Budapest is hell-bent on causing as much trouble as possible. If there’s one thing Ilona knows, it’s that it won’t end well.

  ‘We have to leave,’ she tells her husband who has been sunk in despair since the student-led protest yesterday. ‘We should get out of Budapest, at least for the time being. Things will calm down in a few days now that the Russians are here.’ She has an unwavering faith in the ability of the Russians to put things right. They defeated the Nazis in the war. Surely they can stamp out a local skirmish?

  ‘But where would we go?’ asks her husband.

  ‘We could go to my sister’s in Magyaróvár.’ They haven’t spoken for months – not since their father’s funeral – but surely her sister will understand this is an emergency?

  ‘If you think that’s for the best, dear,’ says Károly wearily.

  ‘I do.’

  They spend the next half hour packing suitcases. Should she take her fur coat? It’s only October now. Surely they won’t be gone that long. They’ll be back home before the winter snows come.

  They load the luggage into the car and set off.

  ‘We’ll have to fill up,’ says Károly before they’ve reached the end of the road. ‘The tank’s nearly empty.’

  Ilona wants to scream in frustration. Her husband should have foreseen a situation like this and kept the tank full as a precaution.

  They turn onto the main road but their progress is painfully slow due to the large number of armed insurgents – Ilona refuses to call them freedom fighters – roaming the streets, dozens of burnt-out vehicles and an abandoned tank. At the first petrol station they come to, she is astonished to see that the pumps are being guarded by teenagers carrying weapons.

  ‘This is disgraceful,’ she mutters. ‘They should be in school. Where are their mothers?’

  When Károly stops to ask if he can fill up his car, a spotty youth, who can’t be more than thirteen years old, tells him that the fuel is to be used for Molotov cocktails only. The same thing happens at the next petrol station they try. Ilona is becoming increasingly anxious. She’s not used to not getting her own way.

  At Móricz Zsigmond Square they are forced to turn around because the square is barricaded by a roadblock made from cobblestones ripped from the road. Rebels bang on the car and tell them it’s not safe to be driving around. They should join the revolution or go home.

  ‘This is hopeless,’ says Károly. ‘We’ll have to go back.’

  Ilona bites back an angry comment. They’ll just have to sit tight and pray that the Russians restore order soon.

  *

  Katalin takes the children upstairs to Petra’s. Tibor, who has been grounded, is sulking in the corner of the living room.

  ‘He’s driving me up the wall,’ says Petra under her breath. ‘Keeps saying he wants to be a freedom fighter and that he should be out there doing his bit. I’ve told him he’s too young, but he doesn’t want to listen to me. What do I know? I’m just his mother, after all.’

  Katalin gives her a sympathetic smile. At least Lajos and little Eva are too young to get involved. But her heart lurches at the thought of Zoltán out there. Where is he? What’s he doing? She hasn’t heard from him all day. Much as she likes Sándor, she worries that his recklessness will lead them both into trouble. She tries not to let the children see how scared she is. But her first duty is to look after her family, which means making sure they have something to eat. She things of her own mother during the war, risking her life to put food on the table. When Katalin checked the cupboards that morning she was appalled to see how bare they were.

  ‘I’m going to the shops,’ she says. ‘Can you mind the children for half an hour, please?’

  ‘You can’t go out there,’ says Petra, grabbing her hand. She looks as if she wants to say more, but stops herself with a glance at Lajos who is looking at them both with a frown. He knows something bad is going on.

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ says Katalin. ‘And we have to eat. I’ll buy some food for you too.’

  Petra nods, thankful. ‘I’ll give you some money.’

  Outside, Katalin walks qui
ckly, keeping close to the shelter of the buildings. Other women with shopping bags are out too, scurrying like mice, darting from one street corner to another. The air is thick with the smell of gunfire and burning fuel. Sporadic shots, like firecrackers, ring out. She turns a corner and stops abruptly at the sight of a dead Russian lying on the pavement, his face and hands burnt to a crisp. The body has been covered in white lime powder to stop the spread of infection, like a sprinkling of snow. It’s a shock to see something so horrific close up, but she walks determinedly on, telling herself that her mother must have seen similar things and worse during the war and always returned home with a smile on her face.

  She goes to the butcher’s first but the counter is bare save for a handful of shrivelled salami sausages.

  ‘There were no deliveries today,’ the butcher’s wife tells her. ‘This is all I’ve got.’

  ‘I’ll take two,’ says Katalin, remembering the food shortages they suffered during the war. She hopes it won’t get as bad as that, but best to be prepared.

  The baker sells her the last loaf. It’s already going stale.

  On her way back, she makes a short detour to Feri’s café. All the tables are occupied by people with weapons, openly discussing politics and the new free Hungary they are fighting for. Behind the counter, Feri looks like a young man again. There’s a smile on his face and a bounce in his step.

  ‘What can I get you, Madame?’ he asks, beaming at her.

  ‘Just a coffee please.’

  ‘On the house,’ says Feri, pouring her a cup of his speciality brew. ‘Vive la révolution!’

  *

  Zoltán and Sándor are now members of a group based at the Corvin cinema and calling themselves the Corvin Circle. Dozens more ordinary Hungarians turned freedom fighters are joining them all the time.

  The squat rectangular building with a flight of steps leading up to a curved front entrance is the perfect headquarters from which to plan their line of attack. Surrounded by a semi-circular sweep of buildings five to six storeys tall, the cinema can only be accessed by narrow alleyways which a tank can’t enter. The buildings surrounding the cinema also happen to be situated on the junction of Üllői Avenue and József Boulevard, a major intersection – the perfect spot from which to ambush and destroy enemy tanks. A school in nearby Práter Street is being used as a canteen and first aid station for minor casualties. More serious cases are taken to the hospital.