It’s approaching ten o’clock yet the park is abuzz with activity. Half of Budapest seems to have had the same idea. We make our way through the park, joining throngs of people, shoulder-to-shoulder in reverential silence. The evening is cold; no one looks at anyone. Beneath our thick coats and hats and behind our vacant expressions, we are one large anonymous mass, paying respect to the man whose distant voice held sway over us for so long.
Large circles of people stand round the steps of the monument. Some make their leave, pushing back through the crowd silently but politely. Others take their place. Many, those who had come prepared, carry candles. Those at the front place their candles on the steps that lead up to the tribune of the statue. Dotted around, watching us carefully, a number of AVOs with their rigid postures and steely stares.
Agnes and I gaze up at the eight-metre-high bronze effigy which, upon its plinth and the tribune, dominates the night sky. We all know its history – erected in 1951 as a present to the great leader on the occasion of his seventieth birthday from us, the ‘grateful Hungarian people’, as it’s inscribed. How we all hate it – being watched over by this oppressive foreigner. Yet, here we all are, placing candles at his feet. To think he was dead – we thought he’d live forever.
Agnes nudged me in the ribs. ‘Come, let’s go,’ she whispered.
I nod and follow her out of the mass of mourners.
‘Didn’t expect there to be so many people,’ said Agnes, once we were free to talk.
‘Rather macabre when you think about it.’
‘Well, we were part of it.’
‘I’m cold.’
We were walking towards the park exit. Still people were coming through. The atmosphere was quite strange – that of a subdued festival. More AVOs lined the entrance to the park, the street lamps reflecting in their buckles and shiny boots. As we made our way out, I heard my name being called. My heart leapt; the natural guilt reflex. I looked around but saw no one.
‘Eva,’ came the voice again, a woman’s voice. Agnes gripped my wrist, looking straight ahead at the line of AVOs. I followed her gaze and sure enough, an AVO was walking towards me. I stepped back – again a reflex. I couldn’t see the face under the peaked hat. But then I saw her eyes – her different coloured eyes. ‘Eva, it’s me – Karolina.’
‘Karolina?’ My word, Karolina.
‘Hello, Eva, how are you? Come to pay your respects to our most esteemed leader?’
‘Y-yes.’ I couldn’t believe it was the same Karolina, wearing the blue uniform of the AVO, her hair tied back, sporting a peaked cap.
‘How strange to bump into you after all this time. We should meet for coffee.’
‘Erm... yes, that’d be nice.’ I couldn’t think of anything worse.
‘Tomorrow, Sunday. That café you used to go to. Is it still there? Ten o’clock?’
‘So soon? Well, yes. Why not? Ten o’clock.’
‘Excellent. See you tomorrow.’ With that, she spun on her heel and rejoined her colleagues.
I could tell that Agnes was suppressing the urge to laugh. ‘“So soon?” You didn’t expect that, did you?’
‘No.’
‘Why did you say yes? You didn’t have to.’
‘I don’t know. She caught me off-guard. Anyway, perhaps she has something to tell me.’
*
And so I was back at the Café of the Revolution. I don’t come so often now, only very occasionally. I sat down at a table to the side of the counter. The window seats seemed too exposed. Karolina hadn’t shown up yet but I was almost fifteen minutes early. I wanted a few minutes to myself, perhaps to compose myself. I didn’t order anything – I said I was waiting on a friend. The café is much the same as it was four years ago. The only thing to have changed is the staff – gone the old hag and her young assistant with her flushed cheeks and plucked eyebrows, instead two middle-aged women serve behind the counter. One slim, one plump. I prefer to be served by the plump one; the slimmer one always has dirty fingernails. The portraits of Stalin and Rakosi are still there, as is the Alpine scene. A radio, barely audible, plays a collection of brass band music. I think of Karolina as I saw her in her shiny AVO uniform, so different to the Karolina who came to see me in this café four years ago. I’m dying to know how she became an AVO, one of them. But it’s the memory of her being arrested, or perhaps just being taken away, that is implanted most firmly on my memory. The look on her face – a mixture of anger and fear. Although I am thinking of her, I still jump a little when, suddenly, she appears in front of me.
‘Have you not ordered?’ she asks. ‘Here, let me.’ She approaches the counter and speaks to the slimmer one. She’s not wearing her uniform, but a jacket and skirt, drab in colour. Her hair is loose, stray strands held in place by hairgrips.
So, with our coffee and a slice of cake each, she asks about my job and my life as a teacher, she asks about where I live, and what I do. She tries to ask as subtly as she can whether there’s a new man in my life. Instead, for some reason, I find myself talking about Ferenc.
‘You may be wondering,’ she says, ‘how I came to be working for the AVO.’
‘The question did cross my mind.’
‘Well, they arrested me – as you know. And I’ll admit, Eva, I’ve never been so scared. I told them everything they wanted to know, and then some more. I sold poor Vida up the river in order to save my own skin. I wasn’t proud of myself but what could I do? They asked me to become an informer. I did. They were impressed. And one day they offered me a job. So I took it. That’s it.’
‘As easy as that.’
‘As easy as that. This cake is awfully dry.’
‘So, what’s it like – working for them?’
‘It’s changed my life – made me into a stronger person. It’s given me a purpose.’
‘And Vida?’
‘Ah, poor Vida. Perhaps if we had children, I might have tried harder. So I survived and Vida was defeated.’
‘Poor Vida.’
‘That’s what I said.’
‘I thought you might have turned on me – for not being able to help you.’
‘No. I knew I’d put you in an impossible situation. And I’m sorry about that. Anyway, I’ve got something to tell you; I thought you’d be interested to know. Do you mind if I smoke?’ She rummaged in her handbag, pulling out a lipstick, a compact...
‘Karolina?’
‘Yes?’ She lit her cigarette.
‘You’re about to tell me something?’
‘Yes, I’m sorry. Vida is in prison. He got ten years. As did Josef.’
I gasped. ‘Josef is in prison?’ I asked, leaning towards her.
She nodded. Turning on her chair, she gazed around at our fellow customers. ‘Ten years also.’
‘Oh.’ I poked at the remains of my cake with the dessert folk. This, at least, was new – they never used to supply dessert folks. We used to have to use our fingers and afterwards wipe them on a napkin. Ten years. A flood of questions crowded my mind. Yet I couldn’t speak.
Finally, Karolina broke the silence. ‘Do you want to go see him?’
‘I can go see him?’
She stubbed out her cigarette, grinding it into the ashtray. ‘I can arrange it.’
‘Oh dear. I’m not sure I could face it.’
‘Perhaps not. But you should, Eva. You have to go.’
*
And so, three weeks later, I sat waiting in a large, dingy room full of tables with a chair either side of each, stone floor, no windows, just the single light bulb, and a faint unpleasant smell akin to dirty socks. Yet despite all the tables and chairs, there were only four of us waiting – all women, one with a child, a young girl. Watching over us, four prison guards, each with a revolver in a holster, and one with a rifle slung over his shoulder. We all waited in silence. Even the little girl, clutching onto a rag doll, sitting on her mother’s lap, had been awed into silence. There were two iron-clad doors leading into the room, the one
we came through, behind us, and one in front. It was on this door we all focussed, waiting for it to swing open. My stomach groaned; I hadn’t eaten breakfast; my nerves had suppressed my appetite. I had Karolina to thank for this. But gratitude was far from my mind. I’d brought a little present. Karolina had suggested it; said it would be OK to bring one item. After some thought, I settled on a jar of honey. Josef always liked honey. I’d wrapped it in a brown paper bag, tying it together with string. Colourful paper, Karolina told me, was not permitted. A reception guard had inspected it, a woman with a huge bust and hefty shoulders holding it up to the light, opening it, sniffing it. Deeming it acceptable, she screwed the lid firmly shut but confiscated the string. I wrapped it back into the paper, screwing it at the top. My mind went back four years; to the day Josef left my life to start anew with the ‘colleague from work’. How my efforts to renew our marriage had failed at the first hurdle. I never saw him again. One day, on returning from work, I found he had been and taken the rest of his possessions – his clothes, a few books and a bust of Lenin. That was about it. He’d left a note – a single sheet of paper anchored down by an empty vase. Just two words – I’m sorry. And that was it. It was a Friday and for the next two days, without school to distract me, I sat in the apartment and festered, reliving our time together. Of course, I knew what had caused our marriage to fall apart. I glanced at the little girl, sitting quietly on her mother’s lap, twisting the doll’s plaits around her finger. The woman caught my eye. ‘How old is she?’ I whispered. ‘Four,’ she mouthed. One of the guards cleared his throat. Four years old. The same age. In the autumn of forty-nine, five months after Josef had disappeared out of my life, I received the notification of divorce. My consensus was not necessary, my signature not required. Josef had merely to fill out the necessary paperwork, sign it himself, ask the registration bureau to notify me and that was it. And so there it was – in black and white. Stark and soulless. The end of a marriage. What puzzled me though was the date stamped on the divorce certificate – 1st October 1946. It was 1949 – why had they put the wrong year? I missed him. I’d got used to living without him very quickly but I still missed him awfully. I felt sometimes as if my memory was full of the missing – Josef, Valentin and of course Anastasia. I often wonder too what happened to Tibor. He’d be nineteen by now. A man in his own right. I wondered what sort of life he was leading now; whether the state had forgiven his adolescent faux pas. I hoped so. I think once I may have prayed for him. And now, sitting in this dank room, four years on, clutching my jar of honey, I was about to meet my former husband. A foreboding prospect. I tried to plan what I wanted to say but my nerves prohibited any semblance of rational thought. The silence of the room was oppressive. I tried to control my breathing. My palms, I realised, were damp. The little girl whispered something to her mother but was cut short by a shush.
The door in front of us opened. Into the gloom, stepped one then another guard, anonymous beneath their uniforms. Then a short parade of ambling men, stooped, diminished beings, handcuffed, all in grey, jacket and trousers, like pyjamas but coarser. Glancing at each of them, it took a few seconds to discern which one was Josef. He stood at the end of the table, stock still, looking down at me. I tried to stand but my legs, sapped of energy, prevented me.
‘Sit,’ barked one of the guards at him.
He did so. ‘Hello, Eva.’
His voice. It sounded different. Deeper. Slower. ‘Josef.’
A guard spoke. ‘OK, you have five minutes,’ he announced. ‘Guests may offer their packages now. No touching. No standing. No smoking and certainly no fornication.’ His colleagues guffawed at his little joke.
‘I... I brought you a little something. Here.’ I pushed the package across the table. I realised my hand was trembling slightly.
‘That’s very kind of you. What is it?’
‘Open it.’
I watched him as he opened up the paper and pulled out the jar with its golden contents. His skin, how grey it was, the same grey as his jacket. His hair had lost its colour too. How pronounced his Adam’s apple, dotted with grey stubble, how thin his fingers.
‘Honey. That’s lovely. I haven’t had honey for years. I can’t open it though, the lid’s too stiff.’
‘Here, let me.’ He passed it back. I couldn’t do it either. The reception guard had screwed it too tight. ‘I’ll try again in a minute,’ I said, placing it to one side and patting the lid.
‘It’s wonderful to see you again, Eva.’
‘And you, Josef. How are things? Or is that too difficult a question?’
‘I’m fine, actually. I’m past the worse. They do say that – once you’ve survived the initial arrest and interrogations and the first few weeks inside, then it gets easier. You just have to keep a low profile. I’m good at that. I’ve been here three years so I’m already almost a third through. And what about you, Eva? Tell me all about yourself.’
‘There’s not much to say, really.’ But I tried. Speaking almost in a whisper, I told him about my life without him, about my job, how we survived, the shock from Stalin’s death, the uncertainty of the future post-Stalin.
‘Two minutes,’ said a guard.
‘Already? Josef, I have to ask you this... what happened to the woman, the other woman?’
He chortled, shaking his head. I felt a knot of tension tighten within my stomach. ‘Oh, Eva. There was never another woman.’
‘What? I... I don’t understand. I...’ I felt a prick of tears in my eyes. ‘Oh, Josef, I never knew.’
He nodded, almost imperceptivity, a wry smile. ‘I had to.’
‘You did it to protect me.’
‘Yes.’
‘You did it for me.’
Leaning forward, he spoke. ‘I knew my time had come; that I’d be arrested any minute. You would have been arrested too, of course. I survived longer than I thought. A whole year. By the time they came for me, I was able to say, “I have no wife. We divorced many years ago.”’
‘Many years? The certificate – the date said nineteen forty-six.’
‘Did it? Excellent. He was good to his word.’
‘You got them to change the date?’
‘It cost a little. The longer we were divorced the safer you were.’
We stared at each other. How we assume. How I believed his story about the other woman. And yet... And yet.
‘Thank you, Josef.’
He smiled.
I asked, ‘Do you ever think of Anastasia?’
‘Not now, Eva; not now, eh?’
I had to swallow my disappointment. I wanted to ask him why; why not now when the shrill voice of the guard declared, ‘Time’s up.’
‘Will you come again? Next year?’
‘Prisoners to their feet.’
‘Next year?’
‘I’m Class A,’ he said, collecting his crutch. ‘It’s all I’m allowed. One five-minute visit a year.’
‘On your feet – now.’
‘Oh, Josef.’
‘It was good of you to come.’
‘Silence. Talking is now prohibited.’
‘To next year then.’
He smiled. A guard, a more junior one, poked him in the back. He turned around and faced the wall behind him.
‘Josef, your honey.’
He didn’t turn around. The guard held out his hand. I passed him the jar. ‘Can you open it?’ I said. ‘The lid – it’s too stiff for me.’
The guard raised an eyebrow, perhaps surprised at my affront, although certainly less surprised than I was myself. I smiled weakly. He twisted and realising it was more difficult than expected, looked at me, then tried again, putting in an almighty effort while pretending he wasn’t. And off it came. A small smile of satisfaction flashed across his lips as he passed the jar to Josef. Josef nodded his thanks.
‘Right,’ said the guard in charge. ‘If we’re all ready?’
And with that, I watched my ex-husband be marched out of the door.
Anastasia. Josef’s bravery in divorcing me had been tempered by his refusal to discuss her. Now I would have to wait another year. She would be a month short of her fourth birthday now. I can’t imagine a time when I won’t know exactly her age. The pitiful sixteen days diminish with each passing day as it recedes further into the past. Every morning, I awake and her face is there, smiling down at me. I experience a few moments of joy before the reality of the day reasserts itself. Each morning I die. In my dreams I have lived her whole life for her, a life that stretches ahead through the years, the distant decades to come. And it’s a life full of joy, full of love; a life that transcends my own in its beauty. It is a life destined by God, His guiding hand leads her through, showing her the strength of her love, the way it radiates on everything around her. See how it touches all those she meets, how they leave her with a smile on their faces, a lighter beat in their dismal hearts.
And through the years of her long, happy existence, I am never far away; for it is I she loves the most, the first point on her compass. And as each night passes, it is I who becomes dependent on her. She needs me less and less but she never leaves me, never ventures too far away, keeping her presence near, her reassuring attendance. And then she is a baby once more. And it is at night she calls me Mama, it is at night she suckles, it is at night I smell her hair, that fresh odour, so indescribably beautiful that I want to bottle it and die with it filling my nostrils, filling my every sense, my whole being.
I still visit her plot in the cemetery and the wooden cross battered by the elements, her name all but invisible now. Oh, my pretty little Anastasia, how I still miss you. I always shall.
Each morning I die.
*
Tonight, three weeks after seeing Josef, I am going out again for a drink with Agnes. It is still early evening when we meet and make our way to the Lenin Bar. Tonight, a pianist is playing, which means Agnes and I can sit at our table protected by the screen and talk quietly without fear of being overheard. The pianist launches into a series of Hungarian folk tunes as we clink our glasses.
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