‘George, you sound like a politician.’
‘We all have to be politicians now – our future depends on it.’
The intense look of sincerity in his eyes squashed me. I knew that he loved me. But I loved George as a woman loves her brother. I had to tell him about Josef but the words wouldn’t come; it would have to wait.
Later, I thought, I’d tell him later.
2.
The outside of the building was pockmarked with bullet holes; every window smashed; the front door blasted into pieces. She had to force the fragments of door to one side. The dark stairway reeked of filth and urine. She looked at the scrap of paper – first floor, it read, number three. She climbed the stairs, strewn with rubble, her heart beating like a platoon of marching soldiers. From outside, she heard a round of laughter and felt as if it was aimed at her. She felt inside her pocket for the money. Almost five hundred florins, most of what they had left. The loose cash Zoltan kept about his person was as much as a factory worker took home in a month. Maybe more. Carrying it now only brought to mind the wads of bank notes stuffed into the mouths of lynched AVOs. She too would be lynched if anyone knew how much she had on her.
A cool breeze whistled down the corridor, the light bulb swung ominously from the ceiling. Number Three. She knocked softly. No answer. She turned to leave, pretending to be satisfied – she’d come as told and knocked, not her fault if no one was there. But then she thought of Roza and knew it didn’t count – a mouse wouldn’t have heard that knock. She turned to try again and this time noticed that the door was slightly ajar. Slowly, nervously, she pushed the door open and gingerly stepped inside. I’m doing this for my daughter, she thought to herself. A shaft of light blasted through the window illuminating a simple table and chair in the middle of the room. Above the table, a chandelier dangled by a single wire, bits of plaster and masonry littered the floor, dry dust everywhere.
‘Hello,’ she said, quietly, praying not to hear an answer. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she noticed the bed to her left in the corner behind the door, equally coated in dust and bits of wood. Above the bed a portrait of Rakosi, without the glass, his features distorted by graffiti into a caricature. Any other time, she may have laughed. She stepped carefully across the floor and saw, under the bed, a teddy bear, ragged and coated in dirt. She ran her finger over the table, leaving a line of wood exposed between the expanse of dust like a aerial view of a river cutting through a plain. It was then she heard the crunch of shoes behind her.
She spun round. Silhouetted in the door, the now-familiar quilted jacket and beret, the scent of handmade cigarettes. ‘Mrs Beke,’ he said. ‘Nice of you to show. Apologies for the state of this place but you know how things are.’
‘Shall we get this over and done with?’
‘Do you know, I know your name but you don’t know mine. You must think me very rude. Tamas, at your service, ma’am.’ He clicked his heels and bowed. ‘I suppose that’s how you expect people to greet you, eh, in this great society of equals?’
‘OK, how much do you want?’
‘Want?’
‘You can have it all.’ She’d come prepared to bargain, to play the game. Start at three hundred and rise when needed. But she didn’t want to play now, she was frightened and simply wanted to get it over and done with and get out. She fished in her pocket and pulled out the notes, rolled up and held in place by an elastic band. ‘Here, five hundred.’ She tossed it on the bed where it threw up a small cloud of dust. ‘That’s it, I have nothing more.’
He looked at the money, kept looking at it as if he’d never seen so much (which, Petra knew, he wouldn’t have), then looked back at her. She stepped back, knowing immediately from the glare in his eyes, she’d made a mistake. ‘You stupid bitch, your sort thinks money will buy you out of anything. I don’t want your fucking money but I’ll take it, I’ll stuff it up your husband’s arse.’ Outside a truck speeded past. He glanced at the window, as if he was expecting someone to appear, then back at Petra. ‘Please, take your skirt off.’
It sounded more like a request, the host offering to relieve his guest of her coat. ‘No.’ The refusal may have slipped out but inside her throat, it had traversed mountains of fear to emerge.
He laughed. From inside his jacket, he pulled out a revolver, clicked it open, inspected it and closed it again. She noticed his fingers without fingernails. ‘Your skirt, Mrs Beke, if you please.’
‘You don’t have to do this –’
‘You’ll be my first in six years – you know that? OK, perhaps there was the odd whore here and there but we won’t count them.’
‘No, please, not me...’
‘You don’t remember, I told you, your husband ordered my cock to be chopped in half. Your fucking husband. I almost bled to death. Couldn’t piss without pain for years. I swore I’d get my own back, I’d kill the bastard. But this, this is so much sweeter, to fuck his wife with the remaining half. So, blame it on him, it’s his fault, you hear? And you’ll go home and tell him. Tamas Kopacsi, he’ll remember. Fucked his wife with half a cock. Ask him if he’s still got the other half. Perhaps, he kept it as a souvenir, eh?’
‘I’m sorry for what he did, really I am, but you can’t –’
‘Can’t I?’ He took a step towards her, his thumbs hooked in his belt. ‘Your skirt.’
She glanced at the window. The left shutter hung on one hinge. She wanted to scream but who would come to help an AVO wife? How far up were they? First floor, too far to jump. How silent the street, how empty her heart. She’d never felt so alone, so at the mercy of another. She wondered whether she’d prefer the bullet but the thought of Roza waiting for her, wanting her to come back, filled her mind. She thought of Zoltan and realised for the first time in years, she loved him and had never told him. How she wanted to tell him now, to shrink in his arms and disappear, engulfed in his warmth, his smell. The tears tickled her cheeks.
‘You’re keeping me waiting, Mrs Beke.’
How absurd his politeness, his use of her name.
With fingers shaking, she unhitched the hook on her skirt.
Chapter 28: Day Nine – Wednesday, 31st October
Zoltan gazed out of the broken window onto Republic Square and the scurrying figures below. The morning mist hung heavily, the square carpeted in places by autumn leaves. Armed insurgents, men and women, had positioned themselves behind trees and burnt out cars.
Wearing only his ‘dead man’s’ civilian clothes, Zoltan had rejoined his company the evening before and felt better for having done so. Petra was right; there was still a chance, a fighting chance. Better to die fighting than caged up in that hole, frightened of every unfamiliar noise.
Donath had welcomed him back with a raised eyebrow.
Young Paul joined him at the window. ‘It doesn’t look good, does it?’ he said.
‘No. But we’ll be OK’
Behind them, other AVOs smoked and waited, their rifles and guns propped up against the wall. A long mahogany table decorated with wilted flowers and blotting pads dominated the conference room, surrounded by high-backed chairs. From the ceiling, hung three lavish chandeliers and, along the walls, a veritable gallery of portraits of great leaders, past and present, Hungarian and Russian. A large clock above the double doors at the far end showed ten o’clock. Men positioned themselves at each of the many windows looking down on the square.
A burst of gunfire splattered the building. The two men ducked as glass shattered around them. Everywhere, men crouched on the floor as bits of plaster fell on them, segments of chandelier glass tinkled to the floor and a cloud of dust floated down.
Donath strode in from the anteroom next door where the regional commander had set up office, surrounded by phones and yes-men (Donath, thought Zoltan, being one of them). ‘Get up, you fools,’ he bellowed. ‘They’re not going to hit you while they’re firing upwards.’ Zoltan looked up and saw the fresh sprinkling of holes in the ceiling. ‘The commander’s
on the phone, we should be getting reinforcements soon. Now get up and return fire. Lieutenant, I leave it to you.’ With a click of his heels, he swung round and returned to his master.
The men gathered up their Kalashnikovs and crawled to the windows. Zoltan found himself sharing a window with Paul but another round of fire kept them down. A portrait of Gero clattered to the floor. ‘Fire,’ shouted the lieutenant from the far side of the long room. Zoltan peeked out of the window, only shards of glass remaining, steadied his rifle and fired aimlessly into the square. Paul followed his example. The insurgents fired back. The whole room reverberated to the sound of gunfire from all directions, ricochets pinged, glass shattered, the walls thudded with bullets. To Zoltan’s left, the AVO machine-gun rattled continuously while the assistant frantically fed the belt with more bullets. A piercing scream rose above the noise; someone to Zoltan’s far left had been hit. Colleagues pulled him back as he writhed in pain, clutching his shoulder. The returning fire was coming at them vertically now, the insurgents had occupied the building opposite. The wounded man yelped helplessly as someone tried to check the spray of blood with a tourniquet.
Saturated in sweat, Zoltan fired and kept firing, ducking occasionally, his teeth clenched solidly. He saw a rebel take a bullet down in Republic Square, someone ran to his aid. Zoltan held his breath, aimed and fired. The rescuer went down in a heap and Zoltan felt the surge of ecstasy rise up within him. He wanted to kill, to pluck the bastards off one by one. An AVO to his right fell backwards silently and landed with a thud, his shirt ruined by the spurt of blood from his neck.
Zoltan reloaded. Outside, the rebels were dropping, sustaining casualties at a fantastic rate. A bullet hit the window frame inches from his face. He looked up and saw a figure duck down behind a window in the building opposite. The figure reappeared. Zoltan fired and the man slumped forward as if trying to escape from the building. ‘Got him,’ exclaimed Paul. For a moment, Zoltan was about to argue the case but then a T-54 lumbered into the square followed by dozens of more rebels using it for cover. Seconds later, two ambulances appeared. Men and women with Red Cross armbands jumped out. The AVO machine gun sprayed the newcomers. A nurse fell lifeless, her white uniform doused in crimson red.
A haze of smoke had descended over the square but the gunfire maintained its tortuous momentum. Every few minutes, another AVO fell. The room heaved with their groans and shouts. More AVOs ran in; some to replace their fallen colleagues, others to carry the wounded away for patching up. The dead, they left where they fell.
More rebels crowded into the square, zigzagging across the open space, firing up at the AVOs. Every tree, every vehicle used for cover; every window in the opposing building occupied. Paul ducked down to catch his breath, ‘Christ,’ he said, ‘for everyone that goes down, another ten spring up in their place.’
Those in the square were getting closer; soon they’d be storming the building. The insurgents were close enough now to throw their home-made Molotov cocktails. Zoltan heard the screams from the floor below as the petrol bombs exploded.
The T-54 fired its first salvo. It shot high. No damage – this time. The AVO machine gun fired back, but a bullet in the head of its AVO operator caused it to pause. Before the replacement had a chance to take his place, another volley from the tank smashed into the building two or three floors above them. For a moment, Zoltan feared the ceiling was about to collapse on them.
The far door opened. It was Donath again, a wet cloth round his mouth against the dust, crawling in on his hands and knees. Above him, the clock read eleven. Through the cloth, he shouted something out but the noise trampled on his words. He disappeared again. But his message spread along the room from one window to the next; it didn’t take long, there weren’t that many of them left now. Zoltan hoped the message would survive in tact by the time it reached him. This was no time for Chinese Whispers. Finally it reached Zoltan and Paul: ‘No reinforcements coming.’
The two men gawked at each other, absorbing its significance. Someone, somewhere, had decided against helping them, had decided to leave them to their fates. They were on their own.
‘We’re not going to get out of this, are we?’ said Paul, close to tears.
‘Yes, of course we are,’ replied Zoltan, not bothering to hide the lie betrayed in the tone of his voice. ‘Keep firing.’
Huge cracks appeared in the ceiling and the wall behind them, the whole building creaked as another tank shell smashed into it.
‘Come on, let’s get out of here.’ As they dashed for the door, Zoltan realised the room was awash with dead and dying colleagues.
‘Comrade...’ A uniformed AVO Zoltan knew only by sight had grabbed his trouser leg, ‘get me down to the basement.’ The side of his head had caved in, coagulated in blood and shattered bone.
Paul waited a few steps away, ‘Fuck sake, leave him,’ he implored.
‘No, comrade, please...’ The grip on his trousers tightened as another shell tore into the wall next to the window where only moments before he and Paul were positioned. Zoltan clenched shut his eyes and pulled his leg away. He wanted to apologise but what was the point? The injured AVO was still screaming at them as they made their way down one of the two stairways, his screams eventually obliterated by the noise of mayhem coming at them from every direction.
AVOs seemed to come from every direction, scrambling down the stairs but as they approached the ground floor, they realised that with the huge front doors blasted away, they could not reach the basement stairs without exposing themselves to gunfire. Voices above them told them to come back up to the first floor.
The room was filled with uniformed AVOs, most of whom Zoltan knew only by sight, if at all. Donath was amongst them. ‘My boys, my boys,’ he said, approaching Zoltan and Paul. ‘You’re my only ones to survive.’
‘What’s happening, boss?’
‘We’re surrendering. The commander’s sending out a forward party under a white flag.’ He looked at each of them in turn. ‘Thank you, boys. We’ve come along way together, eh? A long way.’
It seemed ridiculous, thought Zoltan, but he couldn’t help but bristle with pride; proud that at this last hour, his boss was finally acknowledging his worth.
The surrendering party consisted of three women and a white flag. Good idea, thought Zoltan, the insurgents wouldn’t harm unarmed women. The women waited for their orders. How strange, he thought, the one at the front, holding the flag, had eyes of different colour. It gave her a strange look, but certainly not unattractive. Quite the opposite. The three women passed through the crowd of AVOs, the flag above them, setting out on their fateful journey onto the street and into the hands of the insurgents and the unknown. Shouts of good luck followed the trio as they marched bravely down the main stairway. The men and women left behind stood awkwardly in silence, no one sure of their place, like unfamiliar guests at a party.
They heard the shouts outside. ‘They’re surrendering; don’t shoot.’ They listened as the guns ceased their work, and as the shouts and yells died away.
‘It’s working,’ whispered Paul, his eyes as wide as a child’s.
Donath nodded authoritatively.
The atmosphere lightened as the guests familiarised themselves to their surroundings.
Then, outside, a single shot rang out, followed moments later by another and then the third.
The burst of cheering outside chilled those inside. For a few stilled moments, they remained motionless, each of them coming to terms with God’s decision. The seconds stretched as their lives closed in. Their last chance had just passed them by; death was coming to greet them like an invisible friend, its arm around their shoulders, showing them the way to the eternal darkness that lay ahead.
Then, as one, everyone propelled themselves in different directions. Amidst confusion and screams they collided, pushed and elbowed their way out, each for himself, each opting for a different route to escape, to flee for their lives. The insurgents footsteps wer
e audible now on the main stairway, intensifying the panic. Those who had elected to go that way were soon dragged out and shot.
Zoltan found himself charging down the second staircase, surrounded by others, amazed to see Paul and Donath still beside him, not sure who was following whom. As they passed the ground floor, a group of insurgents poured in like a tidal wave crashing over a fragile boat. The narrow space filled with screams and yells as the forces clashed and clamoured. In a matter of seconds, he saw a rifle butt smash into a head, a knife plunge into a stomach. Wherever he tried to move, a uniform blocked his way. The stench of blood and fear soaked into him. He saw two insurgents pull Paul out by his arms and hair, the high-pitched screams disintegrating into helpless sobs. A flash of courage pierced him, he wanted to save him, but something knocked Zoltan to the ground.
A hand pulled him up, the hand of a young insurgent, his eyes, behind broken glasses, full of fire. ‘You OK, friend?’ said the boyish voice before disappearing into the tumult.
It took a few seconds to understand the significance – they thought he was one of them, without his uniform, he was one of the insurgents. The fight in the stairway dissolved as quickly as it had started. The insurgents moved out, taking with them their screaming prisoners, leaving behind their bloodied victims. Zoltan followed them, joining in with the shouts of ‘death to the AVO’ with apparent ease because inside, his heart felt numb.
The scene outside knocked his heart back into frantic activity – the burning cars and distant bodies registered only briefly, but he retched at the sight of Paul’s lynched carcass, his body twisting grotesquely by his ankles. Around him still, the insurgents pummelled their victims before carrying them off to their places of death. An arm slapped him round the shoulder. ‘Don’t waste your tears for these bastards,’ said a voice in his ear. He turned round but the man had already gone, instead what he saw jolted his heart.
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