The Corpse with the Ruby Lips

by Cathy Ace

  “Here? Luxury?” scoffed Tamás. “You’d need a suite for that. This place was fitted out by the Communists, and I don’t think they’ve changed much.”

  “Tamás, look around you, the new owners are spending a good deal of money here. It’s becoming fashionable again,” chided his great-niece.

  Leaning in Tamás said, “The higher-ups in the party would stay here. Beyond the means of normal people. Of course they allowed the Western tourists to stay as well. Fancy food here. Always. But I hear the beds are bad. Stay with us. We have a room. It is better than a hotel. We have country air.”

  “Klara and Tamás live in Budakeszi,” explained Zsófia. “It’s about twenty minutes away, in the forest. It is popular for people to visit.”

  The first thought to cross my mind was that I didn’t fancy Tamás driving me anywhere—let alone out into the forest, in the dark, on a night I was sure would become slippery with frost and possibly ice. He didn’t look equal to the task. His eyesight was pretty questionable, I reckoned. I reminded myself he’d driven here, and had managed all right, but I still wasn’t keen.

  Bud’s always telling me my face gives away my inner thoughts, so maybe Zsófia picked up on my concerns because she added, “Tamás allows me to drive his car. I can drive us there tonight, and I’ll drive all three of us to class in the morning, then Tamás can take his car home again. We wouldn’t be late for the lecture, Cait, I promise.”

  I weighed my concerns about being driven by an inexperienced driver or a nonagenarian, and realized I’d probably prefer to stay put. However, I admitted to myself my curiosity was piqued. It seemed Tamás had judged me correctly—I do always want to know more.

  I agreed to the plan to dine and stay over, then excused myself to nip off to the little shop in the hotel to get some overnight necessities before we departed. As I was hovering beside the emergency toothbrushes I realized I’d done nothing about finding an untraceable cellphone, but decided to not worry about that—they certainly didn’t have them for sale at the hotel in any case.

  Eventually, I squeezed into Tamás’s tiny Skoda’s back seat, buckled up, and hoped we’d reach our destination in one piece. As Zsófia sped along the still-busy roads, I held onto the seat as tightly as I could. The lights of the city were a blur, and I finally shut my eyes and tried to swallow my terror.

  Safe to Talk

  THE CITY WAS FAR BEHIND us when I opened my eyes again. The darkness was almost a relief, because I was less aware of our speed. There was one final, bone-jarring surprise in store for me though—we bounced over a metal grate in the road that I was laughingly informed was in place to prevent the local animals from straying.

  “It is Tamás’s job to make sure the animals stay where they are, in the park,” said Zsófia over her shoulder.

  Not knowing anything about where we were, I asked Tamás if he was now a farmer, though he seemed too old to me to have any job at all.

  “I am a warden here. This is a wilderness park,” replied the man seriously. “It is a big responsibility to keep the humans safe from the animals. I have done this for many years. I now have young helpers.”

  I wondered what sort of animals he meant, but then we arrived at the Örsis’ home, so all conversation stopped. The house at which we’d arrived was small, traditionally built with white stucco and dark wood features, and every window and door was arched, showing a yellowish light. It made me think of illustrations in library books I’d seen when I was a child, when families of squirrels, or other gentle woodland creatures, were shown living in little homes set into the roots of trees, safe from the dangers of the forest about them. I was pretty sure there was forest all around us—because there were no other lights to be seen, and I could hear the wind whipping through bare branches in the darkness.

  As we walked into the house, Tamás hailed his wife with a raucous croaking sound. She replied with a deep-throated trilling. It was a little unnerving. Not quite as unnerving as the row of rifles in a wooden case hung on the wall inside the front door.

  “You have a lot of guns,” I couldn’t help but remark.

  “We have a lot of wild animals,” was Tamás’s cryptic response.

  Klara emerged from what I judged to be the kitchen, at the rear of the house; the woman I’d met when she was dressed in her finery was now in an old-fashioned velour dressing gown, printed with lurid red roses and butterflies. It swamped her tiny, wizened frame. Upon seeing her great-niece, the woman’s face lit up, and her little arms fluttered around Zsófia’s ample frame. She greeted me like a long-lost family member. We three were shooed into the main room where we sat at the dining table. Tamás disappeared for a moment, returning with three little shot glasses and a bottle made of black glass that bore a circular red label with a gold cross on it. It looked for all the world like a spherical comedy bomb with a neck. He assured me, with a sly smile, that Unicum is a drink that should be taken before every meal. I knocked back the shot-glassful he’d given me and the flavor was more disgusting than anything I’ve ever tasted. All I wanted to do was lick something sweet to get rid of the terrible aftertaste. Zsófia came to my rescue and offered a glass of soda water, which I accepted with gratitude, then she rushed about the house hunting for Valentin’s manuscript, eventually deciding that it wasn’t there after all. We all agreed it would be best for her to try to hunt through Valentin’s rooms the next day, but when she was able to do so without his being there.

  I was keen for the conversation to turn to Ilona, but it seemed that wasn’t about to happen over dinner, which was a bowl of steaming goulash served with homemade bread and a glistening chunk of butter. It was a hearty meal, made with love and experience and, judging by the specific ingredients, on a pretty tight budget. After we’d finished, I felt warm and full. It was a lovely sensation, but it wasn’t why I’d come.

  Eventually, with a nod of agreement from Tamás, Klara opened a cupboard and produced a large leather-bound photograph album, which she plopped on the table in front of me and Zsófia. Tamás settled in his armchair beside the open log fire and worked on his pipe, which eventually gave off fragrant billows of smoke. We opened up the album and Klara showed us a few photographs of her and her husband as small children. Zsófia showed more interest when we were shown a picture of a foursome, who turned out to be Zsófia’s grandparents with Klara and Tamás.

  Ilona had been a pretty young woman, and her husband, Kristóf, looked much older than her. Tamás and Klara hadn’t changed much, despite the folds of age on their faces.

  “Were these photographs taken after the war?” I asked. Their ages suggested it must be the case.

  “Yes, after the Nazis had left Budapest in rubble. It must have been about 1952. We were all still young, as you see. Good friends,” said Klara.

  “Wasn’t it difficult to take photographs at that time? Having access to a camera, film, and getting it developed must have been a challenge.” I said.

  Klara smiled with pride. “Tamás had a good position at a newspaper, so we were able to use the camera he had for his work. The machine had a timing device. He would set it up, then run to be in the photograph himself. Tamás was an artist with the camera.” The aged couple exchanged a tender glance. “And words. He would take photographs and write the stories to accompany them. We met because of that. He was taking photographs of the Roma performers in the streets, and I was singing. It was love at first sight.” Her face creased into a smile as she spoke.

  “Love at first sound,” said Tamás, his pipe clenched between his teeth. “At first it was her singing voice, then her speaking voice. It was rich, round, and I was bewitched. Her beauty was beyond compare to my ears, and my eyes. Then I got to know the woman inside, and I loved her even more. Fate decided we should meet, and choices have kept us together.”

  “Tell me about Ilona. She was my blood,” said Zsófia calmly. “I feel as though I know her though no one will tell me about her. Not properly, as though she was a real human being.
Mama just dissolves or gets angry when I ask her about Grandmother. Please, talk to me about the person she was.”

  “Very well,” said Tamás, removing the pipe from his lips. “She was my sister, so it is my tale to tell. I will be brief, for it is impossible to tell you everything I know. Ilona was brilliant. I was her brother, and brothers do not usually think well of their sisters I have found, but even I had to admit she was beautiful, intelligent, and had a great gift for languages. Here, in Hungary, Cait,” he looked at me over his spectacles, which gleamed in the firelight, “we have people from many parts of Europe. It has always been this way. In the 1930s and the 1940s this was also the case. Yes, Hungarians have often left their homeland for new places, but many people have come to Hungary to find a new life also. Living in Budapest we heard many languages spoken on the streets and in the cafés each day. Ilona was like a sponge. By the time she was a teen she could understand almost any language of Europe, and could speak, read, and write many of them too. I was born in 1924—so I will reach ninety next year. Ilona was born in 1930. My baby sister. The princess of my family. You know how it is for girls in Hungarian families, Zsófia.”

  He arched his eyebrows and Zsófia grinned. “It’s nice to be always pampered and attended to when you are a small child, Tamás, but I am a young woman now. Mama cannot see this. She still wants me to be a child. Being a princess can last too long.”

  Klara patted Zsófia’s hand. “Enjoy your youth, my dear. It will pass soon enough.”

  “This is true,” said Tamás. “When the Nazis arrived in 1944 Ilona was still a child, but like you, she acted like a woman. The photograph you saw? It was taken before Ilona married Kristóf in 1954. It was hard here then. The war was over, but there was so much destruction all around us. Uncertainty, too. We were glad to have the Nazis gone, and many people believed the Communists would be our saviors. Klara and I joined the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party. Most of our friends did the same. It was common, and we did not think it was a bad thing.”

  “It was much better to be a socialist than a Nazi,” added Klara.

  Tamás nodded and sucked on his pipe. “Kristóf would not join, and Ilona didn’t either. This led to pressure being put on them, and on me. I worked for a newspaper, as Klara told you, and my job was at risk because they did not sign up. Kristóf worked at the university, and Ilona was told she had to work for the government doing translation work, or else she would be sent to work in a factory, far from Budapest. In those days you never knew if you were safe. If someone, anyone—maybe a neighbor who didn’t like you for some reason—wanted to get you into trouble, all they had to do was say you were a right-wing person, and the Communists would send you off to a place where you might live and work hard, or you might die. This even happened to leaders of the party itself. For it to happen to little people like us, it was nothing.”

  “I’ve read a good deal of the history of that time, though it’s always hard to understand how the great events of the day, which are what history books tell us about, impacted people on a personal, and daily, basis.” I’d done my homework before traveling to Hungary, and didn’t need a full-on history lesson from Tamás. I was much more interested in the specifics as they related to the Örsis and the Sesztáks. Luckily, Tamás took the hint.

  “Personally, I was not a political animal. I was simply concerned about keeping Klara and myself safe. I think this is natural. I tried to persuade Kristóf and Ilona to join the party. I had grown up through the war years and knew how to keep myself safe. Kristóf had different views. As a psychologist he said any repression was bad, and I believe he worked with some of the anti-Communist factions before he left for Sopron. They were lucky to get out. I know that. I forgave Ilona for not telling me of their plans. I only found out she had escaped a year later. For all I knew she and Kristóf had been taken and sent to a camp in 1956. Through a newspaper contact, I got a photograph from Canada of the faculty arriving at the University of Vancouver in 1957. She and Kristóf were in the photograph. I knew she was safe, but not safe. You see, when she was forced to work for the party she translated conversations that were recorded by the Communists. She and I would talk about this. I do not think she ever told her husband. He would have been angry. She worked on sensitive materials, you see. When she and Kristóf fled, I was taken and interrogated about her. It was bad. I thought I would become one of the people who disappeared, sent to one of the camps. But then they let me go. I managed to say nothing about what she had told me, but, after that, it was clear I had to help the Communists to keep everyone I loved safe. I was marked by them. I had to inform on my friends and neighbors. I had no choice.”

  Klara was crying silently. She didn’t react to the tears rolling down her face at all. I could only try to imagine the terror she and her husband must have felt at the time.

  “And that is why you are now remembered as an informant,” I said quietly. “It seems unfair.”

  “We do what we have to do. We cannot blame people for thinking the worst when they do not know all the truth.”

  Zsófia looked horrified. “This is so cruel, Tamás. The people who persecuted you should have given you the chance to defend yourself.”

  “Why would anyone want to listen to me?” asked Tamás. “I did what I did. They knew that. No one cared why I did it.”

  Zsófia picked at her fingernails as she said, “Do you think the Communists might have sent someone to Canada to kill Grandmother because she knew something she shouldn’t have known, because she translated it here?” I saw hope on her face. “Oh no, wait, that doesn’t make sense, does it? She would have been working here in the 1950s, so why would anyone want to kill her because of that in 1976? Why wait that long? Why bother then? What could she have known that would matter all those years later?”

  Tamás, Klara, and I shared a look of almost-pity.

  “When you’re as young as you are, Zsófia,” I said, “a couple of decades or a quarter of a century is a lifetime or more. But in the world of politics, and power plays, it’s not long at all.”

  “You are correct,” said Tamás. “In 1975 we had elections. I know with certainty of two people who were elected then, who had been listened to by Ilona. If the knowledge Ilona had about their activities during the war had been made public they could have been ousted from power, or worse. Some stood for election because they were true believers, some because they saw a better life for themselves and their families that way. All the candidates were puppets of the party, and all did it because they wanted power and influence at any price—and under any regime. They didn’t really care about parties or ideologies; they just wanted to be in charge. As their rulers changed they adapted their views. Ilona knew about that.”

  “So you think men who were Nazi sympathizers became members of the Communist government?” said Zsófia, surprised. “It seems unlikely they would change allegiance like that. And why would it be only Grandmother who knew this? Wouldn’t everyone know? The people who’d been around during the war, for instance, who knew their opinions and actions then?”

  “Who can be certain what a man believes in his heart when they look at him from the outside?” asked Tamás gravely. “Was I a true Communist, informing on my friends and colleagues, and doing hateful things because I thought they were correct, or was I just a loving husband? The things we do, the words we say, and our true feelings are not always in line with each other. Ilona knew the public words and acts of these men, but she knew the private truths about them too. Yes, they were supported by the new regime, and took power within it. Because the new regime had listened to their private conversations it had leverage over them.”

  I had a thought. “Once these people themselves had power, they might have taken steps to eradicate that leverage. They could have been executed if Ilona had talked.” I looked at Zsófia, my mind whirring. “I’ll be honest; I’ve been thinking of Ilona’s death as something that arose from a family dynamic. However, it could be she was kil
led to shut her up, forever, by someone who’d acquired power here.”

  “You mean she was assassinated?” asked Zsófia, her eyes wide.

  If Tamás was speaking the truth, it sounded as though the reason for Ilona’s murder could well have been connected with her work in Hungary before she fled, rather than with her family life in Canada. As both Zsófia and I came to terms with this new idea, I could see the girl’s face light up with fresh hope.

  “All of that is good news, Tamás. It means Grandmother wasn’t killed by anyone in our family.” She looked happy at the thought.

  Klara laughed throatily. “You thought Kristóf killed her? Or Valentin? Or maybe your mother? Oh, child, they would not have done that. Your mother was too young, and your uncle and your grandfather were not ever men with murder in their hearts. Kristóf was a pacifist, through and through, even though he himself was an angry man. He used words, not fists. Valentin has his mother’s brilliance, and his father’s nature. He would never do such a thing.”

  I felt suddenly hot; I didn’t like knowing more about Valentin’s background than the three other people in the room, who all believed they were related to him by blood. It suddenly seemed terribly dishonest of me to not tell them the truth about him—however much Bud had insisted I keep those secrets. But what impact would the truth about Valentin’s background have? Especially for Zsófia, who obviously loved the man a great deal.

  “You are a quiet guest,” said Tamás, catching my guilty expression. “I think you have ideas about all this you are not telling us. What do you know that we do not?”

  I hate it when people spot that I’m lying—even when it’s just by omission. I didn’t reply immediately. Eventually I said, “My husband found out something about Valentin’s background that I don’t believe any of you know.”

  Zsófia tossed her head suggesting she wasn’t worried about what I might say next, but I was keenly aware I was about to shift her entire perspective on her world as she had known it up to that point.