District VIII

by Adam LeBor

  But the biggest group of foreigners was probably the southern Slavs, the Serbs, Croatians, Bosnians and marooned former Yugoslavs whose country no longer existed and now did not know what they were. Tens of thousands of refugees had poured north across the border into Hungary during the wars of the early 1990s, many of them smart, young and entrepreneurial. Some had planned to return home once the fighting was over, but had eventually moved on to Vienna, London, Berlin, New York or Toronto. Some had gone back to Belgrade or Zagreb. They found their new countries awash with traumatised refugees, gunmen and organised crime. They promptly left again, many returning to Hungary, where they eventually applied for citizenship.

  A handful, like the man Balthazar was going to see, were criminals themselves. Balthazar opened his eyes to see a man with a familiar face, sitting ten yards away on another bench, reading that day’s Magyar Vilag. He took his sunglasses off to see him better. The man caught Balthazar’s eye and nodded. Balthazar half-nodded back.

  What was he doing here? Tamas Fekete was better known as the Hammer, several of which he liked to use in the course of his work. Fekete was in his late twenties, stocky, muscled, about five feet eight, with the over-developed physique of a regular steroid user. He wore a tight white T-shirt emblazoned with the MNF logo and blue shiny track pants. Despite his T-shirt, Fekete was a debt collector for Black George, who definitely did not meet the MNF’s standards of racial purity. Which was why Fekete should not have been in Rakoczi Square. Under the terms of the agreement brokered by the Kris, Black George operated in District IX, all of which counted as his territory. District VIII belonged to Gaspar. Both groups’ men were allowed to pass through either district, if necessary, en route to somewhere else. But they were not allowed to linger. Eating or drinking in a District VIII café, even hanging on a park bench, was a hostile act. Fekete caught Balthazar’s eye again, deliberately this time, winked, sat back and slowly turned another page of the newspaper.

  At that very moment, Balthazar’s phone rang. He looked down at the screen: it was Sarah. He considered not answering. Judging by previous experience, there was only one reason why she was calling now, shortly before his time with his son. He answered, the sinking feeling in his stomach growing steadily heavier.

  ‘I’m really sorry, Tazi. Alex can’t make it this afternoon,’ said Sarah, not sounding sorry at all.

  Balthazar resisted the urge to hurl the telephone across the square, ideally at the Hammer. Instead he kept his voice calm. ‘Why?’ he asked in English.

  ‘He’s double-booked.’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘A children’s conflict resolution workshop.’

  Balthazar held the phone away from his head, staring at it as though it had just landed from outer space. ‘A what?’

  ‘We’re really excited about it. It’s being developed by the Gender Studies department at Central European University. There are some really interesting creative visualisation techniques about non-hierarchical de-acceleration. I forgot that I had put his name down three months ago. Alex is one of the first kids to try it.’

  Alex attended the American school, a mini-campus better equipped than most Hungarian universities, far out on the very edge of Budapest. The children were a mix of expatriates whose parents were diplomats or worked for the United Nations or other international organisations and corporations, and the Hungarian nouveau riche. Like every schoolboy, Alex had to cope with troublesome peers, who sometimes got physical. Balthazar’s advice on conflict resolution was simple and had served him well growing up on Jozsef Street: if someone hits you, fight low and dirty and hit them back as hard as you can. So far, according to Alex, it had worked very well.

  There was no point engaging Sarah on the merits of the workshop. He thought for a moment. Her usual tactic was to try and provoke him, so she could then run to her lawyers and claim he was being uncooperative or even intimidating. He asked, ‘Can I talk to him?’

  ‘Maybe later. He’s asleep now.’

  Balthazar brought his emotions under control. He could call Alex directly, on his own phone, but that would only annoy Sarah. He needed time to think. Sarah considered herself a smart intellectual, but her thought patterns were rigidly set in a politically correct paradigm. Which meant she was actually quite predictable. Which meant in turn that he should be able to outmanoeuvre her. The first thing was to buy some time. ‘OK, Sarah. Listen, I’m tied up with something right now. Can I call you back in a few minutes?’

  ‘Sure,’ she said, clearly surprised how easily the call had gone, and hung up.

  Balthazar was in the middle of a turf war apparently brewing between his brother and the most dangerous organised-crime boss in the city, but that would have to wait. Alex came first. Balthazar knew that protesting to Sarah would get him nowhere. He had to be clever, give her something she wanted. What she wanted, more than anything, was academic recognition. Sarah was still trying to finish her PhD thesis, which would hopefully bring her an assistant professor’s post at CEU. Its working title was ‘Gendering the domestic bio-space: A Study of inter-familial power dynamics in Roma society’. Jargon aside, the topic was actually quite interesting: how Gypsy women used food and sex to control their men. Sarah’s problem was that apart from Balthazar, his family, and Maria, her cleaning lady, she did not know any Gypsies, let alone Gypsy women, and she was no longer welcome at Jozsef Street. Sarah, like many of her colleagues, lived in an academic bubble. She walked from Pozsonyi Way in District XIII across the Grand Boulevard and through District V to the Central European University each morning and back again in the evening. If she went out, it was usually to the ruin pubs of District VII. She rarely visited District VIII and had no contacts in the villages and settlements outside the capital.

  Balthazar had been her ambassador. When they first got together, Sarah wanted to explore everywhere. He had taken her into the ghettoes of Districts VIII and IX, and the Roma settlements in the villages around Budapest. Swept up in her enthusiasm, he had quickly fallen in love with the vivacious New Yorker who was so fascinated by his world. But as their relationship faded, so had Sarah’s passion for fieldwork. By the end, she was mostly content to recycle other sociological studies peppered with densely referenced academic jargon. Her other problem was that when she did meet Roma women, they had no idea what she was talking about. She couldn’t speak Hungarian and had not even learned a few greetings in Lovari. But this was more than a language issue. After so many years in academia, her whole conceptual framework was utterly alien to them. Even Balthazar struggled to translate her questions into comprehensible language. He had heard on the CEU grapevine that Sarah’s supervisor, a ferocious Swede, had said that without more fieldwork, she would not receive her doctorate. He had also heard on his own grapevine that a group of Roma women in a village outside Budapest had recently set up a weaving cooperative -against the will of their menfolk – which would be a perfect solution for Sarah’s fieldwork problem.

  Balthazar glanced across the square. The Hammer had put his newspaper down and was now on the phone. Balthazar put his sunglasses back on and rubbed his neck, trying to ease a tendon which seemed to have locked solid, and thought for a moment. Maybe, much as the idea pained him, he should postpone Alex’s overnight visit. It was only a day since the beating and it would take at least one more to recover. He knew he would run out of energy by the early evening. He didn’t want Alex to see him like this and to worry. Plus, the situation with the Gendarmes was not resolved. Balthazar had humiliated Attila Ungar in front of his men. The attack at Keleti was payback and a warning to stay away from investigating the dead man. But he was not staying away. He was digging deeper. The Gendarmes would come back for him and the next encounter would be much worse. What if they came to his flat when Alex was there? For now, Alex was probably safer staying at his mother’s. He could see him tomorrow evening, somewhere public, like the playground on Freedom Square. That was right by the American embassy. The square was thoroughly cover
ed by the embassy’s CCTV – even the Gendarmes could not interfere with that – and there were always lots of policemen around. They would be quite safe there. Balthazar glanced again at the Hammer. All that aside, why was Black George’s man here, provoking him?

  Balthazar picked up the phone and called Sarah. As expected, she did not pick up and the call went to voicemail. He left a message, suggesting that he meet Alex the next afternoon instead and briefly mentioned the Roma women’s cooperative. He sat back and relaxed, enjoying the warmth of the sun on his face. After a couple of minutes, his phone rang. He glanced at the screen, took the call.

  Sarah was friendliness itself. ‘Hi, so sorry I didn’t pick up. But that’s a great idea to reschedule for tomorrow afternoon, Tazi. The workshop is only on this evening and Alex will have done his schoolwork by tomorrow. He can be out until eightish.’

  Balthazar thanked her, said nothing for several seconds. Sarah was only helpful when she wanted something. The silence stretched out, then she surrendered. ‘Thanks for the information about the women’s cooperative. It sounds amazing.’

  ‘It is.’ Balthazar had taken a course in the Gender Studies department during his time at CEU. He dug into his store of English academic vocabulary. ‘They are doing some pioneering work dismantling the intra-familial hierarchy and reconfiguring the domestic power dynamic.’ He paused. ‘And I know they want to tell their story. They are looking for funding so they need someone to write about them.’

  Sarah could barely keep her hunger from her voice. ‘The thing is, er, Tazi, could you... er...’

  Balthazar smiled. She could not bring herself to ask for what she needed. The Roma women would be much more at ease, would talk to Sarah more openly with Balthazar there. In fact, without him, she would get nowhere. ‘Sure. I can take you. Maybe next Saturday.’

  ‘It’s a date. Thank you.’

  Balthazar checked the calendar on his watch. After tomorrow, he would not see his son for more than a week. ‘Alex could come with us. An extra trip.’

  That meant it would not be counted under the terms of his agreement with Sarah. He heard her sharp intake of breath, sensed her annoyance that she was losing control over his access to Alex fighting with her appetite for academic success. The latter won.

  ‘Sure. That would be nice. Oh, and I meant to ask. How are you? Someone told me you were attacked at Keleti.’

  Tine, now. It got a bit rough, but nothing serious. Let’s meet at Freedom square tomorrow afternoon. I’ll call you.’

  Balthazar hung up, then scanned his surrounds. Two more of Black George’s men had appeared, one young, barely in his twenties, the other obese, in his forties. Both were strolling leisurely around the entrance to the metro station. They too caught Balthazar’s eye. They smiled, sat down on two different benches, facing him from two sides, and lit cigarettes, the trails of smoke rising slowly over the square.

  HEV station, Boraros Square, 3.00 p.m.

  Eniko sat back in the hard plastic seat and stared out of the window as the HEV, the suburban railway, trundled alongside the Danube. Her instructions had been precise. Take the train from Boraros Square, ride it six stops to the end of the line at Csepel, where a driver in a blue Nissan saloon would pick her up. She knew where she was at Boraros Square. It stood on the edge of District IX, next to the Petofi Bridge over the Danube. Raday Street, a trendy pedestrianised thoroughfare, was nearby. The 4 and 6 trams ran over Petofi Bridge, connecting with the Grand Boulevard that looped around the inner city. The number two tram also left from Boraros Square, heading back downtown, rattling north along the Pest side of the embankment, past Parliament until the route ended at Margaret Bridge.

  As the HEV pulled out of the station, she realised somewhat to her shame that after almost thirty years living in the city, she had never been to Csepel Island. Born in Budapest, Eniko had grown up in District XIII, not far from where Sarah lived, although they had never met. It was a liberal, middle-class area, home to a large Jewish community, Uli-potvaros in Hungarian, New Leopold Town, shortened to ‘Lipi’ by its inhabitants. Both Eniko’s grandparents on her mother’s side were Jewish. They had survived the war in the flat where her mother now lived, on a street named for Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish diplomat who had saved tens of thousands of Budapest Jews by declaring them to be under Swedish protection. Budapesters were often intensely territorial, passionately loyal to their own district. Eniko’s life, like many of her peers’, was defined by the 4, 6 and number 2 tram lines which cut the city into a giant semi-circle, with occasional forays into District VIII on the other side of the Grand Boulevard.

  The HEV carriages were oblong, with flat roofs, trusty Soviet-era workhorses, crowded with shoppers laden down with bags of groceries. Three girls in their early teens sat near Eniko, crowding around their friend in the middle as she scrolled through her Instagram account, hooting at the photographs. A cycle path ran alongside the train track. Eniko watched a couple in their early twenties racing the train and each other, swerving in and out before nearly colliding, laughing out loud. Part of her thought that was how she should be spending her day, zipping along the riverbank, out in the fresh air, with a guy – there was one in particular who sprang to mind.

  She closed her eyes for a moment and played back – again -the conversation in Balthazar’s flat on the day that they broke up, hearing herself say that she wanted to end it because she was going to London, the look of amazement on his face, his protests that London was just two hours away on an aeroplane and in any case she was not moving there permanently, but only for a few months; her shake of her head, tight and determined, the dull hurt in his eyes and the heavy silence. Everything Balthazar said had been true, which was why she could not meet his eye. Perhaps she should have just told him the truth: that she was falling in love with him, as she had never done before, and that she was terrified that she would be hurt. So she had taken the coward’s way out and walked away. And part of her – a large part, she realised since she had returned to Budapest – regretted that decision every day.

  But if her personal life was a disaster, at least she had her work. Why did Bela Balogh want to meet her? To threaten her, perhaps? Or to give her more information?

  The latter was more likely. The damage to him was done. In most European democracies – ‘normal countries’ as Hungarians described them – the next step would be criminal charges, and prison. But no Hungarian politician ever went to prison, no matter how corrupt they were and how strong the evidence against them. That was the one rule of engagement that all sides agreed on, whoever was in power. That and the 80/20 per cent split: eighty per cent of the monies stolen from the EU subsidies went to the ruling party, the other twenty was divided up among the opposition. Eniko had been used as a conduit, she knew, aiding one side in an intra-party struggle. She still did not know who sent her the documents and video footage, but every source she had ever dealt with had an agenda. She had no choice but to publish the documents and video footage. As the former interior minister, in charge of both the police and the secret service, Bela Balogh would be privy to many of the government’s innermost secrets. He had been brought down by the prime minister, she was sure. What would Bela Balogh want now, more than anything? Revenge.

  Eniko felt her pulse quicken. Partly from nervousness – she was now a player in a political game with very high stakes -and partly with a familiar anticipation that a big story was coming her way. She checked her watch: it was six minutes past three. Her second appointment was downtown at 6.00 p.m., so she should have plenty of time. The journey from Boraros Square to Csepel Station only took around thirteen minutes. The train veered away from the riverbank, heading deeper into the island, stopping at the local stations. It passed over a small canal, its water brown and stagnant, through fields bordered by wire fences. An abandoned Communist-era industrial building stood by the side of the track, a grey concrete hulk covered with graffiti. Eniko felt as though she had crossed some kind of border, not just o
f place, but of time. Single-storey houses stood shuttered, their front gardens wild and overgrown.

  The train slowed down as it arrived at the penultimate stop, Karacsonyi Sandor Street. The carriage emptied out, the teenage girls and the women shoppers chattering happily as they disembarked. A blue Trabant, now a rarity, puttered down a side street, its narrow exhaust pipe coughing out puffs of grey smoke. A young woman got on board. She looked like she was in her late twenties, skinny, with cropped brown hair and a round face. She wore black combat trousers and a white T-shirt, looked fit and very toned. She sat opposite Eniko, who smiled in greeting. The young woman did not return her smile, but gave her a stony glance. The train pulled out and Eniko took out her old Nokia, called up Balthazar’s number and tapped out a message:

  On the HEV, almost at Csepel. It was good to see you this a.m. Hope the bruises are healing.

  At least someone would know where she was. Eniko pressed send. Nothing happened. She looked down at the handset. There was no reception. This was unusual. Hungary was blanketed in mobile coverage and they were well within the city limits. Eniko glanced at the woman opposite. She looked away, as though she had been caught staring at her.

  Eniko looked out of the window again, feeling increasingly unsettled, watched an elderly woman ride an ancient, heavy bicycle down the middle of the road. For a moment she thought of her Grandma Kati, remembered the story she had told about how she had survived the last, murderous winter of the war. The Arrow Cross had raided her apartment building in January 1945. The Russians were just a few hundred yards away. She could hear the shooting, the crack of the rifle bullets, the stutter of the pe-pe-chas, the Russians’ submachine guns, their shouts and cries. Kati was half starved, shivering, standing in the courtyard of her apartment building together with her Jewish neighbours. The Arrow Cross men were about to march them to the riverbank. One of the gunmen was the parent of a friend of hers. She had been in the man’s house, eaten his wife’s almas pite, apple pie. As the line started to move out, he had pushed her back into the courtyard, so hard she had slipped over.