Lunch with the Stationmaster

by Derek Hansen

  Across the road from the Lantos factory was a small joinery that had once made furniture to order for Sarospatak’s gentry. It was another business that had been run by Jews and folded after a couple of desultory attempts to keep it open. Istvan climbed the wire mesh fence and hid behind the timber still stacked in the silent yard. His hiding place gave him a good view of the factory’s front door. Istvan assumed the factory would close like the others at around five and that Mr Kadar would leave shortly thereafter. But how? Would he have a car? Possibly. But if he had a car, would he also have access to petrol? Istvan doubted it. Any petrol would be saved for deliveries in the factory truck.

  Istvan had no watch but had no trouble knowing when five o’clock had come. He heard voices up and down the street as workers spilled out of factories and headed for home. Within minutes, workers began leaving the Lantos factory, not by the door to the office but down the driveway from the rear of the building. Istvan smiled. He was certain Mr Kadar would not leave that way. Out of interest he counted the number of employees. Eight men, three women and a boy not long out of school. He’d expected more. Two more men followed, one of whom chained and padlocked the driveway gates. Istvan turned his attention to the factory office at the front of the building. There were two windows either side of the doorway with lace curtains which prevented him from seeing in. But he could tell the lights were still on.

  He grew restless. He’d instructed his brother Sandor to go straight home and help their father, asked him to really apply himself to digging out the silt in case he was late. But Sandor was easily distracted and lazy at heart. Istvan had never intended to be so late and he began to worry how his father would react. If Sandor had done a decent job, he’d probably get off lightly. If not — well, that didn’t bear thinking about. Istvan didn’t blame his father for his fits of violence. Instead he blamed the system that had exploited his father’s hard work, robbed him of the benefit and left him with crippling back pain. It wasn’t hard to remember his father in earlier days, when he was always joking and playing games with him, when he’d pick him up and throw him over his shoulder like a bag of wheat and race along the banks of the ditches, threatening to throw him in. His father deserved better. They all deserved better. Istvan’s eyes suddenly narrowed as the lights went out across the road.

  The secretary emerged first carrying a leather satchel, then a gentleman in a pressed suit and tie. Mr Kadar! It had to be. He locked the door behind him. The secretary waited on the pavement and spoke to him. Mr Kadar glanced around furtively before replying. They exchanged more words for half a minute or more, both of them on edge, before the secretary passed him the satchel and they parted company. Istvan gave the factory manager a forty-metre start before scaling the fence and following. Mr Kadar walked quickly and Istvan had to hurry to keep up. A smile briefly lit Istvan’s face when he realised where the man was headed. It wasn’t long before Mr Kadar turned into a street bordered by houses which, although by no means grand, were certainly substantial. Istvan crossed the road to distance himself but needn’t have bothered. Mr Kadar turned into the fourth house without looking around.

  Istvan quickly scanned the house, taking in as much detail as he could. It was one in a block of similar three-storey houses that ran unbroken the length of the street. It was still daylight yet the curtains were drawn at every window except for those on the ground floor. He checked the neighbouring houses: without exception the curtains were drawn back. What did that prove? Nothing or everything?

  He shivered involuntarily as a tremor of excitement ran like an electrical charge down his spine. He could see the evening’s entry into his dossier, see the form it would take and the substance it would assume. Istvan kept walking past the house, fighting back the temptation to take another look at it. His mind raced. What had been in the leather satchel? Papers probably, yet it had bulged as if it contained something far more substantial, something the slim bag had not been designed to carry. Could they be work samples, light switches and sockets? Perhaps. But at a time when people were trading gold bracelets and crucifixes for eggs, it could be that it held something much more valuable and vital than electrical fittings. Especially if the man carrying the bag had four extra mouths to feed.

  Over the next few days, Istvan made a point of walking past the Kadar house, sometimes in the morning, sometimes in the afternoon, taking special note of the curtains. On the top floor the curtains were never drawn back during daylight hours, on the middle level only occasionally and on the ground floor most of the time. He concluded that either the top floor was closed off and not being used, or was being used by somebody or some people not entitled to be there.

  He raced through his chores every morning so that he was free to continue his evening stake-outs of the factory. His dossier recorded that Kadar always carried his leather satchel and on only one other occasion did he have cause to be curious about its contents.

  On the sixth evening, Istvan went to the factory straight after school and settled down in his usual place in the timber yard. He listened for the sound of voices in the street, knowing almost to the second when the first workers would appear in the driveway to leave the Lantos factory. Everything had a comforting familiarity and having his knowledge confirmed boosted both his ego and confidence. But if the movements of the workers were predictable, what of his own? The inexperienced spy was about to learn a painful lesson on surveillance and the perils of conforming to a pattern.

  He was crouched in his hiding place behind a stack of weathering timber waiting for the office lights to go out, when he was grabbed from behind and jerked roughly to his feet.

  ‘What?’ he cried.

  Everything blurred as he was swung around and thrown hard against the old joinery shop wall. Istvan gasped as the impact drove all the air from his lungs. The back of his head whiplashed into the wall and the sudden sharpness of the pain momentarily immobilised his senses. He cried out again as a fist thudded into the side of his face. His assailant turned him, wrapped his enormous arms around him from behind, lifted him and pinned him helplessly against his chest. Istvan felt like a child again, impotent and overwhelmed. His father had often chased him and grabbed him that way in a bear hug. In their games Istvan would keep on running, his legs windmilling wildly in mid-air as he tried to get away. But this was no game and this wasn’t his father.

  ‘Is this the little shit?’

  The voice came from somewhere above Istvan’s head and the anger and malice in those few words scared him more than the beating he’d received. He forced his eyes open, saw the secretary and Mr Kadar staring back at him, saw them nod.

  ‘Right!’

  The world revolved in a dizzying blur in front of Istvan’s eyes as his assailant spun around, lifted him over his head and hurled him to the ground. There was an explosion of light when his head crashed into the ground. He was dimly aware of a crushing feeling in his chest and of pain shooting up his right arm. A boot thudded so hard into his stomach it lifted him off the ground. Hands grabbed the front of his jacket and once more he felt himself lifted off his feet.

  ‘Talk to me, you little shit.’

  Istvan tried to focus on his assailant but failed.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Isssch …’ said Istvan. Blood filled his mouth and he gagged.

  ‘Oh shit! You filthy little shit!’

  Once again his head exploded with pain as his assailant slapped him hard across the side of his face. Istvan forced his eyes to focus, saw his blood splattered down the man’s shirt and across his face.

  ‘I dunno what you think you’re doing, you little shit, but hear this. If I catch you spying on the factory or Mr Kadar one more time, I’ll finish you. Understand? Finish you. You’ll be just another corpse floating down the Bodrog.’

  ‘Yeth,’ said Istvan.

  ‘Now, why are you spying on us, what have you found out?’

  Istvan said nothing. His brain was struggling hard to organise his thought
s but failing miserably. He would have confessed to anything, agreed to anything to stop the beating, but he could form neither the thoughts nor the words. His assailant slapped him again, exacerbating his plight.

  ‘What do you know?’

  ‘Nothing.’ It wasn’t evasion, simply the easiest answer. ‘Nothing. We’ll see, shall we?’

  Istvan braced himself for retribution but had no idea what form it would take. Suddenly he was flying through the air, flying backwards, doubled over from the unbelievable impact of a fist into his stomach. He hit the ground and slammed into the wall. He couldn’t get air into his lungs, couldn’t stop the terrible burning pain in his stomach.

  ‘Just remember this.’

  Istvan tried to look up through the veil of pain that masked his senses and his sight. His assailant was standing over him. Istvan braced for another kicking.

  ‘If I see you anywhere near here — no, if I ever see you again — you’re going for a swim. Understand me? A swim. With bricks in your pants. I dunno what you think you’re doing and I dunno what game you think you’re playing, but forget it. Understand? Forget it!’

  Istvan’s whole body arched in a spasm and he vomited. Blood and sludge. Sludge and blood. He sucked in air almost as a reflex to the vomiting. The shock of the attack was beginning to wear off and every part of his body shrieked with pain. He groaned, trying to take stock of what might be broken and what ruptured. Then the terrifying thought occurred to him that his assailant might have done enough damage to kill him, that he might actually be dying. He began to sob.

  ‘You pathetic little shit,’ said his assailant. ‘I should finish you off now but you’re not worth messing my boots.’

  Istvan was dimly aware of the man turning and walking away before he lost consciousness.

  It was the cold as much as the pain that finally brought Istvan around. Overhead, the stars shone from a clear black sky but there was no moon to help him get his bearings. The inside of his mouth was caked in blood, so was the back of his head where it had hit the wall. Water. He wanted water. His need for it almost overrode his pain.

  He reached over to a stack of wood, used it to help him lift himself up onto his feet. The moment he was vertical a film descended over his eyes and he thought he’d fall. But his hold on the timbers was good and gradually his head cleared and his sight returned. There was an old wooden bucket in the yard. The metal ring holding the top part together had broken which was why nobody had bothered to steal it. Rain had gathered in the bottom, not much, but enough to wash out his mouth, rinse his face and wash away some of the matted blood on the back of his head. There were even a few drops left to swallow.

  It hurt to walk but he could do so, not straight-backed by any means but bent over so he could nurse his injured ribs. He edged slowly towards the fence so that he didn’t stretch or load up bruised and battered muscles. He took a deep breath, prepared himself for unbearable pain and dragged himself up and over the fence. He rested a moment to catch his breath and let the pain subside, then set off for home. What he couldn’t understand was why his assailant had asked him questions and then made it impossible for him to answer them. He’d wanted to answer to stop the beating but he’d needed time. He would have promised anything to stop the beating, even given away his grand scheme, if only the man had stopped hitting and kicking him. Why hadn’t he given him the chance?

  When Istvan heard the vehicle turn into the street behind him his first thought was that his assailant was coming back, that it was the company truck stalking him, the old doorless Ford. But then he remembered watching the driver lock the gates behind him as he did every night, leaving the old Ford parked in the factory yard. He stopped and turned around. It would be a patrol, had to be a patrol.

  The truck stopped just behind him. Two gendarmes with torches got out.

  ‘It’s just a kid,’ said one.

  ‘Christ Almighty!’ said the other. ‘What happened to you?’

  Istvan spun them a story of how he’d been trying to sell some eggs when two men had jumped him, stolen his eggs and beaten him up.

  ‘Serves you right,’ said the first gendarme. ‘Trading on the black market is illegal.’

  ‘My father has a bad back,’ said Istvan. ‘I wanted to buy him some palinka for the pain.’

  ‘Where do you live?’ said the second gendarme.

  Istvan told him.

  ‘We’re going near there. Hop on the back.’

  It was fully five days before Istvan felt he’d recovered enough to leave the house. His time indoors wasn’t wasted: he added to his notes and made his plan. He was determined his work would not be for nothing, and neither would his beating. His assailant had erred badly and now someone had to pay for his mistake. Someone had to pay and he knew exactly who and exactly how.

  The following evening after dinner, he slipped out of the house and walked all the way to the Kadar house. His ribs and legs still hurt but not enough to deflect him from his purpose. When he reached his destination he walked smartly up to the door and rang the doorbell. The factory manager answered the door and for a moment stared blankly at Istvan, at a loss to understand what a poorly dressed peasant boy was doing on his doorstep. Then he noticed the bruises and recognition dawned.

  ‘You!’

  ‘You need to talk to me,’ said Istvan calmly. ‘Or should I talk to the gendarmes instead?’

  Even in the dark he could see the blood drain from the manager’s face.

  ‘You’d better come in.’

  Istvan had never set foot in a house remotely like it in his life, a house with real carpet, polished timberwork and what appeared to be fabric on the walls. His senses were swamped. Everything about it looked, smelled and felt different to anything he’d ever known. People could live in the hallway alone. Mr Kadar led him into what Istvan thought was an office, but far grander than the one at the factory. Dark shelves were crammed with books and untidy stacks of files. The files looked out of place and it occurred to him that they were possibly a recent addition. There was a fireplace, the fire set but unlit, and above it a painting of bare-breasted women in a forest glade surrounded by nymphs and cherubim playing on harps and flutes. Istvan had seen similar paintings in books in the school library but had never imagined he’d ever actually see one framed and hung.

  The manager pointed to a chair. The chair was covered in dark green leather, studded so that the padding rose like so many even-shaped humps. But more intimidating was its sheer size and height. It had not been designed for the likes of him. Istvan feared he’d disappear in it.

  ‘I’ll stand, thank you,’ he said.

  The manager looked at him closely for the first time. Istvan turned his head slightly so that the bruises on his cheek would be more obvious under the light. Mr Kadar averted his eyes.

  ‘Sending someone to beat me was foolish,’ said Istvan. ‘Sending a fool to do it compounded the error.’

  ‘What do you want?’ snapped the manager.

  Istvan smiled. Mr Kadar was clearly a man who used bluff and brusqueness to cover a shortfall in confidence and his height and naturally stern expression to intimidate. But Istvan was immune to his theatrics. He’d dealt with bullies all of his short life. ‘There is a bounty,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll double it.’ Mr Kadar glared at Istvan.

  ‘Four bounties, doubled,’ said Istvan.

  ‘Agreed.’

  ‘Each month.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s good business,’ said Istvan evenly. ‘What’s to stop me taking one payment then going to the gendarmes? Your best interest is served by making sure I keep my mouth shut this month, and the next, and all the months after. You are aware of the penalty for harbouring Jews?’

  Mr Kadar scowled at him. ‘How did you know?’ he asked suddenly.

  ‘I didn’t,’ said Istvan, ‘not for sure. Not until you tried to scare me off. But you are a careless man, Mr Kadar.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

>   ‘It is in my interest for this arrangement to continue and it won’t unless you make a few changes.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘The Lantos family are listed on the register of Jews as not having been deported. You can’t change that but there are other things you can do. The Lantos factory operates as though the owner was still in control. You must have seen from your own observations that this is not normally the case with Jewish businesses.’

  ‘I was his partner. I am perfectly capable —’

  Istvan cut him off. ‘You bring home food in your satchel which I assume others bring to the office for you. You keep the curtains drawn over your upstairs windows. What have you got upstairs that you don’t want people to see? These things were obvious to me and they will be obvious to others. You are also too soft, Mr Kadar. Your man should have killed me.’

  ‘What’s to stop him killing you now?’ the manager said softly.

  Istvan smiled. ‘Do you really think I’d come here without taking precautions? The game is over if anyone so much as lifts a finger. Now pay me, Mr Kadar. And pay me again on the first of every month.’

  The manager angrily reached into the pocket of his jacket and withdrew his wallet. He peeled off some notes and added a few coins from his pocket.

  ‘I believe that is the agreed amount.’

  ‘You will send the man who beat me with the next payment,’ said Istvan. ‘Four o’clock outside the station.’

  He snatched the money, turned and strode from the room. On his way out he noticed things he’d missed on his entry. The chandelier in the hall, the intricately moulded ceiling and the gilt-framed mirror. He paused at the door to allow the manager to open it.

  ‘I have a dossier on you, Mr Kadar. Move the Jews or miss a payment and your dossier will wind up in the hands of the gendarmes.’