Anastasia

by Rupert Colley

  ‘We need support. Report to southern end of Lenin Boulevard immediately. Over and out.’

  ‘He’s calling us back. Come on, let’s go.’

  Petrov manoeuvred the gears into reverse, the tank coming to life, the heavy engine stirring. ‘We shouldn’t have come down here alone anyway,’ he said between gritted teeth.

  He was right, of course, thought Valentin, it was too dangerous to patrol alone; solitary units were too exposed and vulnerable to attack. Bitter experience had taught them too to avoid the narrow streets where insurgents could readily drop petrol bombs on them from the higher floors.

  ‘The smoke’s clearing,’ said Valentin, returning his attention to the bookshop as the tank inched backwards. It was then that he saw her. A woman standing next to the fire, bright red hair, the smoke dancing round her. ‘Christ.’

  ‘What’s up, comrade?’

  ‘That woman.’

  Vladimir took the machine gun. ‘Look at her, stupid cow, just asking for it.’

  ‘No!’ Valentin slammed his hand down on the gun.

  ‘What the fuck you doing?’

  ‘Leave her. She reminds me of someone.’

  Vladimir laughed. ‘Well, in that case we wouldn’t want her to come to any harm, now would we? Is it her?’

  The tank had reversed to the end of the street, and Petrov was clumsily manoeuvring the metallic beast round. The woman faded out of view as people gathered round her and yelled unheard obscenities at the tank and fired defiant shots into the air. ‘No, it can’t be,’ he said, ‘too many years ago.’

  Too many years ago.

  Chapter 24: Day Five – Saturday, 27th October

  1.

  ‘We’re winning, we’re winning!’ Milan hugged George with such ferocity, George feared his lungs would burst; instead they were bursting with happiness.

  ‘The future is ours, George; there’s no turning back now.’

  ‘Not with Nagy back on our side.’

  ‘Three cheers for Imre Nagy!’

  The friends were preparing to go out for the morning, wrapping themselves in coats, scarves and hats for the weather had turned cold. But the new dawn had banished old fears – Nagy had pronounced: the revolution was theirs; the government had admitted that the insurgents were not counter-revolutionaries but had risen out of legitimate grievances against the regime. He announced too that the AVO was to be disbanded, Soviet troops withdrawn, and the Soviet Star replaced by the traditional Hungarian emblem of Kossuth. In the meantime, he said, there would be a ceasefire.

  ‘Eva not getting up?’

  George sighed. ‘No, I don’t think so.’ His joy was tempered by Eva’s behaviour the day before. He’d been embarrassed by it, and by the fact he had been forced to defend her from those who eyed her suspiciously. The way she behaved was peculiar, the way she stood there defiantly in front of the Russian tank, refusing to take cover. Some may have thought it courageous but George knew different. How she survived while so many around her fell, no one could fathom. It was nothing less than miraculous. Afterwards, when he tried to speak to her, she snapped at him, ‘Some things, George, you’ll never know about me.’ Of course he’d never know if she never said. But something wasn’t right.

  ‘How’s her hand?’

  ‘All right, just a scratch really.’

  ‘She was lucky not to have been mowed down. What was it about that book? She’s crazy.’

  George shook his head despairingly.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  2.

  ‘I need to go out to get some clothes and food. We can’t be seen in these clothes; we stick out.’

  Zoltan was lying in bed, his daughter sitting next to him reading a magazine he didn’t believe she could read. The room was surprising intact considering the amount of bombardment the street had suffered at the hands of the Soviet tanks. A couple of window panes had crashed through and all the others were cracked. But inside, apart from a layer of dust everywhere, everything looked almost normal. Petra had swept up the shards of glass, squared the pictures, put back up the curtain rail.

  She now stood in the doorway. He didn’t want her to go; he needed her next to him, needed his wife’s reassuring presence near him. ‘Do you have to go?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can’t it wait?’

  ‘No, it can’t. Roza will stay with you.’

  ‘Mama, no.’

  ‘Roza, come here a minute.’ Roza left his side and went to her mother, who took her hand and led her into the living room. Zoltan groaned. Petra would be telling her that she needed to stay with her father, and not to complain. Roza and he were almost strangers, hence his daughter’s reluctance to be left alone with him. He sympathised, for he had no idea what to say to her, had no idea what her hobbies were, how she was doing at school. He remembered how, when she was much younger, he could entertain her with a few magic tricks. She was too old for that now. When he asked how things were, all he got was a lot of shrugging of shoulders and noncommittal responses he didn’t understand. He couldn’t remember when they’d last spent time alone together. Petra never fully trusted him with her, always preferred to be around when he and Roza occupied the same space. Occasionally, when he slept, he could still see Roza in her pink coat and matching hat face down in the water. She was a different girl now, ten years old with a self-assurance he found alarming. But in the last four days, she’d regressed years, clinging to her mother, blaming again her AVO father for all the trouble in the world.

  Roza returned to the bedroom, glancing at him from under her fringe, circling by the wall, unwilling to commit herself again to his company.

  ‘Come, Roza, why don’t do sit back here and tell me what you’re reading about in your magazine.’

  *

  Petra wanted to run, to get it over and done with, but she forced herself to walk. She needed to find some proletariat clothes. It was the first time she’d ventured outdoors since the start of this frightful rebellion and she felt as if everyone was staring at her. She knew she wore her guilt like a badge, guilty for her marriage to an AVO, guilty for the finer clothes she’d worn, the make-up she could afford to buy, for the annual holidays on the coast, for the plentiful daily delivery of Western-style food. She wore the closest she had to scruffy clothes but she knew it was only the overcoat that disguised her. Stripped of her coat and the world would see her for what she was. Privileged. They would lynch her.

  The outside world had changed since she last saw it five days ago. Electric cables hung down, tram lines ripped up, once-beautiful buildings now scarred with gaping holes, trees uprooted, walls collapsed. Was this the work of man or God? Hand in hand, perhaps both. And the bodies – many covered with the Hungarian flag. Every few yards a loose limb, another bloated victim. She couldn’t bear to look. How could she possibly hope to do what she knew had to be done?

  ‘Morning.’ The old lady’s voice made her jump.

  ‘Morning, comrade,’ she replied automatically.

  The old woman peered up at her from beneath her shawl, eyeing her from head to foot, her toothless mouth open. ‘Don’t comrade me, you silly cow.’ She spat on the ground, turned and hurried off up the street.

  The old woman could tell, and not simply from the misplaced ‘comrade’. Down the hill, she could see a group of children and to her amazement, they carried guns. She shivered. It wasn’t worth the risk, she was going back. She pulled her headscarf further down her forehead and, gripping her coat tightly, walked briskly up the hill and back towards the apartment.

  It was only as she ascended the stairs that the idea came to her.

  Tiptoeing down the corridor on the first floor, one floor below her apartment, she pressed her ear to the first door. Silence. Not daring to breathe, she gently turned the doorknob. Locked. She breathed out and realised how hot she felt. But the coat had to remain. She could hear voices behind the second door and so moved to the third. Silent again. This time, however, the door was not locked. Insi
de, the lights were on but the place was bitterly cold – more chance of it being empty. Two plates of blackened food on the living room table brought a sigh of relief – no one lived here now. She went to the bedroom, determined now to complete the task and get home. The bed was made, pillows plumped but felt like stone such was the cold. She pulled open the wardrobe door and found what she’d come for. Using the chair from the corner, she also found a suitcase on top of the wardrobe. She thanked her luck and began piling in the limited number of trousers, skirts and jackets, male and female, everything old and black. The sizes didn’t matter; as long as the appearance deceived.

  She desperately wanted to get back now. Only one floor away but she’d never felt so vulnerable, so far from home. From the clothes, the pictures, the furniture, she guessed they’d been a middle-aged couple. She wondered what had happened to them.

  As she walked back into the living room, she turned the light switch on. His eyes burnt into her, she screamed. Jumping back, she dropped the suitcase. She slammed into the wall and couldn’t stop screaming. But he didn’t move. ‘Please, don’t...’ She couldn’t talk, her heart beat too violently to think the words. She was crying now, her head felt light, dizzy.

  And still he hadn’t moved.

  ‘Hello?’ How small her voice sounded. ‘Are you...’

  He sat upright on the armchair, a black suit, his square-shaped head fixed to his square shoulders like two blocks of wood. His face was white, his lips blue, a large red hole camouflaged within the blackness of his jacket.

  Without taking her eyes off him, Petra knelt down, her fingers reaching out, and picked up the suitcase. Taking slow, large steps, she stalked out of the room, her eyes fixed on his – terrified lest they might move.

  The living room door, as in her own apartment, was only a step away from the front door. With a leap, she slammed both doors and found herself in the corridor, her hand clasped against her mouth, trying to hold back the vomit in her throat.

  But in her hand – the clothes she had come for.

  3.

  Gyűjtőfogház: an ugly name for an ugly place.

  Josef Horvath had spent five days short of six years incarcerated within its thick wet walls, the first two in solitary. Now, at least, he had company – an old Jewish chemistry lecturer by the name of Hentz and a young farmhand called Laurence. In age, intelligence and upbringing, Hentz and Laurence represented the opposite ends of the spectrum with Josef as the halfway point. Socially and intellectually, they were as divided as they could be, but they shared similar AVO-inflicted scars, and here, in this hellhole, men put aside their differences, their prejudices, and stood together, united by circumstance – and matching pyjama-like grey prison uniforms.

  For weeks now, the inmates knew something was happening, but what exactly no one could say. Rumours abounded, gossip circulated, and hearsay spread like a contamination of false hope. Things had started changing almost imperceptibly – the AVO guards behaved with a little more decency; their food rations improved gradually, both in the quality and the amount they received; they were allowed to receive letters, parcels and even visits. It improved everyone’s moral and benefited all. Josef’s only contact with the outside world was Eva. It’d been seven months since her last visit; five months to the next. She’d believed his story that he’d divorced her to protect her. It was true, but there had been another woman, a woman who had failed to stand by him. As soon as she realised that his arrest was imminent, she’d disappeared, never to be seen again.

  Then, following Rakosi’s downfall a few months before, almost half of the prisoners had been freed. It was pure chance whether you were one of the lucky ones or not. Josef, the chemistry lecturer and the farmhand were not. But their hopes had been ignited.

  Then, nine days previously, on 18th October, something extraordinary happened – something that made the smouldering of hope blow even stronger. Someone (no one knew who) had broken into the prison compound, made it to the prison wall, and shouted up, ‘Prisoners, don’t worry; you’ll all be free within a fortnight!’ Now there was real excitement. Talking was banned, as always, but the whisperings and gentle tapping on pipes lasted all night. What did the message mean, what was going to happen to free them, who was the messenger? It seemed too wonderful to be true; it had to be a hoax, or worse, some AVO machination.

  But on 24th October, instead of hope, came further despair – the AVO guard doubled, and the prisoners’ rights of exercise withdrawn without notice. The guards themselves became tense and twitchy, lashing out at the slightest digression.

  However, it was the guards, Josef noticed, who gave away the next clue – they suddenly appeared with the Soviet stars removed from their caps and, further still, most had swapped their AVO uniforms for regular blue police ones. You could taste the excitement. Why, everyone asked, were the AVOs disguising themselves?

  And now, today, 27th October, the next piece of the puzzle raised the temperature still further – someone had spotted the Hungarian tricolour with the Soviet hammer and sickle removed. No more whisperings, no more tapping, now the prisoners bellowed at each other through their cell walls – spreading the news, speculating loudly on its meaning.

  Josef, Hentz and Laurence talked at once. ‘The food, the visits,’ bawled Hentz. ‘The message –’

  ‘The messenger,’ added Laurence excitedly.

  ‘Yes, the messenger, the caps and now this.’

  ‘They’ve kicked the Russians out,’ yelled Josef.

  ‘Perhaps they’ve kicked the Commies out with them, sent them all back to Moscow.’

  They were all talking loudly, relishing the freedom to do so.

  The door swung open, an AVO appeared briefly in an ill-fitting police uniform. ‘Gentlemen, please, keep the noise down.’ The door slammed shut.

  The three of them, standing in a circle, looked from one to the other. ‘Did you hear that?’ said Hentz quietly.

  ‘He asked us to keep the noise down.’

  Josef almost had to sit down. ‘I can’t remember the last time someone used the word please.’

  ‘And he called us gentlemen,’ said Laurence.

  ‘Is that why we’re talking in hushed tones now?’ asked Hentz. ‘Because he asked us so nicely?’

  Josef began to laugh.

  ‘I suppose it is quite funny,’ said Hentz.

  ‘Funniest thing I’ve ever heard,’ added Laurence.

  The three of them laughed with total abandon, making up for years without humour, choking and doubling-up with laughter.

  But then Hentz stopped as abruptly as he’d started. ‘Shush,’ he urged. ‘Shush now, listen.’

  ‘What? What is it?’ asked Laurence, wiping his eyes.

  ‘Can’t you hear?’

  Josef strained his ears. ‘No, what?’

  ‘For goodness sake, and I’m the old man round here, what’s the matter with you two, can’t you hear it?’

  ‘Is that someone singing?’ asked Laurence, his hand cupped to his ear.

  ‘Good God, yes,’ said Josef. ‘So it is.’

  Straightening his back, Hentz said, ‘I never thought I’d hear that again.’

  The singing they could hear belonged to one man. Even through the cell walls, Josef could hear it, the voice clear and proud; for he was singing the national anthem, not the communist Internationale, but the Hungarian National Anthem of old, the slow melody, full of melancholy, the words stirring and poignant. Another voice joined in, then another and another. Like a huge wave it gained strength and momentum as it advanced until, unstoppable, the whole complex was awash with voices, a thousand voices, singing as they’d never sung before. Hentz, Laurence and Josef, representatives of the social spectrum, held hands as their voices rang out, tears streaming down their faces, united as only the tortured can be.

  As the anthem ended, the spontaneous cry went up: ‘Give us our freedom, give us our freedom...’, a thousand feet stamping the ground, a thousand hands hitting their prison
bars, a thousand voices, deadened for so many years, now chanting for the freedom they knew was theirs.

  The cell door opened, this time a different AVO, but still disguised as an ordinary policeman, a look of desperation on his face. ‘Please, please, you can’t keep this up.’ His hand delved into his pocket. Josef stepped back; surely they wouldn’t be so foolish to start killing now. But in his hand, a fresh packet of cigarettes. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Take them, I’ll get you more, only stop the noise, please.’

  Down the corridor, Josef could hear more cell doors being opened, more desperate AVOs pleading with their captives. The world was turning upside down and how glorious the feeling.

  Laurence grabbed the cigarettes, then pushed the guard to the side. The man fell back against the damp wall, his eyes shocked and frightened. Standing in the doorway, Laurence looked back at his fellow inmates. ‘Well, are you two coming or what?’

  ‘What? Now?’ asked Josef, realising what a ridiculous question it was but it all seemed too easy, too perfect. Behind Laurence, he saw men running down the corridor, a flood of humanity in grey pyjamas, shouting with joy, pure, ecstatic joy.

  With one foot in the cell, the other out, Laurence grinned. ‘I suppose if you want,’ he said, ‘we could hang around for another year or two.’

  Hentz laughed, slapping Josef’s back. ‘The boy’s right; what are we waiting for? After you, Josef, my friend, after you.’

  Chapter 25: Day Six – Sunday, 28th October

  1.

  Petra and Roza had been queuing for over an hour. Petra only hoped they wouldn’t run out by the time she got to the front. Gone were the days when she could simply walk into a closed access store, flash her pass and take her pick from an opulent range of foodstuffs and be served by polite, subservient staff. But the queue of women was cheerful, strangers brought together by atrocity, able to talk for the first time without fear of their words being reported to the likes of her husband. Despite the chaos around them, these women felt free. Petra was pleased for them, and listened to their tales and their gossip, but said little, speaking only to agree or show astonishment; for she feared if she spoke, her words might betray her, her tongue might slip a nugget of information exposing her AVO connection. Twice Roza made to speak; twice Petra shot her a glance that silenced her daughter.