Anastasia

by Rupert Colley

  Nearby, outside a pawnbrokers, another line of women queued. It was a Hungarian housewife’s habit to pawn the family’s winter clothes during summer and the summer clothes in winter. But they remembered too well how in ’45, the Russians had looted every pawnbroker they came across. No one was taking any chances this time. Whilst the women queued for food or clothes, a small gathering of men ambled nearby, each armed with a rifle. They stopped, offered each other cigarettes and lit up. She didn’t know why but something made Petra turn round to look at them. One of them, a man with long thick sideburns wearing a black beret and a short jerkin jacket, was staring straight at her. He winked at her and touched his beret by way of a greeting. She shuddered and turned her back on him.

  On the baker’s window, someone had daubed Russians go home in bright red paint. Plastered up on the windows and the walls of the neighbouring shops and the pawnbrokers, a whole series of revolutionary newspapers displayed for people’s consumption – news, theories, poems, jokes and cartoons. Rakosi with his bald head was a favourite target of the cartoonists. After years of silence, people simply wrote and read whatever they wanted to. Nearby, the carcass of a Soviet tank blocked the pavement, its burnt-out shell still smouldering. The women ignored it, preferring to concentrate on the newspapers while waiting for their share of the next food delivery. Food was coming in from the provinces, trucks laden with bread, milk, flour and vegetables bearing banners that read For our friends in Budapest from the village of... Oranges and bananas had become forgotten treats to ordinary citizens. But it was the supply of chicken and duck that caused the most excitement – plentiful supplies of trussed-up poultry, labelled For Export to U.S.S.R. These women hadn’t had chicken or duck for years, believing the government line that they were in short supply. Instead, they realised now, the government had been packing it all off to the Russians.

  The women talked excitedly of Nagy’s announcement of the ceasefire – no more Russian interference, no more AVO – they couldn’t believe it was for real, it seemed too far-fetched. The AVO were running sacred, hunted down and ferreted out of their hiding places and lynched by insurgents determined to make them pay for their years of brutality. Never again would the population be at the mercy of the AVO.

  Petra smiled weakly and ignored Roza’s inquisitive expression. Roza had been unable to disguise her amusement, seeing her father in the clothes of a proletariat. They were nearing the front of the queue now. The men in the lorry handed out strict amounts per person but refused payment. ‘True communism at work,’ said one.

  Petra thought of Zoltan cowering at home, clinging onto the bed, waking up covered in sweat. He was known to too many people in this city; known for his loyal and long time work as an AVO officer. How long could she hide him there, how long before they came for him? Somehow, they had to escape. But where? And how?

  Twenty minutes later, with her string bag full, Petra took Roza’s hand and made to leave.

  The gruff voice took her by surprise. ‘Good morning, Mrs Beke.’

  She looked up and the man with the sideburns and black beret was standing behind her, acting out an exaggerated bow.

  ‘Come, Roza, quickly,’ she said, pulling on her daughter’s hand, the panic rising fast within her. Roza, sensing her mother’s anxiety, obeyed without murmur.

  She told herself not to turn round; to do so would only betray her guilt. But as she reached the end of the street, she did turn round. He was still there, still watching her. He waved a lazy wave. Like a statue of salt, she felt rooted to the spot. Roza saw him too. ‘Do you know that man?’

  ‘No,’ said Petra, turning, wanting to hurry away.

  ‘He seems to know you.’

  ‘He’s mistaken then, isn’t he?’ she snapped. ‘I’ve never seen him before.’

  She only hoped she’d never see him again.

  2.

  Famous Soviet Footballers, 1947 – 1953. The book remained in my pocket. But I’d been wrong; there was no mention or photo of a Valentin Ivanov, midfielder for Moscow Lokomotiv at the turn of the decade. I’d scanned the index and skimmed the whole thing, all two hundred and eighty-two pages, and not a single mention. He hadn’t been as famous or noteworthy as I’d hoped. No matter, the book was still a reminder and I had no intention of letting go of it. I thought of Valentin; I couldn’t imagine how dreadful it could be, holed up in one of those tanks, mobile coffins as Milan called them, for days on end, a moving target for petrol bombers and a population intent on destroying anything remotely Russian. I imagined him safely in Moscow, strolling hand in hand with a beautiful young Russian girl, hundreds of miles away from this turmoil. I didn’t know how much longer I could stand it. Yes, we all wanted freedom but I didn’t want this. George and Milan, in the meantime, were having the time of their lives. Every morning, they were up early, intent on playing their own part in these ‘wondrous days’ that forever more would be recorded in the history books. Somehow, they were able to distance themselves from the carnage, from the bodies piling up, the brutality of it all. But I couldn’t.

  Today, I nervously stepped outside with them; afraid of what images might confront me. George had insisted in my coming, as I hadn’t left the apartment since the day of the bonfire. I’d used the injury to my hand as an excuse. Doused in white spirit and securely wrapped in a bandage it did, occasionally, throb but the pain, if truth be told, was nothing.

  A cold veil of snow drifted through the streets. Immediately, we met a good-looking boy, a teenager, who stopped to speak to Milan. He wore a trilby and carrying what, George told me later, was a bolt-action rifle.

  Milan and the boy shook hands. ‘Apparently,’ said Milan, ‘the communist HQ is the place to be. Whole lot of AVOs holed up, should be quite a spectacle.’

  George rubbed his hands. ‘Let’s go then.’

  ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘What do you mean a spectacle? I don’t want to see any lynching, thank you very much.’

  ‘Eva, come on...’

  ‘No, George, I know what you’re going to say, they’re AVO, they deserve it, but they’re still human and I don’t want anything to do with it.’

  ‘Keep your voice down, people will get the wrong idea.’

  Milan interrupted. ‘Well, couldn’t I go anyway and leave you two to go towards the park instead?’

  I sighed theatrically. ‘If you must...’

  *

  A large crowd had assembled in and around the City Park. Families gathered with picnics, undeterred by the gentle fall of snow, children rummaged round playing with empty cartridge shells, their parents and grandparents watching from a distance, sitting on blankets or foldable chairs. How strange it all looked; a light, almost-carnival atmosphere; a summer scene transposed into early winter, halcyon days transposed onto a battle-scarred landscape. Milan had gone off with his teenage friend to the communist HQ but George, ever-loyal George, had stayed with me. He was trying his best to disguise his frustration.

  A suitcase caught my eye – it’d been left open on a chair and was full of bank notes. People passed by and dropped more into it but no one, as far as I could see, was actively guarding it.

  ‘It’s to aid those who’re in most desperate need,’ said George, reading my thoughts.

  ‘And no one takes from it?’

  He shot me a look suggesting my question was as ridiculous as it was unnecessary.

  Towards the centre of the park, near the statue of Stalin’s boots, a large meeting was taking place, rows of people on chairs, a speaker standing on a box, shouting, waving his arms about, a Hungarian flag wrapped round his wrist.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

  ‘Ah, those happy souls. Would you believe it, it’s a meeting of the prisoners who forced their way out of Gyűjtőfogház the other day.’

  My hand went to my mouth. ‘The prison? I didn’t know they had.’

  ‘Eva, I despair sometimes. We’re living through the greatest upheaval since the war and you’re not aware of anything
that’s happening around you.’

  ‘But that’s the one Josef is in.’

  ‘You mean – was in. The prisons are empty – all over Hungary. The only prisoners left are the insane ones.’

  ‘Josef could be here.’

  ‘Well, let’s go and have a look.’

  ‘No. Not yet. But don’t you want to join them?’

  He thought for a moment. ‘No, it’s not for me; I’ve been out for three years. I’m OK now.’ He looked at me tenderly and, feeling momentarily awkward, I knew I was part of the reason that George was OK. We strolled towards the meeting, my heart pumping furiously. The speaker had said something that had made his audience laugh. He bowed in appreciation as his audience cheered and clapped.

  ‘You go,’ I said.

  ‘Go? Go where?’

  ‘Go join Milan. It’s your revolution; it’s unfair of me to hold you back. If you’re quick, you’ll catch him up.’

  I could see his expression, torn between excitement and reluctance. ‘Are you sure?’ he said, and I knew he meant it; he would have stayed had I wished it but if Josef was there, and there was a possibility, surely, then I wanted to face it alone.

  ‘Yes. Go on, you go.’

  His eyes flashed with excitement. He kissed me on the cheek and managed to walk off without breaking into a skip.

  I turned my attention to the gathering of liberated prisoners – so many men, and a few women, of all ages, of all classes; a cross section of society; all different but all tainted by the same shared experience.

  ‘Our personal liberation is a reflection of the nation’s liberation,’ the speaker was saying, still waving his arms about. ‘Too long we have lived in a prison called Hungary, too long at the mercy of our guards, the Soviet Union.’ His audience clapped enthusiastically. ‘Too long we’ve lived in a sealed tin, hermetically sealed from the outside world. And what happens if you lift the lid and allow some fresh air into the tin? Everything inside goes rotten. You can never seal it shut again and expect things to remain the same inside. We, my friends, have breathed that fresh air, and we have exposed this regime to be rotten to its very core. We will not be sealed in again.’ This time, as they clapped and cheered, a few rose from their seats to give the speaker a standing ovation. And that’s when I saw him.

  ‘Oh, my God,’ I said aloud, my knees giving way.

  He was there, standing up, clapping, his eyes wet with emotion, or was it the cold? Needing to sit down, I staggered to a nearby bench, fearful that I should faint. The voice continued in the background. ‘Mr Nagy promises us free elections based on secret ballot; he promises us a new government founded not just on the communist party but an all-party coalition...’

  ‘Are you all right, love?’ The voice, nearby, seemed distant.

  ‘She looks ill.’

  ‘Has she fainted?’

  I hadn’t realised I’d closed my eyes but on opening them again, I was surrounded by a group of elderly ladies, leaning over me, blocking out the sky.

  ‘The old parties are reforming and clamouring for their spot on the political stage; they too want a popular front...’

  ‘Welcome back to the land of living, love; we thought you’d fainted.’

  ‘She needs a doctor.’

  ‘Smelling salts, that’s what she needs.’

  I didn’t want their suffocating concern; I needed air, I needed space, but didn’t have the heart to push them away.

  ‘What’s come over you, dear, are you OK?’ More people had gathered behind them. How could a fainting woman on a park bench cause so much interest at a time like this, I wondered. ‘But what they don’t seem to realise is that all this talk and posturing will mount to nothing unless we can garner world opinion on our side. Without it, we are lost, without support, the Russians will say we’ve gone too far, and they’ll bang the iron fist and we’ll be back where we started...’

  ‘Yes, yes, I’m all right.’ My voice sounded weak and faraway. ‘I just need a few minutes.’

  ‘For goodness sake, give the poor woman some air.’

  ‘She’s fine.’

  ‘Wrap yourself up, love, it’s cold now.’

  And as suddenly as they had appeared, they were gone; the dreary sky of grey visible now, pressing down on me, snowflakes melting on my face.

  ‘But will the world listen to us? Will the United Nations take seriously our plight when the world’s attention is focussed on the unfolding events taking place right this minute in Suez...?’ I’d laid down on the bench and realised I was sprawled across it like an old tramp. People passed by, glancing disdainfully at me, young and old, carrying either picnic baskets or rifles, sometimes both. ‘The world holds its breath and watches as British and French troops amass in the Middle East; the United States turns inwards as Eisenhower and Stevenson fight it out for votes. So where, ladies and gentlemen, does it leave us? I’ll tell you where – at the mercy of Khrushchev and his henchmen...’

  I pulled myself up and readjusted my skirt, wanting to appear more ladylike. And then, like a biblical parting of the waves, the crowds dispersed and there, not more than ten yards from me, his eyes fixed on me, standing as still as Stalin’s statue that used to dominate the park, was my ex-husband.

  Chapter 26: Day Seven – Monday, 29th October

  1.

  I woke this morning with my ex-husband sleeping only a few feet away.

  I stared at him for a while trying to equate this crumpled figure with the man who’d once been a constant in my life. Yesterday afternoon, in the park, we sat for what seemed like hours with his head in my lap, the two of us sobbing.

  I asked him where he was staying but he couldn’t speak, he seemed totally helpless. I needed to act for him, to make his decisions. He was too weak to walk the distance back to the apartment but I managed to catch us a lift on a truck full of men with guns. Josef hesitated before climbing aboard, his attention caught by the large Kossuth emblem someone had painted on the side of the truck. I knew the feeling, no one had ever thought we’d see it again, the symbol of our country, the emblem of our patriotism. But now it was everywhere, crudely painted on vehicles, on shop fronts, on signs. He stared at it, his eyes wide, the emotion stifled by surprise, when a pair of arms, strong patriotic arms, reached down and physically hoisted him onto the truck.

  On this late Monday morning, the sun made an effort to brighten the living room as we ate our breakfast of bread and jam, with cups of black and unsweetened coffee. Basic foodstuffs that both of us, but especially Josef, thought were the pinnacle of luxury. But hungry as I was, I couldn’t eat, too worried about George, about how to explain the reappearance of my past. Josef ate slowly, savouring each mouthful; a habit, he told me, from his time in prison. The cherry flavour of the jam was almost too much for him, his senses not use to such an assault on his taste buds; and the coffee made him feel heady, so unaccustomed was he to its strength. Ordeal by luxury.

  Mid-morning. Josef and I sat quietly at the table, the shared breakfast plate empty. Still no sign of George or Milan but it wasn’t the first time they’d disappeared for a couple of days, revelling in the joy of chaos and the chaos of liberty. Occasionally, Josef asked me a flurry of questions – what had happened during his time away; what had caused this sudden uprising; what had happened to the old Stalinists like Rakosi and Gero; where did Imre Nagy fit into it all. I answered as best as I could, often leaving him with more questions. I longed for Josef to talk without peppering me with questions, longed for him to mention Anastasia, but our past was not a subject we broached, nor the future. Both seemed too far away. For now, we concentrated on the present. And all the time I kept a watch on the door. At some point, George would be back. How would I explain this stranger in his space, this dishevelled man with baggy eyes and long, witch-like fingers? Josef was a weakened man. I remembered him as a man of some eighty kilos. He now weighed little more than fifty-five. I dreaded to think what deprivations he endured.

  ‘How strange ever
ything feels,’ he said. ‘It’s odd but after a while life in a cell becomes your only reality. You give up on dreaming of freedom and your past begins to feel as if it belongs to someone else. So you’re left with this stretch of meaningless time. After months of solitude you crave company, for a pair of friendly eyes, a sympathetic ear, and when it happens you love your fellow inmates with an intensity that is frightening and then, after months of living on top of one another, one longs for solitude.’

  2.

  ‘I’m cold, Mama.’

  ‘I know, Roza, here, let me rub your back.’ Petra knelt down and wrapped her arms around her daughter and squeezed her tightly. ‘Papa’s going to get us away from here soon, aren’t you, dear?’

  Zoltan, sitting upright in the armchair, made no attempt to answer, instead kept his eyes fixed on a portrait photograph of Rakosi on the opposite wall. He hadn’t shaved for days, his ‘dead man’s clothes’, as he called them, fitted poorly and were of such dreadful quality it was a wonder they didn’t fall to pieces whenever he moved. He still wore his AVO regulation boots, solidly made from black leather; and in his pocket, he kept his AVO service revolver; the only remnants from eight year’s service. Zoltan’s career, that had been gradually grinding to a halt, was finally over. But right now, that was the least of their worries.

  Their surroundings were unfamiliar, having abandoned their upstairs apartment and come to a vacant basement one instead. The block had survived relatively intact, but the building next to it had been pummelled by Soviet shells, and they felt safer being nearer to the ground. The place was also covered in a heavy layer of dust; many of the windows smashed and, despite the gas fire, he had never felt so cold.