Victory Square

by Olen Steinhauer

  “We’ll discuss this before the Grand National Assembly.” Again he crossed his arms over his chest. “I will not say anything here. This is a vulgar provocation.”

  The prosecutor took some stapled papers from an assistant. His voice rose belligerently. “Will you sign the statement now or not?”

  “I have no statement to make, and I will not sign one.”

  Stepping back, the prosecutor faced the president of the court. “Note the following: The defendant refuses to sign this statement. The defendant has not recognized us. He also refuses to recognize the new forum.”

  Pankov nodded, pleased to hear something, finally, that he agreed with. “I do not recognize this new forum.”

  The prosecutor turned back. “So. You know the new forum. You have information about it.”

  “Well, you told us about it.”

  “Yes,” Ilona said. “You told us about it here.”

  Pankov leaned forward and explained it to them as clearly and simply as he could. “Nobody can change the state structures. This is not possible. Usurpers have been punished severely during the past centuries of our history. Nobody has the right to abolish the Grand National Assembly.”

  As if Tomiak Pankov had not spoken, the prosecutor said, “Tell us why you starved the people!”

  “Nonsense. Speaking as an ordinary citizen, I can tell you that for the first time in their lives the workers had two hundred kilos of flour a year and many additional benefits. All you allege are lies. As an ordinary citizen, I can tell you that never in our history has there been such progress.”

  “What about the golden weighing machine your son used to weigh the meat he received from abroad?”

  “It’s a lie!” shouted Ilona. She rose from her chair. “He was a mayor. He had an apartment, like everyone else, not a villa. Nothing was brought in from abroad.” She settled down and shook her head. “This is outrageous.”

  The prosecutor came nearer to Ilona. “You’ve always been wiser and more ready to talk, a scientist. You were the most important aide, the number two in the cabinet, in the government.”

  She shrugged.

  “Did you know about the genocide in Sarospatak?”

  “What genocide?” Then: “By the way, I won’t answer any more questions.”

  Her husband nodded, agreeing. “She will not answer.”

  The prosecutor pointed with a ballpoint pen. “Did you know about the genocide, or did you, as a chemist, only deal with polymers? You, as a scientist, did not know about it?”

  “Her papers were published abroad,” said Tomiak. “Science and polymers!”

  “And who wrote the papers for you, Ilona?”

  Ilona Pankov, faced with more insults than she’d heard in the entire thirty-two years of her and her husband’s reign, burst. “Impudence! I’m a member and the chairwoman of the Academy of Sciences!” Her lips were damp. “You cannot talk to me in that way!

  The president of the court, agitated, glanced at his watch and said to the prosecutor, “So she’s an academician, and there’s nothing more to say.”

  “By insulting us,” said Pankov, “you’re insulting all the learned bodies throughout the world that conferred these degrees on us.” He patted his wife’s arm.

  The prosecutor opened his hands as if holding a large bowl. “That is to say, as a deputy prime minister you did not know about the genocide?”

  “She’s not a deputy prime minister,” shouted Pankov, “but the first deputy prime minister of the Socialist Republic!”

  Again, the prosecutor ignored him. “But who gave the order to shoot? Answer this question!”

  “I will not answer,” said Ilona. “I told you right at the beginning that I will not answer a single question.”

  Tomiak cut in. “You as officers should know that the government cannot give the order to shoot. But those who shot at the young people were the security men. The terrorists.”

  Ilona nodded. “The‘terrorists’”—she quoted with her fingers— “are from the Ministry.”

  The prosecutor’s head popped back, shocked. “The terrorists are from the Ministry for State Security?”

  The mustached man jerked to his feet with the same look of surprise etched across his features. “And who heads the Ministry? Another question—”

  “No,” said Ilona, realizing her mistake too late. “I’ve not given an answer. This was only information for you as citizens.”

  Tomiak Pankov raised a finger. “I want to tell you as citizens that in the Capital—”

  “We’re finished with you,” the prosecutor said. “You needn’t say anything else. The next question is,” he said, turning back to Ilona, “how did Lieutenant General Yuri Kolev die? Was he killed? And by whom?”

  “Ask the doctors and the people,” said Ilona, “but not me!”

  Michalec was already staring at Gavra with a broad smile, as if he knew Kolev’s name would be mentioned at that moment. Gavra leaned close to his large ear. “They didn’t kill Kolev.”

  “I know,” Michalec whispered back, then returned to the scene.

  “I will ask you a counterquestion,” said Tomiak Pankov. “Why do you not put the question like this: Why did Lieutenant General Yuri Kolev have a heart attack?”

  The prosecutor raised that finger again. “What induced him to have a heart attack? Earlier, we spoke, and you called him a traitor. This was the reason for his heart attack?”

  “The traitor Kolev died naturally. His heart failed.”

  “Why didn’t you bring him to trial as a traitor?”

  “His criminal acts were only discovered after he had died.”

  “What were his criminal acts?”

  “He was coordinating treason with representatives of the Soviet government. He was a liar and a traitor, and as a result of false hearsay about him, and because of his mistakes, we are in this state of siege—”

  “You have always been more talkative than your colleague,” interrupted the prosecutor, raising a hand to silence the old man. “However, she has always been at your side and apparently provided you with the necessary information. We should talk here openly and sincerely, as befits intellectuals. For, after all, both of you are members of the Academy of Sciences.” He slipped his notepad back into his pocket. “Now tell us, please, what money was used to pay for your publications abroad—the selected historical works of Tomiak Pankov and the scientific works of the so-called academician Ilona Pankov.”

  Ilona, snidely: “So-called, so-called. Now they’ve even taken away all our titles.”

  The president of the court, feeling a burst of confidence, said, “We’re not taking anything. Respond to the questions put forth by the court.”

  She let out a whimper of a laugh, a long heeee that ended abruptly. She shook her head.

  The president of the court made a note on his paper. “She refuses to respond to the court’s questions.”

  Tomiak rubbed the back of his neck, thinking, then said, “She should not have to answer these accusations, this misinformation about all of our work. The people ate as well as people from abroad, food available every day of the year, they had one thousand one hundred to twelve hundred calories a day of vegetables. And sixty grams a day of meat.”

  The mustached man, who’d returned to his seat, stood up again. “Please, ask Tomiak and Ilona Pankov whether they have ever had a mental illness.”

  Gavra leaned over to Michalec. “Who’s that guy?”

  “Their defense attorney,” whispered Michalec.

  “What?” said Ilona, unbelieving. “What should he ask us?”

  The prosecutor was happy to clarify. “Whether you have ever had a mental illness.”

  “What an obscene provocation.”

  “This is not a provocation,” said the prosecutor. “It would serve your defense. If you had a mental illness and admitted this, you wouldn’t be responsible for your acts.”

  Ilona turned to her husband, but her voice asked the whole roo
m, the whole country even: “How can someone tell us something like this? How can someone say something like this?”

  “I do not recognize this court,” said Tomiak Pankov. He looked at his wristwatch, mocking the president of the court. “Let’s get this over with.”

  The prosecutor hiked up his pants before stepping forward, and Gavra was reminded of American westerns he’d seen in Ministry screening rooms: John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, Gary Cooper.

  “You have never been able to hold a dialogue with the people,” the prosecutor said. “You were not used to talking to the people. You held monologues and the people had to applaud, as in the rituals of tribal people. And today you’re acting in the same megalomaniac way. Now, we’re making a last attempt. Do you want to sign this statement?” He held up the typewritten sheets again.

  “No,” said Tomiak Pankov. “We will not sign. And I also do not recognize the counsel for the defense.”

  The prosecutor said, “Please, make a note: Tomiak Pankov refuses to cooperate with the court-appointed counsel for the defense.”

  Ilona said to everyone, “We will not sign any statement. We will speak only at the Grand National Assembly, because we’ve worked hard for the people all our lives. We’ve sacrificed our lives to the people. And we will not betray our people here.”

  The president of the court, nodding, rubbed his damp forehead and looked to the prosecutor. “Counsel for the prosecution?”

  The young man looked at him, then turned to face the audience. “Now we will call our witnesses.”

  The senior citizens in the front began shifting in their seats, preparing for their final destination. A bald man in a corporal’s uniform went to the second camera, which faced the empty desk, and turned it on.

  TWENTY-SIX

  •

  I woke at eight thirty to the noise of a family performing their Sunday morning routine. Even during the heady days of the revolution, this was something that didn’t change in the Kolyeszar household. Magda made sure it didn’t. She’d woken first and made coffee—real coffee some black marketeer had gotten hold of over the border in Hungary—and fried slices of pork, which had always been plentiful in that region. She toasted bread in the same pan and stacked it on a plate. The Kolyeszars always ate plenty of apples from their orchards, and each meal had some version of the fruit. She spooned out apple marmalade she’d jarred last spring, and Sanja sat in a highchair eating applesauce. By then Ferenc and Bernard had also risen, tiptoeing past my sleeping form on the couch, and Ferenc had sent his son-in-law down to the cooperative offices where the new regional paper, Liberation, was delivered in boxes to be taken for free. I’d just finished a quick shower when Bernard came through the front door clutching two copies.

  “Morning,” I said drowsily. Everything ached.

  He shook himself off. “Cold as hell out there.”

  I popped two more Captopril, then found everyone at the kitchen table, reading parts of the newspaper. Ferenc, unsurprisingly, took it upon himself to read out loud the most important articles. “Looks like the fighting’s over everywhere except the Capital by now. Damned terrorists.”

  I nodded politely; Bernard said, “They’ll only stop when they see the Pankovs’cold, dead bodies.”

  Bernard was like that. He could surprise you with insight you’d only be convinced of hours later.

  “Dead?” said Magda. She put another slice of bread on my plate. “Let’s hope it doesn’t lead to that.”

  “Question is, where are they?” said Ferenc.

  “In Libya,” said Agota, who now had Sanja on her knee. I was struck by how quiet the child was; I had yet to hear her cry. “That’s what everyone thinks. They’re building up an army to come and take back the country.”

  “Let them try it,” said Ferenc.

  While they speculated, I half-read an article on the looting of Yalta Boulevard 36, which I’d witnessed when I was looking for Gisele Sully. The boxes had been full of secret files where the Ministry kept track of its various informants and agents, and the whole following page was filled with names from those lists. The paper wanted to expose those who had been clandestinely working for the old regime, so that their neighbors would know what kind of people they lived near.

  As I scanned the small-print list (there must’ve been at least five hundred names), I imagined that all across the country sudden break-ins were occurring that morning, and fathers and mothers were being dragged out into the street to be beaten and marked with signs that said COLLABORATOR.

  Then I stopped on a name in the fifth column. The list wasn’t alphabetical—in their eagerness to make it public, they didn’t have time for such niceties. So the B name was in the middle column, near the bottom, and I had to squint and bring the paper close to my eyes to read it, reread it, think, and read it again.

  Across the table, Ferenc gasped aloud and looked at me. He’d found it, too.

  BROD, LENA. MAJOR

  I met Ferenc’s heavy eyes. Then, under his gaze, I set down the paper, went to the living room, found my cigarettes and coat, and walked out the front door. I sat on the stoop and began to smoke, but my lungs rejected it. I didn’t care. I kept going, sucking in the poison and coughing and feeling the ache of my laboring heart. Fe-renc appeared in his coat and sat beside me. He finally took the damned thing away from me and flicked it out into the crabgrass.

  “Did you know?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t believe it.”

  He sighed audibly and patted my knee, then got up and lit a cigarette of his own. He waited a moment before speaking, because he didn’t know what effect his words might have on me. “I believe it,” he said. “She left the country twice a year. She had family money. It all adds up.”

  “Her father made a deal with the government,” I explained, not wanting to see it.

  “Yes,” said Ferenc, “and then her father died. So they made a deal with her. She gets to keep the money and can leave the country whenever she likes, but only if she cooperates with them.”

  Later, when I had a chance to cool down, I would see that it made perfect sense, but I wasn’t ready yet. I wasn’t ready to concede that for forty years my wife had lied to me. “You don’t understand, Ferenc. She hated Pankov. She hated the Ministry. To be honest, she hated this country. She only stayed because of me. No.” I shook my head. “They can put anything in those files. Or in the paper. Someone made a mistake or pulled a trick.” I pointed a finger at him. “It’s Michalec. He puts out a warrant for my arrest, then slanders my wife on top of it. So no one will help me.”

  Ferenc looked at me. I wasn’t even convincing myself.

  Still, I prattled on about Michalec and how he was a conniving son of a bitch. It wasn’t enough for him to kill people; he had to rub shit all over their reputations.

  Ferenc told me quietly that Michalec had no control over what was printed in Liberation. It was a Sarospatak paper, and the list had been taken directly from the army clerks who had produced it. He wouldn’t help me with my self-delusion, and I hated him for it. He rubbed my knee.

  “Come on, old man. Finish breakfast, then I’ll show you the operation. Show you what really matters.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  •

  While growing up, Gavra had seen films made just after the Second World War, grainy black-and-white show trials where ragged-looking, stiff men stood in the dock and became witnesses for their own prosecution. In carefully memorized speeches, they stated their crimes against the people of our great country and asked the people’s forgiveness. These trials were notable for their consistency. A prosecutor went into a lengthy indictment, often very emotional, accusing the defendant of treason or collaboration or any number of crimes whose victim was the entire state. This was followed by the evidence, always in the form of teary-eyed men and women who had seen or heard or suffered because of the defendant’s treachery. As their statements went on, they grew louder. They stuttered and wept when their emotions became too po
werful; they shot accusing fingers at the dock, where the defendant stared back blankly. With recent torture still fresh in the defendants’minds, anything was preferable to returning to those dank prison cells and beatings. Even the bureaucracy that would lead to a life of labor or a firing squad was better than those cells. So they didn’t interrupt the accusers. In fact, they sometimes nodded in agreement. Then, when the time came, they made their own statement, which concurred with everything that had been stated before. All they would say in their defense was that they’d been duped by foreign governments and their own insipid greed. They knew, and they expected, that the court would show no mercy, because mercy was something they did not deserve.

  These films were documents of a particular time. Once Mihai, that wartime partisan and postwar hero, had annihilated or put to work everyone who might pose a threat to his administration, the show trials trickled away. They had served their purpose by cleaning the state of malcontents, and the films reminded everyone else of the dangers of too much unfettered ambition.

  As he listened to the witnesses now, Gavra remembered those films. It was a different time, but they gave their statements much as their predecessors had. A few murmured nervously throughout, and the prosecutor had to ask them to speak louder, but most, including Beth and Harold Atkins, let their emotions enter the stories, and Beth cried three times as she tried to get it all out. Harold was defiant, pointing at the other side of the room while the Pankovs either stared blankly back or pretended to ignore what was going on. A few times, they tried to interrupt, and the president of the court scolded them. After a while, they saw it was no use and just let the old people rattle on and weep and shout.

  The room, Gavra knew, was full of liars: the Pankovs, Michalec, Romek, and Andras Todescu (who had summoned enough courage to stand in the doorway). Even Gavra himself was a liar. The witnesses were the only ones in the room who were not liars; they were the only ones who were not despicable.