Katalin Street Read online

  Until 1944 my father had been living in a dream world, from which he began to awaken after the deportation of the Helds, and Henriette’s murder had finally established his place as a mere observer. He remained what he always had been, but now more vigilant, more politically aware. He told Mrs. Temes about Blanka, explaining why he was unwilling to sleep under the same roof as an executioner, and it was as if he were talking about someone who was already dead. At that moment Bálint was with us, whether or not he were in the village whose name my mother had instantly forgotten in the hospital; but it was no longer the Bálint we had known of old, Bálint as he had really been. He was simply the victim of an injustice done him by a member of our family, a man who had been condemned by something Blanka had done. Mrs. Temes was not a sentimental woman. She managed to control her feelings. But she could find nothing to say to soften the dry narrative, the sheer brutality, of what my father had said.

  My father handed out the presents. On the windowsill one brightly polished shoe remained, with a packet of sweets peeping out. Nobody touched it. Outside, the snow fell steadily.

  1956

  IN THE car he barely spoke. Cigarette in hand, he watched the wagons laden with food supplies going towards Budapest, with their huge, shy, weary-looking horses that looked so out of keeping in the modern world as they trotted along the highway, shaking their heads as if in wonder at what connection they might have with human affairs.

  It simply amazed him how many people, and which people, were making it their business to get him started on a new life. Chief among them was Timár. It was from his mouth that Bálint first heard about the plans to rehabilitate him, and the excited tone in which he spoke struck him as almost comical. He hadn’t “suffered” during these last few years, and he felt in no way punished or humiliated by the life that Timár was determined to rescue him from. The village had been overjoyed to have their own doctor at last; they had treated him with respect and showed appreciation for what he did for his patients. It regularly astonished him how little they cared about what had led to his arrival, while those who knew the circumstances of his transfer instantly concluded that he had been the victim of political persecution. He was treated almost like a village pet.

  Had Bálint not been concerned about Blanka, Timár would never have succeeded in persuading him to go back even for a few days to accept the compensation the hospital was offering him in person. It was only when he triumphantly mentioned that the old director had now gone, as had almost everyone who had been part of that disciplinary panel, and that only the little trollop who had victimized him was left, and she too would be getting her comeuppance pretty soon, that Bálint threw a few things in his briefcase and got in the car beside him. The gangling youth that Timár had brought either to fill in for him while he was in the capital, or to take his place if he chose to remain there, gazed after the departing car with an expression close to envy.

  Bálint’s plan was to sort out the situation with Blanka and then go straight back. He had felt wonderful out there in the peace and quiet, where he had at last been able to think calmly about all that had happened in a way that hadn’t been possible before. He was therefore somewhat surprised by the feelings that assailed him at the first sight of Budapest.

  As the car raced across the first bridge he was astonished at the joy he felt on seeing the city of his birth again, and how a glimpse of the river filled him with such childlike happiness. He was thinking about the different kinds of work he might be doing in the hospital, and looking forward with a certain amount of amusement to the official proceedings, where they would seek to prove beyond doubt what they had been unable to four years before, since Mrs. Karr was still a witness who couldn’t be summoned and there was nothing they could do about that. In fact it proved very straightforward. A hearing had taken place a few days earlier and Timár, as the new director, simply presented him with their decision, followed by a few words at a reception immediately afterwards at which his new colleagues were present. People spoke of his many fine qualities and conscientious work, and stated that even before the libelous allegations of Miss Blanka Elekes he had been subjected to unwarranted persecution because of his class origins. It left him feeling very uncomfortable. In fact the ceremony was rather more painful for him than being arraigned by Blanka.

  Timár, acting now in his official capacity, then repeated the invitation for him to return to his old place of work. He promised him an apartment, in due course, naturally; in the meantime he would be accommodated in the hospital itself. He was also offered a new role, one so important that it was obviously being offered in compensation. It should have made him rather more grateful than he felt, but he grew increasingly irritated and restless. However he had no wish to spoil the little homecoming celebration, especially as Timár was so radiant with satisfaction, and he asked for a few days to think things over. He dined with his new colleagues, in a special room where the food was set down before him as if he were the risen Christ. Over the meal he tried to gather some precise details about what lay ahead for Blanka. Timár said she would be summoned before the disciplinary committee, and he added a word about her accusation. “You were just the first,” he said indignantly. “She denounced anyone she had a difference with, but she wasn’t so clever the next time and the people she accused managed to clear themselves.” Along with his official rehabilitation Bálint was awarded a significant sum by way of compensation. He had no idea what he would do with it. That these people had decided to have him back was something he could take no more seriously than that they had wanted to kick him out in the first place.

  He made no attempt to look for Blanka in her office. He knew he wouldn’t find her there. Whenever she sensed she was in trouble, Blanka’s instinct was to run away and hide.

  But where could she possibly be? Mrs. Temes had written to him from time to time, and told him as soon as it happened that Mr. Elekes had driven her from the house, that they were not in touch with her and she didn’t know her new address. Mrs. Temes was obviously still so angry with Blanka that she hadn’t the least interest in what happened to her. Besides she herself was no longer living with the Elekeses. In the same year that Irén got married she had accepted a place in a student hostel, in charge of the kitchen.

  Bálint went to see her first. He found her alone in the huge building, public events having drawn the students onto the streets. He asked her if she wasn’t worried too. She returned a look of utter incomprehension, as if she had no idea that there might be anything to be concerned about. Her response made him realize just how much she had changed. She showed no pleasure at the news of his rehabilitation and clearly had no conception of what it meant. When he first arrived it had taken some time for her to recognize him. She had shown no particular emotion or joy and had been absentminded, listless, and visibly nervous. Bálint was very fond of Mrs. Temes. He had always viewed her somewhat irregular situation through the eyes of a man rather than a boy, even after he became aware that her relationship with his father went beyond her status of distant relation–cum– housekeeper. Now, as he sat beside her, he felt let down. He wasn’t sure what he had expected from her, but it was certainly rather more than he got. He didn’t stay with her long. Instead he went on to the Elekeses. As they parted Mrs. Temes told him that she had difficulty sleeping and her digestion was giving her concern, but there was no invitation to call on her again after he had finished whatever he had to do.

  He did meet one former acquaintance, and it amused him to think who it was. The man was a dentist, a fellow captive from the war, someone he hadn’t seen since his release. They had made an agreement to look each other up once their old lives resumed, but he hadn’t taken it seriously. Both being in the medical line, they had worked in the same hospital in the prison camp, but the man had done rather better out of his time there than Bálint had, not only because he was a lot more streetwise but because he was more outgoing, quicker to make friends, and generally more sanguine. Whenever B�
�lint thought about him it was with a certain envy. Even in the most grave and troubled situations, Szegi would always come up with some scheme or other, which, with his incredible optimism, he invariably managed to pull off by some inscrutable means. Now, he told Bálint, he was setting off in the morning to see the great wide world—he made it sound as if he were nipping round to the market—and he asked Bálint if he had enough money to pay for the driver to take him to the border too. They were going to Austria. If Bálint had the cash, would he like to go with him? There was still a place on the truck that was leaving. Bálint laughed his refusal. Szegi brushed it aside. In the prison camp he had never been able to understand why Bálint declined to take part in one or another of his schemes. He planned them to perfection and they invariably came off, but they required Bálint to make a decision one way or the other. When it was up to him, Bálint never could make a decision. All the same, Szegi pressed a telephone number into his hand. He could be reached there in the afternoon. If Bálint changed his mind they would come for him in the truck at dawn. They would certainly get out, no worries: he should just trust him. All it needed was the money. Bálint didn’t doubt it. Szegi always pulled his little schemes off, but never gratis.

  Mrs. Temes’s letters had become increasingly confused and downcast, but she had made it clear that he would do well to avoid Katalin Street itself. The old Elekes house was being transformed, along with the Helds’ and his own. He had no wish to see how much was being changed, so he made his way to the Elekeses’ new abode. Whenever he saw people gathering to form a crowd he kept out of the way and turned down a side street.

  The building where Irén and her family now lived was a smart, spanking-new monstrosity. Pressing the bell gave him no sense of unease or embarrassment, despite the fact that he hadn’t seen them since Irén had returned his engagement ring. Mr. Elekes opened the door, squinted at him, blinked his eyes for a moment, then gave him a hug and kissed him. Mrs. Elekes clung to his neck shrieking. Neither Irén nor her husband were at home. Irén, they said, was still at school, and her husband, an engineer with the water board, was never back by that time. Mrs. Elekes thrust Irén’s little girl into his arms. Kinga showed no fear of him, she just laughed, and Bálint laughed back at her. She was a pretty little thing. If she took after anyone it must be her father—she didn’t look like either of the old people or their daughters. But he felt no stirrings of regret that he had not been her father.

  The apartment was arranged in much the same way as the old house, though with less furniture, and much of it in a more modern style. Cicero presided, where he always had, above the bookcase behind the desk. Bálint noticed that they had tried to put their larger pieces into the same places they had occupied in the much larger premises in Katalin Street. Sounds of unrest could be heard coming from the city center, and somewhere in the distance there was singing and cheering. He came straight to the point. He wanted Blanka’s address. He needed to speak to her as soon as possible; it was most important.

  A heavy silence descended. Mr. Elekes, who had changed very little apart from the strangely distant look in his eyes and the fact that his body seemed to be stiffening and drying out, as if slowly turning to stone, said that he knew nothing about Blanka: they had not been in contact since she had left home. Mrs. Elekes stammered in embarrassment that he really should try to forgive her; she wasn’t really such a wicked girl. Bálint started to explain that he had no wish to harm her, he simply wanted to help. He had seen, from the look of terror in their faces, that they were convinced he wanted to call on her for no other reason than to recriminate. But they were also starting to realize that events outside might well take a sudden turn, and that would make it even more important to find out who else their daughter had accused and when. It was no longer a simple question of her ethical conduct but of her safety. Mr. Elekes suddenly remembered that there was a bottle of something rather good in the larder, something Bálint had always enjoyed, and went off to get it. Mrs. Elekes took the opportunity to whisper the address in his ear. She went to see her whenever she could, and added that Irén and her husband also did from time to time: in fact Irén had kept in touch with Blanka ever since her marriage. She gazed anxiously into his eyes, and he assured her once again that she needn’t worry; he had never been the least bit angry with Blanka.

  Mr. Elekes returned with the apricot brandy. Bálint quickly drank what he had been offered and set out for the city. It was now dark. In every window the shutters were closed, as in wartime. He came across bands of armed men, but they ignored him and just ran past. He tried to think what he would say if they spoke to him, and whether he would actually join them if they asked him to.

  Blanka’s apartment was in one of those little old streets in the city center. The concierge he spoke to said that as far as she knew she hadn’t left the building, but it took him a while to get in. For several minutes he rapped on the grubby knocker, at first despairingly, then with increasing anxiety. Finally he heard someone moving cautiously towards the door and opening the peephole. Blanka’s eye peered through it, but only for a moment, and the window was closed again. He shouted to her to open the door.

  There was an unnatural, deafening silence inside. Nothing moved. He rang again and kept hammering on the door. As he had so often in the past, he felt like giving her a good smack once he got inside for wasting his time. It was enough to drive one mad. He knew perfectly well that she was in there, just out of reach, doing what she had done all her life when she was afraid—hiding in the bathroom or the larder, assuming there were a larder in such a tiny modern apartment.

  However, while Blanka invariably slammed doors, she seldom locked them. They had often teased her about it in the old days. She was always expecting some disaster to happen—a fire, burglars, the Day of Judgment—when she would have to escape at a moment’s notice with no time to fiddle with the key. He paused and looked around. She had already put out the rubbish, and next to the doormat there was a bin with a dead cactus on top. It was so typical of her! All her pot plants, everything she laid hands on, withered away: she either overwatered or completely forgot to. He picked up the earthenware pot and smashed the glass in the door. The splinters showered inward. He widened the hole and pressed down on the handle. It was just as he had thought: the door hadn’t been locked. He was free to go in. He found her in the second room, squatting low behind the cleaning utensils and various indeterminate boxes. As she had always done as a child when she was afraid, she had her hands pressed over her ears.

  He seized her by the arm and dragged her into the bedroom. She must have been hiding in terror for some days now, because everything was perfectly tidy. Whenever she was afraid she tidied things up—emptying a drawer always calmed her down. At this point her terror was so great that the tears were pouring soundlessly from her eyes. He pulled her to him and kissed her. It felt quite strange. He had only embraced her once before in his life, but the intensity and unreality of those fifteen minutes flooded back to him, no less intense and unreal now, if for quite different reasons. He didn’t hug her for long. Soon he was holding her the way he had held Irén’s child.

  Finally she began to realize that he wished her no harm and nestled into his embrace. He told her why he had come, and promised to stay beside her until the hearing, where he would explain to the committee what lay behind her accusation, that it was just something between them, or rather between himself and the Elekes family, a personal hostility, nothing political. He also told her what he had heard from Timár, the news that had so shocked him at the dinner; but he really couldn’t believe what they had accused her of. It was all so obviously lies.

  “They aren’t lying,” she said. Her eyes were closed and she was now leaning against his shoulder. “I also accused the girls in the office. Both of them.”

  He held her away from him so that he could look into her face. She submitted but refused to open her eyes. She spoke as if in a dream.

  “It was because they hated m
e, they were afraid of me. I was angry with them because they didn’t like me.”

  Her voice was a whisper, as if she were speaking neither to Bálint nor about herself. He listened to her the way he had to her follies and delinquencies of old. He lit another cigarette and began to pace the room. He felt very tense. At last she glanced at him, then studied his face as if trying to read what he was thinking. When their eyes met he shook his head and said, “You silly girl!” She jumped up, almost knocked him off his feet, and started to shower him with tiny kisses on his hand and face. Then she dashed out of the room, and he heard clattering sounds. When she returned she was struggling under a tray piled high with bread, tinned food, and a bottle of apricot brandy. She set it all down on the table and started to eat ravenously. Bálint suddenly realized how hungry he was too. For some reason nothing at the hospital dinner had appealed to him, and now he set to it with a will. Blanka ate fast and greedily, swallowing large mouthfuls—food clearly hadn’t passed her lips for some time, no doubt because of her fear. Then she set about the apricot brandy in the same way. He could see from the way she knocked it back that she was all too used to it. Soon she was so full she began to choke. He watched her and thought about the tribunal that lay in store for her. How could he possibly make anyone understand or accept what she had done? The girl had no awareness of the nature of her impulses; she never considered the consequences of her actions or the unbridled rage that all her life had overtaken her when she suspected that anyone looked down on her or rejected her. For them, she would be just another Stalinist informer. How could he possibly explain her reasons for bringing that ridiculous charge, or make the disciplinary panel understand, or believe in, what they had once shared in Katalin Street, and how deeply it would have affected her when he abandoned Irén? Smoking all the while, he racked his brains.