Tom Smith: The Secret Speech

Leo was shocked. Fraera shook her head dismissively:

— Did you not realize your true purpose, Leo? You are an unwitting assassin. You are working for Panin, not me.

— I didn’t know.

— That is your answer to everything… You didn’t know. Let me explain. I didn’t start this uprising. All I did was to encourage it. You could kill me. It wouldn’t make any difference.

Leo turned to Zoya. She had a gun over her shoulder, grenades on her belt. Her clothes were torn; her hands were scratched. She held his glance, an expression rigid with hatred as if fearful any other emotion might creep through. The boy who’d murdered the patriarch was beside her. He was holding her hand.

— If you fight, you will die.

Fraera addressed Zoya:

— Zoya? What do you say? Leo is speaking to you.

Zoya punched the air with her gun:

— We fight!

THOUGH RAISA WANTED TO TALK, Leo’s body language was set against it. He’d not spoken since being manhandled into the cell. On the other side of the room, Karoly lay sprawled on the bedding, his eyes closed. His leg had been injured during his capture. Breaking the silence, Raisa said:

— Leo, I’m sorry.

Leo looked up at her:

— I made one mistake, Raisa. I should’ve told you about Zoya. I should’ve told you about her holding the knife over me.

Still lying down, his eyes closed, Karoly interjected:

— The daughter we’re trying to rescue, she stands over you with a knife?

Karoly opened an eye, looking at Raisa, then at Leo.

Leo lowered his voice, trying to cut Karoly out of the conversation:

— The only way we’re going to escape is if we trust each other.

Raisa nodded:

— Trust is not going to break us out of this room.

Leo asked:

— Do you have any idea how we’re going to get Zoya out of here?

— She’s in love.

Leo pulled back in surprise:

— In love with who?

— A vory , he’s young — the same age as her, his name is Malysh.

— That boy is a murderer. I watched him kill the patriarch. He decapitated a seventy-five-year-old man with a length of wire.

Karoly sat up:

— They sound like a good match.

Raisa took hold of Leo’s hands:

— Malysh might be our only hope.

ZOYA LAY AT THE CRUMBLING EDGE of the house. Damaged by shellfire, the entire front had collapsed. Flat on her stomach, with the rifle stretched out before her, Zoya’s eye was pressed up against the scope. There were two tanks at the mouth of the Kossuth-hid, the bridge near Parliament, no doubt waiting for orders to advance into the city as Leo had predicted.

She’d never expected to see Leo again. She couldn’t concentrate, seeing his face. Restless, she needed to pee. Checking on the tanks, seeing no movement, she left her rifle and examined the remains of the bedroom. Since the entire front of the house had fallen down the room was exposed. The wardrobe offered the only privacy without going too far from her post. She slipped inside and shut the doors, squatting. She felt guilty about dabbing dry with the sleeve of a coat, an odd kind of guilt considering she was about to shoot a man. She’d fired her gun on numerous occasions and it was possible she’d already killed, although she hadn’t seen anyone die or fall down. Without warning, grabbing a nearby shoe, she threw up, filling the shoe to the toe.

Unsteady, she stepped out of the wardrobe, shutting the doors. The rifle was as she’d left it, lying across the bricks. Shaking, she slowly returned to her position. A Soviet soldier was staggering toward the two tanks. Zoya lined up the injured officer in her crosshairs. She couldn’t see his face, only his back — his brown hair. The other officers might come to his aid. Fraera had taught her that these were the officers to shoot, the real prize, before finishing off the injured man.

The wounded soldier fell ten paces from the tank, unable to walk any farther. Zoya moved the crosshairs toward the hatch, waiting to see if they’d take the bait. The tank came to life, edging forward, moving as close to the wounded man as possible. They were going to save him. The hatch opened. A soldier cautiously lifted the steel lid, peering out, waiting to see if he’d be shot, ready to duck back down. After a pause, he climbed out, hurrying to the aid of his injured comrade. Zoya had the man in her sights. If she didn’t pull the trigger he would help his comrade back into the tank, then they would advance into the city and kill more innocent families and what good would her guilt be then? She was here to fight. They were the enemy. They’d killed children and mothers and fathers.

As she was about to pull the trigger, a hand pushed the gun down. It was Malysh. He lay beside her, their faces close together. She was trembling. He took hold of her rifle, checking on the tanks. She peered over the rubble. The tanks were moving again. But they weren’t advancing into the city: they were heading in the opposite direction, back across the bridge. Zoya asked:

— Where are they going?

Malysh shook his head:

— I don’t know.

LEO EXAMINED THE ROOM, searching for a way out. Engrossed in his study of the door, the window, the floorboards, he noticed the relative quiet. The sound of explosions and gunfire had stopped. There were footsteps outside the cell. The door opened. Fraera strode in:

— Listen!

A radio in the adjacent room was turned up to full volume. The announcer was speaking in Hungarian. Leo turned to Karoly. He listened for several seconds. Impatient, Fraera called out:

— Translate!

Karoly glanced up at Leo:

— A cease-fire has been declared. Soviet forces are pulling out of the city.

SENSING SKEPTICISM, FRAERA INSISTED on a victory tour. They set out, Leo, Raisa, and Karoly, surrounded by insurgents and the remains of her gang. Leo counted only four vory excluding Fraera and Malysh, far fewer than there had been in Moscow. Some might have been killed. Others must have abandoned her cause: the life of a revolutionary was not the life of a professional criminal. Fraera didn’t seem to care, leading them down the central thoroughfare of Sztalin ut as proudly as if she were marching on Stalin’s tomb. Raisa was beside Leo, Karoly just behind, dragging his injured leg. Through the ring of armed men, Leo caught glimpses of Zoya orbiting the group. She walked beside Malysh. Though Zoya ignored Leo completely, from time to time Malysh would flick a hostile glance in his direction. Raisa was correct. They were, unquestionably, in love.

Leo didn’t see how a Hungarian triumph was even a theoretical possibility. He’d observed the insurgents armed with bricks and gasoline-filled bottles. They fought fearlessly, fighting for their homes, the ground on which they stood. But as a former soldier he saw no strategy. Their campaign was haphazard and improvised. In contrast, the Red Army was the most powerful military force in the world, numerically and technologically. Panin and his coconspirators intended to keep it that way. The loss of Hungary would never be tolerated, no matter how bloody the conflict became. Yet pacing the streets Leo was forced to accept that there was no longer any Soviet presence in the city. There were no tanks or troops. Many of the Hungarian fighters had abandoned their positions.

Fraera stopped walking. They’d arrived at an office, a medium-sized, unremarkable building. There was a commotion at the front doors, a great number of people entering and exiting. Karoly dragged himself forward, catching up with Leo: