Gyorgy Dragoman - The White King

While he was talking I kept looking into his eyes, but after a while he stopped looking at me, and my eyes also drifted away, back to those plastic models again, the ones there behind the glass. Two thick tubes stuck out of the top of the heart, one of them was painted blue and the other was painted red, and when Iron Fist got all quiet I looked at him again, straight into his eyes, and he asked me to promise, but right this instant, because we really did need to get going right away or else we'd be late for the competition. And then with one hand I grabbed the back of the chair, and I said, "No, I won't promise, no way, that wasn't what my dad taught me, sports are supposed to be fair, there's no room for cheating in sports, everyone who participates starts with an equal shot, it's only about how every single person performs," and I said I didn't care, he could go ahead and take me to the competition, but I was going to shoot as well as I could all the same, I'd give it my all, and while I was talking I got really scared from hearing my own voice, it was almost like it wasn't even me talking, and then my hand started really hurting from gripping the back of the chair so hard, and I knew I'd get slapped around in no time, I tried relaxing my mouth, but I was gritting my teeth so much that the pain shot right up into my temples, and I knew that this was it, that Iron Fist would beat my brains out, but not even then could I keep my mouth shut, no, try as I did to swallow my words, not even then could I stop talking. But Iron Fist didn't hit me, instead he just stubbed out his cigarette and put one of his index fingers in front of his mouth and hissed shhh, but that wasn't what made me shut up, it was when I saw him put his other hand in his pocket, because that meant he was about to pull out his brass knuckles, and that would be the end of me, I'd be lucky if I only ended up in the hospital, and in the meantime Iron Fist pulled his hand out, and he didn't have brass knuckles on it, instead he was holding something in his hand, I couldn't tell what it was, and then he held his fist right in front of me, he was wearing a really wide gold ring, I saw my own face reflected in it, and then he asked if I could guess what he had in his hand, but by then I was so scared that even if I figured it out, not even then would I have dared to say a word, that's how terrified I was, and so I only shook my head. Meanwhile I looked again at the heart behind the glass, and for some reason it occurred to me that cold blood flows from the heart through the blue tube and that hot blood flows through the red tube, but when I thought of that, I knew right away it was dumb.

And then Iron Fist said, fine, he could tell that I was giving up, I shouldn't rack my brains anymore because I'd get muscle fatigue doing that, and he opened his hand, and I saw right away what was on his palm, it was the valve of his motorcycle wheel, yes, that's what he was holding right there under my nose, and as soon as I saw it, I felt myself turn pale, I felt my body filling up with ice-cold blood, so cold that my skin would turn blue, and I felt almost as if my heart was about to stop altogether, that's how scared I was, and then Iron Fist said he knew everything about this little prank of ours, Feri had told him everything, that's right, Feri had more brains than I did, the day after our prank Feri realized it would be best to go ahead and fess up completely, because then maybe he could get out of this in one piece, yes, Feri was smart enough to realize that if Iron Fist figured out for himself who was responsible for his having to push his motorcycle up the hill he lived on, whoever it was would be a goner for sure, and then I thought of Feri, so that was why Feri had looked white as a ghost, and while Iron Fist went on talking, the whole time he held the valve right under my nose, and as his hand moved I could see that little ball moving in the valve, it was almost as big as an air-gun pellet, and then Iron Fist put the valve back in his pocket and turned his back to me as if he was looking out a window, and he stood there just like that as he said, "You know what you did, don't you. That wasn't just some school-kid prank, it was an act of sabotage, sabotage against the state." And he said that if he wanted he could not only kick me out of school but also see that I wound up in reform school, and the only reason I wouldn't end up in prison was because I was still under fifteen, "But don't you worry," he said, my mother was older, so I could rest assured that she'd wind up in a real prison and I'd never see her ever again, and then I thought I was about to cry, but I didn't want to cry if I could help it, so instead I only said, really quietly, "All right, I'll do it, I'll shoot as many points as you say, if need be, sixty, and if need be, forty, just like you want," and then I stood up and said we should go, that we should get it over with, and Iron Fist slapped me on the back and said, "Now that's talking," and then we left the science supply room and went all the way down the hall and down the stairs, and we went out the teachers' entrance, and the student monitor clicked his heels and saluted as he opened the door, but Iron Fist didn't return the gesture, and even I just barely raised my palm to my temple.

Comrade Principal let Iron Fist borrow his car, so we went in that, and Iron Fist let me sit up front, never in my life had I sat up front in a car, but I wasn't able to enjoy it, not now, because I kept thinking more and more about Feri, and Iron Fist kept smoking the whole way, and he didn't say a thing.

School No. 16, where they were holding the competition, wasn't far, so we got there fast, but before we got out of the car Iron Fist showed me the valve one more time, not that I was about to say anything if I could help it, and then we went into the school and out to the yard, which was decorated with pine boughs and panels of red felt with pictures and all sorts of quotations on them about the armed forces and about the nation's youth and about the Party General Secretary and about peace, and we got there just in time because the woman commander of the school's Young Pioneers was already greeting "all those assembled here today," she even gave a little speech, not that I paid much attention, no, I had my eyes on the firing positions. Judging from the blankets that had been laid out, it looked like we'd have to shoot lying down, but the targets hadn't been put out yet, and so I couldn't estimate the distance, and in the meantime the Young Pioneers commander was saying something about solidarity and peace, and then all of a sudden her speech ended and everyone saluted, and then we sang the national anthem, not only the first stanza and the last, as usual, but all the way through, I didn't even know the middle stanzas so well, they said something about some plows and, I think, some swords, but then that ended too, and then the school principal wished everyone much success, and then the competition really did begin.

First we drew lots for the weapons, all of us had to pull a number from out of a gas mask to decide which weapon we'd get to fire with and in which half, I pulled the number thirteen, but that didn't worry me because thirteen always brought me luck, besides, it now meant I'd be shooting in the second half with rifle number three. There were ten air rifles and ten ranges in all, and on purpose I didn't look to see how the person using rifle number three in the first half shot, although that would have given me an idea of how accurate that rifle was and which way it would take my hand, but I figured, what the hell, it didn't matter anyway, and so I didn't look there at all, no, instead I just walked around the yard and took a good look at the Corner of Peace, the word peace was written there in a whole bunch of languages, and it also said that the world's children wanted peace, and at the top were the pictures of the Party General Secretary and the commander in chief of the armed forces, and underneath there were pictures of war heroes and generals, and a couple of pictures of tanks and airplanes and of the armed forces' May Day parade, of all those tanks and mortars and missiles passing by the grandstand, the picture of the generals seemed strange, and when I took a better look, I noticed that it had been cut to pieces and taped back together again, which was pretty obvious because of how the wall behind the generals looked, and then it occurred to me that I knew this picture because it was in the appendix at the end of our fifth-grade textbook, but back then the picture still had seven generals on it, and now there were only five, meaning two generals had disappeared from the picture, and it wasn't like I'd even heard anything about them being traitors, and in the meantime I saw that everyone had just about stood up already at their firing positions, which meant that they were done shooting and our round was coming right up, so I began moseying back there, and I noticed the teachers standing around and chatting away by the school entrance, Iron Fist was there too, he was still smoking, and he must have sensed it when I looked that way because he turned toward me and gave a smile and a wave of the hand, with the same hand that was holding the cigarette, and the whole time his other hand was in his pocket, and I knew he was holding the valve, and then all of a sudden I felt this heat surge through me, and as I stood there someone behind me said, "Horáciú," and I got really scared, but I turned around all the same and saw that it was the woman commander of the Young Pioneers, and when I noticed that she was reading my name from a sheet of paper I calmed down a bit because I figured she didn't know the real Horáciú, and so it wouldn't turn out that I wasn't really him, so I said, "Yes, that's me," and then she asked me what I'd been looking at in the Corner of Peace, and I said, "Nothing, Comrade Commander, it's just that before competitions I always look at the picture of the commander in chief of the armed forces, to bring me luck, I mean, because he's my role model," and then the commander of the Young Pioneers nodded and said, "It's just such patriotic thoughts that take the country forward on the path of peace," and then she jotted something down on a notepad and wished me much success, and I went over to my firing position and got down on the blanket.