Gyorgy Dragoman - The White King

BY THE END of the main recess I already knew there would be trouble because by the time the bell rang, I'd won almost all the money off Lupu and his gang, at first I didn't even want to play the coin-toss game with them, I'd heard they were into cheating, that it was hammered money they threw at the hole so whatever fell in never did bounce out, and that's just how it was, but it didn't do them any good because when it came to calling heads or tails, that white ivory king I got at the ambassador's and had with me in the pocket of my school jacket kept bringing me luck, I won every time we tossed coins, so by the end I was getting so scared that I tried calling out the opposite of what I was thinking, heads instead of tails and vice versa, but I kept winning all the same. Not even letting little Zoli toss instead of me helped any, I just kept winning and winning, and finally Lupu made the sign of the cross and spit on his coins and threw them so high that before they came back down he had time to turn on his heels three whole times and call out the name of Tudor Vládimireszku, protector of the poor, but it did him no good, I won even then, and by the end of the main recess, from the way Lupu and the others were looking at me I didn't want to put away the money at all, but I didn't dare give it back either because that would have been admitting I'd ripped them off, when it wasn't me who'd cheated at all, but them. All that change really weighted down the pocket of my school jacket, I'd won so much, and although I didn't dare count it, there must have been more than two tens there, and as I went up the stairs to the classroom I knew I wouldn't get out of this in one piece, on my way home they'd get me for sure.

So on purpose I took a detour, toward the waterspout and then along the hill and on the footpath behind the apartment blocks. By the old soccer field I went off the path because I didn't want to go near that long ditch that had been left half finished, the ditch where the new sewage line would have gone, no way did I want to meet up with that worker called Pickax because one time when some construction workers had us do some volunteer work they played a joke on me by lying that Pickax was my father and that the only reason I couldn't recognize him right away was because smallpox had done a job on his face, and I almost believed it too because I was really waiting for my father to come home from that labor camp down on the Danube Canal. Since then, Pickax had tried passing along messages to me a few times to go pay him a visit. He'd built himself some sort of house at the end of the empty ditch and that's where he guarded the pipes and waited for the other workers to return and the project to pick up where it left off, but it did him no good leaving those messages for me because I didn't want to see him ever again, even though I couldn't help thinking a lot about his face, which really was all eaten up by smallpox, besides, for a moment I had in fact believed he was my father. So I walked along the bottorn of the hill between the bushes, it was almost twice as far going that way, but at least I didn't meet up with anyone, I was just about home already, all I had to do was get back on the path a bit and then cross the yard behind the apartment block across from ours, and I was already thinking I was home free when, all of a sudden, someone whistled really loud.

When I looked over, who did I see but little Zoli sitting there on top of the Big Tree, and that's when they came out from behind the bushes, they were all there, Lupu and the gang, and they surrounded me without a word, even little Zoli climbed off the tree, and then Lupu stepped up and said they caught me, and now I'd find out what happens to cheating rats, and I said I hadn't cheated and they should leave me alone, but Lupu and the rest only laughed. Mariusz spoke next, he said there would be no mercy, that they were going to kill me, they were going to knock my skull to smithereens, and that's when I saw that he had a plastic bag with him, a bag with a brick in it, but he wasn't the only one who had one, everyone did, Lupu even spun his around his head, and the bag swished so loud I got really scared because I knew that if one of those brick war clubs hit me only once, my skull would crack just like that, and Mariusz said I must think I'm pretty smart, huh, for taking this detour, but I should get it through my skull that by doing so I'd signed my own death warrant because if they'd met me on the street, then at most they would have beaten the shit out of me and taken their money back, but out here there was no one around, so they could do with me whatever they wanted, so I should prepare myself for the worst. While he was busy talking I slipped a hand into the pocket of my school jacket nice and easy and then yanked my hand out and flung a whole bunch of coins at their faces, but it didn't turn out too good, the change went all over the place and didn't smack any of them square in the face. I was hoping they'd at least start snapping up the coins so I could somehow fight my way out of the circle around me and try running home, but not only did not a single one of them bend down to pick up the money, Lupu was already swinging his bag toward me, I was barely able to lean out of the way, the brick buzzed right by my head, and I knew that this was it, I was done for, they weren't kidding around, they really did want to beat me to smithereens. I cried out for help as loud as I could, "Help, help!" I shouted, and meanwhile I reached in my pocket again, but this time not to fling the money all over the place but because I knew that if my fist was full of coins I'd be able to punch harder, and then I socked Mariusz right in the belly before someone kicked me from behind, which made me fall forward, but it was lucky I did because by then two of them were swinging their plastic bags toward me at the same time, but only one of the bags hit me, and it only grazed my side. As soon as I fell over I turned and pulled up my knees because I knew they'd be giving me boot kicks in the belly in no time, and I brought my arms in front of my face just the way Zsolt had taught me to do, but without shutting my eyes, and then Lupu swung his bag, and I knew he'd hit me in a second, and from between my arms I could see him baring his teeth, but then all of a sudden I heard this loud shouting and I saw, as if in slow motion, a brown bottle of beer smack Lupu on the side of the head just above the right ear. Lupu staggered and the bag fell out of his hand, and maybe he would have fallen down if Mariusz hadn't grabbed his arm, the skin on Lupu's temple was torn open and he was bleeding a lot, but the bottle wasn't broken, and as it fell to the ground I could tell it was still at least a third full, the beer was all foamy as it trickled out onto the path, and meanwhile I heard someone yelling, "What are you all doing? For God's sake, leave him alone or else I'll beat the brains out of every last one of you!" The voice was one I'd heard just once before, then it was a laugh, but now I recognized it all the same, it was Pickax. I looked up and saw him running toward us on the path, he had a long crowbar in one hand and a sledgehammer in the other, and while running he knocked the two of them together so hard that the whole hillside echoed, and he was shouting, "Victory, victory!" There was a miner's helmet on his head, and from where I was lying on the ground I could see its lamp sparkling in the sunshine just as if it was really lit. He ran right up to me, and Lupu and the others all pulled back, you could tell they were scared, I didn't want to look at the man's face, but I couldn't turn away, his face was really ugly, true, but not as awful as I remembered, and then Pickax stopped above me and shouted at all of them to get themselves home while they could, because in a second he'd show them what beating brains out really means, what was this, what were they thinking, nine of them ganging up on one, and with bricks no less, like gypsies? He'd show them what honor's all about, and while he was at it, what the wrath of God really means. On account of all the pockmarks, his face looked like boiling hot, bubbling yellow wax while he was shouting, but it was more strange than scary, so anyway, Pickax then thrust the crowbar into the ground like it was a spear and told them to come get him if they wanted, but he'd have them know he wasn't just anyone, no, he'd learned to fight among the Lipovans across the country down in the Danube Delta, but by then Lupu and the gang were running already, Mariusz, Zolika, Pustyu, every single one of them was racing as fast as his legs would take him, and then Pickax threw the sledgehammer on the ground by the crowbar and looked down at me and said he just couldn't understand what the world was coming to, back in his day kids still knew what a fair fight was all about, "One on one, with bare hands, just like decency demands, but these days they come in hordes, with weapons worthy of thugs, like rats, terrible," he said, "just terrible," and then he asked me how I was, how much of a beating I'd got, and if I was able to stand up.