Peter Nadas - A Book of Memories

She saw three men standing before her.

One of them held a camera; the moment she budged he started clicking, and after that he wouldn't stop.

She screamed at them, she demanded to know who they were and what they wanted from her, and where was she, and why was she sick; she wanted to see a doctor, wanted to jump out of bed, which was some kind of low couch next to the wall in a large sunlit room full of mirrors; but the three men didn't say a word, they kept out of her way, and the one with the camera took pictures all the time she was having this fit of anger.

First she lost the feeling in her legs, she collapsed, but managed to hold on to a chair; she wanted to grab the camera, but the man photographed that, too.

Then the other two fell on her, punching and kicking, while the third one kept clicking away.

This happened on the second day.

On the third day they pulled her up from the water tank on a rope; she was blindfolded again, and she kept knocking against the iron stairs, but she was glad, because at least she knew where she was, she knew for sure, she heard them slam the steel door.

A long journey followed; they gave her no food or drink, they didn't let her go to urinate; she was so weak she made in her pants.

First she heard the crunch of gravel under the tires, then an iron gate creaked open and they pulled into a closed space, presumably a garage, where the car quickly filled up with the smell of gasoline and exhaust fumes; then with a huge bang they slammed the door shut.

She was overjoyed.

Because if they were going to take her down a winding staircase now, and then along a narrow corridor, where linoleum covered the stone floor to muffle footsteps, and if they were going to shove her into a cell that was like a woodshed, then she knew exactly where she was.

Then they must have brought her back.

Then she was in the house in Eötvös Street, the house she herself had picked out and where she'd supervised every alteration; and then everything was all right, and soon she'd be surrounded by familiar faces.

There was a winding staircase, but no linoleum; there was a woodshed, she could smell the freshly chopped wood and the sulphur smell of coke briquettes, but what her bound hands touched was a damp brick wall.

She was lying on something soft; she kept falling asleep and waking up.

Her lips got so puffy from thirst she couldn't close her mouth; she had no more saliva left, her tongue was sticking to raw, swollen sores.

She tried to relieve the hot throbbing pain by pressing her face against the damp bricks, but there wasn't enough moisture there for her dry tongue.

After a while she managed to work the blindfold loose.

No, it wasn't that house, after all — and then there was no hope.

Very high up she noticed a windowlike opening covered with a plain piece of cardboard; around its edges some light and air seeped through, which meant there was no glass.

In the wall she discovered the sharp edge of a rusty hook; on that she rubbed and scraped the rope used to tie her hands together until she managed to undo it.

Now she had a piece of rope, but it wasn't long enough for a loop and a knot; and besides, there was no place to fasten it.

In her sleep she heard soft music, soothing, lovely music; she was sorry to wake up, but the music continued; it wasn't as lovely as before, more like regular dance music.

She must be hallucinating; she knew that thirst could drive a person mad; she'd lost her mind, then, but not completely, if she was aware of it.

All right, then, she'd gone mad, she just couldn't figure out when it happened.

She even knew she was going to have another fit of anger, she felt it coming on; she was fully aware and felt that she was throwing herself against the wall, and although she had no strength left, she went on slamming herself against the wall.

The music was coming from outside; it got much cooler in the cellar, and no light at all filtered in from anywhere.

It had to be evening.

But she couldn't decide anymore when she was sleeping and when she was hallucinating and seeing images that weren't really there, because the music turned into a little stream in the wall, the trickle became a flow, a flood — a burst pipe, she thought — turning into a roaring, rumbling waterfall; she almost drowned.

The next moment, or a half hour, or two days later — she wasn't sure anymore — she woke up thinking that everything was all right; with her finger she was trying to scoop out wet plaster from the spaces between the bricks.

She even managed to clamber up all the way to the window, but just at that moment the music started playing again and that made her fall back.

But she didn't give up; she tried once more, and with the tip of her finger, with her nail, she reached the edge of the cardboard over the opening.

The cardboard was fastened to the wall, but she kept jabbing and prodding it until she moved it, and then it simply fell down.

She looked out on a terrace lit by colorful Chinese lanterns; people dressed for the evening were dancing to this same music, and on a staircase leading to a dark garden two men were talking in a foreign language with a beautiful young woman.

She wore a colorful print dress, her expression seemed serious.

If after a short while they hadn't come for her and walked her up the same staircase, and if the two men and the young woman hadn't let them pass as casually as they did, and if she hadn't been led across the dance floor on the way to another part of the same house, then she would still be convinced that this garden party with the Chinese lanterns was one of her hallucinations.

From the smells, the overheard foreign words, the look and shape of ordinary objects, she surmised that they had taken her across the border, and they were somewhere near Bratislava.

First they showed me your father's signature; I had to read his official testimony, and then a statement by János Hamar confirming the accuracy of that testimony.

Two men sat facing me in comfortable armchairs.

I told them this wasn't true.

They acted surprised; why wouldn't it be true, they said, and chuckled, and interrupting each other, they kept making pointed and vulgar references to my relationship with both men.

Either they are lying or you tortured them, too, or they've gone mad; there's no other possibility, and that is all I have to say about this.

There was a glass of water on the table in front of them.

One of them said, We've prepared a statement, if you sign it, you may drink the water.

I told them there was no interrogation, no statement, how could I sign anything?

The other man gave a signal and I was dragged out through a side door.

As soon as the door closed behind us, they started beating me; they shoved me into a bathtub, poured hot water on me, struck me with the shower head, called me a spy, a traitor, and said, Now you can drink all you want, you slut.

When I came to, I was in the cellar, but they soon dragged me upstairs again.

Not much time could have passed, because my clothes were still sopping wet and I could still hear the music.

This time they didn't lead me across the terrace but up the spiral staircase, through the garage, and into the garden; we probably used the main entrance this time.

They brought me to a very small room with only a large desk and a chair in it.

A blond young man was sitting behind the desk, by the cozy light of a lamp; even from here the music could be heard.

As soon as I walked in, he jumped up and seemed quite happy to see me, as if he had been waiting for me for a long time; but he greeted me in French, asked me to sit down in French, and expressed his indignation in French that contrary to his strict instructions I'd been treated this way.