Iván Sándor - Legacy

Gertrud laughs. All is not lost yet, darling.

They exchange a kiss.

Another nurse comes into the sleeping quarters. I had not seen her before; she can be only two or three years older than me. Red hair in a long ponytail; she is freckled and has luminous green eyes.

Dress! Make it snappy!

Should I make the bed?

Oh, just leave it! Come quickly!

Snow had fallen during the night, covering footprints and also the corpses that had been stacked beside the building.

The head physician is standing in the doorway of the main building, which lets on to the yard. Dr Temesváry is stout and very bulky, blocking the entrance. The small nurse snatches at my arm and hauls me back; the head physician had given a sign that we should wait. I did not see him make a sign.

Two Arrow Crossers try to tug Dr Temesváry out of the doorway. He holds fast. They are grasping submachine guns. Temesváry says something to them and does not budge. A third Arrow Crosser comes, and they manage to haul him aside. Men are shoved out of the building. The little nurse puts an arm round my shoulder. The men with submachine guns lead the men away. Maybe they’ll content themselves with those eight, the nurse says.

Should we wait?

You can be sure the director will signal when we can go.

I don’t see him make any sign, but the nurse says, Now. We run.

Gizi emerges from the building, and, while running, I see that she, too, breaks into a run to the front and towards the main entrance. We reach the door on to the corridor. Temesváry grabs me by the arm and the sister runs inside.

Gizi comes back. They’ve just taken them away, she says to Temesváry.

I can see nothing in the dark of the basement, only seeing Father when he is standing right in front of me, behind him Mother and Vera. My parents are carrying haversacks, Vera her little suitcase. Gizi produces from her handbag the new Swiss letter. She shines a torch on it. It’s got all of your names on it. Your family name has changed, she says to Vera, and you must practise using it. And when my parents return … it’s only till then, isn’t it? Yes, says my mother. She last saw Vera’s mother in the marching column as it neared Hegyeshalom.

We step over people lying on mattresses. Gizi spots the yellow stars on Mother’s and Father’s winter coats. Heavens, Rosie, she says as if scolding a child. Rip those off immediately!

They tear the yellow stars off their coats. I am about to take Vera’s hands, which I have got used to doing — that’s how we set off on our journeys — but instead step over to Father and help him pick out the ends of cotton threads that have been left where the star had been sewn on. Gizi says, Well done; good job. She then turns to Vera. You go first to the main gate, and you have to act as if you’d just dropped by to visit someone. That job appeals to Vera, and so, getting into her role, she sets off. I’m raring to go after her, but Gizi says, Wait a bit. You’ve got a haversack; that’s different.

Behind me is the dark bend of the basement corridor. The old people are shouting the loudest, not so much the women as the men.

The ginger-haired ponytailed young nurse pops up from the inner depths. It’s time for your rounds, Doctor, she says. Temesváry stretches a hand out to Gizi. The nurse pecks me on the cheek. Vera looks back, but Gizi gestures that she should keep going. At the main gate we should turn right straight away, says Gizi. I will keep twenty or thirty metres ahead, so if I stop and signal look for a doorway, step into it and wait. You come after me, she says to Father, after you Rosie and the girl. You stay at least twenty to thirty metres behind me and keep a look out behind. If you notice anything, tell your father, and you, Béla, pass it on to me.

It’s time to make your rounds, Doctor, says the ginger-haired nurse, who I can see is looking at me.

Godspeed, says Dr Temesváry.

General Karl Pfeffer-Wildenbruch of the Waffen-SS, commander of the forces charged with defending Budapest, reports to Hitler by radio from his headquarters blown into the rock of Castle Hill that he has been obliged to pull back his forces from the north and east of Pest, because the front line is approaching Újpest and Rákospalota, and he requests permission to allow the remaining forces to break out of the encircling ring.

The general has all motor vehicles seized and orders that the troops be concentrated to make a breakout. Budapest must be defended at all costs, Hitler directs anew, and those who disobey orders and break out will face instant court martial when they reach German lines.

Vannay’s paramilitary shock-troop battalion, still comprising mainly officer cadets aged between fifteen and eighteen, recaptures positions the Germans had lost at the village of Csömör on the northeastern fringes of Pest. Soviet tanks, however, draw up in an unstoppable battle array on the flat terrain between Fót and Rákospalota, near the Danube, in the north-easternmost part of Pest. SS anti-tank gunners dig themselves in between Angyalföld in the XIIIth District and Újpest in the IVth.

We’re heading towards Angyalföld, says Gizi, and goes in front. Father follows a minute later. Mother takes Vera by the hand. I wait and count. Then I, too, set off. There are constant mortar blasts.

It may be that Gizi set off more to the left after all.

On a 1943 street map the block of the Albrecht Barracks lies to the right-hand side of Lehel Road. Past the Aba Street turn-off, on the right, are the buildings of the No. 1 Army Catering Unit, while behind the Albrecht Barracks on Lehel Road are the barracks of the Army Transport Corps and further on the Vilmos Barracks.

On that 1943 map only the sites of barracks, other military premises and railway stations are specially marked. The Albrecht Barracks are similarly marked on a 1903 map; the No. 1 Army Catering Unit is here called Military Catering Store; the barracks of the Army Transport Corps the Szekerész Barracks; and the Vilmos Barracks are the Tüzér Barracks.

It is unlikely that we passed in front of these barracks, so most likely we had set off more to the left.

I can see an army squad a couple of hundred metres behind us. They are leaning forwards as they run across a broad road, and on reaching the other side they throw themselves on to the snow. They are not firing but probably taking cover from mortar bombs, and we are far enough from where it strikes, although one can still feel the shock wave from the explosion.

The broad street was presumably Lehel Road.

It would be no bad thing to make it snappy, sonny boy, says a man next to me. I don’t know where he came from. He is in a black winter coat and has wrapped his head in a rag. No bad thing at all before they start peppering our arses. What are you doing wandering the streets at this time? Where are your mother and father?

Father is keeping his distance behind Gizi and I behind Mother and Vera. A growing number of people are wedging themselves in between. Everyone is in a hurry; some are running and some, like the soldiers, throw themselves on the snow when mortars impact.

The last time I saw so many faces was when we had soldiers escorting us and people stared at us from the pavement. Now no one stares at anybody; everyone minds their own business. Those damn fools still want to fight, pants a man who is pushing ahead beside me. Aren’t you in a Levente troop? Sure, I say, I’m a Levente. Make yourself scarce, because Leventes are also being pulled in. Yes, sir, I say. One can tell you’re a Levente, he says. You get trained to say, Yes, sir, Yes, sir. Take care no one mistakes you for a Jew. Yes, sir, I’ll take care, I say. Those bloody fools even took me to be a Jew. Now tell me straight. Do I look like a Jew?