Peter Pišt'anek - Rivers of Babylon

“Like that, like that!” he shouts to the rhythm. The world spins around him.

All the guests have left. The restaurant and the bar are empty. Empty bottles, plates of leftover food, colourful confetti, and overflowing ashtrays are scattered over the tables. The waiters hang around the bar, counting the takings. The musicians pack up their instruments and leave the room. Only from the lounge can you hear music and Rácz singing. Rácz dances and drinks on his own. He drinks and dances, because he’s in love.

* * *

A few days into the New Year Mr. Mugambia Bwawenu takes a room in the Hotel Ambassador. He’s as black as coal. The whites of his eyes shine. At reception he produces the passport of a citizen of the Republic of Mayoumbe. Then he wrestles for possession of his suitcase with the wild porter Torontál, but has to yield. The happy old man grabs the suitcase with his spidery claws and, breathing heavily with excitement, toddles quickly to the lift.

He puts the suitcase down in the room and waits, determined to get his tip. His dry palms open and close in anticipation. Mr. Bwawenu reaches into his pocket and pulls out a two-crown coin. He gives it to the greedy old man. Torontál’s face grimaces with disappointment.

“I don’t have any more,” says the black man, “I haven’t had a chance to go to the bank. Besides, I come from a developing country. There’s nothing in our country except flies and sand. I speak Slovak,” adds Mr. Bwawenu, noticing Torontál’s surprise. “I was educated in your country. I’m black, but I’m a university graduate.”

Torontál leaves, making disappointed noises. Mozoň collapses heavily into an armchair. He grabs his head. He feels like boxing his own ears. He hasn’t even started and already he’s made so many mistakes. He’ll never find out anything this way. He’s behaving like an amateur.

Mozoň looks at his hands. The black dye is coming off his face. Poor quality. Fortunately, he brought a whole bottle with him. Mozoň believes that he won’t be kept here too long. He’ll stay for one, at most two days. He’ll find out what the stoker does all day, where he goes, and when he can be found on his own. Šolik and Tupý are on guard outside. As soon as he injects the stoker with the anæsthetic, he’ll call them in. They’ll all carry the body to the lawyer’s office. There they’ll decide what to do next, following Mozoň’s plans. They’ll either transport him to the safe house and imprison him there, or they’ll just kill him, as the lawyer suggested. The corpse can be taken out of the hotel in bits. Mozoň is against killing; he told the lawyer so. On the other hand, if they let Rácz go, they risk being given away by the vindictive stoker. But that’s not certain, as the stoker also has a lot to hide and if he went to the police after being released from the basement cell and gave everyone away, he’d incriminate himself, too. Well, never mind, Mozoň reflected, he’d see what could be done.

The former secret policeman takes out the bottle of black dye, tears off a wad of cotton wool and starts covering his face and hands. Then he carefully closes the bottle and puts it back in his suitcase. Two days, he thinks. He can last two days easily. He’s noticed that on everything he’s touched he’s left black fingerprints. What an idiotic idea, he thought, impersonating a black man. He had to tell his wife that he’d gone on a business trip, to accompany a very valuable bank shipment. Mozoň hates lying. Not out of morality or for other stupid reasons. He hates lying because a good liar has to have a perfect memory and remember what he said and to whom. And Mozoň doesn’t have that good a memory. Yet his whole life is a big lie. Even his wife and children know him as Ščepán. That’s his name in private life: Ščepán, the bank clerk. Those were his superiors’ instructions. Now it’s too late to change things. Mozoň can’t imagine his wife’s reaction if he were forced to tell her the truth. She’s known him as Ščepán for years.

“Well, that’s how it goes,” Mozoň reflects. “Once you’re at war, you’ve got to fight.” He leaves his room and goes downstairs to the lobby. There are a lot of new guests at reception. Šolik and Tupý sit in comfortable leather armchairs, reading newspapers. Through holes cut into the papers they discreetly observe their surroundings. Bwawenu sits down nearby. He crosses his legs. “You pricks!” he whispers at them, not moving his facial muscles. His subordinates become uneasy. They put down their papers. They’re both wearing dark glasses. Šolik has put on a giant false moustache and Tupý has covered his face with a long false beard. “I’m telling you that you look like idiots,” Bwawenu addresses the wall.

“Why, chief?” Tupý asks in a hurt voice, observing movement around the reception desk.

Bwawenu sighs. He looks round the lobby. “Get out!” he orders quietly, but decisively.

Šolik (alias Livid) and Tupý (alias Bear) have settled into their armchairs. They don’t want to go out. It’s cold outside; inside it’s pleasantly warm.

“Can’t you hear me?” Bwawenu goes for them, still looking at the wall. “Get out and throw the false moustache and glasses away! You look as suspect as a sledge in summer.” Bwawenu turns to his subordinates. “Did you hear me, or not?”

“But it’s freezing out there, chief,” Šolik objects.

“Then go to the snack bar in front of the hotel and get yourself some hot tea,” Bwawenu commands. “But you’ve got to be outside. In an emergency I’ll signal to you from the window. Out, you bloody idiots!”

Mozoň’s subordinates reluctantly get out of the comfortable armchairs and slowly make for the exit, as if still hoping that their superior would call them back at the last moment. But Bwawenu takes no more notice of them. A stocky, broad-shouldered man in a leather jacket and an earring in his ear, who has just come out of the lift, claims his attention. Everyone greets him politely with a bow. “That’s him,” Bwawenu thinks, “it’s Rácz!” That’s Mozoň’s target. Bwawenu gets up and inconspicuously follows the stoker.

* * *

An orgy is taking place at Urban’s place. The music is blasting. Urban is embittered. Only after the event has he realised that he was in love with Lenka. Now it’s too late. Rácz pestered him so long for Lenka’s address that he finally let him have it. He couldn’t refuse Rácz’s offer. A thousand crowns is good money. Now he feels sorry. Rácz really has sent Lenka a hundred orchids.

Urban is copulating mechanically, with a sullen face. Wanda can’t understand why he’s in a bad mood.

“What’s got into you?” she asks, lying under him with her thighs spread wide.

“Nothing,” says Urban, interrupting the coitus and lighting a cigarette.

Wanda wipes herself on a towel and also gets up.

“Where are you going?” asks Dripsy Eva.

“To have a pee,” says Wanda.

Hurensson sits naked in the armchair by a round table. His shrivelled penis dangles between his thighs. He’s poured himself a whisky and is sipping it. He’s back. He had some more money saved up, so he has to have some fun. The whores Urban has supplied are fine. They let you do anything you want. The sight of Urban having sex with Wanda wasn’t too bad either.

“Put the music out,” says Hurensson to Urban in his Swede’s English. “I have a headache.”

“What does he want?” asks Wanda, who has now come back.

“Says he has a headache,” Urban translates. “We have to turn the music off.” He goes to the stereo and turns it off.

“That’s fine!” Hurensson smiles with relief. “I hate that kind of jazz you like,” he admits to Urban.

“What does he want?” Wanda asks and bites into a sandwich.