As the days moved on, and the gravity of Ferenc’s letters and Eszter’s trial bore down on Dora, an unlikely calm began spreading through her. It was the type of calm that only comes when a decision has been made, and one can relinquish all questioning and anxiety, simply ready to follow a pre-determined course. Someone else decided for Dora. Her mom, years ago, decided, and Ivan decided too. Dora had been placed in this position before she could even protest it. She would have to find a way to help her mom.
Dora didn’t feel any sort of hesitation, even knowing her mom confessed to murdering someone. Rather, Dora reminded herself that since she didn’t know the details of Eszter’s crime, she couldn’t make any assumptions. Dora only knew she wanted to set things right. And, if the government caught wind that Eszter still plotted to escape the country, they would surely do away with her. Ferenc’s letters would seal her fate before she even took the stand.
With all doubt banished from her mind, Dora picked up her pencil. Tracing Ferenc’s words, she followed the erratic loops and dips of his penmanship, until she could fabricate it perfectly. In a matter of ten minutes, Dora composed a compelling letter that appeared to be in Ferenc’s handwriting. Lighthearted and inundated with sexual innuendos, it would hold off Joszef for a little while, at least.
Quietly resting her pen down, she moved to her desk where her typewriter sat. Dora needed to make sure Ferenc never mailed another letter through the postal service again, just in case she couldn’t intercept it. Her back straight and eyes glued to the loaded paper, Dora took a deep breath and prepared to compose her second letter. This one would protect Eszter and Dora. It would give Ferenc the hope he craved. It would be the beginning of something that Dora wasn’t ready for, but for which she had been preparing her whole life.
Dear Mike a Korvinközből,
Please, let’s not communicate anymore via the mail system. It’s too dangerous, especially with your encounters with Eszter. Instead, please write “Varga” on your letters to me and deliver them to the secretary at 3 Wesselényi út. She will not know who you are, or what you’re doing there, but she knows the letters must get to me.
You have my full respect and confidence for trying to escape Hungary. My explanation to you is long, but the short version is that I will help you.
My letters will not give you instructions on how to escape. That would put anyone in our envoys at serious risk, and I can’t forgo their safety. Please continue to foster your relationship with Eszter. She will tell you how to safely leave the country. She knows a code. It’s the only way.
MIKE A KORVINKÖZBŐL
February 15, 1965
Dear Uncle Lanci,
Thank you from the top of my lungs for your letter. It is truly the most gorgeous specimen I have encountered. You will help? You will help! I almost squelched Adrienne as I told her the momentous news.
I admit that I harbor no clue as to how your petite letter landed in my coat pocket, but my heart lumbered with excitement when I read it. I always thought admist the ranks of those who fight for the Hungarian cause, your radio stands first in line. But I had my doubts recently with your none response. Your Hungarian is genuine. I am glad to see that you have not pardoned it to flee after living in Munich for so long.
I was so taken on by overjoyousness that I wanted to leap up and tell Anika, who had just departed from me. She was placed in my presence so lovingly because Andras and I spotted her and Marta at an underground bar the night previous. We were domineering the dance floor, when Andras’ matty, pink, sweaty face turned to me and said, “Do you remember those beauty queens we faced?”
The delight in my interactions with Anika nested softly in my heart. My range of words for Andras proved more limited than I even planned. I nodded imminently and sincerely for Andras to witness.
Andras took hold of my hand and whiskered me to the other side of the bar. He forced me in a forward movement and then to an abrupt halt. He pointed forth. “There they are!”
I tripped with excitement. “Let’s go light conversation with them!” I jaunted forward, but Andras caught my chest in his arms. I could tell that he refrained me due to his nerves.
“What do we say?” he spattered.
“Let me take the lead,” I courageously exclamated. I crossed the line above him and around him. Andras shagged behind me, like he was prepping to pick up the balls from a football practice. I could tell his lumpy figure was very close to me.
When Anika’s face pivoted toward me, Uncle Lanci, it was like I was sliding on ice and may plunk onto my tailbone. Her glance was more severe than the coldest winter. When our eyes began to intercourse, a petite frown drooled upon Anika’s cheeks. It forced Andras and I to hang backward in fear.
“She simply failed to recognize us,” I made a whisper to Andras.
“I don’t know,” he said.
But I persevered to walk toward her, and surely as my superb face approached closer, she realized my identity. A smile rang from her and she alerted Marta, who was the beacon of Andras’ lustings, for when I peered behind me he was in full salivation mode.
“Hello,” was all I could mutter, Uncle Lanci, before I persisted sounding more ridiculous than I could imagine.
“Hi,” Anika said in the sweetest of simple tunes.
Her friend Marta nodded behind her, as if the hello Anika uttered was the most profounding academic theory in the universe.
Politely, and so delicately, as Anika’s usual custom, she asked me, “How are you feeling?”
“Great!” I informed her, bugging my chest wide and far for her to see the greatness of my health.
“Good,” she said.
“How are you?” I perpetuated the conversation.
“I am fine,” she said, but her eyes looked the reverse of fine. I viewed her sadness, which I did not view before, but I hypothesize was consistently present. It was so big, and I desired to take it off of her. Anika is a student in the Hungarian way. She says a small amount of words, but holds behind her an immense accommodation of emotion.
I couldn’t perceive whether she wanted us standing there before her or not, but I settled with it. How would you inform someone, Uncle Lanci, that you have been pondering their whereabouts for ages?
I chattered forward about the petite number of happy occurrences I encountered so that our conversation could shine brighter than her sadness. We carried forward like this for a portion of time, discoursing on meaningless things. Andras made a heroic offer to Marta to dance, and she complied with much rapidness.
I continued perceiving Anika as unhappy, but then why did she not depart? She went forth standing there. Unmoving! That did a sign for me, Uncle Lanci. I longed for her hand and grasped it. She put her eyes up at me, and I viewed, through the sadness, the miniscule hope in her. I am aware of hope when it’s miniscule. I know what it is like to place it in storage, majorly back inside. She saw this part of me too and she began to be easeful. She even started saying light things and dancing.
The night swam from underneath me after that, the perfect coincidence of affairs carrying me forward to greater lengths than I could perceive. What I discovered leap-frogged beyond what I had ever witnessed before. Anika and I could converse, and we enjoyed each other’s company so endlessly that the conversation rarely pitter-pattered to a hault on any occasion.