“They say everyone does as you say,” she remarks.
“They do,” he agrees.
Silence reigns again, interrupted only by the clicking of Mrs Kišš’s knitting needles and the shouting from the yard.
“Bugger,” Ďula curses, when the pig bites him.
“And how about the city girls?” Mrs. Kišš asks. “Are they beautiful?”
Eržika blushes. Rácz shrugs.
“I don’t know.” Rácz doesn’t get time to look at girls.
Mrs. Kišš nods with satisfaction and goes on clicking her needles.
The living room is filled with the desperate squealing of the captured pig. The men, frozen stiff, are yelling.
“And what about you, Eržika?” Mrs. Kišš turns to her daughter. “Don’t you want to ask him about anything? Aren’t you interested?” Eržika blushes deep red. “And where do you live?” Mrs. Kišš asks. “Is there a dormitory?”
Rácz coughs and fidgets. Rácz lives right in the hotel.
“Isn’t that expensive?” Mrs. Kišš asks.
“No,” Rácz shakes his head. “It’s free.”
“So it’s like a dormitory,” says Mrs. Kišš.
“Sort of,” Rácz concedes after momentary consideration.
Rácz’s pig darts under the window, cheerfully dragging the rope tied round its neck.
“Up the Virgin Mary’s cunt!” Kišš curses in Hungarian, running and stumbling in the snow.
“And who do you live with?” Mrs. Kišš asks. “Do you have a room-mate?”
Rácz shakes his head. No, Rácz lives alone.
“Good heavens!” Mrs. Kišš says when the clock strikes half past ten. “They’ll be repeating yesterday’s soap opera. Eržika, turn on the television!”
Rácz’s pig decides to sell its life dearly. It escapes to the other side of the yard and crawls under a tool-shed. When the men try to push it out with bean-poles, it squeals and runs away, taking the tool-shed with it for a few metres. The moving tool-shed gets Rácz so interested in the action that he presses his face to the window.
The soap opera shows a scene in a kitchen. A man explains to a woman that he can’t marry her. The actress cries hysterically.
“Did you miss me?” Rácz asks Eržika barely audibly.
Eržika shrugs. She doesn’t know. She’s watching the soap opera. Mrs. Kišš’s needles click. The pig squeals desperately. The men, tired and cold, curse. The frantic actress whimpers.
* * *
In the evening, the Kišš house is crowded with people. It’s packed and noisy. Kišš drags in a demijohn of pear brandy. Everybody has to drink it. Rácz gets boisterous. They seat Eržika next to him. Everyone looks them over with amiable smiles and insinuating insolence mirrored in their faces. The rough, badly distilled spirits tighten Rácz’s mouth into a grimace. He gets up.
“Where’s my driver?” he asks.
They all fall silent, overawed. Ďula, covered in muck, runs in from the kitchen, with a chunk of meat stuck on his fork.
“Have you been drinking?” Rácz asks him.
Everybody turns and looks at Ďula.
“No,” says Ďula. People look at Rácz.
“Are you sure?” Rácz responds in a stern voice.
“Honest to God!” Ďula affirms.
“Then you’ll go to the tavern and buy supplies.” The stoker orders three boxes of sparkling wine, three cases of red and three cases of white wine. “And get a couple of cases of Coke. And three cartons of Marlboros. Got it?”
Ďula nods and starts to looks for the minibus keys. Kišš protests with insulted dignity. Kišš can afford to treat his guests himself. Rácz, his future son-in-law, need not spend his money.
Rácz dismisses the objection. Rácz is richer and it’s his celebration. It’s his party, as they say in the city. He’s come back home after a long absence. He’s come back a success. Rácz will treat his kith and kin. “And that’s settled.”
“And where’s the tavern?” Ďula interrupts, embarrassed.
“Never mind,” says Rácz, “I’m coming with you.”
They drive through the dark village. Rácz says nothing. They reach the tavern and get out. Rácz just gives the orders. Ďula carries the cases and provisions. Then Rácz pays from his giant wallet. The men in the tavern watch in silent admiration.
On the way back, along the unlit, slippery road, they can see in the far distance the silhouette of a warmly dressed man on horseback.
“That’s Feri Bartaloš!” Rácz says. “Step on it!” he orders Ďula and impatiently leans forward. Ďula obeys. Soon they catch up with the rider. Bartaloš’s mighty horse rides at a gentle canter, taking proud Feri home. Feri Bartaloš is so well wrapped up that he doesn’t notice anything around him. “Let’s push him off the road!” Rácz suggests vindictively.
“But, boss…” Ďula tries to object.
“What do you mean ‘but’?” Rácz asks instantly with menacing animation. “Don’t give me ‘but’!” He clenches his fist as always when someone tries to resist him.
Ďula shrugs uncertainly, as a sign of capitulation. He won’t take responsibility, but he changes gear and veers to the side of the road, pushing the rider into a ditch. Then something hits the metal side of the minibus: both rider and horse vanish in a cloud of snow. Rácz looks round. The sight of Feri Bartaloš lying motionless with four huge hooves helplessly sticking up in the air fills Rácz with triumph. He can’t take his eye off the scene. He turns his head forward and looks at the road surface only when his neck starts to hurt.
The windows of the Kišš house light up the night. Curious onlookers from the village stare through the windows and step on each other’s toes. They draw back respectfully as the minibus drives up. Kišš brings a small barrel of pear brandy out onto the porch for them.
Inside, the corks from the sparkling wine soon start hitting the ceiling. Others sip mulled wine. The tables are filled with plates of steaming pork-belly soup and meat.
“Try the champagne, Eržika,” says Rácz, lighting up a Marlboro. “It’ll refresh you,” he adds. He himself has drunk plenty, as he had to celebrate his victory over proud Feri Bartaloš and so, quickly, he’s downed a few glasses of champagne in quick succession. Now he finds Eržika desirable. She is young, well built, with a round face. In her place Rácz imagines Silvia, made-up, bleached, and overdressed, smelling of cigarette smoke with breasts the size of a five-crown coin and with a crotch the width of a hand between her lanky, skinny legs. He suddenly sees things clearly. He controls a sudden urge to grab her full thigh, visible under her full-length apron. Compared to Eržika, Silvia looks like a spider in a privy, Rácz concludes. The same goes for the other scrawny bitches in the Ambassador Cabaret bar: Edita, Wanda the Trucker, Anča-Jožo, and even Dripsy Eve. Disgusting! Only now, at home, among his own people can Rácz breathe freely!
“And you, Ďula,” he turns to his driver. “Why aren’t you having fun?” Ďula is sitting drinking mineral water. Rácz gets up and gives orders. Rácz orders Ďula to drink. They’re not driving anywhere today. Tomorrow. Later. Afterwards. Rácz is celebrating his engagement. Yes, engagement. He’s going to be engaged. Ďula meekly agrees to a glass of champagne and downs it. Eržika, too, finishes her glass. Rácz immediately refills it.
“Tell me, how’s life?” Rácz asks Eržika. He likes her. He’s fallen in love with her and fancies her.
“Well, mixed,” answers Eržika, her speech blurred, and laughs. “Nothing but work,” she adds. Her father makes her work all the time. The old women in the butcher’s shop are always getting at her, nothing is good enough for them. She’d rather go to the city and work in a meat-processing factory. She’d live in a dormitory. She’d come home for weekends. “It’s better in the city. There’s entertainment, discos, shops. What’s here? Nothing.”