Of course by then Big Prodán hadn't been working for a while, no, he was walking back and forth behind us, telling us to keep it up, he even gave Aronka a good kick on the ass, but then one of the laborers yelled at him not to do such a thing again or else he'd knock his brains out, it was enough to keep an eye out for anyone not putting his all into the shoveling, they'd take care of the rest, so from that point on Prodán didn't bother anyone, he just walked back and forth behind us and kept an eye on how we worked.
At one point I turned my head and noticed that the laborers had meanwhile spread a blanket on the ground by one of the excavators and laid down on it, the one called Trajan was puffing a cigarette and the one called Feri began to eat something, and then Prodán sat down there too, and by then only his little brother was walking back and forth behind us, and when I looked back again, I saw that those guys were playing cards.
Áronka was just about to try driving his shovel into the ground when his foot suddenly slipped off the blade and came out from under him, and he flopped on his side and just lay there with one foot in the ditch as if he didn't want to get back up at all, and when that happened all of us stopped working and wiped our foreheads and gathered around Aronka, and Prodán's kid brother asked what the problem was, but Aronka didn't say a thing, he just shook his head.
One of the laborers, the one called Feri, stood up and came over and looked at Aronka and said, "You weaklings wouldn't last even a day at the Danube Canal," and then he said, "All right, time for a break," and he said we could take fifteen minutes and try to pull ourselves together, but he was otherwise satisfied with us, we'd been doing decent work, and we shouldn't worry, we could go home for lunch, but everyone had to come back for the afternoon, the work would last till dark, and he added that they'd written down everyone's name and address on a sheet of paper, so they'd go after anyone who didn't come back, no one was allowed to sabotage community service work.
The laborer then turned away and went over to one of the excavators while the rest of us sat down on the ground by Aronka, everyone was resting, Janika was the only one still moving, he was juggling the soccer ball with one of his feet, yes, he had such a feel for soccer balls that he could have kept that up all day long. I just sat on the ground like everyone else, looking at the ditch I'd been digging, it wasn't deep at all, and at all those tiny pebbles and white roots of grass along the sides, and then I pulled out my father's picture and also looked at that, it was smudged on account of my touching it all the time, but his face was still clear as day. Everyone used to say how much I looked like my father, one time I looked at myself a long time in a pocket mirror while holding his picture up to it, and I really could tell that my chin and my mouth were just like his.
So I was sitting right there and looking at the picture when all of a sudden one of the laborers stopped next to me, I could tell from his bootlaces that it was the one called Feri, and he leaned down and tore my father's picture right out of my hand. "Whatcha looking at?" he asked, and then he held the picture really close to his eyes, like someone who couldn't see well. "Who's that," he asked, "your old man?" But I didn't answer, I only nodded, and this fiery heat passed from the top of my head all the way through me, and my ears were practically on fire and I couldn't say a thing, I couldn't say yes and I couldn't say no, all I could do was nod, and my stomach was in knots, it felt as if a lump had begun moving up out of my belly toward my neck, and when it reached my throat, somehow I did speak after all. "Do you know him?" I asked, but my voice was shaking terribly. "He's there too, at the Danube Canal, you guys also came from there, huh?"
The laborer held an index finger in front of his mouth, bent down closer, hissed shhh, whispered that this was a state secret, and gave me a wink, and then for a long time he didn't say a thing, no, he just kept looking at the picture, turning it in his hands as if he couldn't see it right, and meanwhile he kept biting his lips, and then he shook his head and stood up straight and called out to the other laborer, "Get over here, Trajan, get a load of this, you won't believe it!"
The laborer called Trajan then put down on the blanket the piece of bread he'd been chewing, stood up, and came over. When he got there, the laborer called Feri put the picture into his hand without a word, but then he said, "Look at it good, at first you won't be able to tell, but just look at it extra careful." The laborer called Trajan looked at the picture for a long time too, turning it in his hands, but then he shook his head and asked, "What am I supposed to see? Because I don't see a thing." Feri bit his lips again and said, "That's because you're blind," and he poked an index finger at my father's face and added, "Just look at that mouth and you'll see plain as day that this is none other than Pickax."
Knitting his brow, Trajan just stared at the picture for a while before suddenly breaking into a grin. "Holy Jesus, well I'll be, damn me if that's not Pickax." Now Feri started nodding and tore the picture out of Trajan's hand, "Pickax it is," he said, "and get a load of how young he was, get a load of how nice and smooth his face still was, I wouldn't believe it if I didn't see it," and then Feri got all quiet and looked at me. "So then, you're Pickax's son, are you?" and he reached out a hand, and as I took it he patted my shoulder with his other hand and said, "You can be proud of your dad, he's a really decent guy."
He shook my hand tight but it didn't hurt, and so I asked, "You two know him? You really know him?" Trajan nodded. "You bet we know him, he'll be here in no time, he's bringing the shed we'll be staying in," and then Trajan put the picture back in my hand. "Here it is, put it away," he said, and I asked, "Is he really coming here, you swear?" Even I could hear how much my voice was trembling, and I could feel my whole body shaking, like when you get the shivers from being cold. The laborer called Feri then looked at me again and asked, "What did you say you're called?" When I told him, Feri nodded. "Yes, he mentioned you, he sure did, you remember too, Trajan, huh? He said he hasn't seen you in a long time, and he'll come look you up and bring something for you."
On hearing all this I got so dizzy all of a sudden and looked down at the ground, at my shoes, everything seemed to be turning round and round, the chunks of earth and blades of grass and pebbles too, everything was spinning and I almost fell, but then the laborer called Trajan put an arm around me. "It's all right," he said, "get a hold of yourself." But I was still shaking as I then remembered my father's postcards, and how Mother had at first waited and waited for him to return, and how she always shuddered whenever the doorbell rang, thinking that my father had finally been allowed to come home, and then I said to the laborers, "You two are lying, if my father really came back he would have looked us up for sure, he would have come home to us, to Mother and me, besides, my dad isn't called Pickax, my dad isn't friends with you guys."