But, from time to time, Tamás would create a task for Gyuri.
‘Get a new blade for this hacksaw,’ Tamás requested, which pleased Gyuri as that would fill up the time until lunch. He set off for the stores as slowly as he could to make the most of the trip. When he got there, he was surprised to see a ‘Do not disturb’ sign which looked as if it had been borrowed thirty years previously from a luxury hotel. Inside, the storemaster, who was the Party Secretary of that section of Ganz, was playing cards with three confederates. Gyuri had barely got his foot across the threshold when, without looking at him or noticeably moving his lips, the storemaster said firmly but without rancour: ‘fuckyourmother’. This was said as such an aside, so mechanically, that Gyuri felt it couldn’t have been related to his entry. So he asked: ‘Sorry to interrupt, but…’
The storemaster wheeled on him: ‘May God and all his holy saints fuck you!’ he exclaimed in what seemed a deplorable lapse for an avowed atheist and a historical materialist. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Fischer.’
‘Okay, you’re fired and on your way out stick a horseprick up your arse,’ said the storemaster dismissing him in an enraged tone before turning back to his comrades in cards. ‘Can you believe this? You can’t get a minute’s peace in this place.’
Returning to his electrical engines, Gyuri pondered the question of whether Gombás, his protector, was in a stronger position than Lakatos, the wing Party Secretary, and if he were fired, did he care that much? He tried to kid himself, but then realised that he did care. Ganz might be bad, but it wasn’t Army bad.
Tamás was surprised to see Gyuri returning empty-handed. ‘He said that he was too busy and that I’m fired,’ Gyuri reported.
‘He does have a cruel sense of humour, that Lakatos,’ said Tamás setting off with the blunted hacksaw. Continuing to meditate on his predicament, Gyuri resolved to alert Gombás immediately to the threat to his employment and went up to Gombás’s office.
Gombás’s secretary wasn’t there. Neither was Gombás. After repeated polite and clear knocking in order to ensure that he didn’t accidentally spoil a ‘training session’, Gyuri found Gombás’s office to be vacated. He stared at Gombás’s black telephone. The idea of picking up the receiver and putting a call through to abroad, somewhere, anywhere West, sneaked into his mind. He toyed with the idea of just doing it, of placing a call, just to hear them say ‘Hello’ or ‘Good morning’, just to hear the sound of abroad, the crackle of free air, the ineffable language of out. The prospect xylophoned excitement along his spine.
He enjoyed toying with the idea for a few minutes, knowing for a variety of reasons, first and foremost, a lack of guts, he wouldn’t attempt it but he fully savoured the opportunity. He imagined picking up the receiver and asking in a Gombás-like voice for New York, Paris, London, Berlin even Cleveland, Ohio. It was five of the best minutes he had spent for a very long time.
Then he restarted his worries on getting the sack. Where was Gombás? Had he embarked on a talent-scouting tour? Would he be in the army before Gombás paid another visit to his office? Going back to the shopfloor, Gyuri bumped into Pataki sauntering down a corridor, bouncing a basketball on the floor and off the walls, wearing his sunglasses. Presumably he had run out of wire to watch. Gyuri recounted his problems while Pataki bounced the ball furiously around a portrait of Rákosi. ‘I always envisaged you as a military man,’ said Pataki with the total lack of sympathy only a close friend could muster. ‘No, don’t laugh. I’ve never seen anyone who can rival your genius for digging trenches. In recognition of your trench-digging alone you should make General. And I hear military service is being extended to three years, that should give you plenty of time.’ Pataki then moved off into the offices to dazzle dazzleable young women with his dribbling skills.
Even though he was highly exercised about his own perils, Gyuri couldn’t suppress a pang of anxiety about Pataki who wasn’t slowing down his disregard. He had always been the one to get them into trouble, the self-evident, self-incriminating trouble such as the scout camp where they had drunk all the communion wine, all the communion wine at Pataki’s suggestion. There had been no hope of getting away with it. Father Jenik had been justifiably furious, but since there had only been three days of the camp left, there had only been three days of real wrath and punishment. This camp could be longer…
Bearing two new blades, Tamás reappeared. ‘I told you he was pulling your leg. He’s a good lad, old Lakatos. He wouldn’t let me leave without giving me this carton of cigarettes. I didn’t want to take them, but he really pressed me.’ Tamás gave Gyuri two packets.
Then it was lunch. The weather was a muscular sunshine so most employees went out into the yard to eat whatever they had managed to lay their hands on. Zsigmond and Partos, the two priests, were sitting next to each other, dealing with their bread and cheese, conversing in Latin, polishing their only remaining Catholic weapon. No one paid any attention to them any more. The workers were quite accustomed to the strange workfellows that had descended on them. Priests, accountants, diplomats, cartographers, nobility, all undextrous to a man. There was a great campaign going on for ‘sharing working methods’. Posters, films, exhortations in print and in person were undodgeable. One of the newsreel versions of this appeal that Gyuri had seen featured a seasoned old worker, complete with the beret that was the hallmark of proletarianness, who having ignored the frustrated bunglings of the fresh-faced youth on the lathe next to him, reads the ‘Free People’ editorial on the imperativeness of sharing working methods. The old worker is forthwith struck down with shame at his laxness. Instantly, he rushes over to introduce the boy to the delights of advanced lathe-turning.
This was essentially the Party saying: you’d better train each other because we’re not going to spare the time or cash to do so. While everyone in the works would rather have been dead than carrying out what the Party had urged, if for no other reason than not wanting to waste valuable earning-time, they had provided guiding help and encouragement to the newcomers who had been dropped into the midst of the factory without knowing how to do the job, and often not even knowing what the job was. They were silently acknowledged as domestic exiles.
Gyuri was warmly greeted by Csokonai, who was sitting scribbling away furiously on a mess of sheets on his lap. Csokonai had been a lecturer at the University, an expert on international law, a decent man, if tiresome in anything but the smallest doses, who looked on Gyuri as an ally. Having noted that Csokonai had a bulging bag of crisp apples, Gyuri sat down next to him, amazed at what he would do for a good bite. Csokonai was in a incessant state of fury with only slight adjustments in the volume. He had explained to Gyuri several times, firmly gripping him by the wrist (with prodigious force for a skinny lawyer): ‘They replaced me with an idiot. An idiot. An idiot. A man who knew nothing, nothing. You must believe me.’ Csokonai would repeat this just to leave no doubt that he wasn’t using idiot as a figure of speech, but as a purely technical term. Gyuri always agreed adamantly, because he wanted his wrist released and because he found it plausible that some cadre who had flicked through the paperback edition of Lenin on International Law had got Csokonai’s job. Over sixty, Csokonai was too old to take it; he couldn’t even attempt to roll with the punches. Most of his lunchbreak was spent compiling further violations of national and international law and principles. ‘I’ve really got them now,’ he snarled. ‘They’ll pay, they’ll pay. This nonsense can’t last forever and then they’ll pay.’