The only things that interested them, they said the next day while hanging about in front of the Bingo Bar, were the slingshots, the kind used by anglers for laying out bait, not the mind-numbingly idiotic claptrap the geezer spewed continuously, without any prospect of an end, for he was incapable of stopping, so that eventually, after an hour or so of it, it became clear that it was his own repulsive gabble that had turned him into a head-case, though as far as they were concerned, they said, it didn’t add up to anything, so it was completely pointless for him to talk himself into a frazzle, since the geezer meant as much to them as the wind on the footbridge, wind, that, like him, just kept blowing because it was impossible to shut either of them up, not that they gave it a thought, why would they? since he wasn’t worth it, let him talk wind, the only things that mattered being the three slingshots, how they worked and how they would employ them when the six forty-eight arrived, and that was what they’d all been thinking about just before this creep arrived, of the three professional model ground-baiting slingshots they had got as a bargain, for nine thousand Forints, at the Attila József flea market, the three professional German ground-baiting slingshots they had tucked under their bomber jackets, and they wondered how these would perform, for people said their projectile power was vastly greater than that of the Hungarian sort, and, of course, far superior to that of hand-held missiles, some people even claiming that this German gear was not only more powerful but almost ensured that your aim was one hundred percent effective, and that it was, according to its reputation, no argument about it, the best on the market, chiefly because of the track-device, attached to the handle below the fork, that steadied your hand in case it accidentally trembled, thereby reducing the uncertainty factor to a minimum by holding the arm firm all the way to the elbow, or so it was said, they declared, or so they say, but not in their wildest dreams would they have imagined what really happened after that, since this piece of goods was brilliant, its capacity absolutely phenomenal, they said, or so said the four of them who were not among the first to use it, absolutely phenomenal, they said.
Another long freight train rumbled by below them and the footbridge shook gently along its whole length until the train was gone — leaving two blinking red lights in its wake — when the noise of the very last car began to fade along with the rattling of wheels, and, in the newly settled silence, after the two red lights disappearing in the distance, just above the rails, no more than a meter high, a flock of bats appeared and followed the train toward the Rákosrendezö, utterly silent, without the least sound, like some medieval battery of ghosts, in close order, at even pace, indeed at a mysteriously even pace, swooping strictly between the parallel lines of the rails, suggesting somehow that they were being drawn toward Budapest or riding in the slipstream of the train as it went, the train that was showing them the way, carrying them, drawing them, sucking them on so that they could travel perfectly, effortlessly, with steady, spread wings, reaching Budapest, at a precise height of one meter above the crossties.
Funnily enough he didn’t smoke, said Korin, and he only happened to possess this pack of Marlboros because somewhere on his journey he had to get some change for the coffee machine and the man in the tobacconists he wandered into, would only oblige if he bought a pack of cigarettes, so, what could he do but buy one, but he didn’t throw it away because he thought it might come in useful some time, and would you believe it, he added, he was so pleased that it had actually come in useful, even if he himself had no use for it, or rather, only on one occasion, said Korin raising his index finger, for he had to be honest about it, there was one single moment, and only one, when he would happily have lit a cigarette, which was the time when he returned from the IBUSZ bus company’s ticket office without having accomplished his mission, all because of the two male nurses from the Psychiatric Unit; for he was aware of their eyes following him as he walked away, then as they looked at each other, not in any significant way, or at least not yet, not yet in a way that might show they were resolved to act, though soon enough they did start off after him, a fact of which he was absolutely certain without having to look back over his shoulder, for every cell in his body knew they were close behind him, after which, said Korin, he went home, straight home without a thought, and started packing, and though the apartment was already sold, and many of his possessions already cheaply disposed of, a disposal that involved the wholesale liquidation of a terrifying pile of accumulated notes, scraps, diaries, exercise books, photocopies and letters, not to mention photographs, and, apart from his passport, all his official documents including his birth certificate, his TB inoculation card, his personal ID, etc., the lot tossed on the fire, and yet, having survived the entire process and come through feeling that no earthly possession remained to burden him, the moment he stepped into his room he experienced a sense of utter despair, because now that he was ready to leave immediately, the very copiousness of his preparations for leaving had appeared to be an obstacle: he was incapable of resolving himself to simply go, even though the feeling of long preparation, he said, was misleading because there had not really been “copious preparations” as such, since one generous hour was all that had been needed for him to free himself of his material possessions and make ready to go, and please imagine, he continued, raising his voice, imagine that one bare hour was enough after all those months of forethought to set out, there and then, on his long journey, to open the door and leave the apartment to which he would never return, a single hour for his plans to be carried out and become reality, to leave everything forever, but then, just when he was as ready for departure as he could ever be, there he was, stuck, standing plumb in the middle of the cleared apartment, looking around, and without any sense of regret or emotion, casting his eyes over the vacancy when he suddenly understood that one hour was enough for any of us to dispose of everything, to stand plumb in the middle of our forsaken apartment and step out into the melancholy womb of the world, said Korin, and well, at that point, he would happily have flicked a lighter and smoked a decent cigarette, which was strange, but all of a sudden he desired the taste of cigarettes and wanted to draw heavily on one, to take a good deep breath, blow out the smoke, nice and slowly, and though this was the only occasion on which he felt like this, and had never desired a cigarette before nor since, not once, never in his life would he understand what it was all about.