The Exiled (28 page)

‘I KNOW IT WAS YOU.
There’s no point trying to threaten me or do anything stupid. Réka has already been to the police station and now she’s on her way to the offices of
Magyar Szó
to write up the story. Vajda Péter also knows everything. You can’t get out of this.’

Kovács Gábor was sitting at his bare desk and staring past Anna with empty eyes at the cherry tree growing almost flush against the window.

‘You can’t prove anything,’ he said quietly.

Anna showed him the plastic bag containing the few grey hairs. ‘You really believe that? Guess where I found these. And guess who they belong to.’

‘I went to the site of the murder, wanted to examine it for myself. That’s not a serious crime.’

‘You said earlier that you didn’t visit the site.’

‘I didn’t dare admit it while my boss was listening. He wouldn’t like a retired old man like me sticking his nose into his cases.’

‘We have a witness who saw you running from the wine fair and pursuing Lakatos Sándor. The same witness saw you behind the wheel of your car near the farm where my father was shot on the night he died, though you claim you were at the station all night. Twice in the wrong place at the wrong time. How do you explain that?’

Gábor said nothing.

‘Add to that the fact that you’ve lied to me about other things, too. You told me the state confiscated the mafia’s money found at the farm where my father died. That’s not true. I’ve read every report that was ever written about that case. The money disappeared, and no trace of it was ever found. I know you took it that evening. After you shot my father.’

‘I’ll kill you,’ said Gábor feebly.

‘You already tried that once without much success.’

‘That was just supposed to scare you.’

‘Everybody knows what you’ve done. There’s no point trying to get out of it.’

Gábor turned to face Anna. His expression was frozen, wax-like. Again he was silent.

‘Have you killed Dzsenifer too? Tell me where she is, or do you want her death on your conscience too?’

‘What’s that?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘A conscience. I haven’t had one of those for years.’

‘How could you? My father’s closest friend.’

Anna felt like spitting in the man’s face, lunging at him, tearing that revolting look from his face.

‘My mother told me you helped her financially, looked after the house while we were in Finland. How … how could you bring yourself to do it? You two-faced piece of filth,’ Anna shouted. ‘You destroyed our family, ruined my whole childhood. Do you understand? I’ve had to live without a father, all because of your greed, your reputation and your honour. My mother has had to live without her husband. And let’s not forget Ákos and Áron. Would Áron have ever gone to war if he’d had a father at home to prevent him? Have you ever thought about any of this?’

Gábor didn’t lower his head, didn’t show any sign of shame or regret. Perhaps that was a good thing – Anna didn’t think she would have been able to bear Gábor’s remorse; she might have attacked him physically. She was happy she wasn’t in Finland now and that she wasn’t operating in an official capacity. If she’d been carrying her weapon, she would have shot him there and then, without words, without warning. She thought of Farkas Lajos in his padded cell and felt an overwhelming sense of satisfaction at the thought that this despicable murderer would soon be the Roma man’s neighbour.

‘Where is the girl? Is she still alive?’ Anna asked once again.

‘I couldn’t do it,’ Gábor said, so quietly that Anna couldn’t hear him properly.

‘What? Speak up, man!’ Anna shouted.

At that Gábor cracked. He began to sob.

‘I’ve ruined everything. But I couldn’t kill the girl with my bare hands. I left her there. I don’t know if she’s still alive.’

‘Where did you leave her?’

Spluttering with emotion Gábor told her where he’d taken Dzsenifer.

‘The police are on their way here, so don’t try any tricks,’ said Anna and bolted out of the room, out of the building, and on to the street. She called an ambulance, then turned left at the end of the street, where she bumped into a group of schoolchildren. Then she ran all the way to the banks of the Tisza.

She didn’t hear the shot that ended Kovács Gábor’s life.

THE TISZA HAD BEGUN
flowering that morning. The news had spread through the town like wildfire – posters went up, felt-tip markings giving the specific time when a string quartet would float down the river on a pontoon, playing Handel and Bartók. People had already begun to gather along the riverbanks, the
bogrács
ovens were already warming, and the first swarms of insects were already fluttering above the water.

The blossoming was growing by the time Anna reached the river, which by now was full of boats and celebrating people. There were so many insects that it looked as though a cloud had descended on the Tisza, a rippling, living cloud made up of millions of shimmering spots. The insects forming that cloud would die as the day progressed and fall into the water, a delicious meal for the fish and birds. Anna had learned as a child that the Tisza flowers floating on the surface of the river were already dead, that, as long as they were alive, they remained in the air.

Music could be heard from further upstream. It was a surreal moment for the people waiting along the bank – when the pontoon glided slowly down the river, the beautiful music growing louder all the while. Everyone fell silent as this astonishing piece of theatre took place; they wanted to enjoy every minute of it, as the insects danced in time with the music. Even the children were quiet.

Anna barged past the people in front of her and tried to run through the crowds as quickly as she could. She accidentally knocked a little boy to the ground. The boy started crying and an angry father shouted insults at Anna.

Behind Békavár and the playing fields was an area where the local kids used to hang out. Nowadays there was nothing but overgrown grass and a ramshackle wooden hut, which had once been used to store spare parts for boat motors. Anna sprinted towards it and began kicking at the door, which was fastened with a large padlock. The
rotten boards gave way easily. Splinters flew up as Anna’s foot finally punched through the wood. She enlarged the gap by pulling at the planks until it was big enough for her to clamber inside.

Dzsenifer was lying on the floor. She seemed lifeless, didn’t move. Anna tore the rag from the girl’s mouth, put two fingers on her throat and checked her pulse. The pontoon was approaching, engulfed in the cloud of insects, and the music grew louder. Two violins, viola and cello. The flotilla of boats turned off their motors. Music filled the air. Anna felt a light pulse in Dzsenifer’s veins, a faint flow of air at her nostrils. The music was drowned out by the wail of sirens.

Everything was supposed to be clean and simple. All he was supposed to do was visit the farmhouse; the owners lived elsewhere and only visited their farm in the summer months to grow vegetables to keep them through the winter. The money was stashed in one of the manure stores behind the main building. The farm was out in the
puszta,
in the middle of nowhere. The door to the storehouse had been left open. Nobody lived nearby, everything should have gone as planned.

There was a lot of money, in US dollars and Deutschmarks. The Yugoslavian dinar wasn’t a good currency; inflation had eaten up much of its value and people were saying there was still worse to come. An account had been opened at a Swiss bank and the money was to be deposited in Belgrade three weeks later.

The weakest part of the plan was how to get to the farm. Nobody must see him or his car going out there. Still, he had to drive out of the town to reach the
puszta
, and that almost certainly meant being spotted. The drawback of living in a small town. That was why they had decided that the money would change hands late in the evening – but not so late that the sight of his car would arouse suspicion. He chose the normal route out of town, and only one acquaintance walked past, drunk, on his way home from Három csöcs. The man didn’t raise his hand or greet him. Good. Perhaps nobody would see him after all.

Once outside the town he no longer took the direct route to the farm but drove all the way round Oromhegyes and from there took the back roads to Velebit, then the dirt tracks to the
puszta,
and further on towards the farm.

He stopped by the fence running round the farm and sat in his car for a while, looking at his surroundings. Nothing. Nobody. Somewhere
in the distance he could see the solitary light of another farmhouse, like a far-off star in the night sky. He stepped out of the car, didn’t close the door, listened for a moment then walked briskly to the gate, which had been left unlocked for him. The hinges gave a piercing creak as he pushed it open. A large bird flew up from a tree in the yard. He could hear his heartbeat getting faster. He took a deep breath. Silence enveloped him once again.

He walked behind the main building and headed to the storehouse, stepped inside its low-slung door and started looking. He’d been told that the bag with the money would be behind the sacks of manure. There were many rows of sacks and he had to look behind each one of them. He began to the left of the door. There was nothing behind the first row, the second or the third. Then he got lucky. He sighed with relief and gripped the large sports bag, pulled it out from behind the sacks of manure and switched on his torch. He undid the zip. What he saw startled him. The bag was stuffed full of large banknotes. He was a rich man. Christ, with this money he could live comfortably for the rest of his life; send his children to good universities abroad and renovate the house to put a stop to his wife’s nagging. He wouldn’t do anything over the top – nothing ostentatious, nothing that would make people suspicious. No expensive cars, no swimming pools, at least not immediately, not all at once. One thing at a time. There was no hurry. He had the rest of his life.

At that moment the lights in the manure store flickered on.

Fekete István was standing in the doorway looking at him, his eyes full of disappointment, his expression one of revulsion.

Instinctively he reached to his hip, pulled his gun and fired.

He saw the surprise in István’s face, the terror; heard the muffled pop as his gun fired through the silencer; watched the bullet pierce his friend’s chest, almost in slow motion; saw the dark blood spew forth and soak the fabric of his shirt; watched István fall to the ground almost without a sound. All he heard was the thud. His friend died in the blink of an eye.

Good shot, was his first thought. The man didn’t suffer, there was no need for a second bullet. His next thought almost choked him. He had killed his friend and colleague, a father of three children, perhaps the
only honest cop in the region. This is going to be hell, he thought. I’ll have to cover my tracks, make them lead far away from myself. What happened here must never come to light. Otherwise my reputation will be destroyed and my life will be lost.

He picked up the sports bag and left.

He hatched his plan as he drove through the desolate
puszta,
watching the dark night sky. He drove towards Velebit, where he knew a few petty criminals lived.

THE BUS’S LARGE WINDOW
felt cool against the woman’s forehead. The empty landscape extended before her, sweltering in the heat – the fields raising ears of wheat to the sky, praying for rain, but there was air conditioning in the bus and she felt light. She closed her eyes and succumbed to the exhaustion. It consumed her whole body, one limb, one muscle at a time. Her feet relaxed first – they were covered in painful, festering blisters – then her buttocks, her stomach, her arms. Her eyelids fell shut heavily, as though they were weighted down, but she didn’t fall asleep. Her mind was still alert. It would take a long while before that could finally rest.

She had bought the passport from a scruffy little girl who turned up at the camp one morning. The girl reminded her of a stray cat, her hair was so tangled and the look in her fearful eyes so wild. The girl approached her as if they’d agreed it in advance. There weren’t many women at the camp and even fewer women like her – with no children to look after, with no one.

The passport didn’t cost much. She still had a decent sum of money left. A nest egg. A new start. Flashbacks from the camp in Turkey darted before her eyes; then the fishing boat; the merciless waves that battered the boat to pieces and dragged its miserable passengers into the water. The images tried to push their way into her thoughts – she felt her thighs tensing yet again – but she managed to push the memories aside and focus on her destination. Where that would be, she couldn’t say. The main thing was that she was safe now, and that she no longer needed to walk.

She had left the camp as soon as she’d bought the passport, sensing
instantly that this was her chance. A Finnish passport would help her out of here. It was the best passport in the world. She had to act fast and hope that the passport hadn’t yet been reported missing, that they wouldn’t stop her at the border and send her back to that filthy camp, where hundreds of lustful men stared at her hungrily.

She had stepped on the first bus heading for Budapest. From there she would continue directly to Germany, perhaps by train. She’d cross that bridge later.

The border crossing passed without any difficulty. Two customs officials entered the bus, checked everybody’s papers, asked if they had anything to declare, rummaged through a few people’s bags. She remained calm by imagining she was the woman whose passport she was carrying, on her way home. A stern customs official checked the stamp showing she had entered the country, gave the photograph a cursory glance, stamped her out of the country and handed back the passport. She could easily have been the woman in the photograph. She was the same age, had the same dark hair, the same brown eyes. Passport photographs were always a bit out of focus, and luckily it seemed that attention to detail wasn’t one of this customs official’s strongest qualities.

And here she was. She opened her eyes and smiled. The reflection in the window smiled back at her. She took out her mobile phone and sent her mother a message. She pictured the message travelling in a matter of seconds the thousands of kilometres it had taken her months to cross, imagined it reaching her mother, somewhere far away amid the ruins, the weeping and the hunger. Right now her mother would hear a beep, she’d take the phone in her withered hands and read the message.

All fine. I’m finally free.