suggested that they should play a game of Raid. Ernõ and the one-armed one left the room and the three remaining put on their fancy clothes and adopted poses of leisurely relaxation such as might be assumed by anyone in a secure hiding place. Ernõ gave the door a loud knock. Their task was to explain, employing whatever outlandish vocabulary was available to them, why they were together like this and what they were doing here. Ernõ and the one-armed one represented the forces of the outside world. They had no particular office. They could have been teachers, detectives, a military police patrol, or simply fathers who had sought out their “underlings”—that was the expression Ábel insisted on using—to get them to account for themselves.
Ernõ asked the questions. The one-armed one stood at attention behind him like a member of the domestic staff behind the headmaster, a common foot soldier behind a general, or like a less powerful adult—a nasty uncle, say—behind a father. Ernõ wore a hat and Béla swung his bamboo cane and held his deerskin gloves in his hand as they both walked up and down the room. Every so often he removed his pince-nez and held it before him between finger and thumb to clean it. He had come to a conclusion, he announced, and having discovered them in flagrante, established that they, the pupils, had for some time now been breaking the rules and had without permission of their parents, teachers, their betters, and of civil and military authorities generally, consciously decamped from town so that they might lock themselves away in one room of an inn set in a far from reputable bathing place, where they indulged in smoking and drinking alcoholic drinks and remained there for hours at a time. The sight that greeted the entering authorities was certainly strange.
“Prockauer, stand up. Putting aside the question of your progress, which is regrettably slow, I must admit your recent behavior in school has given no particular cause for complaint. I am sorry to note however that the evidence I see around me constitutes a breach of the rules. What is this? Rum. And that? Grape cider. This box? Rollmop herrings! And what do I see here, Ruzsák? Stand up. Would I be mistaken in assuming that those coffee beans have been purloined from your father’s grocery?”
Béla stood up, fiddling absentmindedly with his gloves.
“Wrong. I only stole money from the shop. I bought the coffee elsewhere with the stolen money.”
So they went on from item to item. Ernõ’s interrogation was thorough and formally impeccable. No one denied anything. They were all prepared to admit the provenance of every object. Lajos exchanged indignant looks with Ernõ. Ernõ’s cross-questioning proceeded slowly, with the sharpest questions addressed primarily to Ábel and Béla.
“Not a word, Prockauer. I shall have particular things to say to you. What is the meaning of this clown costume? Is this how you prepare for exams? How you prepare for life while your fathers are fighting at the front?”
“Excuse me!” Ábel exclaimed. “We are not preparing for life.”
Ernõ placed two candlesticks on the table and politely invited the one-armed one to take a seat.
“What is this nonsense?” he asked. “What else can you be preparing for if not for life?”
“We are not preparing at all, headmaster sir,” Ábel replied calmly. “That is precisely the point. We have taken particular care not to prepare. Life can prepare for whatever it likes. What we are concerned with is something quite different.”
“Utterly different,” Béla nodded.
“Hold your tongue, Ruzsák. You bought coffee beans with stolen money, and therefore have nothing to say. What are you boys up to?”
“What we are trying to do,” answered Ábel in his best school voice, “is to nurture comradeship. We are a gang, if you please. We have nothing to do with what other people get up to. We are not responsible for them.”
“There’s
Ernõ asked the questions. The one-armed one stood at attention behind him like a member of the domestic staff behind the headmaster, a common foot soldier behind a general, or like a less powerful adult—a nasty uncle, say—behind a father. Ernõ wore a hat and Béla swung his bamboo cane and held his deerskin gloves in his hand as they both walked up and down the room. Every so often he removed his pince-nez and held it before him between finger and thumb to clean it. He had come to a conclusion, he announced, and having discovered them in flagrante, established that they, the pupils, had for some time now been breaking the rules and had without permission of their parents, teachers, their betters, and of civil and military authorities generally, consciously decamped from town so that they might lock themselves away in one room of an inn set in a far from reputable bathing place, where they indulged in smoking and drinking alcoholic drinks and remained there for hours at a time. The sight that greeted the entering authorities was certainly strange.
“Prockauer, stand up. Putting aside the question of your progress, which is regrettably slow, I must admit your recent behavior in school has given no particular cause for complaint. I am sorry to note however that the evidence I see around me constitutes a breach of the rules. What is this? Rum. And that? Grape cider. This box? Rollmop herrings! And what do I see here, Ruzsák? Stand up. Would I be mistaken in assuming that those coffee beans have been purloined from your father’s grocery?”
Béla stood up, fiddling absentmindedly with his gloves.
“Wrong. I only stole money from the shop. I bought the coffee elsewhere with the stolen money.”
So they went on from item to item. Ernõ’s interrogation was thorough and formally impeccable. No one denied anything. They were all prepared to admit the provenance of every object. Lajos exchanged indignant looks with Ernõ. Ernõ’s cross-questioning proceeded slowly, with the sharpest questions addressed primarily to Ábel and Béla.
“Not a word, Prockauer. I shall have particular things to say to you. What is the meaning of this clown costume? Is this how you prepare for exams? How you prepare for life while your fathers are fighting at the front?”
“Excuse me!” Ábel exclaimed. “We are not preparing for life.”
Ernõ placed two candlesticks on the table and politely invited the one-armed one to take a seat.
“What is this nonsense?” he asked. “What else can you be preparing for if not for life?”
“We are not preparing at all, headmaster sir,” Ábel replied calmly. “That is precisely the point. We have taken particular care not to prepare. Life can prepare for whatever it likes. What we are concerned with is something quite different.”
“Utterly different,” Béla nodded.
“Hold your tongue, Ruzsák. You bought coffee beans with stolen money, and therefore have nothing to say. What are you boys up to?”
“What we are trying to do,” answered Ábel in his best school voice, “is to nurture comradeship. We are a gang, if you please. We have nothing to do with what other people get up to. We are not responsible for them.”
“There’s
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