The White King by György Dragomán Page A

wanted to say that it's not true, my dad hadn't died, he was still alive, because if he did die, I'd know about that, but I didn't say anything after all, and then Iron Fist said that Horáciú, the boy who took my place on the Homeland Defense team, had been hospitalized on account of falling down the stairs and breaking his nose, and the city finals were being held today, and he needed someone to put in Horáciú's place, someone he could trust, and so he thought of me, but he didn't say that this was because I was the best shot in school, no, he said it was because I looked the most like Horáciú and we were going to the competition at School No. 16 just as if I were Horáciú, but he'd have me know again that I wasn't to speak about this to anyone, and he didn't ask if I wanted to do it or was willing to doit, no, instead he said it as if he was certain that this was how it would be because I had to do what he wanted, and he said that the city finals had already been held in cross-country, the 3,000-yard obstacle course, map reading, politics, and military history, the only thing left was shooting, and although we'd done pretty well in other areas, the competition in shooting was really stiff this year, we now had only a theoretical possibility, a mathematical one, he said, of getting through to the next round, and to do that I had to shoot at least 117 points out of 120, but even then, no more than two shooters on other teams could shoot better than me, true, with those cheap Czechoslovak air rifles this was hopeless anyway, especially since we had to save on ammunition, and everyone got no more than three practice shots, but still, there was a mathematical possibility, and then I said, "That means that if I shoot a perfect score, 120 points, the team will definitely get to the next round," and Iron Fist nodded, and again he blew the cigarette smoke at me, and he said, "Oh sure, that's all I need, for you to shoot a perfect score, how could you even think such a stupid thing," and he got really, really nervous, his mustache was quivering, I saw, and he was taking only little puffs on his cigarette, but I said didn't he think I could do it, because if not, he sure didn't remember how well I used to shoot, because I do know how to shoot, I do, I know how to feel the gun, how to become one with the bullet the moment I pull the trigger, I know how sharpshooters think because my dad taught me that, and I told Iron Fist that if he didn't believe it, he should go ahead and take me to that competition, I'd show him, I'd show him where those holes would be once I was done with the target because if I wanted, I sure could shoot 120 points if necessary, or even 130, because my hands had what it takes to switch one of the practice pellets for the tip of a ballpoint pen since if you need to, you can shoot with that too, yes, that's how I'd get my hands on an extra pellet,
andthen I could shoot even 130 points if I wanted because no one would notice that I'd taken not twelve shots but thirteen. And as I said all this, all of a sudden I got such a big slap that I almost fell off the chair, Iron Fist hit me so suddenly that his cigarette dropped right out from between his fingers and I had to grab hold of the back of the chair from the side, and the cigarette fell to the rug, I saw, where it was still giving off smoke, and I felt dizzy, that's how big a slap I got, but luckily my mouth just happened to be open when he hit me because I was still in the middle of a sentence, and so I didn't bite my tongue and nothing happened to my teeth, and then Iron Fist said I should be ashamed of myself for daring to talk to him in such a tone of voice, it was best if I didn't forget that we weren't born the same day, and he must have noticed that while he was talking I never once took my eyes off that cigarette smoldering there on the rug because he suddenly said he wanted his cigarette back, so I crouched down nice and easy and