The White King (30 page)

Mother shook her head and said she didn't know, and she gave me a little wink to signal that we should get going already, and she said, "Don't be angry, dear Miss Yvonne, but we must be going," and as she stepped away the old lady grabbed Mother's arm and yanked her back, pulling mother right up to her and whispering with such a hiss that I could hear it clearly too, that she would have my mother know that my grandfather had killed himself because he'd always loved her, his dear sweet Yvonne, yes, he'd shot himself in the heart because he could no longer bear having lived his life without her and that she would also have my mother know that my grandmother hid his farewell letter because that would reveal the truth. "But it's all right, it's all right," she said, "fate will do him justice, anyway, you'll see, you will, yes indeed," and she nodded so hard while saying this that the veil fell back over her face. Then she began sobbing again, and she pressed the handkerchief to her eyes through the veil this time, and that's when Mother took my arm and pulled me with her toward the mortuary, saying we should go because we really wouldn't get there for the start of the service, and I looked back because I was scared the old lady would come after us, but she didn't move an inch, no, she just stood there on the sidewalk along the cemetery's broad main promenade adjusting her hat, so then I asked Mother what this was all about, and she said it was nothing, just Miss Yvonne, a crazy old woman who used to be my grandmother's best friend a long time ago and who was obsessed by the thought that Grandfather should have married her instead, for years she kept on his heels and stirred up awful scenes all the time, but this didn't matter now, we shouldn't talk about it, I should just forget the whole thing because we were just about there anyway.

The funeral march sounded a bit distorted and scratchy as it blared away from big black speakers set up on stands, and the closer we got, the more of a crowd there was, but all we had to say was "Sorry, please let us by," and everyone stepped dutifully to the side, looking at us like we were famous people or something, lots of folks said hello and almost everyone said my grandfather was a fine man and how sorry they were, and they asked us to accept their sincere sympathies, and Mother just kept nodding left and right, and I also nodded a lot, and that's how we went on ahead toward the main steps all the way up to the huge, black, gold-inlaid double door, which I'd never seen open before, not that I'd been at too many funerals, especially not one like this, and by now people were standing all over the steps, but when they saw Mother they stepped right aside, and then we went up the steps between all those men in dark suits and women in black outfits, and we went in the door.

I figured it would be dark in there, or at least low-lit like churches mostly are, but instead the light was so blinding I almost got dizzy, three whole circles of light bulbs hung one on top of the other from a steel chandelier that branched off in all directions, there must have been at least two hundred bulbs, so anyway, Mother took my hand and that's how we went forward, the room was really big, and even though there were red drapes all over the walls the picture of the general secretary of the armed forces wasn't on show, there were only all sorts of displays with long quotes from his speeches. And then, all at once, I saw the coffin.

The rear third of the mortuary floor was raised by about a foot, a little like a stage, and the coffin was laid on a reddraped table in the middle of a platform, it was big and black, and it really was closed, and its varnish glistened so darkly that it looked almost fluid, and three tall, black oil-burning torches stood on each side of the coffin, but they weren't lit.

As soon as we stopped, a young man came over holding a maroon leather folder, he greeted us and introduced himself but he was talking so fast I didn't understand his name, and he gave us his sincere sympathies and a warm welcome, he said he was Comrade Bherekméri's secretary, the city's Party committee had entrusted him with organizing this event, and would we be so kind as to step onto the platform, immediate family members have to stand up there, so would we please go on over, there beside the comrade, and he pointed toward the coffin, and that's when I realized that he was pointing toward my grandmother, who was standing to the right of the coffin, all alone, staring right at the coffin as if she hadn't even seen us arrive.

Mother didn't move, she just kept standing there before the platform, but then the secretary waved his folder toward the coffin and told us to hurry because Comrade Bherekméri would arrive soon to give his farewell speech in person, and as the secretary said this he pointed to the side, to a microphone-equipped pulpit by the red-draped wall in front of the platform, so we then started off, first Mother stepped onto the platform and then so did I, and the secretary came with us too.

Up on the platform the lighting was even stronger, what with a row of white neon lights above the rear wall of the mortuary, which was covered with a big ornamental tapestry depicting a machine-gun-toting partisan in the middle of a wheat field, symbolically forging a wedge from several swords broken in two, and in the background of this brightly lit tapestry, behind approaching tractors, were mountains plus our homeland's treasures, its pine forests and its oil wells, so anyway, Mother and I then went over next to my grandmother, but to the left of the coffin, and I said as usual, "I kiss your hand," but as if my grandmother hadn't even heard me, she just looked at Mother and said under her breath that she should be ashamed of herself, what was she thinking, how dare she show her face here, and my grandmother added that she'd like nothing more than to spit in Mother's face, yes, she said, she'd chase her out of here but good.

Mother smiled at my grandmother and said how very glad she was to see that she was feeling better, and that if she wanted, she should feel free to make a big scene right here in front of the whole city, no doubt my grandfather would be happier with a proper fight than with this awful circus, and I could see that this was turning Grandmother even paler under her mascara, she licked her lips and then took a big breath, and I knew she was about to say something really nasty to Mother, but then all at once a double door opened in the tapestried wall, the only reason I hadn't noticed that door until now was that it too was covered with tapestry, and in came this man in worker's clothes, he came straight over to my grandmother and said, "Ma'am, we'll begin bringing in the wreaths now because the chief comrade will be here shortly," and then he asked my grandmother if they could light the torches, at which my grandmother took a handkerchief from her purse, pressed it to her eyes for a moment, and then said that as long as the time had come, then they should go right ahead, at which the man in worker's clothes said, "Yes, ma'am," and no sooner had he left than he was back, but this time with one great big wreath in each hand, and five more workers entered after him, each of them carrying wreaths and flowers that they packed high up by the coffin in no time, and then they left and brought even more wreaths and flowers, and as they walked back and forth in front of me the smell of sweat was strong, and I thought that these must not be any old workers, no, these were the gravediggers, and they must have gotten so sweaty digging my grandfather's grave, and on looking down I noticed that the pant leg of one of them was all muddy at the knee, and I knew I was right, so I took a step back because I didn't want them accidentally brushing up against me. Meanwhile the gravediggers went about skillfully arranging the ribbons of the wreaths so the messages and the names of the people who bought each wreath could be seen clearly, and I read a couple of the names but not one was familiar, and meanwhile the first gravedigger brought in a little three-rung ladder and a decanter, and he took the ladder from one torch to another, climbing up fast and pouring a bit of oil into each one's black spherical top, and then he lit the torches with a long match.

After flickering wildly at first, the tall orange-red flames soon formed nice sharp tips, and as the funeral march got louder my nose was filled with the piney fragrance of the wreaths and the smell of petroleum, and I thought of Christmas, when they cut the power, and Mother and I had to celebrate by an oil lamp, and I looked at the coffin's glistening varnish and knew that if I went close enough to the black-painted wood I'd be able to see my own face in the reflection, and thinking that gave me such a lump in the throat that I could feel myself about to cry, so I reached into the pocket of my school jacket to remove the freshly ironed handkerchief Mother had put in there. It was one of Father's formal handkerchiefs, and while holding it I remembered what the cabbie had said to Mother, that Father would be brought home for the funeral, and I swallowed, figuring that this was reason enough to hold back my crying, just like a real man.

All at once, right in the middle of a measure, the funeral march stopped, the speakers buzzed for a couple more seconds, but then everything got all quiet, and again that double door in the tapestry opened up, and in hurried a tall bald man in a black suit who didn't say hello to anyone but went straight to the pulpit, and the secretary stepped away from us and raced over to the pulpit and put down that red leather folder, so I knew that this had to be Comrade Bherekméri.

Stopping right behind the pulpit, Comrade Bherekméri tapped the microphone with an index finger and extended a warm welcome to all the comrades mourning here today, and asked that he be allowed to say a few words about my grandfather, Comrade Secretary, whom the city regarded as its own departed and whose distinctions were indisputable. Comrade Bherekméri turned suddenly quiet, cast his eyes about meaningfully, and reached into the upper pocket of his suit for his glasses, which he then put on before opening the red leather folder, removing a bunch of paper-clipped sheets, clearing his throat, and beginning to read his speech.

After giving those gathered here today another warm welcome, he said he'd begin by telling us how he got to know my grandfather, who was still a university student back then and who earned enough to cover his tuition by making his way each and every evening from one bar or restaurant to another peddling perfumes, colognes, facial washes, hair ointments, antiwrinkle creams, rejuvenating lotions, and scented soaps, yes, my grandfather lugged the samples with him in two big suitcases, and although those suitcases were terribly, terribly heavy, my grandfather carried this burden without a word of complaint, not whining even once, and he even put up with tipsy guests teasing him, and one time in The Elephant Restaurant, whose reputation was not so very good, the owner gave my grandfather a wager, saying that if he spread hair ointment all over ... but right as Comrade Bherekméri said these words the crowd murmured and stirred, and I could hear someone shouting in a high voice, "Let me through, stand aside, let me go forward!" so Comrade Bherekméri fell silent midsentence, lowered his sheets of paper, and looked over
to the source of the commotion, and when I also glanced in that direction I saw that old lady, Miss Yvonne, brandishing a big bouquet of red roses to cut herself a path through the crowd, shouting the whole time that she would not allow her poor darling to be buried without a proper farewell and that she would indeed go right up to the coffin because she was the one who should be standing there by my poor grandfather's desecrated body, because she, not my grandmother, had been his true love all the time, no, not that evil old hag. As Miss Yvonne kept jostling her way through the crowd ever closer to the front, I heard my grandmother flare up and say, "Take her out of here at once, this is intolerable, this is outrageous, why, I'll go and kill her, I'll go scratch her eyes out," but by the time my grandmother said this, Miss Yvonne was standing right there in front of the platform only two steps from the wreaths, but then all of a sudden someone grabbed her from behind and pulled her back, and I recognized who did it, it was the cabbie we'd met, yes, he picked that old lady right up with a wrestling hold while hauling her away, one of Miss Yvonne's shoes fell off and she dropped her bouquet of roses and she screamed, but the cabbie was already taking her out of there, with Miss Yvonne meanwhile shrieking at the top of her lungs that everyone should know the truth, that my grandfather had killed himself and that my grandmother had destroyed his farewell letter because that would have revealed the truth, which was that all his life my grandfather had loved her and only her, and the only reason my grandmother insisted on a closed coffin was so the truth wouldn't emerge, but by then the cabbie had carried Miss Yvonne out of the mortuary and it was impossible to tell exactly what she was shouting, and then all of a sudden she got all quiet, and then the tapestried door opened up and in came one of the gravediggers, he went really fast over to the front of the podium, where he picked up that one black shoe and bent down again and picked up the bouquet of roses too and put it among the other flowers, and with the shoe in his hand he went back out.

That's when my grandmother began crying out really loud, and she staggered and almost fell, so Comrade Bherekméri's secretary had to grab hold of her, and through her tears my grandmother told him something, all I understood was "coffin," and then the secretary took a blue handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to my grandmother, and he went over to the pulpit and whispered something into Comrade Bherekméri's ear, at which Comrade Bherekméri knit his brow and shook his head hard and cleared his throat, and meanwhile he gathered the pages of his speech, which had slipped all over, rolled them cylindrically lengthwise, and tapped the bottom edge against the pulpit until the pages formed a nice neat stack, and then he began reading again, but he picked up not where he'd left off, with that hair ointment and the wager, no, instead he began this really long sentence about how when he and my grandfather had begun their struggle, they knew full well that they themselves would not be able to enjoy its fruits, that they would not live to see their dream fulfilled, but they'd struggled bravely all the same because the future was much, much more important than their own happiness, it was much more important than ... but I never did hear what was more important to my grandfather than his own happiness because that's right when my grandmother shook herself free of Comrade Bherekméri's secretary's hand and took a step toward the podium, and she shouted right at Comrade Bherekméri, "Aren't you ashamed of yourself, Pista, for lying in my face, what do you mean the coffin can't be opened, you know full well it can be opened, why are you doing this?" And then she stepped over to the coffin and slammed her fist down on it, and she shouted that they should open it up at once because after all this she wanted to see my grandfather one more time, one last time, it was her right to say farewell to him, and besides, she'd heard that all sorts of gossip was being spread about my grandfather having shot his head to smithereens, which was supposedly why the coffin was closed, so she wanted to put an end to every shred of such malicious hearsay once and for all, every last doubt about him having died by his own hand had to be done away with, every shadow of a doubt, she was sure my grandfather would also want this, yes, he too would insist on it by all means. "So open it up," she shrieked, because if they didn't, why then she would do it herself, it was her right, did they understand, her right.