*
Less than a minute later Ilona was sitting on the back seat of a Mercedes with diplomatic number plates, speeding down the 4/6 tramline towards the Margaret Bridge and the embassy in the Buda hills. She took a heavy black telephone from her bag, one much thicker and clunkier than a standard-sized mobile handset and pressed several buttons before she spoke. ‘He knows something. Switch it on.’
NINETEEN
Dob Street, 11 a.m.
Zsuzsa Barcsy nodded politely as she sipped her fruit tea. The heating was blazing and the drink nicely warming. Feri bacsi, as he now insisted she call him, was coming to the end of his lengthy and slowly recounted life story. Once she persuaded him to open his door and let her in, his whole demeanour changed. He was obviously very lonely – a widower, with one son who had emigrated to Canada and who rarely visited and two grandchildren he had only met once.
They were sitting in the dark front room. The walls were covered in heavy green wallpaper, and the old-fashioned communist-era furniture was covered with a faint layer of dust. The tea, however, was served on blue-and-white, gold-trimmed Zsolnay porcelain, kept for special occasions, as he now described her visit. A copy of Magyar Hang, Hungarian Voice, lay open on the nearby sofa. SHOOTING TERROR IN DISTRICT VII proclaimed the front page. TRENDY BAR TARGETED BY GUNMAN. A plate of marzipan sweets from Szamos, one of the country’s best-known confectioners, lay next to the newspaper.
Zsuzsa explained again about the article she was supposedly researching, on how much District VII had changed in the last couple of years.
‘This shooting yesterday,’ said Feri bacsi, shaking his head. He was a thin man of mid-height in his late-seventies, with a deeply lined face and badly cut grey hair. He wore a pair of shapeless grey trousers, a white shirt with a fraying collar and plastic beach sandals.
But his blue eyes were lively and his voice animated as he spoke. ‘It’s terrible. We never had anything like this. Budapest was a safe city. Now they are firing with sub-machine guns, right outside my front door. That Balthazar that lives along the corridor, on the same floor. He’s a Gypsy and a policeman – if you can imagine such a thing. All the Gypsies I have ever met get arrested, they don’t arrest people. He’s famous now, I read about him in the newspaper. But what use is a famous policeman for a neighbour when they are shooting outside the front door?’
Zsuzsa noted the information about Balthazar living here, feeling slightly ashamed of herself. She knew she should engage with Feri bacsi’s prejudices but she was there for another reason and she needed him on her side. Instead she said, ‘There’s good and bad in in all types,’ her voice emollient. ‘At least he’s trying to catch the criminals.’
She glanced down at the Zsolnay cup and saucer. ‘Such beautiful porcelain.’
Feri bacsi smiled. ‘Thank you. It belonged to my mother.’
He picked up the tray of marzipan candies and offered it to Zsuzsa. She looked down at the delicate sweets, each individually wrapped in foil, with a gold band around the outside. ‘Please, take one,’ he said.
Zsuzsa was about to refuse, but she could see the eagerness on the old man’s face. She picked one from the tray, unwrapped it and ate it in one go. It was delicious, a rich concoction of almond paste and chocolate.
Zsuzsa drank some of her fruit tea and took out her notebook and a pen. ‘Tell me more about the changes you have seen, Balogh ur. You have lived through so much.’
‘Please, Zsuzsa, do call me Feri bacsi,’ he said, before enthusiastically launching into a long and unexpectedly evocative description of the small family-run shops – like Javitas – that had been displaced by the gentrification of the area around Klauzal Square. The tailor where he once had a suit made, the butchers that made their own sausages, the cake shops, the small eateries that he used to go to, almost all had been displaced for hipster cafés and eateries serving tourists.
Zsuzsa scribbled as he talked, realising that she could actually write an article on this theme – working headline: ‘The Lost World of District VII’ – and her host’s reminiscences would be a central part. That thought made her feel a little less guilty for deceiving the elderly man. But now was the time to finally steer the conversation to the real purpose of her visit. ‘Thanks so much, Feri bacsi, your stories are really wonderful.’
His face broke into a smile. ‘I’m pleased I could help. When will the article appear?’
‘I am not sure, but I will definitely keep you informed. There was something else I wanted to ask you about, Feri bacsi,’ she said, leaning forward and giving him the full-on wide-blue-eyes treatment.
Feri bacsi offered her the plate of marzipan once again. ‘Please, ask.’
Zsuzsa smiled and took another one, ignoring her growing sense of guilt – was it really this easy to manipulate lonely old people? ‘It’s a long shot, but maybe you can help. I met someone a few days ago at a bar, his name is Elad and he is a historian. He’s Israeli and I think he lives here. He said his flat was overlooking Klauzal Square and there was a memorial downstairs in the foyer, for Rezso Seress I suppose, so it must be here, I guess?’
Feri bacsi nodded. ‘Yes, he was staying at the other end of the corridor, in Eva neni’s flat. I saw him quite a few times.’ He shrugged. ‘She was there yesterday, with the Gypsy cop. They went inside, came out about ten minutes later. I like to keep an eye on things, you know.’
Zsuzsa nodded. ‘Very wise, especially nowadays.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Did you hear anything, noises, conversation?’
‘No, nothing. This Elad, he’s Israeli. The things you hear and read and…’ Feri bacsi’s voice tailed off for a moment.
Zsuzsa flinched inside. Hungarian had a verb, zsidozni, meaning to go on about Jews, and not in a positive way. Was Feri bacsi about to indulge in some zsidozas? ‘And what?’
‘And he wasn’t what I expected,’ Feri bacsi said brightly. ‘He was very polite and spoke quite good Hungarian. Seemed like a very nice young man. Maybe I’ll invite him as well, next time you come for tea.’ He paused for a moment, his voice hesitant. He looked down at his fruit tea then back at Zsuzsa. ‘You will come again, won’t you?’
Zsuzsa smiled, feeling even guiltier. She would, she decided. ‘Yes, Feri bacsi, of course. That’s good I found the right place. I lent him a book and I need it back. But he is not answering my calls or emails. Do you know anything about where he has gone, if he is coming back?’
Feri bacsi said, ‘I don’t know where he went, but wherever it was, it was in a very fancy car, that’s for sure.’
Zsuzsa sat up, alert now. ‘He left in a car? How do you know?’
‘Because I was having a cigarette on the balcony. He came out downstairs carrying two bags, one on his shoulder and one that was a big hold-all. He got in a fancy silver Audi with tinted windows. Nice car, I remember thinking. There was a big guy there, broad-shouldered, shaven-headed. He looked like a hoodlum, but he was very polite, opening and closing the door for him.’
Zsuzsa tried not to let her surprise show, scribbled in her notebook. ‘When was that?’
‘Wednesday evening. I remember because my son called from Canada.’
‘Did he get in the car willingly? He wasn’t forced or anything?’
Feri bacsi looked puzzled and shook his head. ‘Why would he be forced? They shook hands. Like I said, the big guy put Elad’s bag in the boot, got into the car, and then they drove off.’
TWENTY
Falk Miksa Street, 12.10 p.m.
Anastasia pulled up Ilona Mizrachi’s file onto her screen and opened it. ‘OK, Detective, let’s take a look at the Israeli cultural attaché in Budapest. What’s she been up to lately?’
Balthazar sat down beside Anastasia. ‘You have a file on her?’
‘Of course we do.’ She smiled. ‘You think that’s her real job?’
Anastasia opened a folder of images and video clips and began to scroll through the photographs. They showed Ilona at a variety of events, from the Budapest Book Fair the previous year when Israel had been the guest of honour, to Jewish cultural events in several of the city’s synagogues, and at gatherings of the city’s business and political elite. There were also several shots of Ilona out and about at glamorous parties and restaurants.
