Antal Kondor opened the door of the silver Audi and helped Eva neni out of the vehicle. She thanked him, stood still for a moment as she took in her surroundings: the row of regularly spaced villas, the carefully tended gardens, the police guard outside Reka’s house.
She breathed in deeply, trying to control her emotions, keep her voice steady. ‘I haven’t been to Obuda for years. Decades, in fact. Better air than downtown, that’s for sure.’ She squinted, looked harder at Reka’s house. ‘Apart from the police, it looks exactly the same.’
Antal asked, ‘You’ve been here before?’
‘You could say that. A long time ago. A very long time ago, young man. In another life,’ she said, still staring at the house. She looked up at Antal. ‘So, are we going inside,’ she asked brightly, ‘or shall we stand here a bit longer getting cold?’
Reka had called Eva neni personally and told her that Elad was safe and wanted to see her, that she also had some information for her and she would send a car and driver to get her. There had been no question in Eva neni’s mind that she would accept the invitation, especially when Reka told her the address. Antal gestured for her to walk ahead, signalled to the policeman standing nearby to open the gate, and led through the front garden, inside the house to the lounge.
Eniko and Akos stood up as Eva neni walked into the lounge. She greeted Eniko, who she already knew, and Akos introduced himself. A few seconds later Reka appeared from a side room. She walked over to Eva neni, introduced herself and thanked her for coming, especially at such a late hour.
‘You’re welcome. Well, Prime Minister,’ said Eva neni, looking her up and down, ‘you’re even prettier in person than you look on television.’
Reka smiled. ‘Thank you. Please call me Reka.’
Eva neni nodded. ‘OK. And I am Eva neni.’ She looked around the room again. ‘You said he was here. I can’t see him. Where is he?’
‘Come with me. I’ll take you to Elad,’ said Reka, as she led Eva neni through the garden towards the cottage.
‘And Balthazar?’ asked Eva neni.
‘I won’t lie to you. We are not sure. It looks like he has been kidnapped. But we will find him.’ There was no need to tell Eva neni about the internet footage of Balthazar’s abduction, Reka judged. ‘We have a good idea where he might be.’
Eva neni stood still, her face creased with anxiety. ‘Then go and get him, please.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s all my fault. I should never have involved him.’
Reka took her hand. It felt small and cold. ‘It’s not your fault, Eva neni. You have done nothing wrong. Everything will be fine in the end.’
‘I’ve heard that before, several times.’ Eva neni gave her a half smile. ‘It never was.’
‘It will be this time. But for now, please come with me.’
Eva followed her outside and stood still for a moment. She had dressed up, Reka saw. She was wearing a dark-blue wool coat that had once been expensive, had brushed and set her hair. Beneath the bluster the elderly lady was nervous, Reka saw. She was far from her home and comfort zone, and travelling back in time.
The two women walked over to the small house. Zsuzsa and Elad were inside in the small kitchen, sitting at the table, working. The surface was covered in handwritten sheets of paper, books and piles of printouts. They looked up as the door opened.
Elad jumped up and ran over to Eva neni, hugging her. Zsuzsa smiled and quickly left, together with Reka.
Eva neni and Elad sat down at the table. Eva neni wagged her finger at him, mock sternly. ‘Naughty boy. I was so worried about you. Two days you have been missing. I’ve had your parents on the phone every day. You should have called. Or sent a message or something. A few more hours and they would have called the embassy, the police, everyone. Then Reka called me.’
Elad looked bashful. ‘I know. But they told me I couldn’t. It might have put you in danger. I’m really sorry.’
‘I forgive you. Don’t do it again. So what have you found out?’
‘A lot. About your parents. About this house. It’s very sad. Are you sure you want to hear it?’
Eva neni nodded. ‘They’ve been dead a long time.’ She looked around the small room. ‘I want you to tell the story. It’s your story too.’
Elad stood up, looked for two pieces of paper and picked them up. ‘I know. Come, Auntie, let’s go through to the others.’
They gathered in the lounge. Eva neni sat next to Elad on the sofa, Zsuzsa next to him. Eniko and Reka sat on the armchairs, while Akos grabbed a chair from the kitchen.
Reka started speaking. ‘You are probably wondering what all this is about, why this is happening now, why a historian and a journalist are working in the garden house… all sorts of questions. My family, as you know, is one of the richest in Hungary. It was rich before the war, managed to expand its wealth after 1945 and keep its riches during communism. Karoly Bardossy, my uncle, is now one of the most powerful businessmen in the country. I wondered for a long time what the real origins of our wealth were and what happened during the war. I had my suspicions, of course. I’d heard things over the years, remarks, strange references. I’d also found some documents that were very disturbing. I could not commission a Hungarian historian to investigate this. I needed an outside voice. Around this time I had a call from Erno Hartmann at the Jewish Museum, who wanted to show me the museum. I went there and I explained what I wanted to do. Erno was sympathetic, keen to help. I told him I needed someone who could dig deep, wasn’t afraid of what they might find, and that I could pay all the necessary costs.’
Reka nodded at Elad. ‘Erno had heard of you, knew about your work at Hebrew University, and that you understood Hungarian. He contacted you, offered you a stipend, expenses, space in his office.’
Elad started with surprise. ‘You brought me over? You set this up? Hartmann never told me.’
‘Yes, I did. And why should he? He promised to keep things confidential and he did.’
Elad sat very still for a moment. ‘So it was you feeding me the documents. You are the source.’
Reka nodded. ‘Yes. It was me. I gave you the first document. I wanted to see what you did with it, if you would use it to dig deeper or go public as soon as you got it.’ Reka smiled. ‘You passed the test. You kept quiet, carried on working. So I sent you the next document. Then I realised that you were in danger, so I brought you here. Not just from Uncle Karoly. There’s a rogue guy at your embassy, Shlomo. He was very unhappy about your work. He was about to warn you off, in very strong terms. The last thing he wanted was a big Holocaust revelation before Alon Farkas’s visit and the trade deal with Nationwide. Especially anything to do with Nationwide.’
Elad’s eyes widened. ‘Shlomo? I met him a couple of times. He was always so friendly, so interested in what I was doing. He asked a lot of questions.’
Reka smiled and nodded. ‘Now you know why. The more you found out, the more worried he got. Then he got in touch with some people in Serbia, and we got very alarmed. That’s when I brought you here. Now, over to you, Elad. Talk us through the documents.’
Elad looked down at the first sheet of paper. ‘This is a copy of the first document you sent me. It’s a legal agreement between Tamas Bardossy, Reka’s late grandfather, and someone called Miklos Berger. Who was Miklos Berger? Well, he was the son of a family of Budapest Jewish industrialists. The family firm was called Berger Holdings. Miklos was the chairman of the board and the CEO. His father, Samuel, who founded the company, had been sick for a while and died a few weeks before the Nazis invaded. His mother had died in childbirth. Miklos was the only child. He knew that the Nazis would probably invade Hungary and take the business, so he arranged with a trusted business partner, Tamas Bardossy, a way to safeguard the family holdings, which were extensive. The Bergers owned a steel mill on Csepel Island, a bicycle manufacturing plant and several other companies.’
Elad looked around the room. He had everyone’s attention. He caught Eva neni’s eye. She nodded and smiled at him encouragingly. Elad drank some water then carried on talking. ‘So now to the details of the first document. It is dated 20 March 1944 – a day after the Germans invaded. There are two parts. In the first Miklos signed over the company to Tamas Bardossy in exchange for 50,000 Swiss francs. Both men had bank accounts in Zurich, so the transfer was simple to arrange. The agreement was confidential, of course, but could be produced if and when the Nazis tried to appropriate Berger Holdings. The key point was that this document showed there was no longer any Jewish ownership of the company. There is another paragraph about three paintings, a Picasso, a Manet and a Monet, which the Bergers also transferred to Tamas Bardossy for temporary safekeeping. And a house, a beautiful villa in the Buda hills.’
Elad paused. ‘In Obuda, to be precise.’
Elad looked at Reka. She closed her eyes for a moment, swallowed, then met his gaze. She nodded, a quick, tight movement.
Everyone at the table sat very still. The only sound was the faint hum of the fridge and the soft tick of an electric clock in the kitchen.
Elad said, ‘This villa. The Bergers lived here.’
