Zbornik Mednarodnega literarnega srečanja Vilenica 2004 - Ljudmila

porters from behind the windows, went to sleep. Only the enemy was
wide awake and whenever noises were heard from within the tanks, the
men would start up and take another drink from the incendiary bottles.
But Dad, because he was the captain, continued to leap up from time to
time and wave the banner in threatening fashion, but eventually they were
all so drunk that they spilled red wine, almost half a liter of red Vavrinecke,
on the flag, right on the white part. The men stopped waving the flag, so
that the stain would not show and because there was nothing for them to
do, before long they were all asleep. During the night a figure suddenly
crept up to the tanks and knocked on the turret of one of them. The turret
opened, a head appeared and the figure spoke to the head in bad Russian.
After a time the figure climbed on to the tank and a rumbling noise
was heard. Fumes billowed out from the tanks and the column began to
reverse but only for a short time, then the first tank stopped, went forwards
again and turned into a side street. The other tanks followed.
The noise did not waken the men on the barricade. Nor did they waken
when after a time the tanks turned out from the side street behind their
backs on to the main road to Prague and disappeared in the direction of
Hradec Kralove.
It was morning when they were wakened by the rain. The whole town
was apparently still asleep. The men peered out cautiously and in the half
light of morning there were no enemy tanks to be seen. They staggered
out in front of the barricade, blundered about here and there, but of the
tanks there wasn’t a sign. The men shouted in jubilation, Dad leapt up
and punched the air with his fist as if he had just scored a goal. Then they
hauled the flag down from the barricade, waved it above their heads and
marched through the town singing the national anthem.
So overjoyed were they that they failed to notice that the red Russian
flag was flying from several of the houses, Cheering they made their way
to the square where they marched round the Tunel pub that Mr. Pryl the
landlord had just opened. He opened at six every morning, to oblige the
workers, as he said. Mr. Pryl came out and greeted our heroes sadly in a
voice full of emotion, »What are you shouting about, you idiots?« And while
our heroes were falling over themselves to describe how they had chased
off the Russian tanks with their bare hands, he took them into a side street
where the tracks of the tanks could be seen and when they still’ refused
to believe it, he took them into the pub and as it was six o’ clock the news
was just beginning on the radio and one of the items announced the arrival
of the tanks at Hradec.
Translated by Elsa Morrison
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