Zbornik Mednarodnega literarnega srečanja Vilenica 2004 - Ljudmila

Szilárd Podmaniczky
to pay for my liberty, I ought not to take it upon myself.
We fell silent; she stopped crying. I did my best to help: what if she
were to kill him, I said. That’s impossible, I’ve already thought of that, it
would be the end of me, she said. But maybe if you were to do it. My
expression froze totally at that. Oh no, I responded, not that. I would pay
you; he keeps loads of money at home, a million or so. I said nothing for a
while. I can’t do anything like that..., I said. He’s pegged out at home, out
of his skull even as we speak. Come with me, please, I beg you, help me.
She stood up, opened the door wide, and waited for me to go with her.
I didn’t have the heart to leave the wretched woman to her own devices;
I thought to myself, if I were to go and have a looksee, she might
calm down, at least until tomorrow. I grabbed my jacket, and off we went.
Her husband was pegged out in the front room, his arms dangling from
the settee, his mouth wide open. The woman studied me curiously to see
what I would come up with. She glanced from me to the fat, dead-drunk
pig to whom she had pledged her tooth...
And what if it were made to look like suicide, I whispered. I don’t know;
I don’t know anything about that sort of thing, I’m all mixed up, she said.
One could torch the house on him, let’s say, I said, and I began spilling out
ideas, each better than the last, but with a callousness that even I found
surprising, as if I were just tossing them around in a brainstorming session.
Torch the house on him, I said. Or bury him in the garden. That’s not
suicide, the woman said. True, I replied. Or stick him into his car and
trundle it into a lake. There is a lake here, the woman said, just over a mile
outside the village. Then what are you waiting for, I asked. Help me, she
pleaded.
We went out into the garage, inspected the car, and I showed her how
to set the accelerator, the gear and the clutch. But you have to do it, I said.
The car had not been used for years, the tyres were flat. I snatched the
pump down from the wall, and though my head was reeling from it all,
did not waste a moment. When I had finished on the first wheel the
woman gently grasped my neck and stroked my face. No, I said, I told you
you have to carry it through. She vanished whilst I was pumping the next
tyre, and all at once it had come down to me: there was I, pumping up the
tyres of the car of a total stranger, in a completely unknown place that I
had no idea how I had fetched up in, with the old chap croaking back
there, whilst here I was helping to send a lousy creep to his maker. I’ll
scarper before the woman gets back, I thought to myself. Except there
was nowhere to scarper to; it was bitingly cold outside, and the fog was
closing in, and she would follow me to the old man’s house.
By the time the woman had returned, I had filled all the tyres. In her
hand was a bundle of money, which she stuffed into my jacket pocket.
Eight hundred grand, she said. For fuck’s sake, I yelled, get it through your
head: No! The woman pulled down the garage door. Pipe down, they can
hear you. Afterwards you can do with me whatever you want, she said.
Oh no, not that, I said in a more hushed voice, but the anger was undiminished,
and I sensed the anger was somehow alleviating my hangover. If I
335