Winter's End Read online

  “A girlfriend? You got a girlfriend?” asked Basil dreamily.

  “Yes.”

  “You’re in luck. Me, I got no one.”

  “Can we get some sleep, right?” snapped an irritated voice from the back of the dormitory.

  They fell silent for several minutes, but there was still something Basil wanted to know. “Hey, Ferenzy, what kind of animal d’you think I was in my — my earlier life?”

  “I don’t know, Basil.”

  “I do. I was a draft horse, a big strong horse pulling a cart and doing what its master says. A cart-horse, that’s what.”

  On the next night they had an impassioned discussion with two of the other novices on their chances of survival.

  “One in six,” said Flavius, a taciturn, shorttempered man who, so rumor said, had murdered his two wives in turn. “Three fights at odds of one in two, that makes it one chance in six.”

  “Wrong,” said Delicatus. No one knew what he had done, but he spoke to everyone with arrogance and contempt. “We have a one-in-two chance three times running — that’s nothing like one chance in six. In math they call it calculating the probabilities. But that’d be above your heads.”

  Milos didn’t know what to think, except that each new fight would be like the first, so that the chance of survival was always one-in-two.

  Basil put forward another theory, an original and surprising idea. “You ask me, we get a chance of . . . of one in four.” And in spite of Delicatus’s unkind laughter, he wouldn’t budge from his opinion. “If I kill my three men, see, and then there’s me in the fights, that makes four of us in all. And if I’m the only one surviving I have a one-in-four chance, right?”

  As Delicatus could think of nothing to say, he added, triumphantly, “That shut you up, eh, Delicatus?”

  The nights were never quiet. Some of the men had nightmares and woke everyone up yelling with terror; others snored or talked in their sleep; others couldn’t sleep and kept getting up to go to the lavatories or walk outside. In the few calm moments you heard the wind blowing through the oak trees in the forest, and the mournful creaking of the timber used to build the arena.

  One evening as he went to bed, Milos pushed his own bed a few inches closer to Basil’s. Next day he found that Basil had done the same thing. They never mentioned it, but each felt better, hearing the other breathing closer to him than before, and knowing that at any time he could whisper or hear the simple words of comfort that made fear relax its grip slightly: “You all right? Are you asleep? Are you cold? Want my jacket?”

  Another frequent subject of discussion at night was what kind of gladiator it was best to face in a fight — a novice, a premier, or a champion. Myricus had told them the results for the last few years, and they went over them again and again. There were six possible scenarios:

  Two novices fighting each other. In this case the chances were equal.

  Two premiers fighting each other. Here again the chances were equal, and it was the same when two champions fought.

  A novice fighting a premier. In sixty-five percent of such fights, the premier won.

  A champion would beat a premier in seventy-five percent of fights.

  Finally, a novice fighting a champion. Here, surprisingly, the novice won in over half the fights.

  So you could work it out that the ideal scenario was to fight a champion first, alarming as the prospect might seem, then a novice in your second fight, and finally, as a champion, a premier in order to gain your liberty.

  But there was no real point in this reasoning, since the fight organizers picked pairs to suit themselves, even though it could happen that one of the Phalange leaders expressed a particular wish to see a fighter already known to him face a certain other man. They liked to put two seasoned champions against each other in a fierce, final fight. Or at the other end of the scale, they liked to see two terrified novices fighting, or to relish the pleasure of watching fights of two men or three men against one, which amounted to executions.

  A week after Milos left the infirmary, Myricus gave him his sword. The trainer presented it to him with ceremony, like a priest administering the sacraments.

  “Here. This weapon is your only friend now. Don’t count on anything or anyone else, even me, to help you get out of this alive. Never part with it; always respect it.”

  Milos was impressed by the weight of the sword and its beauty. The pommel fit into the palm of his hand as if made for it. The double-edged blade bore no sign of earlier fighting. It seemed to be new, and cast golden reflections at the least movement. A coiled snake adorned the hilt.

  “Thank you,” was all he said, and he slipped the weapon into its sheath.

  During training sessions, Myricus referred frequently to the harmony that must exist between a fighting man and his sword. “It must be a part of yourself. You must feel it in your nervous system, in your blood. It must obey your mind as swiftly as your arm and your hand, even react ahead of them. It’s the extension of your desire, understand?”

  Whatever the exercise — fighting, running, dodging — you kept your sword in your hand. Milos, who was left-handed, found that he liked the warm, reassuring presence of his weapon in the palm of his hand. However, that still left one question. “It’s the extension of your desire,” said Myricus. Presumably he meant the desire to kill. Milos felt no such thing. The dreadful memory of Pastor’s bones cracking as he slowly went limp in his killer’s arms haunted him all the time. Did he want to kill anyone? He did not. On the other hand, he felt a great desire to live. It had him shedding hot tears every night; it almost choked him.

  His wrestling experience came in extremely useful. Day after day in the mock fights he realized that his reflexes were much better than those of his companions. His eye was far quicker. He could see their mistakes in the way they positioned their bodies and braced themselves. He knew he could leap at the best moment to knock them to the ground. Gradually, as his injury healed, he felt sure he would be able to beat almost all his opponents. All he lacked was the really crucial thing: acceptance of the barbaric idea of attacking an unknown man with the intention of killing him.

  But one incident taught him a valuable lesson.

  Winter was coming, and Milos had been in the camp for two months when Myricus picked him for the part of victim in the “three against one” exercise. He had to leave his sword on the benches and go down into the arena ahead of the others. He went along the path from which he had watched Basil’s fight a few weeks earlier. The wooden gate was closed behind him, and he found himself alone on the sand. His first opponent appeared in the gateway opposite, armed with a sword. It was Flavius, the man with a murderer’s dark eyes.

  Inflicting serious injury is forbidden, Milos told himself to calm his thudding heart. Flavius took small steps as he approached and then speeded up, brandishing his weapon. Milos began jogging to keep his distance. They skirted the arena three or four times like this. Several times Flavius rushed at Milos, forcing him to throw himself to the ground, but it was more like a dance than a real attack. Flavius had obviously been told to make his adversary run and tire him out without touching him.

  By the time the gate in the barricade opened again, Milos was out of breath, but he still had enough strength to avoid his second adversary for some time. However, it was a shock to see that the new man was Caius. His chest was still bandaged after his recent wound. He had hardly reached the sand before he made for Milos with a perfect diagonal approach. The nature of the contest changed abruptly. Myricus had always recommended them not to waste their energy in shouts and useless grunts. “Leave that to your opponents,” he used to say. “Keep quiet; concentrate; be pitiless.” But Caius couldn’t refrain from making muted growling noises. His mouth twisted in fury, he struck low at his adversary twice in quick succession, and Milos realized what Caius’s perverse wish was: he wanted to hit the leg that had already been wounded. Milos flung himself backward to avoid the blade, rolled over on the gro
und, and then, getting up in the same movement, he raised his fingers, spread like claws. Challengingly, he fixed his eyes on Caius and hissed through his teeth like a cat. The other man let out a howl of rage and flung himself into the pursuit of Milos, who was running as fast as he could go.

  Up in the gallery they had all risen to their feet except for Myricus, who sat there impassively, determined to let the contest run its course. Milos was going so fast that he hit the barricade and saw Caius about to attack him. He didn’t have time to avoid the sword quickly enough. Blood flowed from his forearm. He waited for Myricus to call out, “That’s enough!” However, the trainer kept his mouth shut. He felt like calling for help, but that would have been no use. Leaping aside, he avoided a second cut, and fled at frantic speed. If only I had my sword, he thought at that moment. If only I had my sword, I’d kill him. After all, he wants to kill me.

  He reached the other end of the arena, not too bothered by Flavius, who was now reduced to the role of spectator. Then the gate opened for the third time, and Basil came in. He looked savage. He was faster than Caius, and quickly reached Milos, who was backed up against the barricade. He struck fast and precisely, and Milos’s hip was covered with blood.

  “That’s enough!” boomed Myricus’s deep voice at last.

  “Sorry — I’m sorry,” stammered Basil, who was kneeling beside his friend. “I didn’t have any choice. That bastard, he’d have finished you off. Took you for a cat, didn’t he?”

  “Thank you,” breathed Milos. “I think you’ve saved my life.”

  “Don’t mention it. That’s OK. Me, I always liked cats.”

  Fulgur didn’t trouble to hide his delight when he saw the injury to Milos’s leg. “There’s a pretty sight! Who gave you that, Ferenzy?”

  “Rusticus.”

  “The cart-horse, eh? Think yourself lucky. He usually strikes harder. Anyone can see you two are good mates. Come on, then, I’ll give you a little encore.”

  Without more ado, he gave Milos an injection and didn’t even wait for it to take effect before setting to work. Milos turned his head aside and gritted his teeth under the piercing pain of the needle. Then, gradually, he felt it die down, until at last he felt only the unpleasant sensation of the thread as it was pulled through the edges of his wound, drawing them together.

  “That cart-horse, he ever talk to you about his brothers?”

  “What?”

  “Rusticus. He ever tell you about ’em?”

  “Tell me about what?”

  Milos remembered the conversations he’d had with Basil at the school. The other boy had indeed introduced himself as a cart-horse, but without explaining exactly what he meant.

  “No, he didn’t,” he said, careful not to insist on keeping quiet to Fulgur anymore. “He hasn’t told me anything.”

  “Pity. You’d have enjoyed it, especially the last bit. Because it all turned out badly for them. Very badly. I could have been a cart-horse myself, you know. I had all the qualifications: I’m hefty and I didn’t exactly invent hot and cold running water. Problem is, I like to be on the winning side. Yup, that’s my problem.”

  Fulgur finished his stitching. Hearing the little sound as the thread broke, Milos knew that the brute had just bitten off the remains of it with his teeth, as you might bite the thread after sewing on a button. He preferred not to look. Fulgur completed his care of his patient by painting the place with iodine.

  “There, you can go back to your room. Getting into the habit of this, aren’t you? Soon there won’t be space on you for any more stitching! And don’t forget: next chance you get, ask your friend Rusticus to tell you all about his mates — if you want a good laugh. Ask him how Faber is, for instance. Oh yes, that’s a very funny story.”

  Milos didn’t have to wait long for his next chance to talk to Basil. Late in the afternoon, Milos was dozing in the infirmary sickroom when the door opened. His friend’s large head appeared around it.

  “You asleep?”

  “No, come in.”

  Basil sat down on the edge of the bed and raised the sheet. “Dammit, I didn’t miss you.”

  “That’s OK. It’s not deep,” Milos reassured him.

  “Sorry, but I didn’t know where to strike. Finding the right place isn’t easy. I mean, finding somewhere to bleed a lot that’s not too dangerous. I thought of a buttock, but you didn’t turn your back, and then sitting down’s tricky later.”

  “Really, don’t worry. You aimed very well.”

  “Caius is furious with me. Told me if I ever found myself facing him, he’d make a hole in my hide. But he doesn’t scare me, just because he’s won twice . . . Hey, look! A jay!”

  The big, colorful bird had settled on the windowsill without a sound. It just fit between the bars and looked almost as if it wanted to come in.

  “We know each other already,” said Milos, smiling. “He comes visiting the sick.”

  The two of them fell silent and watched the jay. They were both thinking the same thing: you’re free, bird. You can come and go; you can fly away over the wire fence and perch on the forest trees when you like. Do you know how lucky you are?

  As if guessing, the jay turned weightily on the sill, took off, and flew away.

  “Who’s Faber?” asked Milos into the silence that followed.

  Basil’s mouth dropped open. “You know Faber?”

  “No, but Fulgur mentioned his name just now. Who is he?”

  Basil bent his head. He was frowning. “Faber is the leader of the horse-men,” he muttered at last. “Our leader, see?”

  “And . . . and something bad happened to him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did they kill him?”

  “Worse than that.”

  Milos dared not say any more. Basil sniffed noisily and then wiped his nose and eyes angrily on the back of his cuff.

  “They did worse than kill him, Ferenzy. They made fun of him. I’ll tell you, but some other time. I kind of don’t feel like it here.”

  If she hadn’t been missing Milos and feeling constantly anxious, Helen’s time in the capital city might have felt like the best days of her life. She had never known such a delicious sense of freedom before. Having a place of her own, her name on a door that she could lock and unlock with her own key, going out when she liked, getting on the first tram to come along and losing herself in unknown streets: she relished these small pleasures day after day. They never faded. Mr. Jahn had given her half her first month’s pay in advance so that she could get herself what she needed. She bought an alarm clock, a brightly colored hat, a pair of woolen gloves, a scarf, and a pair of boots. The coat that Dr. Jose f ’ s wife had given her, although a little old-fashioned, was warm and comfortable and she decided to keep it. She also unearthed a dozen novels going cheap in an old bookshop near the restaurant, and lined them up on the shelf in her room. “My library,” she told Milena proudly.

  She came back quite dazed from her solitary walks in the city. She loved mingling with the anonymous crowd swarming over the sidewalks at rush hour. If you could see all these people, Milos! Racing about, bumping into you without even noticing you’re there. You feel like an ant among millions of other ants. If you were with me, we’d have to hold hands to not get separated. I go into shops, boutiques, hardware stores, choosing what I’ll buy when I have more money. If only you were here too, my love. . . .

  But what she liked even more was walking at random, going farther and farther afield, delighted to discover a new bridge, a pretty square, a little church. She walked fast, wrapped in her warm coat, until her legs began to tire. Then she would catch a tram or a bus going back toward the city center.

  Dora was right: people here weren’t very good-tempered. Or rather, it was as if they didn’t trust one another. You heard little laughter and few cheerful conversations. The fact was that the people of the capital seemed depressed. Sometimes Helen met a glance from a pair of friendly eyes, but they turned away at once. She soon learn
ed to spot the Phalangist security police and the agents on night duty: men with wary faces, often hidden behind newspapers like something in a bad thriller, but you could easily guess that their ears were working harder than their eyes.

  When she got off the tram one afternoon, she found that someone had slipped an invitation to a meeting into her coat pocket, and she thought the wording suggested that it was for people opposed to the Phalange. She thought of the young man who had been sitting beside her; it must have been him who’d given it to her. He had looked attractive and rather nice. “A trap!” cried Dora. “Whatever you do, don’t go!” And she advised Helen never to talk freely to strangers, however friendly they seemed. “New friends, whoever they are, must be introduced to you by someone safe, or it’s better not to trust them.”

  A few days later, as she was going back to the restaurant on foot, she heard shouts: “Out of the way! Militia!” She had no time to move aside and was knocked down by three men armed with clubs who were chasing a tall, lanky man. They caught up with him and beat him. He fell to the ground, curling up his long, thin limbs to protect himself, but they kept hitting him on the head and the back.

  “Stop!” cried Helen, paralyzed by horror as the unfortunate man huddled there while the brutes went on attacking him. “Stop it! You’ll kill him!”

  She realized that everyone around her was running away except for a young man, who had turned his collar well up to hide his face.

  “Bastards! You’ll pay for this!” he shouted in his own turn, and then he too ran for it. He was obviously counting on his burst of speed to escape the militiamen, and he was right. One of them chased him a hundred yards and then gave up.

  “I’ve seen your face!” the young man taunted the militiaman, turning around one last time. “I’ve seen all your faces, and believe me, I’ll know you again!”

  The militiaman hurled insults at him and went back to his companions. Helen hadn’t moved from the spot.

  “Got a problem, miss?” he spat as he passed her. “No? Then you better get out of here.”