Outcasts (29 page)
Karola felt calm, safe, and serene inside this place. Gazing at the statue brought back the warm memories of when her children were young. In her mind she was transported back to the place and time when she held them in her arms and cuddled them, played with them, kissed their tender, dewy skin. She realized that giving birth and raising her children was the happiest, most fulfilling part of her life.
Here, in the chapel, Karola felt she could bare her soul to the Virgin Mother. Mary alone understood her heartache at this juncture in her life - as a devoted wife and mother. Each day she prayed for her sons Tibor and Bela. No one seemed to know where they were. It was June 1945, the war had officially been over two months now, and still there was no sign of them. Karola felt at peace here, praying for them, but as soon as she left the chapel, the feeling of restlessness and panic about their fate swept over her like a bitter windstorm from the nearby mountains.
Since leaving their home in the fall of 1944, Karola and her family had endured six months as refugees, scattering from one temporary shelter to another - sometimes not knowing where their next meal would come from or where they would rest their weary heads at night. For a while they lived in a tiny apartment in Sopron, the westernmost city closest to the Austrian border, yet still inside Hungary.
Karola prayed for her husband as well - prayed that all of them would have the strength to accept their present situation and bear all their adversity with dignity. After months of uncertainty, when the war finally ended, they were herded into a displaced-persons camp near Micheldorf in Austria in the American Zone. It was fortunate for them that Domokos spoke English reasonably well. He went to pay an official visit to Colonel Arthur Harris, the local American commander of the district, in order to offer his services as a translator. Domokos knew they needed someone who could oversee the repatriation of the Hungarian enlisted men and their families. The rules of military conduct dictated that when a war ends and peace treaties are in force, the displaced enemy combatants are sent home, including prisoners of war. Colonel Harris accepted the offer.
A few days later, Harris took a tour of the displaced-persons camp where they were living. It was housed in a cavernous school where the refugees slept in large classrooms on floors, tables, benches - wherever they found space. Colonel Harris hardly had a few square metres left to walk through the enormous rooms. One communal bathroom was used by about three hundred people. When he asked where Colonel Aykler and his family were housed he was shown to a niche at the end of one of the rooms. The entrance to their small living area was blocked by a blanket hung on a rope drawn across two dresser drawers, providing the only bit of privacy. As her husband drew the blanket aside to welcome Colonel Harris into their tiny abode, Karola could see on the look of embarrassment on the face of the sympathetic American officer. Inside, four cots and a few trunks shoved together offered the only place to sit or lie down. They offered to make tea, but Colonel Harris kindly refused, seeing how impossible it was to make and serve tea or anything in the cramped quarters.
After the tour, Colonel Harris was overheard saying to one of his deputies, "Shame on the Hungarians for subjecting their commanding officer and his family to such appalling conditions. I hope if we are ever in such a situation, my men will treat me and my family with more decency."
Colonel Harris gave Aykler Domokos the mandate to make lists of all the Hungarian ex-enlisted men under his command. A mutual respect and friendship developed between the two men, both of the same rank but one on the victorious side, the other on the side of the vanquished. It would take time and resources to organize the repatriation and Harris looked upon Colonel Aykler as someone he could rely on to get the formidable task accomplished.
Massive prisoner-of-war camps run by the Americans for ex-enemy combatants were rumoured be operating in several places in the American zone. Domokos Aykler was informed that such places were merely clearing centres where the military sorted out war criminals among the ex-enemy. Domokos heard that his sons might be in such a place near Tittling. When he informed his wife of this possible lead, Karola felt her heart was being crushed by the news. After the initial shock, she peppered her husband with questions.
"How could they possibly be considered enemy combatants? Tibor was a reservist - he didn't take part in any fighting during the war. Bela was in military school - he had no rank. Can't they see he's still a boy?"
Domokos replied with silence.
Domokos went to Tittling, with a letter from Colonel Harris, asking the commanding officer of the camp "to extend all courtesy to the bearer of this letter in finding Bela Aykler, sixteen years old, and Tibor Schroeder, twenty-seven years old, both Hungarian nationals."
Domokos returned with the news that Tibor and Bela had been transferred out of Tittling just two days earlier. No one could tell him where they had been transferred to or why. Karola was dazed and shocked by the news. For a few days, she stayed in her cot, feeling like an empty shell. But seeing the helpless, stunned look on her daughter's face, Karola realized she had to collect her strength again - her family needed her. It was from that point forward that Karola decided to put her trust in Mother Mary. No one else could possibly understand her complete and utter devastation upon hearing this news.
T
IBOR AND
B
ELA WERE
part of a mass movement of millions of displaced refugees on the move across Europe, all trying to get back to someplace called "home." Tibor in particular felt the pull of home and Hedy and their life together. After surviving Tittling as prisoners of war, they were discharged to a refugee camp called Pocking. Following ten days there, a surprising announcement was made: everyone born in Karpatalja was now a Soviet citizen and would be provided papers to go home. Bela and Tibor reported along with a group of about thirty men and teenagers who assembled for the journey.
Railway lines were bombed out - only partial lines were running sporadically here and there. No one had tickets, currency had no value, yet everyone was trying to get somewhere. The trains were crammed, at each stop more and more people jumped on. There were even people lying on top of the railway cars, everyone covered in black soot - like chimney sweepers - from the smoke belching out from the front of the coal-fired locomotive.
S
UTI STARTED HIS JOURNEY
home by hitching a ride on a U.S. Army truck leaving Linz and going east. Let off at Melk (still in Austria), he crossed the Danube on a river ship, as all the bridges were either bombed out or blown up. He entered the Russian-occupied part of Europe.
Here he joined with other refugee teenagers and became a group of almost twenty. They "borrowed" a cart with a horse from a farm for the next leg of their journey - stopping by farmhouses along the way to ask for, and if refused, take food. They went from Wiener Neustadt to Bratislava - a distance of thirty kilometres. After days of travelling by foot, by cart, and whatever means, they arrived in Bratislava, from where they knew there were some trains running.
This is where Suti met Kornelia Weisz, an older girl and neighbour from Nagyszollos. Although they had the same last name, they were not related.
From Bratislava they took the train.
T
HE TRAIN
T
IBOR AND
Bela travelled on, headed east through Czechoslovakia. When it reached the Slovak-inhabited eastern part of the country, they were told that most of the bridges had been destroyed and that each time they reached a crossing the train would stop and disgorge all of its passengers. They would have to walk through the town or village and find the other end of the destroyed section of track where the railway continued. The first couple of times they had to do this they didn't notice anything unusual about the townsfolk, but the third time, it was as if the locals had been forewarned of their arrival.
"Filthy Hungarians - you started all this!" yelled one man at the side of the road as he watched the group walk by. Tibor couldn't help but notice the man's ugly wife and children, who were all screaming at them, taunting them.
"We hope you die, you pigs. We should kill you ourselves, with our bare hands," a nearby neighbour yelled.
"War criminals!" screamed a woman who was carrying a pitchfork.
To Tibor, it all seemed surreal. He remembered how the Slovaks became rabid Nazis early on in the war. They set up a special, homegrown Nazi regime run by a de-frocked Catholic priest. Slovakia had the dubious distinction of being one of the first countries to deport their Jewish population to Auschwitz-Birkenau and to willingly fight on the side of Hitler. When the Slovaks terrorized and finally ousted their Jewish population, many fled to Hungary.
War criminals indeed, thought Tibor as the group became more belligerent.
Their steps quickened as the local mob started ripping the knapsacks off their backs, throwing stones, and kicking dirt.
"Don't ever come back here, rotten Hungarian scum!"
By the time they reached the next railway station they were exhausted and filthy. Tibor, still breathless, looked behind him and noticed his brother had fallen back a bit. Tibor waited for him and saw that Bela was short of breath and fighting back tears.
"I don't have the strength to go on. They stole my knapsack and boots, and my last clean shirt is gone." Tibor looked at his brother and noticed for the first time how thin he had become. His prominent nose had become even more pronounced, as had his high cheekbones. A fine coating of dirt covered his face, interrupted only by little streams of tears. The look on his face was like a child who had been beaten up by a bully. Tibor wanted to just put his arms around Bela and comfort him, but he didn't know how he would react. While they were prisoners, Bela had stayed tough - it was as if every obstacle became a challenge. Bela provided for both of them. Now he had reverted to childhood again, not knowing what to do about all the cruel things that happened around them. He looked to Tibor for every decision.
It was almost dusk and they found an abandoned farmhouse and took a drink of water from a well. Tibor washed the spit off of Bela's back - the saliva was mixed with dirt and stuck to the back of his shirt. The washing left a sizeable mud stain on his back. Tibor didn't want to tell him how he looked now - Bela was always so meticulous about his appearance.
Tibor pulled Bela aside, and extricated a can of sardines from one of his deep pants pockets. He opened it deftly and tried to encourage his brother.
"We'll eat like kings tonight. Don't worry about your knapsack, little brother."
They travelled after dark from then on, finding hiding places and resting during the day.
S
UTI
, K
ORNELIA, AND ANOTHER
boy kept hopping onto and switching trains. They had to jump on a train going through Debrecen in eastern Hungary in order to catch a train that went further northeast of their destination to Kiralyhaza, where they finally switched to an overcrowded train going west to Nagyszollos. Trains that were running seemed to be going east-west and not north-south. Finally, they reached Nagyszollos - or, as the Russians had renamed it, Vinogradov.
It was almost midnight when the train pulled into the train station. Suti and Kornelia were warned that the train would not stop, only slow down. It was the last train of the day carrying Russian soldiers west, and the station master, Palyuch bacsi, was ordered to stay and salute as it went by. There was one dim twenty-watt light bulb still burning in the office of the station master. Otherwise, a thick blanket of darkness enveloped the train station. Suti and Kornelia jumped skillfully off the train in time, without injuring themselves, and saw Palyuch bacsi just as he was collecting his things and locking up to go home.
Palyuch bacsi was a short, pudgy, bald man with glasses. He was an ethnic Rusyn and spoke Hungarian with a local accent. Suti and Kornelia knew him. When Palyuch bacsi saw them coming toward him in the dim light he knelt down and made the sign of the cross. He recognized them, but didn't quite trust his own judgement - he had already imbibed a couple of shots of homemade brandy by then. Waiting for the last train was tedious and time-consuming. As the two small figures drew near, he whispered in disbelief, "Is it really you?"
As they assured him they were truly Sanyi and Kornelia Weisz, tears began rolling down his face. The two teenagers helped the station master to his feet. After touching their hands, feeling their faces, Palyuch bacsi collected himself and declared,
"You are coming home with me tonight." Suti and Kornelia were surprised by the generous offer and accepted, and the three of them walked the two-kilometre distance to his home.
After gently inquiring whether or not they had any lice, Palyuch bacsi and his wife gave Kornelia and Suti each their own bed to sleep in. That night, for the first time in over a year, Suti slept in a bed with clean sheets, a pillow, and a comforter. As he settled in, he savoured the softness and thickness of the down comforter.
