Piroska said she had seen Valery entering the same building on three separate occasions, the last being just two days ago.
“What was the building?” Jack asked.
“The building contains the laboratory of Miklos Pazmany, the mathematician and physicist.”
“What is Pazmany’s claim to fame?”
“He has the only mainframe computer in Eastern Europe.”
Jack was puzzled. “Was Valery alone?”
“Not the first time,” Piroska replied. “The first time he was with someone, a much shorter man who wore an expensive Russian sable hat and a long muffler wrapped around his neck and half his face, covering his nose and mouth.”
Sailor and I exchanged a quick glance and shared the same thought — the “Beekeeper.”
Jack continued to ask Piroska questions, not only about Valery, but about Pazmany, about his computer, and about the building itself — how many entrances and exits, was there security in the building, and if so, how much and how many? Piroska answered every question and asked Jack a few in return. Jack answered as best he could. Of course, he couldn’t tell her the real reason we were looking for Valery. Their conversation went on for most of the afternoon. Meanwhile, and unknown to us, there were students and demonstrators gathering by the thousands in the streets of Budapest to protest against the government and its Stalinist regime. Speeches were given and proclamations read at the Bem statue, where the crowd chanted the forbidden National Song with the refrain, “We vow, we vow, we will no longer remain slaves.” Later, they crossed the Danube and joined with other protesters outside the Parliament Building. By early evening, the crowd had enlarged to 200,000 people. The Hungarian Revolution had begun.
The next day Soviet tanks moved into Budapest, parking in front of the Parliament Building while Soviet troops guarded important bridges and crossroads. Armed revolutionaries fought the tanks with Molotov cocktails; the Hungarian resistance finally forced a cease-fire on October 28, and a new but fragile government was in place. By October 30 the tanks had withdrawn from Budapest to Soviet garrisons in the countryside. Many people in the streets believed the Soviets had left Hungary for good. Jack knew better and said he doubted they would ever do that.
During the first week of the revolution, fighting in the narrow streets made it virtually impossible for any of us to watch for Valery at the University. It wasn’t until November 1 that Piroska could show us where she had seen Valery enter Pazmany’s laboratory. There were two entrances at opposite ends of the building. Sailor and I set up a sort of stakeout at one of them, while Jack and Piroska took the other. For three days we saw nothing but students, teachers, and workers coming and going. Finally, early on the morning of November 4, I caught a glimpse of a tall man in Italian shoes and a tailored wool coat walking briskly across the street toward the laboratory. He looked once over his shoulder and hesitated.
Then we heard the tank fire followed by sporadic gunfire. It came without warning, and it sounded as if it was coming from every district in the city. The Soviets had returned, invading Budapest in full force, including air strikes and artillery.
I looked at Sailor. “What should we do?”
“Stay out of the way as best we can,” Sailor answered, but it was too late. At that moment, three Soviet T-54 tanks turned the corner and headed right for us. The lead tank was firing indiscriminately at buildings and civilians. One blast took out a corner of the building next to us, sending a shower of broken glass, bricks, and concrete into the street. I heard screaming and people started running in every direction.
One block away, Jack and Piroska were scrambling door to door, trying to make their way through the smoke and debris to Sailor and me. Jack shouted something, but I couldn’t hear him over the sound of the tanks. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion. I glanced at the entrance to the laboratory building. Valery was standing outside watching the carnage, and the moment I saw him, he saw me. Jack and Piroska were only fifty yards away and it looked like they were going to make it through the chaos. Just then, the lead tank came to a halt. The turret with its long cannon began to swivel and take aim directly at a small group of people that included Jack and Piroska.
Sailor did not hesitate. He walked calmly into the street and raised his arm, pointing his hand with palm out and fingers spread toward the tank. He mumbled something in Meq and closed his eyes, as if in a trance. Using his mind and his “ability” of telekinesis, in a split second he lifted the huge T-54 tank a foot off the ground and spun it in the air, just as the cannon fired. Sailor opened his eyes and smiled. The blast destroyed the tank directly behind it, and Jack and Piroska scrambled the last fifty yards to safety.
Jack grabbed Sailor by the shoulders and said, “I don’t know what you did or how you did it, but thank God you did it, Sailor.” Jack took hold of Piroska’s hand and turned to me. “Let’s get out of here, Z, and I mean out of here.”
I looked across the street and found Valery’s eyes. They were wide with awe and wonder. He took a step or two toward me. He had seen everything. We began to run and he yelled after us, “Itxoin! Itxoin!” Jack and Piroska kept running, but Sailor and I stopped dead in our tracks.
“Who is that?” Sailor asked.
“That is Valery,” I told him.
Valery had spoken in Basque and begged us to “Wait! Wait!” How, why, and what it meant would have to be answered later. We had to get off the streets and out of Hungary. Sailor and I caught up with Jack and within twenty minutes we were back at Piroska’s apartment. As spontaneously as the revolution had begun, in three days it was cruelly and systematically crushed and stamped out. On November 10 we sneaked quietly out of the city and joined some refugees making their way to Austria. Jack tried to talk Piroska into leaving with us. She declined and stayed in Budapest, saying her work, her friends, her life was in Hungary, not Austria or anywhere else. Jack understood, but I could see the disappointment in his eyes.
We boarded a train in Gussing, then changed trains in Graz and took the longer, scenic route through the Alps on our way back to Montreux and the “école dans l’ombre.” While Jack slept, Sailor and I stared out at the mountains and talked at length about what had happened in Budapest and what the consequences might be. I told Sailor I was surprised he had acted so quickly and with no fear of being exposed to the Giza. Sailor said, “There was no choice, Zianno, or more precisely, there was only one choice.” As for the consequences, neither of us had an answer, but one thing was clear. The Soviet agent Valery seemed to know much more about us than we knew about him. And I still had not seen the sphere. I had to see the sphere again. In my heart and mind, I was becoming obsessed with reading the sphere. As we approached Montreux and the shores of Lake Geneva, which was shimmering in ten shades of blue, I was thinking only of the sphere and the mystery carved into its stone.
We had telephoned Opari and Sheela from Graz and they met us at the station in Montreux. Opari could see the distraction and frustration in my face and she mentioned it. I told her I would work it out, but I didn’t. Over the next few months, we heard nothing from any of Cardinal’s resources. Valery (and the Beekeeper) had vanished once again.