Free Budapest Noir by Vilmos Kondor Page B

Schnuschnigg, the Austrian chancellor. Finally, a fat man with an oily complexion started toward the bier. He wore black boots polished to a sparkle, a leather jacket pulled tight around his belly by a belt, and a flat service cap that covered his eyes. Gordon shuddered. This was Hermann Göring, supreme commander of the Luftwaffe, Prussian interior minister, the man in charge of the four-year plan of the empire’s military economy, and Hitler’s most loyal backer and devotee. Göring stopped in front of the coffin, the Iron Cross hanging from his neck. He clicked his heels, threw back his head, and then, swinging his arms forward to clasp his hands, he stood in silence for a few moments. The quiet was broken only by the snapping of cameras and the popping of their flashes. Göring now turned around and took his seat to the right of the bier. He had barely reached his seat when Archbishop Jusztinián Serédi appeared, stood mutely for some moments, and then sat down to the left of the bier. Gordon glanced over at the Prussian interior minister, whose face remained unreadable, and suddenly Gordon recalled what Gömbös had boasted to Göring in the spring: by applying the fascist principles learned from the Germans, Gömbös would reshape Hungary within two years and would preside over the new state as its dictator.
    Kálmán Darányi stood up and went to the steps leading to the rotunda. Gordon winced the moment he heard the sound of clicking heels. He glanced at the red velvet chair set apart on its own beside the bier. Hungary’s regent, Miklós Horthy, now appeared on the steps in his admiral’s uniform, his head topped off by a calpac, and his chest bearing the Grand Cross of the royal Order of Saint Stephen of Hungary. It was practically with piety that Darányi—in the company of the two speakers of Parliament, Sándor Sztranyavszky and Bertalan Széchenyi—greeted the head of state, who took determined steps toward the velvet chair, adjusted his sword, and sat down. Gordon shook his head with silent glee at the sight of the admiral’s uniform. The regent, his face somber, knit his brows and stared into the air. Silence had once again descended upon the hall when the clergy arrived, with Lutheran bishop Sándor Raffay in the lead. Gordon looked at his watch. A few minutes past ten. He sighed deeply, took a seat in the rows reserved for the media, and proceeded to listen to one speech after another as the funeral began. After Raffay came Darányi, who in turn was followed by Sztranyavszky, and then Széchenyi and, finally, Béla Ivády, president of the National Unity Party. Gordon’s head was buzzing by the end. It seemed as if this was the funeral for someone like the American president, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, instead. A champion of freedom, said the orators. A man who struggled for the rise of the nation; someone whose efforts brought the country order, security, and economic prosperity. A creative genius hammering out his people’s future. Sometimes Gordon glanced up at the given speaker in surprise. Was it only now that he would learn how great a loss this was? A champion of democracy—luckily that was left off the list. Only then would the laudation have been complete.
    During the eulogies, he passed his eyes over the elite who were on hand. A couple of them seemed to have fallen asleep. General Schamburg-Bogulski, head of the Polish delegation, undoubtedly nodded off, jerking up his head at one point, giving a quick, confused look around before deftly suppressing a yawn. Horthy sat there with an unruffled expression; at most, he would sometimes fiddle with the handle of his sword. Gömbös’s widow, sons, and two siblings cried quietly as his mother stared glassy-eyed at the coffin.
    After the eulogies, there came Siegfried’s Funeral March from Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung , conducted by Erno Dohnányi. Gordon was practically counting the measures to determine when the music would end. Once the