590
PARTISAN REVIEW
After the war he returned to Hungary where he was given a post in the
Cultural Division of the Embassy in Paris . An urgent telegram called him
home and when he arrived at the railway statio'n in Budapest he was arrested
by the AVH.
After the first blows he gave up-he asked for a glass of cognac and
when, to his greatest surprise, he got it, he began
to
spin a fantastic tale
centering around his recruitment by the American Intelligence Service. It
was a poetic masterpiece of a confession, worthy of his artistic nature. When
he described it
to
me, trembling, he said that since he was convinced we
were going to be hanged no matter what we did, he had concocted a state–
ment of such nonsense that hopefully some day, someone reading it would
understand the absurdity of the whole proceeding.
We met again later in the prison of Vic, after the secret trial of the
"French Group." He had been sentenced
to
life imprisonment.
In February, 1950 I was returned to Andrassy Street. This time the
interrogator was someone I knew, a Lieutenant Ervin Faludi whom I had met
several times socially . The notes I had written, he told me, were useless, I
could not be sentenced on the basis of such ridiculous self criticism. The
preparations for the trial of the "Swiss Group" were complete, only my
statement was missing. If I did not sign a confession, he said , thirteen wit–
nesses would be paraded in front of me and I would never leave the prison
alive.
But, he continued, he knew me as an intelligent man , a good comrade.
He and I would write the confession together and I would receive a short
prison sentence, three years; he could assure me of that even before the trial.
For the first six weeks I would live in a villa; my wife could visit me , and
then when the entire affair had been forgotten, I would work under an
assumed name for one of the provincial newspapers until it would be possible
to return to Budapest. By now, he pointed out with great reasonableness, I
should realize that it was not me that the Party was concerned about. After
all , Rajk and Szonyi had already been hanged and the "Swiss Group" was
now a part of the history of the international labor movement. It was just
my bad luck that I had been a member of the group so the Party had no
choice but to treat me as a friend or as an enemy, depending on my attitude.
I had become a particle of dust to be trod into the ground by the Party
at any time, with no one
to
notice . I had been in the nether world from
which there is no escape-but now everything would be cleared up . The
Party knows everything. Six weeks in a villa and it is forgotten-a particle
of dust whom the Party can once again turn into a human being.
I signed.
The statement was five pages long.
It
described how Szonyi had re-
