EOA KRISEOV
A
455
describe it briefly yet fully -
ill
1949
IJOlllld al1 application Jar Party man–
bership all
/'/I)'
desk. I tho light it strallge, becallse gelldarmes halle always been
forbiddell to )oill political parties
(cJ.
the oath I mentiorled earlier), bllt I sub–
mitted it allyway. My childre/z were growillg lip, and I wanted to buy a hOllse,
pllt a rooJ oller ollr heads. Inwgille my sllrprise when on
8
December
1950
I
receilled the Jollowillg
-
alld I qllote: "You halle been IInanimously denied
eIl–
trallce to the COml1l/llIist Party oj Czechoslollakia dlle to cirCllmstances that
have come to light
ill
the collrse oj relliewillg YOllr application. YOII may appeal
the decisioll to a sllperior Party orgall.
JJ
Well, that's that, I said to myself. Twenty years in the Subcarpathian
Ukraine, ten here - that's enough for a gendarme, an honest gendarme.
But no, they didn't want me to quit; they were just trying to transfer
me. I don't like it, I told them. I was the last of the old guard - eleven
of us there'd been. One of the new men, a red-haired hunchback of a
whippersnapper, said to me one day, You served capitalism and the ex–
ploiting class. And I said to him, You listen to me, you red-haired
hunchback of a whippersnapper, I said, when I was your age I had seven
mouths
to
feed. I've always served the people, and I can prove it. I've
never done wrong, never broken the law. The law is my Bible. That
time I paced the kitchen three whole days. Window
to
door back to
window. I'm quitting, Mama, I said. But she said they wouldn't let me
get away with it. I decided to report sick, but I couldn't bring myself to
keep it up.
To preserve
Illy
hOllar, I let myself be trarlsferred. I had to travel twenty
kilometers to and Jronl LlIork alld start at the very bottom. That is why my
pension is so low. I call prolle that Vladimir Hakl is responsible Jar my misfor–
tlllle becallse I stood lip to him when he tried to set himself up as a dictator.
By
1953
I hadjillally saved enollgh to blly a hOllse.
To this day I can see it from my window, Mr. Bl<lha thought,
looking out. There it was among the foliage, its eyes sparkling like gems.
Hakl had beaten him to it. It was his lights Blaha was staring into.
The CIIrrellcy riform was the elld oj me . I was jired a year later. I went
down to fifty-eight kilograms. I got IIlcers. I was called in and told I should be
glad
[
had any pension at all, it was a gift Jrom the working class.
So you don't even honor your own laws?
[ waS/! 't IIsed to that. A gendarme knows the law inside out. He is always
III/der oath, the oath he took when he took office. And suddenly the law is in–
valid. I get sellen hllndred CroWIIS, while ellery Tom, Dick, and Harry is entitled
to eighteen 11IlI1dred.
I had to slave twenty years to get where I was, and that hunch–
backed whippersnapper took over one two three the moment I was
gone.
As SOOIl as I'd tallght than what they lIeeded, they tossed me out on my
