‘What do I do? Should I divorce her?’ asks Csabi, though he already knows the answer.

Aurora smiles.

‘Once you have converted, there is only one way to separate from your spouse. And you know it.’

Death.

After this, a series of afternoons and nights passes, all soaked through with the lovers’ passion. Csabi doesn’t get what the woman sees in him, but he ceased to be in control of his life a long time ago. Perhaps he never had been. The Great Lord dreams through eternity without purpose. The planets and black holes and dead suns drift helplessly through the black mud of the universe. One betrayal more or less has no importance whatsoever in the great indifference of things.

Neither does murder.

The night before the funeral Csabi doesn’t get any sleep. He is eagerly waiting for something to show up in the night, something so terrible that he could die at once out of sheer terror. Then he wouldn’t need to make decisions anymore. A tear rolls down his face.

If the Great Lord is indeed dreaming, his dreams moving the world, if the faith of the believers is true, then murder doesn’t matter. It’s a part of life and it’s not only forgiven, but welcome. And if there is no Great Lord, then there is only Csabi and his decisions. He decides whether to be a good or a bad person. Whether he’ll be a murderer or an innocent man. In that case the indifference of the universe wouldn’t redeem his sins. He would have to live with them.

By sunrise Csabi has made up his mind.

Right at this moment Peter wakes from a dream, screaming.

‘The prison again?’ asks Mari while stripping the soaked pajamas off the old man’s body.

Peter nods.

‘Prison, prison, yes,’ he says in a hushed voice.

It’s a lie. He dreams of the children. Of the smell of their fear, their stammered promises as they try to bargain for their lives. The moment the warmth of their outpouring blood corrupts the cold winter air. The sound of their last breath, and the deafening silence that follows.

For a long while his mind has been free of these thoughts, but now it’s as if it happened yesterday. He has been suppressing his desire for such a long time.

The purpose of the sacrifice had been so the family would survive the war, so they wouldn’t get packed on trains along with the Jews, or get slaughtered on the main street by passing troops, their houses burned down, their women raped and their children mutilated. It had to be done in order to survive. It had to be done so the eye of the enemy would overlook them.