vissza a fõoldalra

SUITE ONE: THE CHALLENGE

Make sure to take some time out of your day and visit a website that has been one of our most generous patrons throughout the years. On their site, you can read about online casino affiliate programs and how you can make an earning by partnering up and promoting the games and deals of an online gambling establishment


1/1. Village - under the ground

A worm appears from the dark with a roaring sound, as if reaching for the light from its underground lair. A poisonous viper glides away nearby, racing towards the surface. It reaches the sunlight on a hillside; we can see Kesernyes ('Bitterville'), the tiny Hungarian village from this location, as it lies calmly in the valley.

2/1. Uncle Cseklik's house - int.

"Hukkle", an unsuppressable sound is heard while still on the vista shot. Then we are in a room.
Uncle Jozsi Cseklik is very old; he lives on his own, in a run-down yet romantic house complete with veranda. He is currently fiddling around with the food carrier, ignites the gas and warms up the puree. Then we get another dose of the strange sound: "hukkle". Uncle Jozsi takes a couple of bites, but this hukkle won't let him: his body contracts with a jerk as the sound leaves his mouth. He is hiccuping, hukkle, but he is used to it for long, nothing against it. He picks up a heavy blanket from the bed and a metal can with milk in it, and leaves his room. He tries to calm himself, taking advantage of this no deposit bonus offer and win up to $100 + 150 free spins, so he can spend his time reading reviews and playing free online casino games until his hiccup passes out. Hukkle, his hiccups return with short intervals.

2/2. Uncle Cseklik's house

The wooden door opens creaking -- creeeak --, the old man steps out through it onto the street. Hukkle; he sits on the bench in front of the house. Hukkle. The warped wood replies him: nyek, hukkle, nyek, hukkle, nyek... They keep replying each other.
A fully-grown boar approaches from the end of the street -- plutch, plutch --, its smaller-sized owner follows -- knick-knock, knick-knock, knick-knock --, driving the boar with a stick. They pass the sitting old man, the shepherd lifts his hat -- shurrr --.
A kid on bycicle appears on the other side: he cracks a thin leash above his head, sheep running ahead of him. Behind him the postman rides his bycicle furiously, overtakes him, waves at the old man, rings his bike and rides away. He knocks at the neighboring house, a smiling Grandma takes her pension from him. She signs the receipt, the pen is spluttering.
Cows stir a giant cloud of dust under uncle Cseklik's nose; he keeps on hiccuping. A small child is eating a huge piece of bread with honey. He drops it in the dust, he seems to lose heart, but then he picks it up and eats it.
Geese, ducks, hens make a lot of noise in the neighboring gardens, while a cat cleans itself on a window sill -- slup-slup --.

2/3. Uncle Cseklik's house

A horse carriage approaches from afar, the clatter of hooves grows in volume; tluck-tlick, tluck-tlick, hukkle, nyek... tluck-tlick, tluck-tlick, hukkle, nyek... The snoring of the drunken driver is now audible: Khrooo... khrooooo... ooo... It fades into the other noises, becomes element of them.
We are on the carriage, passing uncle Cseklik sitting on the bench. The dim-witted boy is the driver; he is asleep. The horses pull the rubber-wheeled wagon in a slow, monotonous way--as if to the rhythm of uncle Cseklik's hiccups. We see 20-liter metal cans on the carriage; their clinking sound adds another color to the gradually unfolding noise symphony (clink-clink).

3/1. At the spring

The horses stop at a spring at the village border. The boy unmounts the motoric pump, hurls one end to lake formed by the source, and starts the engine. Then he picks up one of the cans from the car and places the snakelike hose in it (clink-clink, chub-chub). Clear water slowly gathers in it; he smokes a cigarette in the meantime; he coughs. He plays with the tree branches, picks his nose, wates time until the gurgling water fills the can. A bird is singing on the tree. A mouse slips into a hole in the ground, each adding its own noise to the harmonic order of the sounds.

3/2. At the spring - the pasture

Sheep graze at the nearby pasture, they bleat, bite the grass; a dog with a harsh bark drive the clinking herd. In the shade of the tree a younger shepherd girl rests; as she lifts her head it becomes audible and visible that she is listening to music; a sparkling Discman lies in her satchel; meanwhile she lets a ladybird run free on her body, letting it reach intimate zones; she seems to enjoy it, and so does the boy peeping from behind the bushes.
The horses wait patiently, graze, the carriage squeaks from time to time as they pull on it. The water has long filled up the 20 liter can by now but the boy is not concerned with it; the spring water proceeds to flow out of the mouth of the can; it is quiet, the landscape is lovely. The ladybird leaves the girl, it is now dancing coquettely on the nose of the boy; he is smiling dumbly.

4/1. Field - cirque

The horses graze intently, pulling the carriage with them as they go searching for beter grass; they end up on the field behind the spring which is not visible from there.

4/2. Field

An old lady with a good-willed face is leaning on the field; highly romantic scene as if in a movie; bees fly onto the petals of suddenly grown wonderful flowers; in a few seconds, a seedbud is growing into a long-stemmed plant accompanied by a strong frictional sound, then a host of colorful flowers open up with pops . Trees are whispering in the background, the grass and colorful flowers of the field are waving; small fleecy clouds swim through the sky slowly. In the middle the old lady in black is picking flowers. A small hare is watching her skilful hands from the grass. A guinea-fowl about to sleep is blinking down on her from a nut-tree; but the insects and snails are also aware of the careful human intervention; the lady is preoccupied with a distinctive, dark purple plant that rests among the multi-colored variety; she is singing quietly. Suddenly, a stork quivers nearby; then we leave the scene.

4/3. Field - flying

We are flying above the village, with the stork as our leader; it flies all the way to the pub.

5/1. Pub - int.

Door, curtains, brandywine, bowling dummy, fahrt. A fly is circling a glass of brandy; beverage pours in the glass; the bartender is measuring the halfpint; the fly comes to a rest on his arm for a second, then flies on. Pastoral pub with a small garden containing a bowling course made up of planks.
The sounds are the main thing now: squeak of the door, clap of the glass, chink of the coins, crackle of the matches, mush of the television (with an old hit: The world lasts for a single day), clap of the coin machine, strike of the darts, clang of the chain curtains, the dog, the bowling and so forth.

5/2. Pub - ext.

Ten to fifteen people contemplating over their sour wine or brandy; they hooray to the bowlers, yelling; the bowlers keep on hitting the dummies; when the ball hits, there is a sudden darkness: the ball covers the light from us.
6/1. The apiarist's grange

It is dark; scraping, brisk noises to be heard, a short swish from time to time, then wet splash; we are among bees, on our way from the bottom of the hive, as one of sixty-thousand drones dashing to the queen. The buzz is growing in volume, so do the bees in numbers. We can now make out the giant female ruler as she plops out her offsprings as her servants buzz around.
Then lightness fills the dark of the hive; a killing weapon--seen as a huge stake from the point of view of a bee, but only as a needle from that of a man--drives through the body of the mother queen. In his odd protector suit, net on his head, the apiarist makes sure that he succeeded in his queen-refreshment.
Fire blazes, the brown top of the reed starts to glow, then to smoke; the apiarist uses this to calm down the bees. The smoke creeps inside within the frames, it is sharply visible in the strong sunlight piercing the little house. The body of the more lively insects flashes in an even sharper yellow as they assault the invader through his suit, even if it means their death. The apiarist is long used to the bites, it gies with the job; he lifts the frame swiftly and places it in the cylindrical machine; he turns it on, it starts with a screech, the spindle begins to rotate, then golden honey starts flowing through a thin tube at the side of the cylinder.

... (see 6/2.)

The apiarist takes off the net and the cap from his head; he grubs into his sweaty hair that falls in knots. He drops them on the ground; he kisses the entering Boske and peeps out from the door to the road to make sure no one saw her coming; shot with a hidden camera; Boske does not want to enter. The apiarist, to save the situation, acts as if the lunch has just arrived and he brings a cup of honey in exchange.
The bees zealously gather honey in the sunlight. A bit later the apiarist sits down to have a luch upon completing his schedule. He is eating with a spoon; a vagabond bee climbs down in his collar...

6/2. The apiarist's grange - bycicle road (from the middle of 6/1.)

A bycicle runs swiftly on the tight forest trail; a woman in her fifties rides it, a carrier bag is hanging on the handle bar. She turns to enter the apiarist's grange.

7. The dressmaker's

A sewing needle cuts into the canvas like a bee's sting. Faster and faster, again and again; thread is worked, binding two pieces together. A small piece is sewn to another, skilful womanhands arrange it under the quickly running needle.
A sewer's box opens, it contains needle, thread, jar of oil (the jar is picked up by a woman), bobbin, materials.
Once they are done with their phase of duty, the women pass the clothes in creation to the ones sitting behind them, who sew another piece on them, then pass the clothes to those sitting behind them. When the clothes make a full circle across the two rows in the long room and get ready, the garment is packed in a sack (the coat is just like the dim-witted boy was wearing at the spring), and put in a red car.
Morose women toil, chat with the boss at the window, lean out to the street, exchange little jars among each other.

8/1. Unlce Cseklik's house - car

The red car startles a bunch of hens scratching about at the ditch side and drives off to the distance; it passes the postman who is just unmounting his bycicle and presents a sum of cash to a smiling old lady, along with a receipt.
8/2. Unlce Cseklik's house

The red car races past uncle Cseklik's house; the old man is still hiccuping; he is not out of rhythm. He gazes in front of himself and hiccups away unshakably. He went along with the rhythm of the bees buzzing, the pub's chinking and cheering, the sewing machines' rattling -- or rather it was his hiccuping that defined the mysterious harmony in the first place. Uncle Cseklik is sitting on his bench like a storyteller.
Just when the red car races in front of him, a corn harvester approaches from the other direction; it stretches out on the road slowly and calmly; the clap of the driving belt, the metallic wobbling of the lopping shears, the puffing of the top-mounted exhaust all seem to reply to his hiccups.

9. On the fields

The farmerwife can't wait for the harvester to arrive; she is standing outside on the road leading to her farm. She knew that once she's got the machine, they are done with the work in a jiffy.
Corn stalks fall under the machine; a scared little fawn is looking for a way to flee from the oppressive, noisy harvester; the corn field proved as a shelter until now, but not anymore.
Corn seeds are getting ground in the bowels of the ugly machine; a truck is positioned under the outlet pouring seeds; it escorts the harvester humbly; when the bay is full, it leaves the field.

10/1. Mill - on the way there

The truck is driving on a motorway, the farmerwife looks at it as she is hoeing in the vineyard; besides her there is a scarecrow, as if her partner.

10/2. Cornmill - ext.

The truck finally arrives at the cornmill.

10/3. Cornmill

The truck unloads all its seeds onto the weigh-house; the dredger carries them off to form a pile. From the pile, the seeds fall into a shaft, then a conveyor belt carries them inside the clattering mill. The huge steel structure is operating on its own; the machines are working but no one is around. There is only a cat on top of the controller's booth.
The corn is being ground on its own, leaving on the other side as flour, then being packed so that...

11/1. Grandma's house

...Grandma can take it from the shelf in order to prepare the lunch. She needs the cornflour for Grandpa's meal who can only eat pulps since his throat operation. The rest of the family is allowed to have princely meals. Ingredient: one hen from the court. We see this hen running away from Grandma who finally kills it, pours boiling water on it in the trough, deplumes it, adds onions, vegetables to it from the garden, produces spices, two eggs from under the hens and so forth.
Then the chicken soup and the stew are being made--to a rhythm; she cuts the onions into small slices, along with the celery and parsley, then puts on a large pot of water to boil, cuts the hen to pieces, cooks fat, kneads dumplings and pours seasoning in the soup.

11/2. Grandma's house

Guests from the town arrive at the country Grandma; they park their Audi in the court; the front door opens -- clat --, the young man alights, then the other door opens -- clat --, the wife, finally the children alight through the back doors -- clat, clat --, the front door closes -- paff --, the trunk is being opened -- paff, nyee, paff, paff --, Grandma glances outside, the hinge creaks -- anyee, paff -- they all enter the house -- tip, top, paff.

11/3. Grandma's house - int.

Everyone is merry, Grandma sets the table conscientiously; the family is together. Smiling Grandma prepares a special shake for Grandpa; she puts the chicken meat and the pulp in the shaker, and since this is a feast-day, she adds some pickles and some white liquid from a jar, then mills them together. They are eating; spoons clatter, glasses clink, knives makes squeaks at the bottom of the plates; the father hiccups once.
The six year old grandson likes the shaker machine a lot, but he is only allowed to eat normal food. This is why he grabs and hides the shake bottle when no one is watching; he settles down with it in a hidden corner of the court, and starts licking what Grandpa has left of it; he gives some to the cat that appears: he licks one half of his finger, the cat the other.

11/4. Grandma's house

We leave with the cat, following it where it goes; its legs fail to obey it, running separately, as if under the influence of a major power; it falls down a couple of times but staggers to its feet; finally it is unable to rise once more, it is just looking at us; its eyes are still alive but will not move.

11/5. Grandma's house - dirt road

Dead cat on the road; its skin starts to wiggle, strangely sinks in, but
the body remains stiff with no shine; soon the stomach opens up, loads of white worms pour out of it, and devour the flesh in second, leaving the bones white. Then even the bones crumble away on the sun; in a few seconds there is but dust remaining of the cat, which can be blown away by the weakest wind.

11/6. Grandma's house - dirt road

A car's wheel drives onto the now cleared up road; the wheel of a police car; it brakes, and the village policeman alights from it; he starts investigating the sky with a telescope hanging on his neck; then he sits back in the car and drives off.


SUITE TWO: THE CONTEXT

12. Uncle Cseklik's house

Uncle Cseklik is about to sit down on his bench with a milk can and weathered blanket when the police car races past him; he is still hiccuping steadfastly. The postman is doing his job in the background, chatting with women, distributing money.

13/1. The apiarist's house

The police car stops at a modern village house; the young policeman alights and calmly proceeds to the house through the garden. He pats the dog; he is home, not at work. He walks into the house, greets his parents in the kitchen, his mother pours soup in his plate, his father, the apiarist, pours wine, but the son's glass is only half filled, the bottle is emptied. The mother takes the glass from the son. The man walks out for more wine, the camera follows him, and he reenters with a keg; the camera does not reenter; the woman feeds the hens in the court; the two men come from the inside, chowing sausages, laughing and joking with the dog; the woman is not bothered by them, she reenters the house.

13/2. The apiarist's house

We walk in the room with the poiceman; the television is turned on: the woman is watching a Brazilian soap; his son sits besides her; he is very tired after today's work.
Meanwhile, the apiarist goes into the bathroom, washes his face, observing it and does some back exercises; his wife is visible through the half-open door as she walks into the kitchen, does the dishes and places a small jar in the depth of a shelf; she murmurs a prayer.
The apiarist mixes two beverages, takes them out to the living room, sits with his son on the couch, they light a smoke, clink but neither of them starts to drink. They sit silently next to each other; when the woman passes them, the apiarist drinks his wine and escorts the departing policeman back to his car without any haste. It is dawning, the postman rides his bike in the distance.
The woman turns the eggs in the incubator in the middle of the room; the apiarist follows his wife into the bedroom; when he is inside, he sees she is in the bed already; he puts on a nightgown and lies next to the woman; they are strangers to each other, only their movements complement the other's; they lie silently. The growing chicken lies also restless under the safe eggshell. The woman rises unexpectedly from the bed, puts on slippers, leaves the room, hurries through the now empty house; she discovers the untouched glass of beverage in the living room; she turns off the light.

14/1. Shepherd's grange

The shepherd girl from the pasture turns on the light in her home; movement strikes the silence, triggered by the sharp light. Three men of three generations lies around in the house; they are apparently sick, hardly able to sit up; this is the time of feeding. The girl warms the food, helps the men sit down at the table (they are not disabled, just dazed), watches them with the master's eyes as they eat.

14/2. Shepherd's grange - ext.

Outside the window, the bluish, dawn landscape is calm; the lambs are bleating. We approach the nearby hill slowly; we are so close that the camera almost hits the ground.

14/3. Shepherd's grange - under the ground

(At the moles) The camera does hit the ground, but proceeds further, we are now under the ground, among the clods, until we encounter a groove; a black mole is using it; we follow him; he hurries towards his family to warm them up. Then he starts off again to hunt; when he is far from his lair, he digs himself up to the surface, then progresses underground; suddenly a gigantic blade pierces the groove, leaving strong sunlight in its place; it enters again and again; the mole escapes.

15/1. The midwife's house - court

The pleasant-faced old lady who picked flowers back then is now hoeing the cabbages in her garden; that is, she is hunting for moles; with a swift move she elevates the mole and catches it; the chained dog barks heavily at the newcomer; the pleasant-faced lady protects it, keeping it away from the dog; a pleasant scene, so pro-animal; the doorbell rings.
It is the postman, he came with the disability pension; the lady looks out, throws the mole to the dog, then hurries to the front door to pick up the money; in front of the house, in the cold shadow, an even older woman lies helplessly. At her head, a small pot is visible containing a milklike liquid; a fly is dying in it. The postman seems intrigued by the helpless woman, he watches her; the dog lacerates the mole. The pleasant-faced lady signs the two papers and receives the money; he waits until the postman rides off then enters the house.

16/1. Street

The boar approaches in the company of the little man -- plutch, knick-knock, plutch, knick-knock, plutch --; they pass along the midwife's fence; we follow them; they are going to work in this house, and it's a well-paid job.

16/2. Street - in the sty

The sow grunts as the boar climbs on her; the pig owner and the lady watches their enviable zest with a smile.

16/3. Street - The midwife's house, backyard

Through the boards of the sty we can see the midwife's house; we peep on the midwife hurrying towards the kitchen; she tidies it up: stacks pots, pours liquid into jars, does the dishes, cleans the table with a cloth; she even turns on the radio; she begins to dance to the music, she is in a fine mood; she fills up the jars with white liquid.

16/4. Street

The boar is done with his job, backs off to the street through a narrow span; the boar goes first; when he enters the bridge -- plutch --, the cement crumbles a bit under the weight -- sshhh --, a small piece falls in the water -- plitch --, startling the frog resting there; the frog jumps in the water -- chob -- (+ frog subjective from the leaving boar).

17/1. Angling pond

We follow the frog swimming: it slaloms between tin cans and plastic
bags until it reaches a larger body of water.

17/2. Angling pond

There the poor frog is eaten alive by a catfish, and we continue with the fish to the deep; it swims past a male corpse, biting into the rotting flesh; then we hear a splash that startles the fish; it notices a hovering worm and bites on it; the hook gets a hold in its mouth and a wire starts pulling it outwards.

17/3. Angling pond

An angler is sitting on the beach, he is Rapsic, and he is happy to get a catch; he hits the fish and packs it, then rides off on his bycicle; the fish hangs besides the bike.
Rapsic meets the policeman at the embankment, he shows him the fish proudly; he gives away the smaller ones; then he rides away.
An old woman with sorrowful eyes is sitting in the policecar; they drive to the booths at the other side; they leave the car; the policeman looks around; a rod in the water, half a sandwich next to the chair, all is here, the fish are long dead in the net, the key is in the booth's lock as if the angler would be back in a second. The woman looks at the water and sobs; he prays quietly so that the policeman would not notice; something is here that he does not like; he is investigating the set of clues, thinks long, opens the booth door.

18. Rapsic's house

The catfish's body hits the table; Rapsic, the poacher, is eating; their daughters sit around the other, smaller table; he feels cursed by having daughters only, in fact five of them. The woman observes him gravely; the girls seem to be filled with hatred and fear; they look away from him. They do not have a single word: the man is eating with good appetite; only him. His wife goes outside; we move to Rapsic's back and we see through his body;
as if watching an x-ray footage, he is swallowing the food.

19. Doctor's office

The x-ray picture is now observed by a doctor in his office. The patient is a scrawny middle-aged man; he is half-naked; his wife appears nervous; the phone rings, the assistant picks it up, listens, notes something on a paper; puts it down, but it rings again. The doctor sinks into a chair, thinking hard, clueless. Then he lets out a sigh and produces a large print; he fills it according to the ID card, signs and stamps it; in the meantime the man dresses, his wife is watching the doctor's movement intently.
In the waiting room the men are sitting, the wives are standing; they are escorting their husbands; there are lots of them, and all the men seem to share the same distress, the same sour fate. The man and wife step out from the office: the man is obviously very ill, his wife is apparently very joyous, though trying to hide it; she holds the large print and kisses her husband; he looks proudly over to the other wives when passing through them; they look at each other slyly.
On the street she helps her husband get on the carriage; the dim-witted boy is waiting with the horses; the woman takes the reins from his hands and rides away.
The apiarist is cominfg from the other direction; he is walking on the highway into the distance; he carries special apiarist tools on his shoulders; when he is far away, almost as if part of the scenery, he suddenly tumbles over like a hoe.

20. Pub

The bowling dummy tumbles over; there are only six men left playing; one of the old guys stands up the fallen dummies and carries the ball back to the others; they notice a burial procession on the road, progressing to the cemetery. Except the old guy, all the men join the village march.

21. Street

The carriage is squeaking; the little coffin is heavy indeed; behind the cart we see the meal-cooking Grandma dressed in black, walking slowly, the family besides her in mourning garment; even the throat-operated Grandpa is present; the grandson is dead.
Village dwellers, hired mourners scuff after them; towards the end of the procession, not everyone is dressed in black; many were driven here by curiosity. In the silence the sighs, tears, sobs are heard amplified; Flowers rattle in their cellophane, creased handkerchiefs rustle, sad steps knock. The postman takes his cap off when seeing the procession.


SUITE THREE: THE FINISH

22/1. Uncle Cseklik's house

The procession passes uncle Cseklik; he is hiccuping, staring in front of himself; the mourners leave, we stay with uncle Cseklik; suddenly the hiccups are over. Even he is surprised; there is deep silence now; everything is silent, the animals stop moving, too.

22/2. Uncle Cseklik's house

And then the earth begins to shake; the table is trembling in the lunch hall, the wine circles in the pub glass, the wall is cracks in Grandma's house, chinas dance around in the apiarist's display case. Even the industrial sewing machines tremble in the oppressive din; in the cornmill millions of yellow seeds rearrange into new dunes, the dead flies in the pot near the midwife's grandmother shake madly.
The animals flee helplessly from the judgment day, the fawn is running in the wheat field, the rabbit seeks shelter in the forest, chaos ensues in the hen houses, even the chained fox in Rapsic's house
is scratching the cage desperately.
The earth shakes in the cemetary as well, and on the freshly dug grave a distinctive plant is growing out from the earth slowly, striking leaves,
buds and finally hairy crops; it is the kind of plant the pleasant-faced lady was picking on the field.
We can feel the overwhelming quake and landslide in all the scenes; the landing stages crash into the water at the angling pond, the medicine vials come to life in the doctor's office; even the church bell starts tolling; this is the end of the world.

22/2. Uncle Cseklik's house - cemetary

The earth shakes in the cemetary as well, and on the freshly dug grave a distinctive plant is growing out from the earth slowly, striking leaves,
buds and finally hairy crops; it is the kind of plant the pleasant-faced lady was picking on the field.

22/3. Uncle Cseklik's house - pasture

And then the latest type of fighter plane flies across the village, coming from the american military base in Taszar; first we can only see a black spot over the field, but as it approaches, we can gradually make out its form; the sheep grazing on the field gather together, then start running in all directions when the plane whizzes past above them with an unearthly roar; the shepherd girl is now alone on the field.

22/channel. Uncle Cseklik's house - channel

The plane maneuvers under the Sio-channel, then pulls up sharply;
the policeman walking on the bridge cannot believe his eyes.

22/4. Uncle Cseklik's house - in the plane

The pilot removes his mask and laughs wholeheartedly at his dangerous stunt.

22/5. Uncle Cseklik's house

Silence follows; then the old man suddenly: hukkle. Hiccups break up from him; he starts it off in the same rhythm as of old; hukkle, hukkle... But all the noises are now amilified around him; this is the beginning of the end.

23. Pub

The old guy is standing alone at the end of the bowling course and rolls; he hits all the dummies; he glances around triumphantly, but nobody is present; he walks front to get the ball for himself, but he lost his spirit.

24. Street

The giant boar walks past in front of the pub's fence; he is going home all alone without escort; he turns in at the gate, looks for the sty and lies down in the mud alone.

25. Police

First we only hear sound bits as we cross the threshold; metallic sounds, as the typewriter's keys clatter, the key turns in the lock, iron bar opens and closes, a safe door squeaks. As we approach from the corridor, the noises are amplifying; we glance into a room through a half-open door; a few people inside; employees idling about as if it's Sunday.
The policeman, son of the apiarist, comes in this room with the camera; he sits down in distress to his table; he inserts paper in his typewriter but does not start to type; he fetches a keyring and unlocks the drawer; he picks up photographs from it, observing them with care; then he pours water for himself, drinks, thinks hard. He starts walking up and down; he looks out to the gray sky through the window; down there the postman is giving pension money to a middle-aged woman. The policeman watches them and thinks, looking at the postman, the woman, the money; then he takes his cap and leaves the house.

26. Wine cellar

The apiarist's wife tries to remove a hornet lair from the wall with a broomstick; she holds an empty bucket; she appears nervous, her movements are clumsy, this is not something she is used to; but she is in a hurry.
She is sucking the wine from a big barrel with a calabash; she pours it into the bucket, and when it's full, she brings it out to the vineyard and pours it on the ground. She is hurrying up so much that she is obstructing herself in doing so; when the liquid reaches her mouth, she sneezes and spits nervously. When she is making one of these rounds at the cellar, her son suddenly appears behind her back at the door; the woman senses the presence and turns around; she stares emptily at his son; she is disabled by desperation, all she hears is the blood throbbing in her ears; the contents of the calabash is pouring on the ground. The policeman stares back stupefied, there is dread and sadness in his eyes. They look at each other for some time; there is nothing more to tell, both know it all.

27. Culture house

The policeman proceeds straight to the culture house; there is a bridal feast here; the young couple is apparently ill-fitting even now: she is young and cold, he is older, drunken, joyous, offspring of a rich family; they wedded in a few hours; the wedding guests are all intoxicated, we see red faces and noses, we hear sounds of a pleasant mood. The tables all contain the remains of the supper; some still eat; most of them are drinking by now, smoking, chatting tipsily stood up or leaning to the wall. The smoke and the cacophony are overwhelming; in the middle the village female choir are singing a song on their screeching voice: 'The world lasts a single day'; they are actually widows dressed in black. Only a few young girls among them in pied national dress; one of them now stands forth and starts singing a wonderful folk song: 'I am orphaned...'.
The policeman is besides himself in the midst of the feast; he is very much alone; unable to hear or see anything; he does not even notice when he is being nudged or when an acquiantance greets him; the story has assembled and finalized clearly in his mind.

28. Uncle Cseklik's house

The house is familiar to us, though it is dawn; orange sparks leap forth from the chimney; the bench is empty; we hear hiccups from the house: hukkle; they are audible on the street. Uncle Cseklik zithers a bit before going to bed, then he tucks himself in and turns off the light. Slowly, the rain starts falling; at first it's just a background to his hiccups, then the nocturnal shower takes over, like a round of applause on the asphalt.

- THE END -