“Good morning!” The children’s clear voices called me from the next room. Breakfast was ready on a glass-covered verandah, opening on to the back garden. The old flower-bed under the sprouting ornamental trees had been replaced by vegetables, but shrubs remained, and beyond the fence were trees, shingled roofs, little gardens. Aspen trees, willows and graceful, slender poplars were reflected from a soft, brilliant mirror—the Ipoly in flood. On the other side of the river were the vineyards where the Czechs were encamped. For two months their guns have been trained on the town. I mentioned my notes; Huszár gave me some paper and a pencil. Then the front door bell rang. Who could it be? It was unusual to have visitors at that hour. Gregory, the faithful old coachman, put his head in. “Two armed Reds are here!” he exclaimed. I clasped my hands in terror. Mrs. Huszár turned white to the lips: “What are we to do if they are after you? The town is full of detectives.” She went out and when she came back she was laughing. “I was never so frightened in my life. They asked me: ‘Does Comrade Huszár live here?’ Then one of them made an awful face and added: ‘We have been informed that there is a—er—library in the house.’ I really thought they had found you. And all they had discovered was our library!” It was a good library; I spent a long time among its volumes, and found them representative of Hungarian history and of the development of Socialism. I determined to study. “You’d better write a book,” said Mrs. Huszár. “When we have got over these times, let people know what we have gone through.” * * * * * _April 18th._ Good Friday. At the feet of Christ’s cross, under the black sky, on the Red land, Hungary has been crucified among the nations. We hoped that an attack on the town would be delivered this night by the Czechs. It sounds sheer madness, and yet it was so. It was different last year, when Károlyi had opened our frontiers and our predatory neighbours could walk in undisturbed on our unconscious, shackled towns. Balassagyarmat was the only one that rose to arms and drove out the intruders. Hideous change! We are waiting for the Czechs! And this day all those who are Hungarians in the republic of the Jewish tyrants are waiting in suspense. * * * * * _April 19th._