THE SIXTEENTH
Martin’s world ceased being blackyellow. He’d sensed for a long time now that those warning signs were fading away, that the whole childish game, which was to divide the world into mine and yours, would run out of steam. Eva went off to Prague to study languages. His brother Petr got his longed-for pink slip (that’s what the stamped insert permitting travel to the West was called. It actually was pink). He showed the stamp of the Interior Ministry to Martin — he didn’t let him take it in hand; he only showed it to him. ‘So it’s only good for two weeks: to Hannover for the expo. Then what?’
‘I hope it won’t be fourteen years before we see one another again,’ his brother said in a voice husky with emotion.
And so it happened that Petr, whom Martin didn’t understand anyway, d
