“She’s the Cheetah, isn’t she? That’s what I keep hearing from her little sister.”
Sewer Rat jumped right in on my behalf. “There’s a bit more to it.”
“You mean to tell me she actually used that gun. It wasn’t just for the picture? Not just a pose?”
“Sure, it was just a pose,” Sewer Rat said as he winked at me. “You’re a real ham, Cheetah, you know that?” Then he said to my aunt: “You may want to ask the Russians about that. Or the ÁVO guards at Vác.”
My aunt locked her gaze on me. She took a long pull on her cigarette and let the smoke out of her mouth slowly so she could inhale it back through her nostrils. “My, my,” she said. “You mean to tell me she’s a hero. You know what happens to heroes in Hungary? Sooner or later, they end up in jail. If the Russians and the ÁVO stay in power,
