- Kata: I think I am terribly afraid.
- János Biró: So am I, it's natural. But at least we can be afraid together.
- János Biró: It will be midnight in a second.
- Kata: I'm so afraid.
- János Biró: Of what?
- Kata: I don't know, I fear death.
- János Biró: Now!
- [inner speech]
- János Biró: It doesn't matter where you are or how you are so long as you feel free inside yourself. Have just a little feeling of security.
- Kata: What did you say?
- János Biró: Happy New Year! I was just saying that the important thing is to be healthy, the rest will come somehow.
- Kata: Happy New Year!
- Pali: They're looting shops, shooting people in broad daylight on the streets. It's not the Germans, but uniformed tram conductors with machine guns. On Rákóczi Street, they've hung up a boy. People are stealing from houses, women taking furs, hats, velvet coats. They're shooting people, throwing them into the Danube as people watch on the other side. With a single armband they've won the right to ransack the streets. I watch their faces with their deceitful eyes. I don't want to live here anymore, that's if I don't die like a dog before it's over. How do you think it will be afterwards, where will those people go? They'll be tram conductors, housekeepers again. This will never end.
- János Biró: How can I explain to you that I'm scared of you, how much I loved Elza in Germany? She spent nights with me secretly coming through the balcony. She reported me to the Gestapo in '33. Anyone and everyone can be their man.
- Kata: Could anyone still betray you? Do you trust anyone to that extent?
- János Biró: This country is like a dirty river. You stir it up a bit and up comes the filth. You could see that today. The only possibility of existence and safety, is not to believe. The only defence is not to talk. The only strength is not to trust anyone.
- Kata: Tell me, do I mean anything at all to you?
- János Biró: It's not that I don't trust people, I don't trust the times we live in. Man wasn't born to live on the limits of his moral proclivity. Understand?
- Kata: I don't know what you mean by "moral proclivity".
- János Biró: My friends from my student days - chemists, doctors, physicists. They're in America, Canada, Australia. They only flirted once with revolution, in 1919. They got scared and realised that they only had one life. In any case, they were talented.
- Kata: Aren't you talented?
- János Biró: I don't know what I am. A girl once told me that I was a second class revolutionary. I think she was right.
- Kata: Who's first class?
- János Biró: Those who are braver.
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