THE DOGS OF PEACE

by

Alan C. Baird

INT. TRIANON - LATE, LATE, LATE AT NIGHT. JUNE, 1920.

What's this? A meat hook impales the familiar red/white/green shape of a certain Eastern European country, Austria's unwilling wartime partner. The supporting cable contains a weight-scale meter which reads 100.

An officious little functionary with a huge nose approaches the meat hook. He's brandishing a much-too-big cutlass, and obviously fancies himself quite the swordsman. As he delicately slices a small piece from the red/white/green map's left side, its weight-scale now indicates 98, and a tiny drop of red liquid runs down the side of the meat-hook-impaled map.

The functionary grabs the portion he's carved off, and throws it over to a slavering dog, who waits in the shadows. The pooch is oddly colored - red/white/red, top-to-bottom.

The functionary is now beginning to enjoy his bloody little task, and steps up to the map with relish. As he severs a sizable chunk from the top, his weight-scale shows 79, and the red liquid flows down freely, all over the map. He tosses this newest filet negligently over to several smaller dogs, who wait hungrily in another dark corner.

SLASH! Another incision appears near the map's bottom, and the weight-scale hovers near 60. An unruly pack of canines begins to fight over this wedge. Blood spurts all over them.

One last gash butchers a huge area from the right side, dropping the weight-scale below 29. The functionary is now smeared with red, and he's grinning fiendishly, as he hands over the territory to a pit bull. This dog is also colored strangely: blue head, yellow midsection, and red hindquarters.

FADE TO BLACK.

[Afterword: Over 70% of one country "vanished" in The Great War. Today, the exiles' great-great-great-grandkids still think in Magyar.]

Editor's note: Few nations in contemporary history have been struck by a calamity of such lasting impact as Hungary when, on June 4, 1920, as a consequence of the peace treaty of Trianon, she was deprived of her historical boundaries and two-thirds of her territory and population, including 3,400,000 Hungarians attached to the neighboring states. At the same time, Germany lost but 13.5 percent of its former lands to victorious neighbors, and Bulgaria a mere 8 percent. Thus, the greatest injustice in Paris was committed against Hungary, as if that country were mainly to blame for the war and its outbreak.

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Alan is the Harvard Book Prize winner who recently coauthored "9TimeZones.com" - a hardback/softcover/web/wap project featured in the Whitney Biennial. He lives just a stone's throw away from Hollywood... which is fine and dandy, until the stones are thrown back.

Alan can be reached via email at: acbaird@yahoo.com.

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