by Imre Kertész
“What about him over there?” Köves gestured with his head toward a farther-off table by the street-side window, where he saw a silver-maned man, whose rugged face with its marked unruly features seemed to vouch for extraordinary passions that were held in check only with great difficulty. He wore spectacles with double lenses, the outer of which were dark-tinted and could be flipped up (as Köves could tell because they happened to be flipped up), and he seemed to be immersed in some occupation that could not be made out from where they were—Köves would not have been surprised if it were to turn out he was writing a musical score or painting miniature pictures. Sziklai’s face, however, burst almost into splinters when his gaze swung across in the direction Köves was indicating:
“Pumpadour,” he laughed. In his free time he, too, was one of the Uncrowned’s employees. To paint the dye onto the fabric intended for peasant women they used a spray device driven, or pumped, by a treadle, and that work is usually done by Pumpadour, which is the name given him by the Uncrowned, who incidentally appreciates the joke and is a fan of the theatre, and by way of a full-time job Pumpadour worked for the theatre across the street as one of the extras (Köves was almost surprised, this being the first he had heard that the town had a theatre), beside which he also took on repairing clocks and watches. No doubt that’s what he was doing right then, repairing someone’s watch, though while on the subject it often occurs that once he’s taken a watch to bits he’s never able to put it together again, and all the customer gets back is the dial, the metal case, and a heap of tiny springs and cogs, carefully wrapped in a sheet of paper, despite which he’s never short of work, because the way he shakes a watch, puts it to his ear, opens its lid to take a look at the clockwork through those double-lensed spectacles—that inspires people with confidence time after time, not to speak of the low prices he charges.
All Köves could learn about a blonde woman—a striking figure, the way she propped her face, interesting after its own fashion, with the chin resting on her folded hands, staring with an empty gaze at nothing, an untouched glass of spirits on the table—was the name by which she was known in the South Seas: “the Transcendental Concubine,” whereas it was Sziklai who drew his attention to a grey-templed, suntanned, conspicuously elegant gentleman, remarking that Uncle André was “the Chloroformist.”
“How’s that?” Köves laughed, and Sziklai related that once upon a time, when foreign countries still had links by international railways, Uncle André used to strike up acquaintances with rich ladies travelling first class, then by night press a wad of cotton wool, doused with chloroform, over their faces and then rob them; according to Sziklai, even now Uncle André knew by heart the timetable of all the express trains on the continent (if express trains were still running, that is, and the old timetables were still valid), even though he personally had been “withdrawn from service” on several occasions, indeed for long years at a time. As to what he did nowadays “to maintain standards,” all Sziklai knew was:
“It’s a mystery.” To which he added shortly afterwards: “Women, you can bet it’s women: that’s all it can be.”
There were, of course, other customers, respectable people, about whom there was nothing to tell, and others about whom there was, though Köves just listened without really taking it in, and he was not even convinced that he was hearing what he did hear: he both believed it and he didn’t—ephemeral glimmers in a continually ebbing and rearranging wash of waves of voices, images and impressions, and people would have no doubt misconstrued his absent-mindedness, which was in truth a discovery, admittedly a somewhat gloomy, somewhat melancholic discovery, yet nevertheless sweet, like the taste of long-gone happiness, but all of a sudden he found he was being slapped on the shoulder by someone and urged “Chin up!”
“We’ll get by somehow,” said Sziklai looking pensively at Köves. “There are two ways,” he went on: “the short and narrow, which leads nowhere, then the long and roundabout way, which leads to who knows where, but at least one has the sense of moving ahead. You should bear that in mind,” he added promptly with a touch of care-laden anxiety.
“Why?” Köves asked, grumpily, like someone whose tranquillity is being threatened, yet with the faint smile of someone who has not yet given up all hope.
“Because,” said Sziklai, “I reckon it’s amusing and could be put to good use in a piece.”
“What sort of piece?” Köves reluctantly posed the question, perhaps hoping that by posing it he would be able to elude it.
“That’s precisely the point,” said Sziklai. “I reckon a piece should be written,” and Köves started to regain his senses, though only slowly, like a poison administered drop by drop.
“What kind of piece?” he inquired.
“That still needs to be thought over,” said Sziklai, although it appeared that he may well have already thought it over, because he carried on at once: “A stage play would be gratifying, but tricky; the cloven hoof would be glaringly obvious straight away. I reckon it needs to be a light comedy: that’s what will bring success.”
“Success?” Köves questioned, hesitantly, as if he were getting his mouth round a strange, near-unpronounceable word in a foreign language.
“Of course,” Sziklai looked at him impatiently. “One has to make a success of something. Success is the only way out.”
“Out of what?” Köves asked, and for a moment Sziklai scanned his face mistrustfully as if he were searching for some secret.
“What a weird sense of humour you have,” he eventually said, evidently brightening up, like someone who had come to some conclusion: “but you have a sense of humour. I don’t, or at least it limps along when it’s written down on paper. But on the other hand,” he continued, his eyes constantly on Köves, and Köves became more and more ill at ease, because he sensed a demand in Sziklai’s gaze, if nothing else, then at least for his attention: “On the other hand, I’ve been reading up on dramatics for some time. You can study it, you know,” Sziklai gave a dismissive wave, “it’s a load of baloney, only on my own I’m getting nowhere with the dialogues. I don’t even have a really good idea,” he went on, with the tension increasingly getting the upper hand over Köves, an ominous presentiment that he was gradually being sucked into something, a plan perhaps, that was being hatched far away from him yet still was going to claim his energies: “Old bean,” he heard Sziklai’s triumphant cry, “we’re saved: we’ll write a light comedy!” to which Köves said:
“Fine.” Then, as if in self-defence, “But not now,” and they agreed on that. First they needed to sort out their affairs; Sziklai signalled to Alice and, despite Köves’s protests, he paid the bill, adding a big tip to the sum.
“What’s this? Robbed a bank, have we, sirs?” the waitress asked as she buried the money in her apron.
“Marvellous character.” Sziklai followed her with his eye, as if he were already seeing everything in the light of the light comedy to come, but then his face clouded over. “It’s just such a pity,” he added, regretfully.
“Why?” Köves enquired, at which Sziklai peered searchingly around:
“I can’t see him here right now,” he eventually said.
“Who do you mean?” Köves enquired.
“Her … how should I put it, her guy,” said Sziklai.
“Who’s that?” For reasons he was unclear about himself, this time Köves would have been interested to be enlightened—Alice seemed to have caught his attention to some extent, but all Sziklai would say, evasively, was:
“There’s lot of stories about him. And then,” a melancholic insight appeared on Sziklai’s face, “Alice is only a waitress, after all, and waitresses always need someone who can live off them.”
“I see,” said Köves. “Yes, I’ve heard about that sort of thing; the usual story, in other words,” at which they made their way outside, with Sziklai nodding a greeting to a table here and there as they crossed the place. On the street, they shook hands and agreed tha
t one evening they would, as Sziklai put it, “find each other” in the South Seas; indeed, they could leave messages for one another with Alice, now that Köves knew her, and as soon as their affairs were settled they would make a start on the light comedy.
“Until then, rack your brains for a good idea,” Sziklai said by way of a parting shot, and with an easy smile, which may have been directed at the sunshine and the prospect of gratifying a sudden wish for solitude, Köves responded:
“I’ll try.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Permanent residence permit. Landlady, houseman.
Köves went off to the authorities in order to get his temporary residence endorsed as permanent and to obtain ID papers to that effect: Mrs. Weigand, the landlady, had reminded him for the second time that, insofar as he wished to carry on lodging with her, he needed to attend to his official registration as soon as possible.
“Of course, I don’t know what plans you have,” she said casting her clear little pools up at Köves, and Köves smiled uncertainly, as if he had less idea about those plans than even Mrs. Weigand.
“To be sure,” he said, therefore, “I’m finding it very satisfactory here,” as if that were the reason he was there, not anything else, to which the woman responded:
“I’m glad to hear it!” as she picked some invisible thread or crumb off the tablecloth. They were standing in Köves’s small room—Köves had vainly offered Mrs. Weigand the sole chair as a seat, so he too remained standing—with the afternoon already getting on for evening, though not yet time to switch on the lights, and the landlady had just before knocked on Köves’s door. Köves had initially flinched slightly, thinking the boy was going to burst in on him again, but before he called out “Come in!” it occurred to him that it could hardly be him as Peter was not in the habit of knocking.
“You didn’t even mention that you’re a journalist,” the woman carried on, with a hint of mock reproach lurking in her voice and a timid smile appearing on her pallid, pinched face, as if she were in the presence of a renowned man with whom she ought to speak with restraint, and Köves, who had indeed mentioned nothing of the kind, was astounded at how well she was informed. How could that be? Did the grapevine work that fast there? Yet instead of asking for clarification, he considered it of greater urgency for himself to supply some clarification, as if he wished to dispel a disagreeable misunderstanding which almost amounted to mudslinging:
“Yes,” he said, “only I’m not with a newspaper.” Then, not caring what a letdown it might cause the woman (for all he knew she might have already been boasting that she had a journalist as her lodger), he swiftly tacked on: “They fired me.”
But if she did feel any letdown, that did not show on the woman: it seemed as if she had, in some manner, become more relaxed; her face. cagey beforehand, now assuming a surprised, yet for all that, a warmer expression, and in a tone that Köves felt was more natural than before she quietly acknowledged:
“So, they fired you,” and, head slightly askance, she looked up at Köves with interest, and, being a blonde, albeit possibly from a bottle, she now reminded Köves of a canary. “You poor thing,” she added, at which Köves raised an eyebrow as though he were about to protest but didn’t know yet what he should say. It was thus again the landlady who spoke next, now asking in a confidential tone, as if there was no longer anything to hide between them, and at the same time softly, as if she did not want others to hear them (although there was no one except themselves in the room, of course):
“And why?…”
Köves for his part responded:
“Can anyone know?”—an answer which now again seemed not to miss its mark:
“No,” said the woman, slowly lowering herself onto the previously offered but at the time rejected seat, all expression being extinguished from her face, as if she had suddenly become aware of being inordinately tired, “one can’t.” They held their silence for a short while, and so as not to make the landlady feel awkward, Köves sat down too on his bed, while Mrs. Weigand, for want of more crumbs or threads, now started fiddling with the fringe of the tablecloth.
“I’ll tell you what,” she eventually spoke in the deep voice that Köves had heard from her only once before, on the morning of his arrival, “there are times when I feel that I understand nothing any more.” She slowly raised her head to look at Köves, the unexpected pools among the zigzagging wrinkles now seeming to have shadows cast on them by dark clouds. “As a matter of fact,” she continued, “I ought to be apologizing to you.” Then, maybe taking Köves’s silence to be incomprehension or perhaps expectancy: “On account of my son,” she tacked on: “He’s a nuisance, I don’t doubt.” There was no gainsaying it, Köves had been having trouble with the boy; already the very first evening, when Köves was getting ready to go to bed, having had practically no sleep for two days on end, the boy had simply opened the door on him, chessboard under his elbow: “I’m here!” as if, amid the myriad other urgent calls on his time, only now, at last, did he have the time to spare to meet a longstanding obligation toward the lodger. It was useless for Köves to look for a cop-out, in vain that he instanced his tiredness and bad humour, the boy had already spread out the board on Köves’s couch and made a start on setting up the chessmen. “Black or white?” He glanced severely at Köves from behind his glinting spectacles, and promptly answered for him: “White. Your start.” So, Köves started, then waited for his opponent to move, then again moved, hardly paying attention to the board, his hand pulling the pieces about mechanically, essentially independently of himself, in accordance with some dreamlike battle array that his fingers had somehow, no knowing how, retained a memory of, something that had entered them, perhaps, when he was still a boy himself—almost marvelling, Köves smiled to himself at the thought: there had been a time, of course, when he too was a child, and he only snatched up his head in response to a hissing sound. It was Peter, lips contorted, head trembling, his face seemingly drained of the last drop of blood. “Such a cheap sucker trap … a cheap sucker trap … and I fell for it!” he was hissing, glaring at Köves with a look of hatred from behind misted-up spectacles. Then: “I resign!” whereat board and chessmen went flying in all directions, at which Köves, in his initial discomposure, began bending down to pick them up until it came to mind that he was dealing with a child who therefore should not be spoiled but chastised. “Pick up now the bits you’ve chucked around!” he rebuked him in the sternest voice he could manage. But the injunction was unnecessary: the boy was already scrabbling around on all fours on the floor, and just a few minutes later the board was already in front of Köves, with the pieces set in their places. “I’ll hammer you now, thirty times in a row!” the boy informed him through clenched teeth, as if he were preparing to wrestle, rather than play chess, with Köves. He thereupon opened the next game. Köves most likely fell asleep several times while play was in progress, at which the boy would either nudge his knee or bawl out “Your move!” while Mrs. Weigand also popped her head round the door from time to time to enquire shyly: “Is the game not over?” and then disappear again, to which the boy paid no heed, except that once he remarked, evidently not so much for Köves’s benefit as just for its own sake, out of petulance:
“I hate it most of all when she calls it a game!” “Why?” Köves was aroused by a spark of curiosity, “Isn’t that what it is?” “No way,” the boy snapped back curtly. “What then?” Köves poked further: “Work, perhaps?” “Got it in one!” It seemed as though the boy were glancing at Köves with a spot of respect. “I need a way of pulling myself out of this shit!” he added, but without expanding on that; teeth clenched, frowning, he was already pondering the next move, and his voice was already snapping brusquely, dryly, like a rifle shot aimed at Köves: “Check!” In the end, all her rational arguments—that it was late, for instance, or the lodger might be tired, and especially that it was long past Peter’s bedtime, and tomorrow they both had school or the office to face—proved f
ruitless, and Mrs. Weigand had to literally drag her son out of Köves’s room, yet for a long time still that evening Köves was able to hear the boy’s hoarsely menacing and the woman’s soothingly engaged voices.
“An odd boy!” Köves remarked.
“Yes, but you have to understand him.” The woman was quick to get in her counter, and it was somehow well-drilled, as if it were not the first time she had used it and maybe—so Köves sensed—had to keep permanently on tap. “Things aren’t easy for him,” Mrs. Weigand went on, “and I have my difficulties with him. He’s at just the age when he is in most need of his father …”
She fell silent, and Köves, out of some obscure compulsion, as if he had been called upon for some purpose, though he didn’t know precisely what, followed that with:
“To be sure, he went quickly enough …”
What he said cannot have been clear, however, because Mrs. Weigand stared at him uncomprehendingly: “Who did?” she asked.
