by Sándor Márai
They counted back. Béla and Ernõ seemed to have won roughly an equal number of times, Béla playing a high-risk game, Ernõ more cautiously. Ábel and Tibor both lost.
The loser might just as likely have cheated, said Ábel. Perhaps he cheated because he was losing. Everyone is equally under suspicion. You can treat me as a suspect too if you want. It is true that I was the one who discovered the cheating but it might be that I get a kick out of flirting with danger. I might have cheated then made a deliberate point of launching the accusation and taking pleasure in seeing all of you torturing yourselves. That’s why I say we would be idiots to frisk each other. We are all equally under suspicion.
Everyone is suspect, the one-armed one declared happily, grinning.
They weren’t listening to him. Ábel looked up with a pained expression on his face.
But maybe I wasn’t the cheat, he said slowly and speculatively. The strange thing is that we could imagine any one of us cheating so the cap fits all. It seems everyone that may be suspected might be guilty.
That’s an exaggeration, said the one-armed one.
The actor ordered ham with pickled cucumber, a softboiled egg, and tea with lemon. They didn’t look at each other. The actor hadn’t yet said anything; instead he thoughtfully adjusted his wig, and apart from a little chomping, began to eat in the most delicate and refined manner. He held the dessert spoon lightly with two fingers, cracked the shell of the egg with a demure, slightly amused tap, used the ends of two fingers to break off a pinch of bread and dip it into the yolk, cut the fatty edge off the ham with infinite care, and conducted a tricky surgical operation to excavate a sliver of muscle from it. He raised the knife with one hand like a conductor with his baton.
“That’s an exaggeration,” he pronounced with a mild but firm voice that brooked no contradiction.—“Lajos is right again! Have you noticed how Lajos has always been right recently? You exaggerate, my friend”—he turned forty-five degrees to address Ábel.—“We are all aware of your tender, sensitive soul.”
He stuffed a slice of ham into his mouth.
“Don’t take this amiss, but only very young people can say that kind of thing. My general experience of the world, or so I have observed on my travels, is that people get over everything. That is providing they survive of course.”
He bent over the egg and sniffed it.
“You are of a philosophical bent, that is all. Naturally, it is an unpleasant episode. We have every reason to believe what our friend Ábel says. One of you has cheated. It’s not such a bad thing.”
He clicked his tongue.
“What does it mean? Perhaps it wasn’t the money that he cheated for. People never know what they are going to do next. It’s a puzzle, a real puzzle. He came prepared of course, for he brought the cards. Maybe he just flirted with the thought. Life is just a big game, my friends.”
He touched the cards carelessly, put down his knife and fork, and leaned back. He looked around him in a dreamy fashion, surprised by the rapt attention he noted on their faces. He had got used to the fact that people never took serious note of what he said, that they heard him with mocking or indifferent expressions. In this company each word of his hit home. He gave a smirk of satisfaction.
“I am not thinking of the unmasking of our friend, Ábel,” he said with a dismissive gesture. “What are cards? What is money? It’s something else I have in mind. When through my friend Lajos’s kind attentions, I was invited to join your circle…my young friends, my very young friends…the first question I asked myself, having acknowledged the charming impression you immediately made on me, was what holds them together? Because something does hold you together. I have considerable experience in gauging human relationships. I said to myself: something joins them together but they do not speak of it. Yet each of them thinks about it. And one of them is cheating.”
He ate with great gusto. The ham slice became a ham sliver, the egg a hollow shell. Everything he picked up, even the salt cellar, seemed to be on familiar terms with him.
He spoke quietly, ceremoniously, with feeling. He even closed his eyes for a moment as if communing with himself. Havas’s voice could be heard from the next cubicle, and the slapping down of cards. A woman was moving through the café with a bucket and mop in her hand. The waiter sat by the billiard tables in the half-light, like a monk by the window of his cell at twilight. Lajos ran his eyes around the company with lively, friendly interest.
“It is probably unimportant that the person in question has now extended his cheating activities to a card game,” the actor continued. “He is your Judas, and we don’t really know him. He is someone I dare not even begin to suspect since the four of you are equally dear to me, and yet he must have been cheating you for a long time, cheating in his every word, his every look. The only reason he cheated at cards was because he wanted to round off his triumph in that way. He wanted to experience the full physical delight of having cheated you.
“There’s a nice expression: to sweep something under the carpet. It is an excellent expression. Don’t rack your brains, my friends. We are together. It’s been a wonderful day. You are no longer responsible to your masters. I thought we could celebrate the event tonight.”
The actor continued his meal with patent satisfaction. Here’s to a good time tonight, he said, his mouth full.
A calendar hung in the enclosure. Ábel stared at the date: May seventeenth.
We’ll have a nice little haroosh, said the actor and chomped a little more.
Ábel slowly gathered up the cards one by one. Technical terms of the game. Bank, clear-out, castle, take one, flush, no flush. Ernõ never offered up a flush. The cards clicked in Havas’s hands. Who is Havas? The proprietor of the town pawnbroker’s shop. Why has he been dreaming about him for weeks on end now? He dreams that Havas enters the room, wipes his walrus mustache with the back of his hand, and unbuttons his collar in leisurely fashion. He is laughing so hard his eyes are quite lost in the folds of fat. His breath is like the stink of a kitchen: it smells of lard and dishwater. Tibor’s mouth assumes that defiant suffering look.
He has put the cards in his pocket.
They watched each other carefully, bent over the table again, made eye contact with one brief last look, and immediately shifted their gaze. The waiter stood up and went to the door, turning on the lamps as he went. Guests were arriving. Two officers, then the town clerk. The Gypsies shuffled in.
HAVAS STOPPED AT THE DOOR OF THE CUBICLE. Cigar ash was clinging to his crumpled and swollen waistcoat. He took the cigar holder from his mouth.
Greetings, Amadé, he puffed, out of breath.
Greetings, Emil.
They turned to him.
“Your servant, gentlemen,” said Havas. “My compliments.”
“Soon be time for the May picnic,” said the one-armed one.
They had discussed the May picnic in the afternoon. It had been the one-armed one’s idea, and was generally welcomed. They liked the thought of it and talked about the recent mild weather. They were bound to agree if the one-armed man thought of it. They would hold the picnic in the grounds of The Peculiar on top of the hill. They had already sent a messenger to inform the innkeeper. They had reasons for choosing The Peculiar. The one-armed one had had a very productive afternoon in town. Everything was ready. He had ordered lanterns, had spoken with the teaching staff and got most of the alumni to agree. The Peculiar was already green and leafy. They could always go inside if they needed to at night. Cost of ticket, five crowns. Those paying no school fees half price. Dear Guests Are Cordially Invited. Havas sat down with them. He made sucking noises with his cigar holder. He said a May picnic was a jolly good idea. The weather was good, quite summery. He himself had never liked outdoor parties. One sits down at night on damp grass, one’s rear chills down, it leads to looseness of the bowels. Havas would have preferred the party to be in the Petõfi café.
“I went to nothing better than an ordinary state school,
” he said with satisfaction, “but I have no hesitation in commending the Petõfi. It’s not much to look at. It’s a single-story building with a not particularly attractive entrance. But inside, gentlemen, a man can feel at home. The proprietor spent four years in jail for pimping. That was in peacetime. So he made mistakes. So what? It’s like being at home. I have even danced on the billiards table there. Should anyone wish to dance on the billiards table I propose the Petõfi café. A bottle of reservé costs eight crowns.”
He gazed sleepily in front of him. The actor finished eating.
“No news from your dear father?” the pawnbroker asked Tibor.
His voice was deferential and respectful. Amadé stared at his plate. Ábel raised his head and sneaked a look at Tibor. The one-armed one looked bored. Tibor moved. He made as if to leap to his feet.
No news, he said.
“A hero,” Havas declared. “The colonel is a hero. The hero of Valjevo.”
He drew his chair closer to the table.
“Now here’s a remarkable thing, gentlemen, for young Lajos is a hero too. The hero of Isonzo. And now young Master Tibor too will have the opportunity of showing what he can do. A heroic family.”
“That’s enough, you old fool,” said Ernõ.
The pawnbroker gave a forced laugh. They breathed a little more easily. Ernõ was the only one who dared talk to the pawnbroker like this. The pawnbroker was a friend of Amadé. When people met the pawnbroker they tended to avert their eyes.
The pawnbroker was professional and polite in his official capacity. The article please. Write it down, miss: a lady’s gold pocket watch, 80 grams, estimated value 120, deposit 100, less handling and interest 4.60, there we are 95.40. Next please. He did not look up. He didn’t even look up when Tibor brought him the silver. The well-known Prockauer silverware, complete with monogram. Aristocratic Prockauer. The actor had talked with him that morning. They were taking his mother into the hospital for two days, for tests. That was six months ago already: October 13, 1917. Date elapsed: April 13, 1918. Write it down, miss. One set of silverware for 24, 22 kilograms, with monogram. Estimated value 800. Deposit 600. He didn’t look up: his nimble fingers pushed the money under the glass screen.
“I, for example, would never eat only cold ham for supper,” said Havas. “It’s not the food, I believe. My friend Amadé claims it’s the diet. But please, what use is a diet to me? I lose not an ounce of weight, I get a headache, and it’s such agony I want to curse all day. A body needs decent sustenance I say. And a spot of exercise. Love has a slimming effect too. Love, gentlemen, take it from one who knows. But how is one to find a little love nowadays? It’s scarce. A man has to rely on himself.”
“Fat pig,” said Ernõ and turned away from him.
They laughed awkwardly. So did the actor. The actor was showing his false white teeth as though Ernõ had said something remarkably witty. They cackled as though compelled to do so. Ábel blushed. There was something painful yet welcome about the way Ernõ had addressed Havas. Havas weighed close to two hundred and ninety pounds. Ernõ knew that unless a miracle occurred everything depended on him: they were all dependent on Havas being in a good mood. Tibor’s mother hadn’t yet noticed the silverware was missing. But the colonel might arrive home any day on leave or wounded and he might decide to inspect it. It did not bear thinking about what would happen if the silverware was not in its usual place. The colonel had once knocked the driver of a dray cold with his bare fist. It wasn’t just Lajos and Tibor’s fate at stake: it was all their fates. If the silverware was lost, if Havas didn’t want to hang on to it until they found some money, it was possible the colonel wouldn’t stop short of setting the lawyers on them. Their affairs would not bear close examination. It was a private matter. All that had happened in the last six months was their business and no one else’s. If only Havas would grant them a few weeks’ grace. Just until they had finished their training. True, the matter of the silverware would have to be faced even so. The colonel might follow them to the front and threaten them with a sound whipping even in the heat of battle. There was no limit to the power of fathers.
Ernõ spoke to Havas as though it were degrading to address remarks to him. The pawnbroker put up with it. Ernõ had some hold on the pawnbroker, though no one knew what that hold was. Maybe he knew something about him, was aware of a piece of dirty business, had information about his usury. Ernõ would turn away whenever the pawnbroker approached them. He pulled a painful face, as if the disgusting sight were enough to make him spit. The pawnbroker pretended not to notice Ernõ, nor to hear his insults. He hastened to agree with anything he said. He kept smiling. The hairs of his mustache bristled as he smiled. Tibor said Havas was frightened of Ernõ.
The actor looked as if he were daydreaming and occasionally glanced away.
“It is all settled,” he told Tibor. “Havas is a friend and he knows you to be gentlemen. There is nothing in the conditions that obliges him…He won’t demand anything.”
Havas did not demand anything. The money, like all money in the last few months, drained invisibly away: they were having to save Béla with it. Amadé was embarrassed, since he too was in receipt of some. He kept quiet for now. He smiled. He could smile so stiffly while looking straight ahead that one would think he had a glass eye. His bluish jowls sat stolidly in the vent of his collar. His brow practically shone. It was like precious china. He smiled, a toothpick dangling from his lips, and looked fixedly into the distance with his glass eyes. The pawnbroker fitted a new cigar into the holder. They stared at each other, smiling icily. The actor gave an almost imperceptible shrug. They both smiled.
“Master Ernõ is right,” said the pawnbroker. “I am a fat pig. I have got used to it. What can I do about it? So I’m fat. Should I torture myself with the thought? I am the kind of fat man who is fat because he eats a lot. Amadé is the kind of fat man who eats practically nothing and yet is still fat. I’d die if I couldn’t eat properly. A fine, solid piece of roast pork, in a nice crispy roasted skin, accompanied by potatoes boiled with onions and some pickled gherkins: it’s a pleasure biting at the crisp skin. That’s the stuff for me. And lángos with cabbage. This is my fate in life. You should try to see me as the helpless creature of fate.”
Everyone looked at him and Ábel noted the pained courteous smile on Tibor’s face. It was this smile that he particularly liked about him. There was something distracted and troubled about it, a kind of noblesse oblige. Tibor was trying to smile indulgently at Havas’s corpulence. Béla was giving him a fish-eyed look as if he had never seen him before. Ernõ was screwing up his nose.
“Yes, just imagine it…,” he said with a shudder of disgust.
“You should see me undressed,” Havas continued, calm and solemn. He drew loudly on his cigar holder. He nodded. “Yes, terrible. And I should also confess that I wear a girdle. Not a full girdle, just a thing that goes round my stomach. When I take it off my belly simply drops.”
He surveyed the assembled company. The actor gave a croak.
“Are you staying with us, Emil?”
The pawnbroker rose slowly to his feet. He put on his hat so it was tipped back over his head. His brow was glistening with sweat.
“Thank you for the kind invitation,” he said quietly. “I will not remain with the gentlemen tonight.”
Tibor made a sudden movement.
“I would like to speak to you tomorrow, Mr. Havas.”
The pawnbroker’s eyes disappeared under his swollen lids.
“At your service, Mr. Prockauer.”
“Not at your shop.”
“Just as you please,” said Havas. “Two o’clock at my apartment then. At your service.” He looked around. “Perhaps Master Ábel would like to come too,” he added.
Ábel blushed. Tibor turned away. “Yes, I’ll come too,” said Ábel quickly.
The pawnbroker nodded as if he thought this the most natural thing. He did not shake hands with anyone. Once he had gone Tibo
r sat back down and rubbed his eyes.
“And now we shall have the most splendid party,” said the actor.
2
THE TOWN DOZES AMONG MOUNTAINS, PRESERVED in cotton wool, its three towers pointing indifferently at the sky. There is electricity and running water in its houses. A train in the station is blowing its whistle. Three mountain peaks surround the town: inside the rock, some copper and a little magnesite. A river rushes through, a brisk mountain stream, the air above it sharp and hard and delivered into the heart of town while, in the opposite direction, the dense forest swarms up the mountainside. The middle peak retains its cap of snow for a considerable time: the locals are proud of the alpine backdrop it so picturesquely provides. A narrow-gauge train carries passengers from the railway station to the main square. The houses too are narrow and long, tending to shoulder up against each other because the town was once a fort and people have lived here for generations. The seminary is yellow: mornings and evenings you can see the monks in their brown robes, their rope cords, and sandals carrying their rosaries as they make their way to church for their devotions. The bishop’s palace has a wide wrought-iron balcony, its spikes complete with baroque ornamentation, the flag-holder above them. The bishop walks out with his secretary every afternoon at three, the secretary’s hard hat glimmering with silk and a tassel dangling behind from the hat’s rim. The bishop makes a point of grandly greeting everyone who greets him. He rises early because he is an old man who sleeps badly; by dawn he is standing at his high desk forming tiny pearl-like letters. Others are measuring out wine in the cellars of the town hall, the wine stone cold. The vaults of the cellars are made of heavy slate: a century ago it was Poles who were drinking the wine here, the smoky marks of their torches still visible on the walls. Damp keg smells, the delicate, dense smell of alcohol and stearin candles. A bread ticket. Closing time. An endless sequence of barely noticed trains passes through town. One rumbles past now: it measures at least two or three hundred meters but the platform guard doesn’t even look up and the trains roll on carrying holidaymakers and the wounded, for here is the resort and here is the station. Some open the doors of their cars for an hour or so and the smell of carbolic and iodine oozes out to an enormous silence. The smell wafts downtown but is particularly acrid near the station. Big buckets of lime wait on the platform, for it sometimes happens that certain passengers have to be carried from the train and need to be sprinkled with it. But this is the fourth year of hostilities and the town has gotten used to it, especially those people whose job it is to sprinkle lime. They are very quiet now. There are no longer attendants in snow-white garments with red crosses on their armbands waiting at the resort station: the lady volunteers of the town are gone along with their shining uniforms that looked as crisp as those worn by wax nurse dolls displayed in the pharmaceutical department of the big store, to be replaced by, at most, two sanitary workers whose uniforms do not shine and are not crisp, and who grunt hey-upp when called upon to act as stretcher bearers. The war is a long way from here. There is only a kind of ash or soot, the kind that is carried from a distant fire and falls some distance from its source. The war will never reach as far as this. There were only telegrams at the beginning, and then the trains that passed through town. An elementary school had to be turned into a hospital as did half the monastery. A number of people were awarded distinctions for their services to the nation. The stationer’s window still displays the maps of Russia and France, but the nimble, plumpish old proprietor no longer nips out each morning to pin tiny flags on them to mark the victories of the Central Powers with his own fair hands; in fact he tends not to put pins anywhere and has lost a little weight for no one pays attention to the maps now. The town has become accustomed to the war. No one talks about it, rushes out for special editions of the local paper, or bothers to pick up the national press at the station. The town has become accustomed to the war in the way one can get used to old age, the thought of death, to anything at all. The roads are a little neglected, a lot of people go about in mourning dress, some familiar faces have disappeared, but you can’t deny that a few sprigs of well-being are blossoming in the ruins. The war is a distant hourglass, sand mixed with human remains, but this morning you could see the treasurer in his gray morning suit and yellow elastic-sided boots in the public gardens, girls who were children only four years ago but are now slender young ladies strolling down the promenade, girls to whom men turn their minds despite the war. It is a small, clean, and colorful town, a toy town in its gift box. There is a lot of litter everywhere now, houses are not repaired, old notices in groceries inform the public that salted fish are expected, but that’s about all. Red, blue, and yellow advertisements on street columns. And, here too, those who are doing well can find opportunities for helping themselves. Every afternoon the town clerk may be seen ambling through Szent János Square with his vizsla hound, heading for the embankment to play fetch. The movie house is pretty popular and the theater is almost always full when they perform operetta. Amadé Volpay is the comic. One day Ábel will be sitting in a big city and will pronounce the words “world war,” but recall only Tibor and Amadé, and a certain anxiety and curiosity. One’s hometown is not merely the church tower or a square with a fountain though, it is flourishing trade and industry, it is the doorway where some thought first crossed your mind, a bench on which you used to sit pondering something incomprehensible, a moment in the shower where you seemed dizzily to remember fragments of an earlier existence, a neatly polished pebble found in an old drawer that you can no longer think why you stored there, the scripture master’s hat, brown with an unbecoming patch, the cold sweat before a history lesson, strange games whose rules no one understood and you were too embarrassed to explain, a lie the consequences of which gave you nightmares for the rest of your life, an object in someone’s hand, a voice you hear at night through an open window and cannot forget, the way a room is lit, two tassels under a pair of curtains. War is not precisely what we tend to think about it. Ábel will not be telling tales about it to his grandchildren as they sit on his knee, because in him too the war awakens memories of fear and anxiety, but the fear is in respect of Tibor and the anxiety is focused on Amadé. The population numbers sixty thousand. There are tennis courts. The town happens to be asleep right now, the mayor has problems with his heart and lies spread-eagled in his bed, his dentures in the glass of water beside him; in musty rooms omnipotent fathers sleep in nightshirts beside their wives. In the woods above town animals are waking. The actor is saying: Sad to say, you don’t know real vodka. The real pure stuff turns everything you see a blue color.
