The Reluctant Trophy Wife

by Judith Petres Balogh

  She soon found out. Twenty-four boys and girls greeted them, and they helped to unload the two cars, sniffing at the baked goods, recognizing the casserole, an old favorite, and in general filled the silent convent with tumultuous life, but no one minded. Father Paul and the nuns had programs for the afternoon to enrich the soul and the mind of the kids and they noisily disappeared somewhere in the vast building. Lena and Sarah made preparation for the evening meal. They chopped, stirred, mixed and grated in quiet harmony, as if they had not done anything else in life but toss salads make sandwiches and heat soup, using pots and bowls of restaurant size. Even Sarah was silent during their labors.

  After Lena covered the long refectory table with the plastic tablecloth and placed the crude plates and paper napkins on it, the total effect was dismal. How in the name of holy etiquette could one expect exquisite manners from children, as long as the supper table serves no other purpose than to offer a parking place for the food, and the meal is degraded to the basic need to still hunger? It was so wrong. Bodily needs and cultured behavior should not be divorced from one another.

  She folded the cheap napkins in intricate patterns as if they were made of the finest Irish linen and then searched in the garden for flowers and vines to decorate the bare table. When all was done, the table was still not fit to host royalty, but after she gave it this mild touch of refinement, it looked definitely better.

  There was still some time left until supper and she used it to inspect the tiny bedroom assigned to her for the three nights. Truly, there was not much to see. In glaring contrast to the princely dimensions and somber elegance of the chapel, the dining hall and the conference room, or even the relatively small living room, the bedroom was just a bare cell without the slightest pretension to creature comfort. In her estimation, the room was smaller than a standard prison cell, and the furnishing was definitely more austere than those of prisoners. The reminder ‘Memento mori‘ was printed on parchment paper, framed and hung on the wall next to a black cross. In the absence of everything else, it was easy enough to remember death, even without a reminder nailed to the wall.

  Perhaps some ancient founding mother designed this austerity on purpose in order to aid virtue. Sensuous dreams could never have visited the nuns, who slept in these uncomfortable cubbyholes. The guiding idea must have been to force the body, the seat of temptation and sin, into extremes of discomfort, otherwise chastity might suffer. The long-ago interior designer of the convent certainly achieved this goal with admirable efficiency. After spending the night on one of these tortuous beds, the only desire they could have was to wake up in the morning and still be able to move.

  Lena pulled back the single, rough cover, and was gratified to find crisp, freshly laundered bed sheets. She hoped that she could put up with austerity and discomfort for three nights. After this flash inspection she planned to unpack her overnight case, but since there was no place to put her things, she abandoned the idea and returned from the dismal bedroom to the dining room.

  The ebullience of the already assembled children eagerly waiting for the evening meal soon erased all memories of death and self-mortification on that spectacular cot. The children said a rapid prayer before the meal, obviously more intent on the pots and serving trays than on the blessing. Father Paul apparently saw nothing wrong with that. To their credit, between the hastily said prayer and the deep silence during eating, they did notice the flower arrangements on the long table and commented on it with surprise. The praises Lena received back home for her Herend or Rosenthal table settings could not compare to these childish but sincere accolades.

  Father Paul was right about the children. They were bright, happy, had humor enough to fill a sit-com, and could carry on decent conversations. Long after the meal was finished, they lingered at the table to talk, to challenge, to ask or just to exchange verbal cross fires. They directed their questions most often to Sarah and Lena, because they wanted to know a great deal about the United States. The animated conversation would not have had much of a chance without Father Paul’s translation. The kids knew enough English to form questions, but not enough to understand the answers. Lena could understand the questions fired at her in two languages, but lacked the skill to answer them in Hungarian. The curiosity-driven excitement was great fun and the questions kept coming.

  How long does it take to travel from the east coast to the west coast? How old must one be to vote? Which is the best basketball team? Why is not New York the capital? How many oil fields are there in the US? What is the difference between American and European football? How many political parties are there? How can one get into college? How much does it cost? How big is the military force? How does one vote for the president? Is it true that anyone can be president of the USA? Who elects the federal judges? What is the difference between federal and state law? How much does an average tradesman earn? Are American schools like European schools? Is it true that Americans only eat hamburgers and that women cannot cook? How many time zones are there in the continental part of the United States? Is it true that every family has at least one car?

  There was no end of the questions, but finally Father Paul decided to end it. Sarah and Lena cleared away the supper dishes, he and the nuns played board games with the children for a while, but the day faded away and it was time for retiring. The departing sun painted the western sky red, then gradually the vivid color faded into pink and the rest of the sky turned from blue to slate. Shadows massed under the trees and the few stray clouds left over from the day slowly dissipated at the horizon.

  Father Paul ushered the children into the chapel for the evening prayers; the nuns, Lena and Sarah joined them. A gentle wind slipped through the open windows and made the candle flames dance on the altar and the masses of flowers scented the hushed peace. Somewhere in the vast garden birds sang their personal evening prayers and were no less pious than the nuns murmuring the incantations. Those bent, black-veiled heads spoke of humility and contrition, but what sort of sins could burden their kind old souls, Lena wondered. If they see themselves as sinners, than what are we, the rest of humanity?

  After the prayers the children left the chapel and father Paul expressed his own supplication, whatever those were, in a storm of organ music. Lena did not recognize what he played, but it made no difference. She guessed it to be Bach, but the way he played had the personal stamp of his very own. It was pure, truthful, coming from the profound depth of his soul, and spoke of thoughts and emotions, which could never be expressed in words, perhaps because there were no words for it. The music cut across boundaries, doubts, ambiguities and pointed to the central issue of man’s existence. To her it was an authentic epiphany, and even after the nuns left the chapel, she still sat there, holding on to the memory of the music, until darkness completely wiped out the world.

  SIXTEEN

  When Lena finally left the chapel, she found Sarah and the priest sharing a bottle of wine in the small living room next to the dining hall. “Welcome back on earth, lost space traveler,” greeted Sarah. “We were not sure whether you crash-landed on a far planet or whether you decided to take the veil and moved in with the nuns. In either case, have a glass of wine.”

  “Your organ playing…” mumbled Lena as she took the wine, but Sarah did not let her finish the sentence.

  “I told you, didn’t I? It turns you inside out, and for moments you think you died and are in heaven, as the cliché goes.”

  “True. It was… profound and cleansing.” Lena did not find the right words and drank her wine silently. After a while she asked, “What have I missed since I last saw you two?”

  “Not much. We just recounted the day, which was successful so far. At least we think so. The kids are good, food was thankfully inhaled, your flower decorations appreciated, kids sound asleep -- what else could we wish for complete happiness? How is your room?”

  “Not quite Carlton Ritz, but it will do. I brought a book to read, but there is no reading lamp. I would s
ay that is one of the shortcomings of this virtuous place.”

  “And it is right so. I do believe you can actually read too much. You can be so well-read that the time could come when you no longer know which are your own thoughts, and which are second-hand, borrowed from some author, whom you don’t even remember any more. One day you will have to face the bitter truth that you are no longer yourself, but a composite of hundreds of mostly strange people and of their ideas.” According to her established custom Sarah expressed her wittily absurd views with grave seriousness.

  “How scary! How could I ever find myself again?”

  “I’m afraid, you couldn’t, Lena. For the rest of eternity you would be in search of yourself. Better quit reading while the damage is not complete.”

  “Speaking of reading, I have found an interesting book by Hillaire Belloc,” said Father Paul. He was ready to start the mind-expanding conversation of the evening.

  “Never heard of him. Should I be interested?” Sarah could admit quite comfortably when she did not know something.

  “You probably would enjoy his view about the root of European civilization. What he wrote is not new or revolutionary, but it presents history in such a way that it no longer appears as a series of solitary events petrified in antiquity.”

  “Well, I guess I should be interested and if I understand correctly the way you operate, you will at once enlighten us,” answered Sarah. “Was he a saint?”

  “I wouldn’t know that, but he was a Catholic writer, having eminent pedigrees, earned lots of admiration and caused plenty of controversies. He probably had as many followers as he had enemies. He emphasized that the philosophy and the driving force of any given civilization is determined by the religion its people practice. Religion, among other things, is also the glue that holds a culture together.”

  “Not a terribly popular view nowadays,” grumbled Sarah.

  “Obviously. Also obviously he is not very popular in certain circles, but it does not really matter. No man born of a mother was ever totally accepted by all his fellows. Belloc is no exception. He wrote that Europe cannot be understood unless we accept that it is a civilization with deep roots in classical Greek culture, Roman law, and that its ultimate form, its very essence was given by Christianity. These influences and trends made it into something markedly different from all the other great cultures on the globe. He indicates that if some forces would eliminate this foundation the entire civilization as we know it today, would disintegrate.”

  “No wonder he is not popular! Where would his idea leave me? I am a Protestant almost-agnostic busy-body, if there is any such thing, yet I consider myself fully civilized in the western sense,” Sarah argued.

  “I wish I had in my parish more agnostics, such as you claim to be!”

  “Don’t push my marginal agnosticism or for that matter my Christianity, Pater! You know that I guard my views jealously. But I wonder how your bishop would react to your wishing more of the likes of me in your church!”

  “He would want to make your acquaintance, Sarah. But to put your restless mind at ease, I am not questioning that. Belloc does not either. He only writes that if this particular brand of civilization chooses to ignore this fact, or divorces itself from it completely, then it is going to self-destruct.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “Meaning that it is not a very good idea to rip out the roots and forget the past. Meaning that we cannot deny the very essence of a thing.”

  The evening was mellow and gentle, the windows were wide open; the only light in the room came from the garden lamps outside. Armies of bugs were warming up for a major offensive; it was wiser not to invite them with bright indoor lights. The tranquility of the mellow evening entered the comfortable little room and it was good. Comparisons can be very unfair, but as Lena settled back with her glass of wine in expectancy of a sociable time, she could not avoid thinking of her desolate evenings with Clyde.

  She turned to the priest. “Knowing what we know about the flagging enthusiasm for religion, is this civilization then on the way to Hell in a handbasket?”

  “I am not a prophet and Belloc wasn’t one either. I am not qualified to make such a statement, but what I read excited me,” Father Paul said evasively. “The early history of our country appears now in a more focused light through his book. It gave me the AHA sensation.”

  “Such as?”

  “For example we know a great deal about Saint Stephen our genial first king, and about his work around the year 1000 A.D., but only after reading Belloc’s description of the continent’s early state of political, military, social conditions and arrangements did I fully realize how brilliant this king was. The territory he and his tribe wished to call their own was landlocked and inconveniently wedged between East and West. The problem of having to choose between two incompatible extremes made its first appearance at his time. Unavoidably it was a recurring misfortune in the history of the Magyars. It is Stephen’s virtue and our luck that he could make the right choice at that crucial time.”

  Overcoming the initial reluctance to discuss history, Father Paul gradually warmed to his subject and talked with enthusiasm. Stephen and his Magyar tribes were just barely second or perhaps third generation newcomers in the Danube valley. At that time he was not yet king or a saint, and was not even called Stephen; the name given to him at his birth was Vajk. He received his new name only after he was baptized. He knew that if they wished to stay in their new home, called at that time Pannonia, there were only three choices.

  They could remain pagans, and in a few years would have been no more than a faint historical memory. That was the fate of those tribes that streamed out from Asia attempting to settle in the Danube valley before the Magyars did. In the provinces bordering the great Roman Empire the survival rate for newcomers was extremely low.

  Alternatively Stephen could orient himself to the east, join the Byzantium and eventually melt into the Slavic section of Eurasia.

  Or he could choose Rome. He decided for Rome and for western civilization. Time has shown how right he was.

  The ticket for membership in the Roman culture was to accept the dominant civilization and the necessity for his stubborn, strong-willed tribes to convert to Christianity. Nothing less would do. It was a question of survival, based on the classical choice, which was perhaps an elegantly veiled threat: ’you are with us or against us’ and then sotto voce the Roman establishment added, ’and please note, our army is terrific’. It truly was terrific: professional, well trained and loyal to Rome. Those, who lived inside the more or less civilized boundary of the Holy Roman Empire, were defended by this professional army; those outside had not a chance for survival .Stephen, who could clearly envision the future, made sure that his people would be part of the Empire, not unprotected outsiders.

  For a while, Father Paul continued to talk about this part of history as if it happened yesterday and not more than a thousand years ago. He outlined the national policy of a time gone by, as if the issues were up for discussion in the glass and concrete edifices in Brussels and not among men dressed in leathers and furs in long-ago tents made of animal skins. History stepped out of its fossilized dignity and pulsated with passion. The fears, hopes and loves of a group soon to become a nation were very much present in the convent’s parochial reception room.

  “Today this country’s staying afloat is dependent on being part of the EU. In an almost similar sense, more than a thousand years ago it was a question of being part of the Holy Roman Empire. It is not an easy choice today and it was not easy then. There was no real alternative then, as there is none today. Somebody had to make a decision and Stephen was capable to do that. Ultimately history is the result of the dreams or plans of an unusual personality, who at critical times can see the future, and can put events into motion,” he said. “Was there ever a real change in history, a large step forward without a person of stellar qualities, who planned, guided, inspired and won? Or lost. Either way, the
world after him would never be the same again. A group, a nation, which cannot produce such a man of consequence in times of crisis, is fated to disappear into the great jaw of inevitability that is waiting patiently to swallow mediocre nations. No nation can stumble along blindly and hope to see the future if it does not have ideals, plans and an inspired leader. It is always imperative to have a plan and the plan is usually initiated by one man. The Magyars were fortunate for having such a man in St. Stephen, who could make the decision at the turning point.”

  King Stephen’s words -- at least those recounted by Father Paul, --were as up-to-date as the morning’s newspaper. Where did the thousand years go? What changed meanwhile? Men and women of those times are long gone, yet the needs, dreams and desires are not outdated, but are part of the daily life even after so many generations. Who were they? Hollywood at regular intervals answers these questions, but its luminous and romantic interpretations are about as accurate as its concept of love.

  “What sort of a man was he?” Lena wanted to know.

  “We can only guess,” he admitted. “I often wonder about that human powerhouse. What made up the charisma that radiates down the centuries right into the age of the atom, globalization, confused ideals and the general malaise of the world? What would he say or do today? He was inspired, intelligent, welleducated and a believer. This much we know from his writings and from the accounts of his historians. We can also deduct this from the accomplishments during his rule.”

  “Then according to Belloc and to you, the Faith and Europe are an invincible amalgam,” Sarah said.

  The priest smiled and shrugged his shoulders ever so slightly and continued the discussion unperturbed. “Only those civilizations survive that do not forget their basic beliefs. Just look at Judaism. They never forgot what made them into what they are, and they are masters of survival, even though for a great part of their history they did not even have a country, a land they could call their own. But they survived, because they insisted on holding on to all their beliefs and traditions. This does not mean that we should refuse certain changes or block logical and necessary developments. No nation can afford to live without improvements, without necessary adjustments, modifications and novel ideas, but it is good to remember what the Greeks taught us, ‘All things in moderation’. It does mean however, that the foundation should never be destroyed. If we forget or delete the basics, the thing is heading for certain death. We might as well dedicate a tombstone at an appropriate place, perhaps in Rome, Brussels, Berlin or Paris, with the inscription ‘Here Rests Western Civilization’ and place a wreath over it. I wonder if anyone would be left to shed a tear for it.”