They Were Counted (The Writing on the Wall: the Transylvanian Trilogy)

by Bánffy, Miklós

  At one end of the table were grouped all the desserts – mountainous cakes with intricate sugar decorations, compotes of fruit, fresh fruit arranged elaborately on silver dishes, and tarts of all descriptions served with bowls of snowy whipped cream. As well as champagne there were other wines, both red and white. An innovation, following the recent fashion for imitating English ways, was a large copper samovar from which the Laczok girls served tea.

  As the guests were finishing their supper and beginning to leave the table replete with delicious food and many glasses of wine, the gypsy musicians filed into the room and took up their places to play the traditional interval music. On these occasions Laji Pongracz would play, in turn, all the young girls’ special tunes. At the winter serenades he had made sure that he knew exactly who had chosen which melody as their own and now, each time he started a new tune, he would look directly at the girl whose song it was and smile at her with a discreet but still knowing air.

  The guests had all seated themselves on the chairs and sofas pushed back against the wall and Balint, looking round the room for a place, found nearly every seat taken. At the far end of the room, near the door, he saw a free chair beside Dodo Gyalakuthy, who was the only girl present not to be escorted by a partner.

  ‘Aren’t you afraid to sit with me, Abady?’ she said quietly as Balint took his place beside her.

  ‘Is it so dangerous then?’

  ‘Oh, very! No one dares sit with me. All the young men are afraid they’ll get a bad name if they’re seen paying me any attention!’ She laughed, her long eyes and round face smiling. ‘Yes! Yes! It’s true. I’m too good a parti, and they don’t want to be thought fortune hunters! I promise you it’s true. You’ve been away so long you don’t know, but I’ve known it for two years now, ever since I first came out. Even for square dances and cotillions I’d never get a partner if the organizers didn’t take pity on me. I’m a wallflower. And as for waltzes and csardas I’m only asked by boys too young to be accused of looking for a wife!’

  Dodo said all this humorously, smiling sweetly as if she did not care; and Balint realized that he had hardly ever seen her on the dance floor; she was always sitting apart, by the wall. He looked at her more closely. She was very pretty, with a small rather pert nose. She was intelligent and her kind smiling mouth was full and naturally red. Her round, white neck and smooth full shoulders seemed infinitely desirable, like ripe fruit. She had beautiful hands and small shapely feet, and was in every way a most attractive girl.

  ‘I’ve thought about it a lot, and there can’t be any other reason why no one asks me. And I certainly don’t dance any worse than the other girls. Hasn’t anyone warned you?’ she asked, in playful reproach. She went on: ‘Nobody even talks to me. You wouldn’t know, of course. The girls don’t because they’re jealous that I’m so rich, and the boys are frightened people will gossip about them. You’re the only one that’s safe. The Heir to Denestornya is above suspicion.’ She laughed with light irony. Then she continued, more seriously: ‘Only that Nitwit talks to me. He doesn’t seem to care, but then he’s Austrian, not Transylvanian!’

  ‘I saw you had supper with him.’

  ‘Of course! He’s the only one who dares come near me. Perhaps I’ll decide to marry him, but I don’t like him much. You know something?’ and she leant confidentially towards Balint, as if taking him into a great secret, and went on: ‘I don’t like stupid men! Nitwit’s quite nice, and very good-looking, but he can’t string two words together!’

  Balint looked round, searching for Egon Wickwitz. He was standing in the embrasure of a window, talking to a woman half-hidden by the curtains. For a moment Balint thought that it was Adrienne, but only for a moment for, as the woman leaned forward, he saw that it was Dinora Abonyi. The couple in the window seemed to be arguing, Dinora’s face looked unusually serious, her fine eyebrows drawn together almost into a scowl, while her normally smiling mouth was set in anger.

  Balint looked away as the musicians were suddenly silent. Laszlo Gyeroffy had crossed over to the band-leader and asked for his violin and, by way of prelude, plucked a few pizzicato notes. Then he raised his bow. Everyone waited, excited and pleased. What would he play? Those who had heard him in Kolozsvar, playing at the late-night gypsy revels, started calling out: ‘It’s Laszlo! How marvellous! Listen everybody!’

  So Laszlo started to play, but not the sentimental little ballads that the gypsies had just been playing for the girls. He played tunes that were sharper, full of rhythm, but witty and playful. When he played a song, he would not sing the words but would speak them mockingly, ironically, even scornfully. Sometimes he would imitate the famous Lorant Frater, but in the manner of a French diseuse. His technique was extraordinary. The violin itself seemed to chuckle as if it were being tickled, and then suddenly Laszlo would pluck the G-string sharply, so that the instrument itself seemed to be scandalized with shock; and a pause would follow as if a question had been asked, and it was waiting for an answer. And, after the pause, again a sudden rush of melody which seemed to bubble with merriment.

  The guests loved it. They applauded, cheered, and their laughter and appreciation spurred him to give them more. Perhaps because Laszlo was already a little drunk he began to clown, searching for broader and funnier effects. Without for a moment ceasing to play he would run round the room, jumping and whirling and leaping between the chairs before returning to the band-leader’s place beside the cymbalist. Sometimes he would play with the fiddle on his knee or hold it above his head while he crouched on the floor, slithering from side to side, his legs flung out as in a Russian dance, his toes twinkling, until once more he leapt in the air like a goat. Whatever he did the sound remained perfect, flawlessly beautiful, the melodies unbroken by his antics, the rhythm impeccable. The poor band-leader, Pongracz, watched anxiously, worried about his beloved violin. It was as good as any turn in the music hall, and so funny that the guests rocked with laughter.

  Balint himself was embarrassed by the clownishness of Laszlo’s performance. It annoyed him to see his friend debase himself. Edging up to him he said, in a low voice:

  ‘Play us something of your own!’

  Gyeroffy stopped, suddenly serious: ‘I have nothing to suit these people …’

  ‘The Valse Macabre?’ suggested Balint, remembering one of Laszlo’s earlier and milder works.

  ‘Well, yes. That one, perhaps …’ Laszlo turned to the gypsies and, so as to give them a lead, played a few notes in the key of G-minor. Then he straightened up and stepped forward in front of the little band. Suddenly he was no longer a clown but a figure whose demeanour and presence sent a wave of surprise among the guests. A frown furrowed his wide clear brow which was surrounded by thick wavy brown hair, features that more strongly than ever recalled his Tartar ancestry, and his mouth was set in a hard line, severe and implacable – a straight, calm and elegant figure that would not have been out of place on the stage of a famous concert hall. He paused for a moment and then, drawing his brows together in still more of a frown, he began to play.

  First he held a deep long-drawn note for about four beats – the gypsies hesitant, not quite knowing what to expect – and then, almost imperceptibly the rhythm of a slow, unusual waltz began to emerge. The beat was unconventional, strange, not the usual three-four beat, but modified, transformed, modern, harsh, with unexpected passages which seemed sadder than anything anyone had ever heard before. The bewildered gypsies could not follow him; more and more confused they stopped playing, one by one. Pongracz shook his head with disapproval; this was not at all his kind of music. But Laszlo played on, unperturbed by the gypsies’ defection until he was playing quite alone.

  There was silence. Then Farkas Alvinczy jumped up, waved to the disconcerted gypsies and led them back into the ballroom. In a few moments the latest popular waltz from Vienna could be heard and soon the hall was filled up dancing couples.

  Laszlo Gyeroffy stood alone in the middle of the almost empty draw
ing-room. Dodo Gyalakuthy came up to him, looking up with admiration in her large doe-eyes.

  ‘It was beautiful, what you played! I don’t think many people understood it, but I did. I liked it very much. It was lovely, so unusual, so new and interesting.’

  Laszlo looked down at her, resignedly.

  ‘It was silly even to try!’ he said. Then, encouraged that he had at least one listener who sympathized with him and understood his music, he started to explain how difficult it was for a band to follow his unfamiliar harmonies.

  As Laszlo and Dodo talked in the middle of the room, the little Countess Abonyi emerged from the window embrasure, followed by Egon Wickwitz. She walked towards the ballroom and, seeing Balint still by the door, called to him, her spirits visibly improved by the sight of her old friend: ‘Dance with me!’ It was an order and, when Balint complied, she nestled into his arms and whispered her old endearment for him: ‘Little Boy – Little Boy!’ in her once-familiar caressing voice as they danced away into the great hall. Balint pressed her hand in recognition of the memory, but his eyes remained cold and unmoved.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she went on, ‘I don’t expect anything of you. I’m just pleased to see you again, Little Boy!’

  They danced in silence, Balint’s arm tightly round the well-remembered slim waist that pressed against him with such careless abandon. They danced for a long time until, at the far end of the room where no one was standing, Dinora suddenly stopped. Looking at Balint with something of the old feeling in her eyes, she said:

  ‘Look, Balint, you’ll be back at Denestornya in a day or two. Do come over to Maros-Szilvas soon. I’d love to see you. And I’m sure you remember the way,’ she added flirtatiously, ‘but seriously, I want to ask your advice about something important. We are still friends, aren’t we?’

  ‘Something important? A serious matter? Of course I’ll come.’

  ‘A very serious matter!’ Dinora smiled sweetly, but she looked worried. Then she seemed to recover and her little white teeth gleamed between the voluptuous lips. Suddenly she passed her hand over Balint’s cheek in the lightest of caresses. She laughed at her own audacity and turned away. ‘Goodbye,’ she murmured over her shoulder as she glided away, to be swept up at once by another dancer; and in a flash she was gone.

  Balint pondered what Dodo had told him in the drawing-room, and looked around to find her. Once again she was sitting alone on one of the chairs ranged along the wall, and so he walked over and asked her to dance. As they floated round the floor he thought how well she danced, indeed she followed instinctively everything that her partner wanted to do, and when he reversed and danced anti-clockwise round the hall in a complicated new step that had just been introduced in the capital, she followed perfectly. She was like an ideal pupil who divines every unspoken instruction. He was so pleased that they went on waltzing for a long time.

  It was hot in the hall when they finally parted. The windows had been kept shut as the slightest breeze sent a shower of wax from the candles. Balint decided he would like a breath of fresh air, and stepped out onto the terrace.

  The unexpected beauty of the moonlight made Balint catch his breath as he might have had he been startled by a sudden cry of fear. Coming from the hothouse atmosphere of the ballroom it was like emerging into a wonderland as unreal and full of magic as a fairy tale. The azure sky merged into the far horizon; distance and nearness did not exist. The terrace was all in dark mysterious shadow, limited only by the faint horizontal line of the balustrade where here and there a carved stone arabesque gleamed faintly.

  Glancing round he saw a woman near the right hand corner. It was Adrienne Miloth. She stood motionless against the glow of the night sky and the light behind her was so strong that her face, bare arms and shoulders seemed scarcely lighter in hue than the deep-green silk of her dress.

  Adrienne stood quite still, erect and alone, gazing out into the distance. Balint was reminded of the days when she would stand beside the newly lit lamp, her chin up, her arms clasped behind her back, her stillness recalling the half-repressed rebelliousness of her youth. It was perhaps because of this surge of memory within him that Balint, instead of avoiding her, approached softly and leaned on the balustrade beside her.

  She moved slightly, tacitly acknowledging Balint’s presence and seeming to approve of his coming, as if she had said aloud that she needed sympathy, kinship and spiritual understanding. Relaxing from the unbending pose she had adopted, Adrienne leaned forward, slowly and quietly resting her hands on the balustrade. Balint thought of the silent movements of a panther, solitary and dark in the blackness of the night. Like Adrienne, panthers moved in slow harmonious symmetry and grace. And, like Adrienne, they gazed into the distance with their golden eyes.

  For some time neither of them spoke. The faint sound of the dance music from the castle behind them barely disturbed the silence of the night, indeed its muted tones and faintly heard rhythm deepened the infinite stillness. Occasionally they could hear a dog barking far in the distance.

  Balint began to feel with increasing urgency that he must say something common-place that would break the silence between them and release Adrienne from whatever sorrow or disappointment it was that seemed to hold her so firmly. In a low voice, almost a whisper, as if he were afraid to break the magic by a harsh note, he murmured:

  ‘What a lovely night it is!’

  ‘Yes. Yes indeed. It’s lovely.’ She too spoke quietly, not daring to raise her voice, ‘… but what a lie it all is!’

  ‘What do you mean, a lie?’

  Adrienne remained motionless, looking away into the distance. Then, very slowly, choosing her words hesitantly and carefully, she started:

  ‘It’s all untrue. A lie. Everything beautiful is a lie, a deception. Everything one believes in, or wants. Everything one does because one believes it to be helpful, or useful. It’s all a snare, a well-baited trap. That’s what life is,’ and we are stupid enough to be taken in, to be duped. We swallow the bait, and “click!” – the trap is sprung.’ She gave a little half-uttered laugh, but her eyes remained serious, gazing ahead. Then she turned to Balint and said: ‘What are you going to do now that you’ve come home? What are your plans?’

  But Balint was thinking only of what she had said previously:

  ‘I don’t believe that, that in our lives everything beautiful must be a lie. No! No! The opposite is true. Beauty is the only eternal truth there is! Beauty of purpose, of deed, of achievement. That is the only thing worth seeking for, what we must all try to find. Other ethical arguments are false, this is the only real one. Why? Because you can’t define it or classify it, put it down in black and white. We’ve talked about this before. Do you remember, back at Kolozsvar?’

  ‘Oh yes, I remember, I remember it well. And then I think I believed it.

  Balint wanted to ask, why only then, why no longer? But he felt she would say no more if he dared approach whatever secret pain lay behind her words.

  For a few moments they spoke no more. Then Adrienne started again.

  ‘People say nice things, nice words and so on, but …’ She narrowed her eyes in a search for the right words to express what she wanted to say but her instinct told her should remain hidden. She took refuge in parable.

  ‘Look how beautiful that distant hillside looks, soft, undefined, lovely but uncertain. We don’t know what it’s made of, what it’s really like. Is it mist, or cloud, or is it just a dream? Pure beauty, as you were saying? It looks as if one could dive into it and become a part of it, vanish inside it as into a fog; but only now, and from here in the deceitful moonlight. It’s really just an ordinary hillside, made of hard yellow clay, poor grass and dead thistles. It’s not even a real mountain of clefts and rocks. When dawn breaks we can see it’s land fit only for sheep and goats. Useful, of course, but all we can say then is how many ewes and lambs can graze there. She laughed again and added: ‘You see what a dull dour farmer I’ve become!’

  Balin
t went on, in the same low voice as before but in more fervent tones.

  ‘Maybe it’s no more than a farmer’s stock-in-trade. Perhaps tomorrow we will see it for what it really is, a common pasture with dumb sheep bleating and aimlessly leading their lambs from place to place. But tonight it isn’t! Now it isn’t! I don’t care about tomorrow. Tonight, tomorrow does not exist! Tonight, everything is beautiful and that beauty which fills our eyes, your eyes, mine, remains ours for ever. Nobody, nothing can take it away from us. We can lock it in the steel tower of our memory where no one can touch it, and there it will remain, like the Sleeping Beauty in her magic castle, until we – and we alone, – can bring it back to life again. You and I. No one else.’

  ‘Not all memories can be wished back. There are others too, unwanted ones, but no Sleeping Beauties!’

  ‘How we feel ourselves is all that matters. Nothing outside can touch us. Hurt and joy come from inside. Conscience is our only judge. That is our secret, and we can neither change nor control it.’

  ‘Maybe …’ Adrienne spoke so low he could hardly hear her. Resting her head in her hands, she still looked away from him, away from the world. It seemed that she could not find the words to define what it was she found so hard to express. Balint waited. She must speak first or he would never know what was in her mind. He hardly dared look at her lest she should be disturbed, so he kept his eyes fixed on the garden.

  The walls of the courtyard and the wings of the great house were in deep shadow, a shadow whose outline was a sharp as if drawn by a ruler. Outside this shadow the parterre shone with a blue light, and the paved circle in the centre gleamed with a myriad little points of light, each pebble seeming to sparkle like hoar-frost or snow and at its heart the grass lawn too seemed to shine, each blade distinct and separate. Only the lilies remained dark and velvety, the deep red flowers black in the moonlight and the russet leaves like ink-stains spreading on the ground.