They Were Found Wanting (Writing on the Wall: The Transylvania Trilogy)

by Bánffy, Miklós

  Suddenly he stopped in front of Balint and spoke: ‘Come to my room!’ he said in a commanding voice. ‘Come! I want to talk to you!’

  He turned and walked towards the door. Balint got up and they left the room together.

  Adrienne thought that she could not bear to remain another moment with her mother-in-law and so after a few minutes she too left the room and hurried down the corridor to her bedroom which was at the end of the house and just above her husband’s study.

  Adrienne went to the open window of her room and leaned out listening. The window of the room below was also open, but she was unable to distinguish what Uzdy was saying. She could just hear his voice, but the words were unintelligible. All she could make out was that he seemed to be explaining something and that his voice rang with controlled passion.

  Her heart constricted. What could he be trying to explain? Was he telling AB to his face that he knew all about them? Was he accusing him, spelling out their guilty behaviour in Venice and their illicit meetings in the forest? And would he, when he had finished, turn on Balint and shoot him as he would a dog?

  Adrienne was filled with a dreadful premonition. She waited, terrified, believing that the awful workings of Fate were about to end in a death.

  While all her attention was riveted on the mysterious happenings in the room below, her mind went back to a string of seemingly inexplicable events in the past weeks, the oddnesses – some ominous, some reassuring – in her husband’s recent behaviour, his sudden sharp glances so full of menace, and strange disconnected utterances. She tried to recall everything that he had said and done.

  Only now, as she began to put it all together, did she begin to glimpse a pattern which had eluded her at the time. For several months Uzdy had shut himself away in his study for periods far longer than he ever had before. In the past he only used to disappear into his study in the morning to bring the estate account books up to date, but recently he had taken also to vanishing for most of every afternoon, frequently not even emerging in the evenings. Sometimes he would remain there for most of the night. She had often heard him walking up and down for hours at a time. Then there would be silence, and then, after a while, she would again hear him pacing up and down, and the light from his window would stream out onto the lawn below almost until dawn. Up until now she had hardly given a thought to what he might be doing, and she certainly had not objected, but on the contrary had rejoiced in the fact that her husband had taken to shutting himself mysteriously away only allowing old Maier occasionally to come in to clear up. As long as this went on he very rarely came to her room and so she had been spared the sinister sound of his heavy tread on the creaking wooden stair, a sound that filled her with terror and loathing for what must inevitably follow.

  All this had been a great relief to her, indeed it had seemed like her salvation, especially now that she had been able to give full rein to her now liberated passion in Balint’s arms.

  Consequently she had not looked for any explanation of the odd behaviour which had kept her husband away from her. Now she began to wonder if, during these long weeks, Uzdy might not have been planning to kill the man she loved. The more she thought about it the more she convinced herself that Uzdy had merely been waiting for the right moment to settle the account once and for all; and now, when all she could do was to wait and listen, listen and wait, wait, wait, now that moment of decision had arrived.

  There was still no sign, no movement, only the sound of Uzdy’s voice, talking on and on with an occasional interpolation from Balint. Uzdy showed no signs of stopping, just endless, endless sentences, half-heard and totally incomprehensible. Adrienne’s nerves were so strung up that sometimes she even imagined that she heard the sound of a shot and then she could almost see the figure of her husband standing triumphant and mocking as he laughed over the dying body of her lover … but nothing happened. It was only her imagination working her up until she had terrified herself.

  Two hours went by, two long hours of agonized waiting.

  After the two men left the drawing-room Uzdy had led his guest in silence out of the house and then climbed the wooden stairway that led to his study above. There he had taken out his keys, opened the door and, when they were both inside, locked the door again behind them.

  At this moment Balint also believed that a final reckoning was about to follow.

  He wondered if Uzdy planned to shoot him at once or whether he would first be subjected to a litany of accusations and interrogation. He looked around him to see if he could lay his hands on some heavy object with which he could defend himself if Uzdy should suddenly attack him, but there was nothing to be seen. All around the room were hung clip-boards carrying long sheets of paper covered with columns of figures. At one side were two large architect’s drawing tables covered with more sheets of paper bearing columns of figures and complicated diagrams. Near the window was a shelf carrying some heavy agricultural books and Balint thought that perhaps he could protect himself with one of these if Uzdy reached for his gun. He quickly placed himself within reach of the shelf, his back to the wall, his body in shadow. It was a strategic position from which he could watch Uzdy’s every move. Now he was ready for anything.

  However, all Uzdy did was to seat himself in a chair in the centre of the room and at once start to explain something. It was a most unexpected subject.

  ‘Do you know why we use a decimal system, basing everything on multiples of ten? Tell me! Why is it that we count up to ten, and then ten times ten, followed by ten times a hundred and a thousand times a thousand to a million? Do you realize that this is just a legacy of barbaric times when man could only count on his fingers? And mankind has gone along with this, despite the fact that all science is based on units of twelve, and has been forced to carry on this nonsense? The year has twelve months, a day has twenty-four hours, the circle has three hundred and sixty degrees … and yet we still go on with a decimal system, counting everything in tens, just because the world is full of fools too cowardly to touch what has been for so long established! They’re afraid, that’s what it is, afraid! Do you grasp what I’m saying? Well, I’m not afraid. Oh no! Not me!’

  He slapped the drawing-board sharply with his long hand, his eyes glinting. For a moment it seemed he was about to jump up in his excitement, but then he controlled himself and went on in a more dispassionate voice, ‘The decimal system has other serious drawbacks. Ten is divisible by only two other numbers, the two and the five; all others produce a fraction. But twelve can be divided by three numbers, by two, three and four. For any mathematical problem this is an incalculable advantage! Yet we’ve thrown this away, ignored the possibilities until now. It’s incomprehensible. You understand that, don’t you? You understand that this is of world-shaking importance?’. And he leaned forward, his lips drawn back showing his teeth tightly clenched, his normally grim tartar face alive with eager expectation.

  ‘Everything you say is most interesting, but I don’t see any solution.’

  ‘But I have the solution!’ cried Uzdy, leaping up, his long narrow-shouldered figure almost majestic as he flung his arms wide apart, the very picture of one of the prophets of old. ‘I’ve solved it! Yes, I! And I’ll tell you – but only you, mind you, because you’re the only man I know who could grasp how universally important this discovery is!’

  Suddenly he burst out laughing.

  ‘The solution is utterly simple, as all great natural things are. Look! Sit down here and I’ll explain it to you.’

  Balint came forwards and sat down at the table close to Uzdy.

  ‘I call the twelve ten. From one to nine the numbers remain as they are, but ten and eleven need new names and signs to fit the new numerical order. It may be childish vanity but I’ve named the old ten and eleven Uz and Di, after the two syllables of my name. I had to think of something and of course these two syllables can be pronounced in any language. It follows naturally that the new numbers are written as U and D. Now the secret i
s this: according to my system, in the old value of one hundred there are one hundred and forty-four units, in a thousand three thousand and thirty-six units. It’s so simple, ten times ten is still a hundred, and ten times a hundred still a thousand – so we keep all the advantages of the decimal system as well as the Arabic figures! On the other hand the year has ten months, the day twenty hours, and the circle three hundred degrees.’

  Balint felt his head reeling. He said, ‘Then according to this all historical and astronomical data will have to be altered.’

  ‘Exactly! That’s just what I’m saying!’ replied Uzdy enthusiastically. ‘And that’s what has scared off anyone who’s thought this out since men discovered how to write. Oh, I admit this is going to be the biggest hurdle when I finally reveal my system to the world. That’s why I’ve worked it all out alone, by myself. I know I’ll still have to work on it for years, but it’ll be well worthwhile. Look how far I’ve got already!’

  They went together to study all the data clipped to the boards on the walls. There were five or six long sheets, all covered with figures, attached to each board. Uzdy went on, the words pouring out of him as he set out to explain, ‘Here we have the historical lists! All the most important dates of antiquity – well, not all, for the Babylonian ones haven’t yet been done here – are the Greek … and here the Egyptian …’ The paper rustled as he turned up the sheets with his thin fingers, showing Balint all he had done. ‘Now, here are the mathematical tables, every number up to billions. Maybe that number of figures will satisfy those idiots …’ and words poured from him as he talked of eclipses, comets, quoting figures and numbers sometimes according to the old system sometimes to the new. He seemed to have it all by heart or be able to find what he wanted as soon as he needed it, waving his arms, pointing, stabbing at the sheets with his bony tapering fingers. He did not wait for an answer, for any questions that his hearer might want to put, but talked on and on, his sentences crowded with facts and dates and theories until his hair seemed to stand on end and the veins on his forehead bulged and his mouth widened in joyful fanatic enthusiasm.

  This lasted for a long, long time. Abady listened, marvelling at all that Uzdy had learned and studied in the pursuit of his strange mania. As he did so he became deeply saddened.

  Dusk had already fallen but Uzdy did not stop. Now this obsessed monologue became ever more confused and rambling as Uzdy paced the room, his long arms flailing as he hurled curses at Archimedes or Newton, abusing their memory and praising himself.

  All at once he stopped and sank into a chair, silent. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and then remained there for a moment, immobile and spent. Then he turned to Abady and, with an unusually sweet smile, said, ‘I hope I haven’t bored you. I’ve talked far too much, but you see I am so full of it and it was wonderful at last to be able to tell somebody!’

  And when, finally, they went back out onto the lawn Balint saw that his host’s face wore an expression of calm fulfilment.

  At dinner that night the conversation was as cold and meaningless as it had been at lunch, perhaps even more random and impersonal. Uzdy, worn out after the excitement of his afternoon with Balint, sat silent and withdrawn and Adrienne hardly spoke. Those two hours that she had spent at her window, suffering endless tortures of anxiety and terror, had filled her with renewed hatred for this house and its inmates. It had been, of course, a relief when she had finally seen her husband and Balint pass below her window calmly talking together, but the release had come too late to make her calm too, too late to wash away the effect of those terrible hours of waiting.

  Adrienne found herself filled with a mad desire for vengeance, for the chance to pay back what she herself had been made to suffer, and this longing for retribution strengthened her will. She already knew how she would do it for after dinner she had once or twice seen on Uzdy’s face the tell-tale signs, the constricted mouth, the facial spasms like an animal about to bite, the strange glittering light in his eyes that meant that that night he would come to her room.

  It was quite late when everyone rose and said goodnight. For once Uzdy accompanied his wife along the corridor to her room and as he did so he put his arm round her shoulders as if he would press her to him, but Adrienne coldly shook herself free.

  When they arrived at her door Adrienne would not let him in.

  ‘No! Not today! Not today!’

  ‘Why? What is it? Darling Addy, what silliness is this?’ said Uzdy, all honey and sweetness. Then, abruptly, he changed his tone and with all his old menace he asked slowly, ‘Any special reason today?’

  Adrienne longed to tell him how much she loathed him but she knew from experience that any such words only excited him the more. She knew that any opposition only whetted his appetite, provoking his desire and stirring up his conquering instincts. Accordingly she merely said in a cold voice, ‘None. I just don’t want it today, not today. That’s all!’

  Uzdy towered above her, his hand clenched into a fist against the door, but Adrienne stepped quickly back, pushed him away with a sudden thrust against his chest, closed the door and locked it from inside.

  This happened in the fraction of a second.

  Inside Adrienne leaned back against the door, her heart beating wildly as she wondered whether in his rage he would hammer on the door and try to break it down. But nothing happened. Both remained motionless, she in the dark room and he in the corridor divided from each other as if by a wall. For a long time neither moved. Adrienne could just hear the sounds of old Maier closing the main door of the house and then his footsteps on the gravel outside as he crossed the outer court. Then once again there was silence. Neither moved …

  A long time later Uzdy turned and went away. Perhaps the fulfilment he had found that afternoon had deflected his usual determination but, whatever it was, he went and he went so softly that the only sound Adrienne could hear was the gentle creaking of the wooden stair that led to his rooms below.

  When Adrienne heard this noise, which had always before been the herald of such horror for her when he was coming to her room, she was filled with a sense of triumph and her amber-coloured eyes opened wide with joy at the knowledge that, at last, and even if only for once, she had been able to protect herself from his hated love-making.

  She was as dazed as a slave unexpectedly set free.

  For a long time Adrienne could not sleep. She lay still and triumphant in that great wide bed where she had so often cried herself to sleep, humiliated and defiled among the ravaged sheets, and the sense of her victory kept her awake until, at long last, as the cocks were already crowing, she feel into a deep untroubled sleep.

  Abady did not leave Almasko as early as he had planned. It was about nine o’clock when he strapped up his bag ready to return to the forest, but even then he was hanging back hoping against hope to see Addy again, even if only to exchange a word or two and to arrange when they should next meet. Still hesitating, he went out into the forecourt, moving slowly towards the circle of lawn in the centre. All at once Adrienne was beside him, cool and radiant, her eyes bright and shining.

  ‘I’m coming with you,’ she said. ‘We have to talk.’

  When they had gone only a few steps a window from the corridor was flung open and Uzdy appeared. Adrienne and Balint stood for a moment petrified, for both of them were surprised that Uzdy, who always slept late, should be up so early. ‘I had to say goodbye,’ he called. ‘Out of politeness, of course! It’s proper for the host. Wait for me! I’m coming down!’ He disappeared and Adrienne and Balint looked wonderingly at each other, asking themselves what this could mean. Had he been spying on them? Could he have heard how familiarly they spoke to each other?

  Uzdy came out towards them dressed in a long dark-grey flannel robe like some ghost advancing slowly across the lawn.

  ‘I wanted to ask you to be so good as not to tell anyone about what we discussed yesterday. Not to anybody, anybody at all! This whole thing is so universally important –
and, of course, so simple, so elementary – that somebody might well try to steal the idea. Then it would get written up and all my work would be for nothing. It’s just the idea, that’s it, just the basic idea that counts. That’s what matters – the idea!’ He barked out the words and tapped at his forehead as he almost shouted once again, ‘The idea! That’s what matters!’

  Balint assured him he would keep it all deathly secret and they shook hands. He started to move away, and Adrienne went with him.

  ‘Darling Addy, you are going with our distinguished friend?’ asked Uzdy in an exaggerated drawl.

  She turned to face him, her black hair seeming even more alive than usual in the slight breeze. Her head was held high, her aquiline nose as sharp as a knife-edge and her whole attitude one of challenge and defiance.

  ‘Oh, yes! I’ll go with him. I always walk at this time. Do you object?’

  ‘No! No! Not at all. Go ahead … of course, of course. Do go … of course.’ He spoke each word more slowly than the last, but stayed where he was, motionless on the lawn in front of the house, as Balint and Adrienne started to climb the hill.

  Before they reached the trees they both turned and looked back.

  Uzdy was still standing in the same place and to the young man at least it looked as if Uzdy’s oriental features were distorted with rage and his mouth open as if he were about to call out after them. The tall elongated figure silhouetted against the butter-yellow building was like an exclamation mark after a cry of menace.

  ‘You must tell me! What happened yesterday, all the time you were in his room? Why that awful time?’ asked Adrienne as soon as they had reached the shade of the forest. ‘I was so afraid for you. It was hours … I was terrified!’