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

by Bánffy, Miklós

  There were roars of laughter as each story came to an end, for Akos knew well how to tell a tale to good effect. Only Gazsi Kadacsay, who was sitting nearby, seemed to grow sadder and sadder as he listened. In the past Joska had been his hero, the ideal man, who knew more about horses than anyone living and who held the reins better than any other amateur driver. Ever since he had been a small boy Gazsi had done all he could to imitate and emulate him, and if he couldn’t surpass him as a driver at least, perhaps, he might excel as a rider. It was, of course, true – as he knew to his cost – that it was not advisable to buy a horse from Joska; but then in that world cheating when selling horses was accounted almost as a virtue, a skill to be admired! Later it had seemed to Gazsi that Joska had not seemed unduly troubled by his conscience in other matters either, but then, as long as he was merely an amateur sportsman, such failings could be overlooked.

  The death blow to Gazsi’s hero-worship had come when Joska accepted the post of Prefect, for now his lack of conscience came as a real disappointment. Gazsi felt somehow deceived and started to look at his friend with new eyes, and judge him ever more harshly; for this revelation of his old hero’s real character coincided with a new spiritual hunger that, had he known it, had been growing in him for several years past. More and more it was borne in upon him that all those years spent in trying to be like Joska were wasted years, years squandered in pursuit of a foolish, vain and useless dream. Gazsi, though basically intelligent, had not done as well at school as he should have. Though a volunteer for army service he had remained a soldier principally because in those days young officers in hussar regiments spent most of their time, like Joska, either riding in steeplechases or resting while their collarbones, broken at point-to-point races or in training sessions, had time to mend. Now he began to realize that he was ignorant and knew nothing of things that really mattered. Accordingly he had left the army, started buying books and studying in a mad desire to catch up on everything that he had previously disregarded. His reading was haphazard and indiscriminate. He would read anything, particularly works of philosophy. But the more he read the more bewildered he became. He would puzzle out one problem only to be faced with another; and when he had started to tackle the next subject the more complicated and puzzling it would seem. And the more he read the more he developed a deep resentment for his former neglect of himself: and with it almost a hatred for Joska Kendy on whom he had squandered ten long years of hero-worship. And when he drank too much, as he had on the day of the bazaar, these thoughts became so strong as to become almost an obsession.

  Akos Alvinczy was telling a new story. This time it concerned a landowner, one Todor Racz, whose property was situated in a remote country district. He was a passionate but singularly unskilful gambler and, of course, he usually lost. The new Prefect, Joska, was one of his regular poker school. One night, after the usual disastrous session, Racz told everyone that this would have to be the last time he played because in two days’ time the bailiffs would come to take possession of all he owned. For years, Racz explained, he had managed not to pay any taxes, not a penny, but now they had caught up with him and everything he owned would have to go to auction. What, asked Akos, did Joska do? Why, he sent for the village headman and ordered him to declare an outbreak of cholera in the district and to mark every other house with a red cross, thereby in effect putting the whole district in quarantine. When the bailiffs arrived on the following day they were chased away by armed guards from the village itself.

  ‘And so Todor Racz’s absence didn’t spoil their game after all. He went on playing and to this day the bailiffs haven’t dared set foot in the place!’

  At this Gazsi could no longer contain his anger. ‘I don’t think that’s at all funny. No humour in that little stor-r-ry!’ he growled, rolling his ‘r’s as usual. ‘A Prefect isn’t appointed to ensur-r-re that a fellow ar-r-ristocr-r-rat can welsh on his taxes!’

  Whatever, they all wondered, had come over Baron Gazsi? He had always been such a joker, a fellow never known to take anything seriously. Abady, however, remembered the little speech that Gazsi had made that evening at Mezo-Varjas when, though less tipsy than tonight, he had talked about the non-existence of true happiness. Something is troubling this man, he thought, as everyone else looked at Gazsi astonished.

  Joska Kendy merely took his friend’s words as the introduction to some joke or other and so, from where he sat near to Mrs Korosi – having until now behaved as if he had heard nothing at all of these flattering stories about himself – he called out, pipe in mouth, ‘When four-legged animals form a government you too can be a Prefect!’ in the sort of bantering tone they had always used with each other.

  ‘Not even then!’ retorted Gazsi in an angry tone. ‘I’d never accept a job I didn’t know how to do. I’m a fool, a donkey, and I know it!’

  ‘Fancy admitting it! That’s most interesting,’ said Joska in a tone of unconcerned mockery.

  ‘And even if I were made Pr-r-refect for four-legged animals – as you so cleverly put it, meaning donkeys I presume – I’d still feel I had some obligations and not tr-r-reat it all as some kind of joke!’ Turning to Balint, Gazsi went on, ‘Aren’t I right? You talked to me once about this. Do you remember?’ And then, not waiting for an answer, he shouted over to Joska, ‘At least I admit I’m a donkey.’

  ‘And what does that mean?’ asked Joska drily, pipe in mouth, but with a serious expression which showed them all that the argument was about to get serious. Gazsi hesitated for a moment, obviously searching in his mind for the appropriate insult.

  At this point a tall lean figure stepped up between the place on the platform where Joska was sitting and the stand, a yard or two away, where Gazsi had sat down. It was Pali Uzdy, tall as a tower, who was dressed in a long travelling overcoat. Totally disregarding everyone else he stopped in front of his wife, put one booted foot on the steps leading up to the platform and said, ‘I’m leaving for Almasko! Do you have any messages, dear Adrienne? Is there anything you need from there?’

  ‘You’re going now? At this time of night?’ asked his wife, somewhat taken by surprise.

  Uzdy’s slanting eyebrows were raised even higher than usual as he asked, ‘Surely, my dear, you are not still surprised by my comings and goings?’ And his tone was as ironic as ever. ‘My carriage is at the door. So there is nothing you want? Good! Well, I just asked. Well, well! Goodbye then! Until we meet again!’ and he swept his beaver hat in a wide gesture of general farewell. ‘Goodbye to you all!’

  He turned and stalked out with the same silent measured tread as when he had walked up a few moments before.

  When the doors had closed behind him Adrienne’s and Balint’s eyes met for a brief second.

  Young Kamuthy now decided to take advantage of the sudden silence to return to his favourite theme. ‘In Angland,’ he said with even more self-importance than before, ‘no one expecths national figureth to be experths in their jobthe. On the contrary, they feel that too much expertithe destroythe all objectivity.’

  ‘Well, nothing’ll destroy yours!’ shouted Joska, who was all too glad of the diversion because he would have hated to have been obliged to have it out with Gazsi as this would have meant making their dispute an ‘affair of honour’ with the inevitable duel to follow. Everyone, in fact, was happy that the laughter and the joking had started again and they all joined in with gales of mirth when Pityu Kendy went for Kamuthy and said, ‘You’d do better to go and wash those stamps off your face, young man! Someone might try to shove you in the post-box!’ At which the stage-Englishman touched his forehead and, horrified, screamed out in English, ‘Oh, my God! Oh, Lord! Oh, Lord!’ and ran shamefacedly away.

  Kamuthy’s going prompted others to leave too.

  ‘Goodness, how late it is! Time to go home!’ said someone; and at these words, as if by magic, everyone started getting their things together.

  ‘Only now, when the party’s over, does one notice how tired one is,’
said Adrienne as she walked towards the door.

  Balint stayed on for a few moments, barely seeming to notice Adrienne’s departure. He appeared to be absorbed in something that the Prussian baron was explaining – though it might have been that he was merely fascinated by Ugo’s Pomeranian accent.

  ‘Das ist man so, wie ich soeben Ihnen sagte, mein lieber Graf; bei uns und auch in Ost-Preussen ist es wohl nichl anders – that is how it is, as I’ve just explained to you, my dear Count; with us and also in East Prussia, it is never otherwise …’

  Chapter Three

  ADRIENNE’S BEDROOM was in almost total darkness. Only a single candle was burning and this she had placed on the floor beside one of the bedside tables. The light was therefore indirect and cast strange shadows on the walls, transforming the outlines of the table-legs into weird lines that broke disconcertingly at the angle of the ceiling. The outline of the bed threw half the room into shadow as if it were filled with dark clouds. The unusual source of light gave a sense of fantasy to a room whose appearance was normally quite ordinary, indeed almost banal. There were a few upholstered chairs dating from the 1860s, a chest of drawers indistinguishable from countless others, and, in front of one of the windows, a dressing-table. On the walls was a faded wallpaper: nothing more. If it had not been for the bed the room would have been like any of those furnished for occasional guests. Adrienne’s bed was exceptionally large, had no headboard or tester, and was covered with flounces of flowing ivory-covered lace draperies. In the grey, ordinary, otherwise cheaply-furnished room, it was like an exotic foreigner. Indeed this bed was the only thing in the room which was Adrienne’s own; all the other pieces had been put there originally by her mother-in-law. There it was, an alien object, as out of tune with everything else as were, in the adjoining drawing-room, the white woolly carpets strewn with multi-coloured cushions that Adrienne had placed in front of the vast chimney-piece and which contrasted so strangely with the severe lines of the despised Empire furniture which Countess Uzdy had thought fit for her daughter-in-law’s use.

  Everything that Adrienne had brought to these rooms had a curiously temporary character, as if they were a nomad’s possessions put down wherever their owner should lay his head. The great divan set haphazardly in the centre of the room, pillows, blankets; they had come with her and should she go away and remove them then the rooms would not change but merely revert to their original appearance. It was as if their owner had merely chosen the rooms to camp in, rather as Bedouins might set up their tents between the columns of some classical temple.

  The only definite colour in the room was the triangle of black on the pillows where Adrienne’s hair lay fanned out like an ancient Egyptian wig.

  She was awake; and waiting, for she was sure that Balint would come to her that night. They had not discussed it, indeed they had had no opportunity, and besides Uzdy had been in Kolozsvar and no one had known of his imminent departure until he himself had announced it so abruptly and unexpectedly at the end of the bazaar. Adrienne’s and Balint’s eyes had met, just for a brief instant, but it had been enough. Their meeting that night had to be, must be, after so many months of waiting and aching for one another.

  It had been a long, long time. Ever since Adrienne had returned to Almasko from her father’s home at Varjas they had not been able to meet. That had been the beginning of November and now it was the end of March. Endless days, endless nights of absence and yearning and waiting. It had been the same for both of them, obliged to live apart and only from time to time getting a brief note one from the other; for a regular correspondence would have been too conspicuous and drawn attention to them. For Adrienne it was as if she were a prisoner in her husband’s and mother-in-law’s house without even the consideration offered to a guest. There had been dreadful weeks of worry over the health of her little daughter, and of struggle, too, with her mother-in-law who ever since the child had been born had taken full charge of the girl and done everything to exclude the mother. When the child was well Adrienne had not seemed to mind so much and, indeed, after the first few confrontations with Countess Clémence, had given up the unequal struggle. That had been eight years before, when Adrienne herself had still been very young. She had had to give in; and slowly she had got used to the fact that they had stolen her child from her, though this had been somewhat if not entirely alleviated by the growing knowledge that little Clemmie herself was so different from her mother, so passive and unresponsive that she might have been someone else’s child.

  But Adrienne’s own passive consent had vanished the day that the child had fallen ill. By nature all women are nurses. It is one of the immutable laws of motherhood and it is doubly true when it is the woman’s own offspring who needs care. Adrienne’s first outright revolt came when the old countess, without even telling the child’s mother, had a trained Red Cross nurse sent out from Kolozsvar. There had been an appalling scene between the mother and grandmother made all the more bitter and distressing because it had been conducted with the greatest politeness and in calm, smooth words whose meaning was impregnated by mutual hatred. Her husband had not helped her but had merely sat by and listened in silence to the embittered dispute between the two women. It was almost as if he were amused by the scene. As it turned out the younger woman won, but her victory was far from complete. All that Adrienne gained was the right to do for her daughter what the Red Cross nurse, or the Nanny, would have done, and even this menial role had to be fought for every day. The Dowager Countess Uzdy watched her every move, hoping to catch her out in some negligence and so use Adrienne’s inexperience as an excuse to shut her out again from any contact with her child. The regular taking of the temperature, each medicine or other treatment given, every little change of the symptoms of the girl’s illness, had all to be recorded with exact details of the hour and minute – and woe betide anyone who made the smallest omission or error!

  That every minute of the day was occupied by this constant preoccupation and worry was, at least in one way, helpful to Adrienne, indeed beneficial: it kept her occupied. The days and then the weeks went by, and the work made Adrienne put aside the bleakness of her everyday life. One new little joy she had, and it came from the child herself. Little Clemmie had begun to warm towards her mother. During the long convalescence, as Adrienne would sit beside her bed, the little girl would sometimes look up at her mother and smile and often, when the time had come for Adrienne to leave the sickroom and someone had come to relieve her, little Clemmie would try to keep her there, saying, ‘Don’t go yet. Don’t go, please stay with me!’ and at the same time putting her little hand in Adrienne’s. When she did this she would look slyly up at her grandmother, for it seemed that she only did it when her grandmother was also in the room. When Countess Clémence was not there the child did not say such things … or did she? No! Only when the old woman was present. And so it seemed that perhaps she only made up to her mother because she knew it would annoy the old lady, and for no other reason. Adrienne tried hard to put this thought from her for she desperately wanted to believe that her child was genuinely fond of her.

  When the little girl was well enough her grandmother took her away, to Meran where they had been so often before. Adrienne came to believe that if little Clemmie had not been whisked away from her so quickly then she might have been able to find her way into the child’s heart. But taken away she was, and so the fight for the girl’s soul would have to start all over again. And this time it was Adrienne who decided that the battle must be joined … and Adrienne who was determined to win.

  This is what Adrienne had been thinking about as she stared at the weird shadows on the ceiling of her room.

  In the adjoining drawing-room the latch of the French window made an audible click. In the wave of joy at seeing Balint again all these painful memories were wiped from her mind.

  ‘This is no life!’ Balint said again. ‘This is no life at all!’ and he started again to enumerate all the arguments why Adrienne woul
d have to find a way to divorce her husband. They were lying in bed, their bodies clasped tightly together, quite motionless. Their total mutual surrender made every position one of ease and comfort and, just as their souls fused so completely that they had no need of words to understand one another, so their bodies fitted in such harmony that they might have been unsophisticated wild animals entwined (even if in the cages of a zoo) in the simplicity of uncomplicated sleep. Their faces were very close, so close that their softly murmured words were almost kisses in themselves.

  Balint was pleading ever more urgently for Adrienne’s divorce. It was necessary, it was inevitable. He used every argument, going over and over the awful circumstances of her life – and his.

  It all sounded completely convincing as they lay together, naked flesh to naked flesh, his arms holding her closely, his hands caressing her skin and his lips breathing kisses. Everything spoke to them of freedom, of liberation, of the inevitability of their being forever together. Even so Addy managed somehow to remain calm and matter-of-fact.

  She was thinking that perhaps their dream really could be realized. Recently Uzdy no longer seemed actively to exercise his old tyranny and indeed while she had been nursing their child he might almost have been avoiding her … not that that proved anything for it had happened often before in their life together. Uzdy, she knew well, was nothing if not unpredictable. But there was another question, a serious question, that weighed upon her mind. What was to become of the child? It was unthinkable that she should leave her behind, abandon her! Little Clemmie could not just be sacrificed, as she would be if Adrienne went away and left her to the influence of her husband and mother-in-law. That would be the ruin of the child. Already she was strangely introvert and silent, unnaturally reserved for someone of her age. For this Adrienne was sure that her mother-in-law’s cold severity was entirely responsible and she felt it was for her to come to the child’s rescue. But could she succeed? Even supposing that Uzdy were willing to divorce, one thing was quite clear. He would want his revenge and would stop at nothing to punish her. The old woman would fight to the death to keep her grandchild with her and if Uzdy listened to anyone it was to his mother. Therefore this would be the most dreadful of all obstacles she was bound to encounter. After the last five months’ long struggle for control of the child Adrienne felt it would now be humiliating to withdraw.