Temptation

  “Had her, too,” he’d say, and to prove it, he’d give a detailed description of the young lady’s sexual abilities.

  But he did have a hopeless love as well. Her name was Mária, but everyone in the building called her Márika instead. She was a rosy-cheeked, full-bodied, pretty little brunette, unbelievably young. She blew through the courtyard’s walkways like a tornado, bringing the latest news and stopping to chat with everyone. She shared everybody’s tears, she shared their laughter. She laughed, she cried, she talked for hours and, despite Herr Hausmeister’s strict prohibition, used to sing at the top of her lungs. The “filthy Kraut” didn’t come bellowing at her to stop. Whenever he saw her, his blue eyes would go so misty the whole building fell about laughing at him. But he didn’t get far with Márika. He couldn’t blackmail her because she always paid on time, and besides, she despised Herr Hausmeister. Once, when he put his arms around her, she slapped him so hard that I not only saw it, but heard it from the third floor.

  Márika was married and had eyes only for her husband. She loved him passionately; the whole house resounded with her love. The object of her affections was called Árpád; he was twenty and a typesetter at a printer’s. He loved Márika back, but more quietly, in his own way. He was a quiet, pale, short boy with spectacles on his narrow, crooked nose which magnified his bloodshot eyes frighteningly. He was the brains of the building. Whenever someone had some complicated official affair or had to write an important letter or request, they’d come up to the third floor to see Árpád. Árpád used to come home late and spend his spare time either down at the working men’s society or in the corner at home, reading. Márika looked up to him like other people look up to the sky, never expecting (and perhaps never envisioning) that she could rise to such exalted spiritual heights.

  They both worked: Árpád at the printer’s and Márika at a cleaning firm. They were as careful with money as the old folk. To save on the tram fare, they used to cycle into Újpest, which is to say that Árpád would cycle while Márika stood on the back wheel, clinging to her husband. Árpád was still an apprentice, because he had started in the profession very late. He was from Salgótarján, and they had sent him down the mines very young—it had been a long, difficult road to that printer’s in Budapest.

  “But once he gets an idea into his head!” Márika would boast, indicating with a broad gesture that nothing, nothing could stand in his way.

  She was always dreaming of the day when Árpád would finish his apprenticeship.

  “And then!” she would say, her eyes aglow, and would throw her head back dreamily.

  We were sitting around the kitchen, the three of us, one Sunday afternoon. Márika had brought chestnuts—we were roasting them on the stove.

  “You’ll be stinkin’ rich,” my mother said, “and if there’s a flat goin’, you’ll leave us like there’s no tomorrow.”

  Márika’s face turned all mysterious.

  “No, we can’t,” she said.

  “Why not?”

  “On account of the baby.”

  “Well, I’ll be!” my mother said, smacking the table. “You don’t mean you’re in the family way?”

  “Not yet,” Márika replied. “But when Árpád finishes his apprenticeship . . .”

  And that was all she talked about all afternoon.

  “That’s why we’re so busy savin’ up,” she said in barely more than a whisper, as if she were imparting secrets. “But I swear that child will want for nothing.”

  “So he will,” my mother said. “So he will.”

  Márika was as devoted to my mother as if she had been her own, and my mother, too, cared for her very much.

  “If they wasn’t around,” she joked, poking Márika playfully in the side, “I might not be around no more, either.”

  Márika laughed. I didn’t see why.

  “Here I was, with a forty-degree fever,” my mother recounted. “And I had no money for the doctor, and the hospital wouldn’t take me. We can see that you’re sick, they said, but there ain’t no room, what can we do, we can’t stick you on the roof. And in the other place they said, if it was an urgent operation, maybe, but like this . . . Then in the third place, they didn’t even say that, just showed me the door, sayin’ there ain’t no room, and off you go, and I was left wandering on, on foot, no less, ’cause I’d used up all my money on the tram already. I was shivering with the chills, I could barely stand up, I thought I was going to die. And then that genius Árpád thought of faintin’.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “Faintin’,” repeated my mother. “Árpád says: they’ll pick up even the poorest person off the street, ’cause they’d get in the way of all them ladies and gentlemen. They’ll send the dog catcher for the dogs and the ambulance for the people. Think about it, he says. Yes, I says, but what am I to do if it ain’t in my nature to faint, even when I’m this damn weak? Just make like you fainted, he says and takes me by the arm, headin’ for the water tower. By then I was so sick, it didn’t take much for me to make out like I’d fainted, I can tell you that. The copper wanted to jab me awake like a tired horse, but Árpád had told me not to let him. If I could lie there till the ambulance came, they’d take me to the hospital. That’s how smart he is, Árpád.”

  “That’s right!” Márika concurred. “He’s smart, he is, and people don’t know the half of it, on account of him being the quiet type.”

  The chestnuts, meanwhile, were done, and we started eating. They were lovely chestnuts and would have pleased anyone, but they were especially delicious to mother and me, because they were the first things we’d eaten all that Sunday. But of course, we didn’t tell Márika that.

  “Oh!” my mother gushed. “That were the life! Hungry? the nurse would ask, and off she went to fetch the milk. And not the kind, mind you, we drink, but real, fine milk, that costs thirty-four fillérs a litre! Never had it so good, me, not even in my muther’s belly!”

  I thought a lot about that later, when I read about the appalling conditions in the Rókus hospital. Everything in the world, it seems, is relative.

  “It were wonderful,” my mother repeated. “I keep thinkin’ how nice it would be to get another bit of that pneumonia.”

  “That’s right,” Márika chorused. “We were just talking with Árpád the other day about how good it would be to be in hospital for a few weeks. Just lyin’ there in peace, drinkin’ that good milk and never mindin’ what it cost. And I hear serious cases even gets chicken now and then! Mmmmm, that’s the life!” she enthused, and threw her head back dreamily, as always when she was enthralled.

  Those were the dreams people dreamt in that building. This was where I started out from each morning to go to the hotel where the gentlemen—and I don’t know why, but this was what always infuriated me the most—would pay two and a half pengős for a packet of cigarettes.

  5

  COMING HOME ONE NIGHT, as I got to the third floor, I was surprised to see the light on in the kitchen. I couldn’t begin to imagine what had happened. My mother was usually asleep at this hour and even if she was awake she never used to put the light on, because we couldn’t very well afford such luxuries. I recognized Márika’s voice, and I was even more baffled. What was Márika doing with my mother at this hour?

  I opened the door. I saw my mother lying in bed, yellow as a candle, and though it was bitterly cold, there were beads of sweat on her forehead. Márika was sitting on the edge of the bed with a pot of soup in her lap, from which my mother was drowsily spooning. I watched them in silence.

  “Don’t look so scared,” said my mother. “There ain’t no gettin’ rid of me that easy!”

  “What’s wrong?” I finally managed.

  “She came over all faint, poor thing,” Márika said. “She was washing for the head porter and she fainted beside the tub.”

  “But this time they didn’t take me to the hospital!” joked my mother. “Looks like if you faint for real, they don’t take you.”


  “You seen a doctor?”

  “They fetched one. It was him that brought me round.”

  “And what did he say?”

  “What they always say. Rest up, eat well.” She shrugged. “So much for them.”

  She began once more to spoon her soup. There was silence, only the Gypsy music from the tavern filtering in. My mother’s eyelids began to droop; she put her head down on the mattress and fell asleep, spoon in hand. Márika stood up quietly.

  “She’s weak, poor thing,” she whispered, and pulled me away from the bed. “Tell me, Béla, she eating properly?”

  Properly? I thought. Is she eating at all?

  “I don’t know,” I mumbled, but then it occurred to me how ashamed my mother would be if other people knew she was starving, so I added: “Yeah, ’course she is, I’m sure she is.”

  My mother groaned in her sleep. I looked at her, and when I saw her stiff, bloodless face, I was struck by a sense of cold dread. What if she dies of starvation in the night? She was complaining just the other day that the diminutive head porter had taken her washing for them for free to mean they didn’t have to give her lunch, either. Who knows when the poor thing last had anything to eat?

  “Márika!” I called, and I was frightened to hear my voice tremble.

  Márika looked at me in surprise.

  “What is it, Béla?”

  “Um . . .” I muttered, “I don’t know how to say this. I’m so ashamed. Mother gave me money this morning for bread, but I . . .”

  “Spent it?”

  The dumpy postmistress had asked the same thing when I hadn’t had enough money for the stamp. I knew now to say yes. I nodded.

  “Could you lend us a bit?”

  “ ’Course I will,” Márika replied, and off she ran to get it.

  They lived opposite us, so it wasn’t long before she was back. She brought a whole loaf, and I could have kissed her. My God, I thought, the good it’ll do mother!

  “But don’t tell her,” I whispered, because I knew my mother.

  “Like I would!” she said, and winked conspiratorially. “But next time don’t you go spending that money. Well, g’night!”

  “G’night, Márika. God bless you for your kindness.”

  The door closed behind her and a fearful silence fell. Down in the bar, the Gypsies were still playing. I remembered poor Berci. He’d fainted once too. It was during geography; the Schoolmaster was drawing the waterways of Hungary up on the board, and in the silence, we heard a dull thud. That was in the spring. He was dead by autumn.

  “Muther!” I said, alarmed.

  My mother trembled.

  “What is it?”

  “I’ve brought you some bread. Won’t you have some?”

  “Sure,” she replied weakly, but by the time I took her the bread, she was asleep again.

  I sat down on the edge of the bed and waited. She was sleeping so deeply that I didn’t have the heart to wake her. I just sat there and looked at her thin, careworn face. The next thing I knew, I too had fallen asleep. I dreamt that I was an altar boy, ringing the bell at my mother’s funeral. I woke to find myself sobbing loudly. My mother was asleep. She made hoarse, whistling noises in her sleep, and now and then would moan like a child. The lamp had run out of petroleum, the wick glowing smokily in the darkness. I put it out. It was only when I touched the warm lamp that I felt how cold I was. I struck a match and looked at the clock. It was half past three. I have to go in an hour and a half, I thought. I should sleep, otherwise there’d be trouble at the hotel.

  I went into the room and lay down, but couldn’t sleep. My teeth chattered from the cold and tiredness. Manci wasn’t home, so I got up and walked around the room. I walked around till dawn, but by the time I left home, I knew what I would do.

  I deliberately missed the communal lunch at noon, and only came to the kitchen when the others had already left. I stuffed my pockets with paper and, in an unsupervised moment, wrapped up all the food in it. I only ate what I couldn’t pocket: the soup and the vegetable stew. I did the same thing in the evening with dinner. On the way home, I was so hungry that I could barely resist the temptation. But then I remembered my mother and all at once I lost my appetite.

  She was asleep by the time I got home.

  “Evenin’,” I said, nice and loud.

  She looked at me in surprise, because I never usually woke her.

  “Something the matter?”

  “Not at all,” I replied. “Just wanted to know how you’re doing.”

  She shrugged.

  “Like a cat in a well, my boy.”

  It was true, I could see that for myself. I quickly diverted the conversation.

  “Didn’t that doctor give you some medicine?”

  “No,” she replied a little testily.

  The conversation just didn’t want to get going.

  “Has Márika been?” I asked, just for something to say.

  “Yes.”

  “Anyone else?”

  “The Sabbatarian came by in the afternoon.”

  “What’d he want?”

  “Nothin’. He heard I were sick. Read me a bit of the Bible.”

  I kept on asking her questions about this and that, and it was only ten minutes later that I remarked, as casually as possible:

  “I brought you something to eat. Here.”

  I took the package out of my pocket. There were two slices of meat, a good deal of potatoes and two big slices of bread. My mouth watered, and I could see that my mother, too, swallowed heavily. But she pushed the food away.

  “You eat it, my boy,” she said. “Grown-ups can go hungry easier.”

  “Hungry? Who’s hungry?” I boasted. “They give us so much to eat at the hotel it’s enough to spoil your stomach. I always end up leavin’ half of it.”

  My mother gave me a funny look.

  “Leavin’ half of it?”

  She sounded doubtful, but there was also a little indignation in her voice. I realized I’d gone too far. I wouldn’t have believed her, either, if she told me she used to leave half her food. So I added:

  “You know, for the others.”

  “Yes, ’course,” she nodded, because this she could understand. The poor don’t advertise their troubles.

  “But I’m smarter than that now. I’ve figured out a way.”

  “Just mind you don’t get yourself in trouble, son.”

  “I wasn’t born yesterday. I’ve got my wits about me.”

  “Yes,” she replied seriously. “You’re a smart lad, no denying.” She gazed pensively for a while, and then said without looking up, “You ought to be going to school.”

  I didn’t reply. It grew silent; there was only the dripping of the water pipe.

  My mother glanced again and again at the food.

  “Sure you won’t eat?”

  “Told you I ain’t hungry.”

  “Go on, have half !”

  “Want me to spoil me stomach?”

  That did the trick.

  “All right, then,” she said with a reluctant smile and bit into the thick, juicy pork chop.

  I had to sit down, because I was faint with hunger. It was a two-faced moment. One of the finest of my youth. I had fed my starving mother.

  •

  From then on, I smuggled my food home every day. The lack of food and the distances I had to walk made me so weak that by the evening, I could barely stand up. I couldn’t wait for the moment my shift ended, and at the same time I was terrified of it, because that was when the hardest part began: the walk to Újpest. I would drag myself along like a sick animal, and by the time I got home, I was often on the edge of fainting. And then something else happened, as well.

  The Major, it seemed, couldn’t live without the army, playing soldiers with us instead. Every morning, he’d line us up in ranks like privates and hold a strict “inspection”. The brass buttons on our red bellboys’ uniforms had to be gleaming, and God help whoever didn’t
have a perfect crease in their trousers. We had to comb our hair in the “regulation” manner, too: down flat, parted to the left. He “inspected” our fingernails, ears, and necks, and would sometimes even sniff us like a dog; and there was hell to pay if someone smelt of sweat.

  During one of these inspections, he barked at me:

  “What kind of shoes do you call those?”

  I didn’t know what to say. Should I have said that they were the Schoolmaster’s shoes, and I’d been to hell and back to get them? That I had been thrown in jail because of them, beaten with the stock of a rifle and chased out of my village? That they were the reason I couldn’t go to school any more? What was I supposed to say?

  There was an awkward silence. I thought the world had ended. And then Elemér unexpectedly piped up:

  “Sir, he’s damaged his foot, sir. It’s bandaged, and that’s why he’s wearing this . . . this great big pair of battered old shoes.”

  But the Major wasn’t interested in the state of my foot. He snapped curtly:

  “Don’t let me see you wearing them again!”

  “Yessir!”

  “Not ‘yessir’, but yes, sir.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Dismissed.”

  When the Major had left, Elemér came over.

  “You should buy a pair of shoes,” he whispered.

  “I know,” I nodded.

  “D’you have the money?”

  “No.”

  “So what are you going to do?”

  “What can I do?” I said with a shrug. “They’ll fire me. And it couldn’t have come at a worse time.”

  “Why?”

  “My muther’s sick. Very sick.”

  Elemér didn’t say anything, just looked straight ahead. We were silent for some time.

  “I ain’t got money either,” he said apologetically, and came closer. “He mustn’t see you,” he whispered. “Make yourself scarce if you see him.”

  “What’s the point?” I replied. “I have to turn up for inspection.”

  “I’ll say they’ve sent you off somewhere. You’re in my section, I’m responsible for you.”

  “Sure,” I shrugged, “but how long can we keep that up?”