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

by Bánffy, Miklós

  Because the hammering would be sure to be heard and give away their presence they did not construct the usual shelter but rolled themselves in their blankets and slept on the ground. A tiny fire they did make, but this was so insignificant, and anyhow so soon doused, that it could not have been seen from a distance.

  It was still dark when they took to the road. Blindly they struggled upwards in the darkness hardly able to see the path. When they reached the summit dawn was beginning to break, and though the smaller stars had already become invisible in the slowly brightening sky a few of the brighter ones still shone high above them. Thick fog covered the valley of the Intreapa but the ridge opposite could be clearly seen as a hard purple shadow silhouetted against the blushing eastern sky. To the right of where they stood lay the two-hundred-acre plot but as it was still in shadow it was impossible to see if there were any cattle grazing there. On the side where the Abady property marched with the village common lands the boundary was marked by a short straight opening on a steep slope which needed only four men to control it effectively. At the bottom of the valley was the stream which led down to the Szamos. Abady’s plan was to corral all the cattle into one group and then drive them away beside the bed of the stream.

  Balint picked his way slowly downhill. Now it was getting lighter and he could see, on the other side of the valley, Winckler marshalling his men into place so that they would be ready as soon as the morning mists cleared away. The two men met briefly at the stream and then Winckler returned uphill so as to direct his men when the drive began.

  Then the early morning breeze got up, caused by the sun warming the air in the lower valley of the Szamos, which then rose to the upper valleys disturbing there the cold night air and provoking chilly gusts of wind which lasted until the sun could penetrate the depths of the upper valleys. Suddenly, as if touched by a magic wand, the fog disappeared, and the whole valley was clearly to be seen. There, in front of the waiting band, was the Abady clearing, on both sides of the valley, filled with cattle, the cattle of the Gyurkuca villagers. There must have been at least two hundred of them, calves, oxen, heifers, little spots of white clearly defined against the green grass and the cut tree stumps. One of the gornyiks started the drive with a soft whistle. Abady’s men moved slowly forward but after a few minutes, before they had time even to reach the edge of the plantation, a strange thing happened.

  From one of the ridges above them came the deep bellowing sound of a mountain horn, wild and startling and somehow almost melodious as well, a sound something between a hunting horn and an organ; it was the three-yard long tulnyik, the calling horn of the mountain people, and now there was not only one, but another, on the other side of the valley, and then a third from right in the centre where the ridges on both sides of the valley came together to form a miniature pass. It was a long-drawn-out sound, full of terror and menace and so powerful that the very air seemed to tremble.

  At the first wave of sound the cattle seemed to go mad, running helter-skelter in the direction of the village, pregnant cows, elderly oxen, young calves and yearling heifers alike, racing towards the beaters, jumping over fallen logs, barging into carefully constructed woodpiles, rushing homewards with all the impulsion of the Gadarene swine; they had been called by the clashing sound of the great horns resounding from the hilltops around them. In an instant twenty or thirty of the beasts had already reached the stream below, running with all the force of a cavalry charge. The horns continued their deafening sound, and now it was mingled with the frightened lowing of the cattle and the shouts of Abady’s beaters. It was an inferno of sound in the previously tranquil valley.

  Such was the force of the stampede that it would have been impossible to ‘arrest’ a single animal. In a few moments the horns ceased and the cattle had all disappeared. The two-hundred-acre plantation was empty.

  Abady’s men were all in a rage of frustration and when Juanye Vomului reached Abady’s side he threw his sheepskin cap on the ground and cursed as he had never cursed before, spluttering with anger, though nothing could stem the flow of his expletives. The other gornyiks did their best to outdo him, just to show how keen they were, but none succeeded.

  Clearly there was nothing to be done. The trap had failed.

  Honey Zutor suggested he should take a party up to the ridge above and try to catch the shepherds who had given the signal, but they all realized it would have been to no purpose. Everyone concerned would have been long gone. And so, while Winckler turned back to take the path to Beles, Balint took the easier route to the foot of the Ponor where Zutor and Juanye would rejoin him with his horse.

  It was already noon before Balint reached the banks of the Szamos river, and there, so as not to have to ride through the village, shamefaced after his fruitless expedition, he forded the river to take a different path, one that lay through the woods and emerged at the sawmill of Toszerat whence the road led either up to the mountains or down to the main valley. When they reached the mill Balint found there Gaszton Simo, the arrogant and pretentious district notary who had in some way become aware of Abady’s movements and was obviously waiting for him. As soon as Abady came into sigh he galloped up on his handsome dapple-grey gelding.

  ‘And what brings you this way, my Lord?’ he asked slyly, little shoe-button eyes glistening with mockery. There was no doubt, thought Balint, that Simo already knew where he had been and what had happened. When Balint did not reply at once, he went on ironically, ‘Working again, I suppose, ever diligent on behalf of these benighted peasants? I must say I admire your perseverance almost as much as your all-merciful heart!’

  ‘Why pretend you don’t know?’ said Abady roughly, extremely cross that such a mountebank should dare to mock him.

  Simo was not in the least abashed. He gave a light laugh and then said, ‘Well, Mr Deputy, now you can see what a wicked, dishonest depraved lot they are, these men you are so anxious to protect!’

  ‘Of course I protect them and want justice for them. I won’t tolerate their being subject to extortion and blackmail; but neither will I tolerate their doing damage to my property. And what’s more I can understand that they know no better when for years the example set by their so-called betters has been just as bad! Grab, grab, grab, that’s all they know!’

  The notary cleared his throat. He knew only too well that this last remark was directed at him but, determined not to show it, he now adopted an attitude of the utmost goodwill and co-operation.

  ‘This is a matter you can safely leave to me, my Lord,’ he said. ‘I will send a few gendarmes to reinforce your gornyiks. They’ll patrol the high valleys at night and they’ll arrest the men with the horns. Then your Lordship’s forest-manager and his men will be able to drive away the cattle with neither let nor hindrance. Always at your service. Naturally!’

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ answered Balint shortly, for though the idea was nothing if not logical he still did not want to have any dealings with Gaszton Simo. Also he was determined to be under no obligations to such a two-faced character of whose honesty he already had the gravest doubts.

  ‘As you wish,’ said Simo with a slight bow. The notary then lit a cigar. When the two men reached the road, Abady lifted his hat and said, ‘Good-day to you, Mr Notary!’ and turned his horse towards the mountain road.

  ‘I am taking the same road,’ said Simo. ‘I’m going up to Retyicel on business.’

  ‘I hope you didn’t take this long detour just to see me,’ said Balint. ‘Wouldn’t it have been much quicker for you through the Gyalu Botin?’

  The notary laughed softly. ‘Maybe for that too,’ but he did not say more.

  For a while they rode side by side without speaking. Then the notary said, ‘What’s the news from the great world of politics? My uncle the Chamberlain – you know who I mean – just returned from Budapest and he says there’s an alliance between the Constitution and Independence Parties, and that’s why Ferenc Kossuth has got the Grand Cross of the Leopold Order
. Is it possible? Or did he have it already?’

  ‘It was awarded for arranging the commercial treaties,’ said Balint drily.

  ‘Well, well, well!’ Simo seemed to be pondering what he had just heard. ‘Fancy that! The son of the great Hungarian patriot sports a Habsburg decoration! It’s hardly credible. In BanffyHunyad they are all saying that he’s sold his soul for a peck of gold, but I defended him, of course,’ he added hurriedly. ‘After all, he is my chief!’ This last statement hardly rang true as Simo then went on to add a few critical remarks of his own. Still, as he still wished to seem loyal in front of such an influential person as Count Abady, he soon fell silent again. A little later, as Balint still rode on without saying anything, the notary returned to his original question. ‘This alliance,’ he said. ‘Do you think it’ll ever come about?’

  There was little that Abady could say. Of course there had been discussions. The Independence Party members were using this project as their price for accepting the proposed reform of the voting qualifications; and indeed, such an alliance would have been of infinite value to the country since it would automatically bring to an end the constant secret struggle between the various parties forming the Coalition, that struggle which continued effectively to paralyse the government’s freedom of action. At present nothing could be decided without much bargaining and concessions by both sides. No serious advances were possible and the only measures to find an easy path through Parliament were those which enshrined the vote-hunting slogans that had been aired at the election booths. Even the great project for introducing universal suffrage was delayed by the jealousies and petty arguments of the party leaders.

  ‘I really have no idea,’ replied Abady after a long pause. ‘As I am not a member of any of the parties concerned, I know very little about it!’

  The truth was that he did not want to discuss the matter at all, at least not until something definite had been decided. Personally he longed for the projected fusion of the two great parties to become a reality as he was sure that one immediate effect would be to remove all those loud-mouthed demagogues whose trumpeting of parochial nationalist slogans diverted any attention from the increasingly menacing turn of events in the great world outside Budapest and the boundaries of Hungary. This was a time when the nation desperately needed a strong and undivided government, especially now that a liberal constitution had been established in Turkey and the increasing power of revolutionary elements there might lead to serious disturbances in the neighbouring Balkan states. Simo, as if he had read Balint’s thoughts, himself suddenly switched to the Turkish question, though it was possible, thought Abady, that he only did this to show off the range of his political thinking.

  ‘Well, then, what do you think about the news from Turkey? What an extraordinary thing, eh? Perhaps now that they’ve got a constitution they’ll give us a hand against Austria, what? After all the Turks and the Magyars are brothers, or ought to be. Time was when we marched shoulder to shoulder against Vienna. Everyone was talking about it in the club at Banffy-Hunyad. There they were saying…’ and he drifted off into a lengthy discourse, quoting what Bocskay and Gabor Bethlen had written, and saying how the best solution to all their problems would be a great union between Turks and Hungarians which would soon bring the hated Austrians to their knees. It was a marvellous mixture of rhetoric and muddled thinking and Balint found himself growing more and more irritated by the folly and stupidity of it all. He could hardly wait to rid himself of the notary’s tiresome presence and so, seeing a barely passable path leading into the forest and thence through dangerously rocky places to the Prislop, he turned abruptly into it, thinking anything was better than having to listen to any more of this nonsense.

  ‘I turn off here! Goodbye to you!’ Balint said suddenly just as Simo was in mid-sentence, and plunged into the thicket, his men striding behind him.

  Damned stuck-up aristocrat! said the Gyurkuca notary to himself as he rode on. In about fifteen minutes the road entered the dark forest. Here for a moment Simo stopped, looked around him carefully, undid the leather clasp of the holster that was strapped round his waist, and making sure that there was nothing to hinder him reaching for his gun, rode slowly into the shadow of the forest.

  The path that Balint had chosen was not really suited to anyone on horseback. The little mountain ponies themselves could pass anywhere but the branches of the surrounding trees were so low that Balint found himself repeatedly lying flat in the saddle while even the horses had to duck their heads. Soon Balint decided to dismount and continue on foot.

  As his pace was faster than that of the gornyik’s ponies he soon found that he had left them far behind and was walking alone in the great forest.

  There were several tracks on the mountainside, all leading to the meadow on the Prislop, and soon Balint found that he had to choose between two of them, one above, one below the other. He chose the higher. Soon he emerged from the dense thicket of young pine saplings into a more open part of the timber forest where, among the more recently planted trees there were some older ones whose growth had become stunted in the rocky soil and whose branches were covered in moss. Here the sloping ground was dotted with burr-covered burdock while the young summer bramble shoots, now bright green but soon to be laden with blackberries, grew as thickly as if they had been planted by hand.

  So unexpected was the dramatic contrast between the brilliant green of the brambles on the ground with the soft lilac-coloured shade of the tree trunks above that Balint stopped in wonder at the beauty of it. In the branches above hung silver-grey tassels of moss seemingly woven into veils of net. Everywhere there were only these three colours, silver, grey, and vivid green: and the more that Balint gazed around him the more improbable and ethereal did the forest seem until it was only those strands near at hand, which moved gently in the soft breeze, that seemed real while everything further off, the pale lilac shading into violet, was like clouds of vapour in slight perpetual movement as if swaying to the rhythm of some unheard music. And everywhere around, at ground level, was this green carpet, also stirred by almost imperceptible movement, from the valley below to the edges of the lilac-shaded forest above, so that Balint had the impression of a magical seascape. This was enhanced, here and there, by rigid blocks of projecting rock, grey-black slate which shone in the sunshine as if covered by invisible spray. Indeed the rocks really were wet, wet with the humidity of the mountain forest, so wet indeed that tiny droplets were constantly falling from the sharp edges of the rocks onto the damp sponge-like earth beneath. Even the thick soil of the path was damp and resilient underfoot.

  Balint moved slowly on. He felt strangely trance-like, as if some hitherto unrevealed secret would suddenly be unfolded before him, as if a golden stranger would step out from the lilac strands of moss to welcome him to Paradise. And, as always when suddenly aware of unexpected beauty, he thought of Adrienne as if anything in the world that gave him pleasure must stem from her pale skin, her full lips and golden onyx eyes. He could almost see her coming towards him through the lilac and silver threads, her familiar long steps and individual tread gliding over the glittering ocean of green.

  At once he decided that as soon as they were married they must come here together, at the same time of year, at the same hour … and wander, hand in hand, in the silence of this magical forest.

  From his dream Balint was awakened by the faint flutter of wing-beats. Before him there rose a little bird, smaller than a quail, with a strange swooping flight. It rose in the air and then dropped again, and Balint saw that it was a young snipe, barely more than a fledgling, and still very awkward. The beak seemed disproportionately long for the body and even so it seemed as if its wings were not yet strong enough to support the little bird in anything but awkward stumbling interrupted flight. For a moment Balint watched the little bird’s efforts as twice more it flew up and then came to earth again, cowering in the grass as if too tired to try again. The man then walked swiftly on so as not to frig
hten, or tire further, the little snipe in its first efforts to earn to fly.

  Another quarter of an hour’s walk brought Balint to the edge of a steep cliff. It was an almost perpendicular rock, some six or seven metres high, partly covered by stunted pine and young Balkan maple trees which hung down from the summit, their gnarled trunks seeming to search for light and air above the open space of the meadow below. Here, Balint saw, the little band of forest guards had already arrived and had made there a stop on the way where there was water and the grass was green and so made it a good place to rest and feed the horses before tackling the last stretch of their way to the Prislop.

  Andras Zutor and his companions were sitting in the shade at the foot of the rock. They were talking excitedly among themselves and it had been the sound of their voices which had brought Balint to the edge of the cliff above them. He was just about to call out that he was there when he heard a phrase which made him stand still and hold his breath: ‘… and that’s why the notary is so frightened, and why he came this way round.’

  They spoke, of course, in Romanian, but Balint could now well understand everything that was said, and he was curious to know what all this was about. The voice came from young Kula, the boy from Pejkoja who had been enlisted to look after the horses on Balint’s trip to the mountain.

  ‘Of course he’s frightened!’ answered old Zsukuczo, who lived on the Gyalu Botin, near the road from Beles to Retyicel. ‘Didn’t they shoot at him not far from where I live? Of course he’s frightened, wouldn’t you be?’ he said, and laughed as he did so.

  ‘Is that really so?’ asked Vomului, as if he were astonished by the news which he knew perfectly well already.

  ‘Where did this happen?’ asked Zutor.

  ‘I told you. Close to where I live. It was there on the hillside where the road follows the boundary line above the Korbului creek.’