They Were Divided

by Miklos Banffy

  Balint had been waiting for her not far from the top of the stairs and when she appeared he took an unconscious step towards her, but Adrienne checked him with an almost invisible smile behind which he sensed the unspoken words: ‘Now you can see what it is that I brought from Vienna and which, despite your demands, I would not tell you about. I kept it secret even from you, so that you should see me like this, suddenly, unexpectedly, my tribute to you’, and she continued her progress between the double line of guests, many of them clad in all the colours of the rainbow. And as she continued her queenly progress down the hall a soft murmur of admiration rose around her which mounted to a crescendo as the spectators caught sight of the cascade of thin golden threads which fell from the back of her imperial crown, some almost to the ground, and all of them ending in a golden flower with a ruby at its heart. As she walked these flowed behind her, each flower reflecting the red-hot desire that could be seen in the eyes of the men who watched her progress.

  Finally she arrived at the platform on which the Patronesses of the ball were seated. Then she sank into the deep curtsy of one being presented at Court, her supple body sinking and rising with all the calm and assurance of a panther; and her bearing was so regal that there was a burst of spontaneous applause.

  Adrienne’s sweet-natured aunt, Countess Laczok, cried out enthusiastically, ‘Oh, how beautiful you are, my darling!’ and for once even the spiteful old Countess Sarmasaghy, Aunt Lizinka, suppressed her natural malice and found herself saying: ‘I must say I’ve never seen anyone so beautiful!’ Uncle Ambrus, dazzled, roared out: ‘Damned fine wench!’ and in a few moments she was surrounded by a crowd of men, young and old, who would not budge from her side even though the music had just started. Many of them at once asked her to dance. Some she did not seem to hear, but to others she just gently shook her head, for she was waiting for Abady and when he reached her side she took his arm and the others started to melt away.

  Recently it had always been like this. Since Uzdy had been taken away hopelessly insane Balint and Adrienne had made no attempt to pretend or hide their love for each other. They made no secret of it and everyone knew; though whether they really were lovers or not remained uncertain. It did not matter for they both held their heads high and everyone knew that they belonged to each other; and so society accepted the situation. Men no longer chased after Adrienne, even though she was now so much more beautiful than before, for they realized that she would never look at anyone but Balint, and to pursue her would be in vain.

  Everyone knew that divorce was impossible for her and so her feelings for Balint, which neither of them made any attempt to conceal while at the same time conducting themselves with so much dignity and discretion, always together at every function but never arriving or leaving together, became an accepted fact. Even Aunt Lizinka stopped spreading her evil tales about Adrienne for there were no men chasing after her and no flirtations to gossip about. Uncle Ambrus stopped yearning after her and hinting that they were having an affair. Now everyone knew the truth, even if not all of it; and as the basis for gossip is conjecture and concealment, here there was neither and so nothing to gossip about.

  Boldly and together Balint and Adrienne faced the world openly.

  Deprived of her favourite object of malice Aunt Lizinka had had to look around to find another target. She soon found it in the person of Count Jeno Laczok’s elder brother Tamas. After a riotous youth and several years of adventure abroad, Tamas had qualified as a railway engineer and had found employment with the Hungarian State Railways. His work had brought him back to Kolozsvar, and his predilection for very young gypsy girls soon became well-known. Aunt Lizinka at once pounced on this juicy scandal and decided to become ‘worried’ about him. Now, sitting on the Patronesses’ elevated dais, she plunged into the matter with glee, explaining with zest and false concern, that she was terrified that her nephew Tamas would land in gaol. ‘You know, my dear, that little gypsy girl he keeps isn’t even thirteen! Think of the scandal! How dreadful this would be for the family! I know for a fact that the police are after him even now.’

  Although Aunt Lizinka’s high-pitched screech could be heard in most parts of the hall, Balint and Adrienne, who were strolling past, heard nothing of it. Other people’s affairs were no concern of theirs and so they did not bother to listen. They walked together as in a dream, completely wrapped up in each other and in their own happiness. Soon they sat down together on a bench beside the wall and then Adrienne turned smiling to her lover and said, ‘Do you like it?’

  ‘Very, very much!’

  ‘Really and truly?’

  ‘Even more than very, very much!’ he repeated warmly and then, very softly, in a low whisper that no one could possibly overhear, he muttered into her ear a few words in English, words whose meaning was their own secret symbol of their love.

  For a moment Adrienne lowered her eyelids over her big topaz-coloured eyes. She did not speak, for the little movement was her accepted answer; but her full lips opened slightly to show the gleam of her white teeth …

  Then with joy in her heart she told him how she had devised her imperial head-dress, how she had pored over illustrated books, and how, when she went to Vienna, she had somehow managed to have it made in the workshop of the opera house. Then she told too how she had secretly brought it home and how, because the hanging flowers at the back had tickled her neck, she had lengthened them herself to make that jewelled cascade that everyone had admired so much.

  The ball soon got under way, and the opening csardas was followed by a series of waltzes. Just as Laci Pongracz, the popular band-leader, swung his musicians into the new favourite, the ‘Luxembourg Waltz’, there was a new arrival. A powerfully built man with a black beard entered the room. It was Tamas Laczok, and his appearance was to cause almost as much stir as had that of Isti Kamuthy an hour before, especially among the Lady Patronesses and the other matrons on the platform. This reaction was not entirely unexpected, even by the subject of it himself, for he, as well as all the others, had been fully aware of all the tales that had been circulating about him. As an engineer of the State Railways he had been sent to take charge of some repair works on the line between Kolozsvar and Apahida and had taken up residence some three weeks before in a small peasant’s house in the district of Bretfu.

  Though he was not far from the centre of Kolozsvar he had not often come into the town, for his was a solitary nature and he liked his privacy.

  Even so the news of the ball had somehow come his way, and though this would not normally have attracted him, he had also heard that old Countess Sarmasaghy was to be one of the patrons together with his younger brother Jeno. To cap it all he had been at the station that morning and had seen the arrival of the banker, Baron Weissfeld, and his family, who had come to attend the ball. The presence of these three had made him decide to put in an appearance himself.

  In this he was prompted only by the dislike, amounting to hate, which he felt for all three of them. He was convinced that his brother had plotted with the banker to deprive him of his rightful share of the Laczok forestry holdings and further, that it had been Aunt Lizinka who had played a major part in seeing that he had been disowned by his family at the time he had been sowing his wild oats. The result had been years of exile. It was, of course, true that this experience had made a new man of him, for it was this that had led him first to study in Paris and obtain his engineering degrees and then to find a position with an international firm that had first sent him to Durazzo on a construction job and later to work on the building of a railway across the Atlas mountains. He had remained in Algeria for many years and he could have stayed there with a position of great responsibility. But he had decided that he would rather hold some secondary post at home with the Hungarian State Railways, partly because he had come to realize that he only felt really at home back in Transylvania and also because if he were to return he would be able to haunt his much hated brother and perhaps also find the means
of revenging himself upon his old enemies.

  If this was the main reason why he had decided to attend the ball, he had also got wind of the scandalous tales that his aunt was now spreading about him. He had arrived late because he had not at once been able to find his evening clothes, and when he had found them his gypsy servant had had to iron them and then he had had to come into town, locate a shop that would supply him with a stiff shirt and white tie, and then go back to Bretfu to dress.

  All this conspired to make him late. Now that he had finally arrived he looked around, peering above the heads of the dancing throng, until he saw his aunt and sister-in-law on the official dais and he realized that if Ida Laczok was there her husband could not be far away. Then he saw Baroness Weissfeld fanning herself on a chair near the others. Screened by the multitude of dancing couples he threaded his way, stooping slightly like a big game hunter stalking a pride of lions, towards his much disliked relations, carefully keeping out of their sight until he could suddenly burst before them from among the throng of dancers.

  The surprise he caused them was as successful as he had hoped.

  A little while before most of the older men had vanished from the official platform and taken refuge in the hotel’s smoking room. It was one of the rooms put at the disposal of the Comte d’Eu during his recent visit. The Patronesses, however, had not moved from their place of honour. There, right at the front, were Countess Kamuthy, Baroness Weissfeld, and Tamas’s sister-in-law, Ida Laczok. They were listening open-mouthed to Aunt Lizinka who, since she had successfully fought, and won, a battle in the courts to regain her husband’s properties during the repressive régime of Count von Bach after the 1848 uprising sixty years before, had prided herself on her knowledge of the law. Aunt Lizinka was now in full flood describing the criminal proceedings which, according to her, now threatened her nephew Tamas.

  At this point she was saying, ‘My dears, it is quite clear. The law says that such persons must not only be locked up but also condemned to five years’ hard labour. I know for a fact that the police have already put out a search for the little whore’s birth certificate and that her old clay-digging father, who sold the child to him, is already in custody.’

  Countess Ida, who never thought or spoke ill of anyone and who found herself forced to listen only because she could find no excuse to move away, now started to close her ears from boredom and looked round the room to find some distraction. And the first person she saw was her brother-in-law himself, standing quite close and clearly able to hear everything that was being said.

  There he was, the spitting image of her husband Jeno, if perhaps not quite so plump. He had the same Tartar features with a single tuft of hair on his otherwise bald pate. With his slanting eyes almost buried in folds of fat, with his wide-spread eyebrows which gave him the air of perpetual enquiry, he resembled more than anything one of those soapstone figurines to be found in oriental bazaars. In this he was even more like than his brother Jeno, for while the latter sported only a pair of imposing moustaches, Tamas also wore a long thin beard twisted to the shape of a lyre. He stood there, just in front of Ida, quite straight on his shortish legs, with his hands in his pockets, smiling up at her.

  ‘Tamas!’ she cried out in surprise. ‘Where on earth did you spring from?’

  ‘Servus – greetings!’ he replied.

  Everyone looked round, and Aunt Lizinka choked in mid-sentence. Then she too stammered out, ‘You? You here? You! How did you get in here?’

  ‘Because, my dear aunt, I am still at liberty to go where I please! J’ai voulu vous tranquilliser à ce sujet – I just wanted to reassure you about that!’ and he mounted the platform, pulled up a chair and sat down beaming all around him in good-fellowship and high good humour.

  Faced with such a fait-accompli there was nothing that the others could do. Then Tamas turned to Baroness Weissfeld and, carefully choosing his words, slowfully said, ‘Not everyone gets to prison who deserves it, as your good husband must know.’ Then he turned to Ida and went on, ‘How is my brother? I heard he was suffering from a slight Thief’s Cold.’ After this, with the others speechless, he addressed himself directly to old Countess Sarmasaghy.

  ‘My dear aunt, have you heard of my latest troubles? Oh, nothing to do with that tale about the gypsy girl, nothing whatever. No, it is all because my second foreman has just got himself sent to gaol for slander. It’s really been most annoying for he was such a good worker and I don’t know how I’ll manage without him. The fool said something scandalous about the head foreman and as he said it in front of several of his work-mates, one of them denounced him and the idiot found himself hauled before the court. Three witnesses swore that they had heard the slander and the judge believed them, saying that there was little he could have done if only one man had spoken but that three he was bound to believe. What an idiot the fellow was to spread slander in front of three other people!’ and he gestured towards his sister-in-law, Countess Kamuthy and Baroness Weissfeld. ‘They shut him up, my dear aunt, and you can imagine the trouble that has caused.’

  For a moment or two he paused, a wicked look in his eyes as he looked at each of the ladies in turn. Then he rose and said, ‘Well! As I’m here I might as well have a look round. Ma chère tante, je me prosterne devant votre bienveillante attention – my dear aunt, I submit myself to your ever-vigilant goodwill.’

  Then he bowed and went on his way.

  As soon as he had left all three women rose hurriedly and fled in different directions, and Aunt Lizinka was left to suffocate in her own venom.

  Farkas Alvinczy, who had been the previous dance leader, and a Member of Parliament until the year before, stood in a small doorway behind the gypsy musicians. To emphasize the fact that he was not really attending the ball he had come dressed not in evening dress but in ordinary day clothes. This was to show everyone that he had now renounced the frivolous pleasures of the world. It was his pose that a man like him with a brilliant past, who had been the envy of all other men and the favourite of the most beautiful women in Budapest, who had been an eminent servant of the state and a prominent politician, would now choose to withdraw from society rather than take second place in such provincial revels. How could he, who had tasted every pleasure the world had to offer, now be seen courting the attention of a group of dowdy country-women? Naturally he had not said this to anyone, but his air of mysterious superiority just tinged with melancholy spoke only too clearly for him.

  And yet it really was nothing but a pose. It was true that he had been a Member of Parliament, but he had had nothing to say. While in Budapest he had had no more social success than many other good-looking young men, and like other good-looking young men he had had neither more nor fewer adventures with women than had the others. But he had tried to lead the life he imagined and he had even begun to believe it himself to the point at which he now suffered as much as if it had been true. Since he had lost his seat at the last elections he had stopped going out in society and had gone out only to gamble the night away. During the daytime he had slept. He no longer went with the others to sing and dance with the gypsies and it had begun to be whispered that he had become a heavy but secret drinker. Looking at his puffy face and watery eyes people had begun to guess that the rumours were only too true. Still, even if he had started to run slightly to fat he was still exceptionally good-looking.

  Young Ida Laczok caught sight of him from across the room and at once said to herself that he would do for her. Since Gazsi Kadacsay had so inexplicably faded out of her life, she would have accepted anyone who asked her, for by now both her sisters were married and she was the only one still single.

  Stopping her dancing partner as they waltzed by the gypsy band, she bowed to him and went over and stood near Farkas. He in his turn stepped up to her and they shook hands just behind the double-bass.

  ‘What are you doing with yourself these days?’ she asked. ‘It is nice to see you again,’ she went on with a sparkle of encourag
ement in her eyes. ‘You can’t imagine how much we miss you.’

  Farkas made a somewhat disdainful gesture and said in a bored voice, ‘I just wanted to see how the Garazda Boy was making out. I must say he seems to be doing quite well. He’s a clever lad so I expect he’ll learn.’

  ‘Oh, but it isn’t at all the same as when you did it!’ said Ida in a flattering tone and went on with several remarks in the same vein.

  Shortly afterwards they were joined by Margit.

  ‘Have you seen Adam?’ she asked her brother-in-law. ‘He disappeared ages ago. Is he in the card-room? Were you there?’ and her voice held an unusually stern and demanding note.

  ‘I was there all right, gambling if you want to know,’ Farkas replied bitterly, ‘but whether Adam was or not I really can’t say, and I don’t care. I’m not one to spy on others: they can do what they like for all I care!’

  This was intended as a gibe at Margit, for all three of Adam’s brothers resented the young woman who had captured him. They were also afraid of her for they knew they could not compete with her practical brain and strong will. Even so Farkas would not have dared to speak to her like that if they had been alone.

  Margit raised her little beak-like nose and looked up at her tall brother-in-law’s face. Then, with the shadow of a smile, she said, quite calmly, ‘In that case I’ll go and look for him myself!’ Then she turned and walked swiftly away.

  Margit stepped out into the corridor. There she hesitated for a moment or two not knowing which of the four double doors led to the card-room. Then a waiter appeared carrying an ice-bucket and opened the third door. Margit followed him for she had heard the booming voice of Uncle Ambrus saying, ‘Come on, me lad, shell it out! We don’t play for peanuts here, you know. The bank is sixteen hundred. Who wants it?’