The Adventures of Sindbad (New York Review Books Classics)

by Gyula Krudy

  From behind the low stove there appeared the cloaked knight whose care it was to watch over the dreams of women’s rooms: silently he stepped forward, his ostrich-feathered cap perched on his head, and soon the woman’s white arm was hugging the pillow as tenderly as if it had been Sindbad’s neck.

  The train was rumbling warily over the blasted and frozen plateau, fearing to disturb the dead lying beneath the snow-covered field. The wheels kept rolling. Whole hours might have gone by till eventually Sindbad gave a faint laugh and took leave of his first dream, the dream of the coffee-shop woman.

  The train had stopped at a station. Beyond the carriage window snow was flying so fast one could be certain that somewhere, not too far off, wolves would be slinking along the highway towards the village in single file, their heads bent low. A lantern was being carried down the length of the platform in the dark, the voices of railworkers distant, faint, conspiratorial.

  At last the chains rattled, the icy wheels screamed and the train trundled off again. As it left the midway station behind, Sindbad began to think of the slight figure of Paula with her dark hair. Where would he find her? And that dear little shoe of hers with the ribbon tied in a bow — what state would that be in now? Would the hair tucked behind her ears be clean and sweet-scented?

  The winter afternoon, as if in recognition of the fact that these were red-letter days on the calendar, cast brilliant beams of pinky gold over the small border town under whose snow-covered roofs Sindbad was making his way past solidly frozen wooden bridges and niches from which carved stone saints peeked out, searching for the actress who went by the name of Paula. Yes, this is where the company of actors are staying and where night after night they gladden or sadden hearts at the Great Bercsényi inn.* Paula is the company’s ingénue, heroine and mother figure all rolled into one, and at this precise moment she is learning her lines, pacing a sunlit garden at the edge of town, where once upon a time the castle chapel used to stand, the chapel past which resolute-looking noblemen and ladies with finely arched feet would stroll from the castle into town. Paula, who doesn’t take lunch at the inn with the others, regards it as her favourite place — or so Sindbad was assured by the prompter, Pápai, an acquaintance of some three hundred years, for in his youth Sindbad frequently travelled to see performances in the country and would make a point of occupying the box nearest the stage. Pápai coughed, lisped and blew his nose into a large spotted handkerchief, then stuck a half-cigar between his teeth and tried vainly to strike a match against an old matchbox, but said nothing more of Paula.

  Only at the end of the conversation did he append a comment of his own. ‘Really, I thought the gentleman would have learned a thing or two by now. Still chasing actresses?’ Then he pointed out the way to the garden. ‘You’ll pass three inns on the way. Turn up the lane after the fourth.’

  There was the hillside and there indeed was the old garden, white with snow, a stout old matron playing the virgin. The miserly trees hide their thinning twigs under shrouds of snow, the bushes are bare and old before their time, the scrupulously clean snow-covered paths are patterned with footprints of foxes, rabbits and other innocent visitors. It is as if summer had never been — no lawn, no shrubbery, no lush overarching boughs. As if no one had ever wandered down these winding paths, no one from the old castle, no pink-faced courtiers with ladies on their arms (ladies in deerskin boots!), no one from the little town below, no seamstresses hanging on to excitable young students, no frightened but happy girls making their way to forbidden secret rendezvous with men waiting and twirling their moustaches under the chapel arches; no one at all except rabbits and more rabbits.

  Everything was silent and pure and virginal, only an old rook flapped its black wings and trailed its brown shadow across the snow. Sindbad proceeded quietly, looking left and right, but the garden seemed empty, the ruins and the snow presenting a picture of eternal decay.

  Then a dark shadow appeared from behind the castle. It was a woman in a long coat, with a little eagle-feathered cap on her head, eating something, dipping her fingers into a brown paper package. As soon as she saw Sindbad she hastened to stuff this into her handbag.

  ‘It’s Paula,’ thought Sindbad and began to walk rapidly towards her, while she stood chilled and motionless, and perhaps a little scared, in the middle of the path. There was anxiety written across her heart-shaped face, and her deep brown eyes fixed Sindbad with an almost tearful look of entreaty. Then suddenly she brightened and a timid, hopeful smile transformed her whole expression: it was as if two fireflies had raised their wings in the pupils of her eyes. One foot advanced from beneath the long coat and she took a step forward.

  ‘Good heavens, what are you doing here?’ she cried, looking him up and down.

  Sindbad seized her hand, squeezed it, kissed her glove, then took her chin in his hand and gazed deep into that suffering and gently fading face which was the colour of pressed flowers. ‘Weren’t you waiting for me?’ Sindbad asked. ‘Didn’t you dream with me?’

  ‘I did dream once, last week or maybe it was yesterday. But I dream a lot of foolish things. I remember now: we were acting something together on stage and you, sir, were wearing a frock-coat with a big star on the left lapel. How did you get here?’

  ‘I dreamt you were dreaming with me, so I set out.’

  ‘You always had a ready way with words,’ answered the actress with a faint suppressed laugh.

  ‘I began to wonder what you were doing, and about your life in general since we last met. It’s a year now. Remember? We were cruising down the Danube, the stars were shining and the trees were thick on the shore. The captain was Serbian. He was in love with you.’

  ‘Joco.’

  ‘Not unrewarded, I trust? …’

  ‘What do you think I am… I never saw him after that. After all I was yours then.’

  ‘I loved you very much.’

  Paula bowed her head a little and stared at the snow. ‘Happy creature, how easy it is for you to say that. If only we poor women could afford to say such things!’

  ‘I’m here. Isn’t that enough? I’ve come to you because I wanted to kiss your hand. Let me look at you. Turn around. Let me examine you from head to foot. Hm. You’ve not changed at all.’

  ‘I am often unwell.’

  ‘Your figure is as it was, neat and graceful … Let me smell your hair! Show me your shoes and your stockings! You ought to wear finer gloves. The little ribbon about your neck is charming.’

  ‘No one takes any notice of me.’

  ‘You have no sweetheart?’

  The actress half-closed her eyes, then, suddenly maternal, stroked Sindbad’s arm. ‘You fool. Do you think it was so easy to forget you?’

  ‘Snake in the grass!’ cried Sindbad silently to himself. ‘Liar! You have forgotten me often enough!’ But still he liked Paula touching him, it satisfied something in his heart to see the laced shoes, the fresh floral band and the light stockings of the woman for whose sake he had once sailed down the Danube all the way to Pancsova.* The smell of her hair was as delicious as the scent of brushwood tucked into the folds of clean underwear and the almost invisible lines on her face, like the marks of tiny scuffling birds’ feet, made him feel sad and affectionate at the same time. It was as if she had spent sleepless nights lost in fantasies of which these faint rings round the eyes were the silent evidence. Sindbad could still see the trace left by his kiss on the fading velvet of her lips: amorous farm-girls’ bodies left just such marks among the meadow flowers, their contours still apparent on the crushed lawn. The white neck which craned so curiously from the black dress was like a bird’s neck twinkling under the black velvet ribbon, the pocket of her coat was warm and lined with cat fur and made a little nest into which Sindbad slid his hand to find hers.

  ‘I have a wonderful idea for this afternoon,’ said the actress, her shoulders brushing against Sindbad’s chest. ‘Come to the cellar with us. Kápolnai — an old local teacher — has invited members
of the company into his cellars this afternoon. His wine is good and the cellar itself is very neatly arranged. I’ll make sure the old teacher invites you.’

  ‘I’ll be at the café this afternoon.’

  ‘Good, we’ll come for you there. Now please be good enough to escort me home. I live not far from here.’

  Sindbad was still lost in thought behind the mallow-coloured curtains of the café, when the teacher, a grey-haired, red-cheeked, croaky-voiced old fellow, clattered in, embraced him, told Sindbad that he was to regard him as his best friend, and assured him of a choice pipe back in his cellar. ‘Hurry now! Quickly!’ he cried heartily. ‘There’s an awful lot of snow between here and the cellar.’

  The company of players was waiting at the café door, mostly cheerful ragged juveniles and two women, Paula and the singer, a plumpish blonde who immediately fixed Sindbad with a searching look as if to say, I know what you’ve come here for. Pápai the prompter was puffing his pipe at the back of the group, reading a theatrical magazine as if this had nothing at all to do with him.

  ‘Come along, class!’ commanded the teacher good-humouredly and reached into his coat where the cellar keys were jangling. ‘It’s lovely to be together again.’

  On leaving town and turning into a narrow winding lane which led up the hillside they suddenly came upon a huge snowdrift. But even from here they could see the soot-coloured entrance to the cellar and with a lot of cheering and shouting the young actors set out across the snow-covered meadow.

  ‘Hurry up!’ the old teacher encouraged them.

  Happy and proud, Paula snuggled against Sindbad’s shoulder and clung to his arm. ‘Help me, Sindbad,’ she whispered.

  Pápai brought up the rear and yelled out at them. ‘Can’t wait till dark, eh! There’s no softer mattress in the world than fresh fallen snow!’

  ‘The nerve of the man!’ Paula complained with a soft throaty laugh.

  Sindbad saw the high, soft field of virginal snow and had to admit the old prompter was right.

  The Secret Room

  There once was a woman who kept Sindbad prisoner for almost a year and a half and afterwards he could never erase it from his mind. She was called Artemisia and she was the wife of a landowner whose estates consisted chiefly of forest in a district where bushy-bearded priests presided over Mass and the eyes of the baby Jesus were made of precious stones. A crow was perched on top of the snow-covered tower, perhaps the very same crow he saw through the high barred windows of the thick masonry wall when he was a prisoner of the lovely Artemisia. The secret room where Sindbad spent his year and half in the highlands was in an area where men had long ago raised walls and dug secret passages which extended through the house and the surrounding countryside: in the previous generation there had been another man imprisoned there, but then it was Artemisia’s mother who had held the keys. On the peeling wall above the settle a German poem was still visible. The previous inhabitant had written it in his boredom. The inside of the wardrobe door was covered with various other inscriptions that Sindbad’s predecessor had absent-mindedly scribbled while changing his shirt. An itinerant Romeo had lived here — in those days there were still such people about — and the constabulary was after him for dealing in false currency and cardsharping. Artemisia’s mother concealed the fugitive, persuaded herself that he was a patriot republican in hiding, and soon had the then master of the house, a man not in the first flush of youth, nodding with satisfaction that it was no longer he who had to occupy this secret room, which often remained without heating the whole of the winter thanks to the hard-heartedness of the aforementioned lady … Sindbad often had to bite his knuckles to prevent himself laughing when he thought of these strict and miserly women who beat their husbands while putting themselves at the service of equally vehement lovers, checking that their maidservants were safely tucked up in bed before tiptoeing through the garden gate, out into the night …

  Who is living in the secret room now? wondered Sindbad one day when, like most prisoners, he felt like revisiting that place with strong towers and high walls where he himself had once been chained up … So Sindbad set out hoping that at last he might be able to gaze calmly into the eyes of the maid of whom he had been so frightened at one time that he hardly dared speak to her without clasping his hands in prayer. ‘How come I never once kicked her!’ thought Sindbad, grinding his teeth.

  It was night and the snow shone as it usually did in those highland towns where you can see the bells in the belfry a long way off and can make out with surprising precision the shadowy figure who begins to toll them at midnight. Near the river the blue-dye man* was painting the snow ashen grey, apparently trying out a new colour for use on Slovakian girls’ skirts. Everyone in town was fast asleep, the snores of the bushy-bearded magistrate resounded right through the market-place, young women slept under Christmas trees together with their children, and the old ones dreamt of tales told during the evening, in which, on snowy nights, pitiless bands of men from far-off countries would overrun the little town and seize the women from right under the Christmas trees.

  Naturally, Sindbad was familiar with their dreams, since the dead know everything, but he did not hesitate on his way to the brown gates built into the wall from which spiral stairs lead up to the first floor which remains dark, even by day, and the Christmas tree stands in the front room with its nuts and almonds and scent of gingerbread and the women are sleeping under it on home-made rugs. At the opposite corner a rust-coloured iron door protected the inner recesses of the house, a house with frozen eaves and frosted windows, which in the bright night looked like a house cut out of paper, the chimneys hovering pale blue against the sky and a white curtain trembled in one of the windows as Sindbad silently crept into the house. The night-watchman was just making his way through the deep snow down the high road — he seemed to be alarmed by the shadows of the houses — and caught a glimpse of a queer little patch of luminous fog before him, like light flashing off a helmet or a sword.

  Artemisia was sitting before her mirror examining her reflection. This had become her usual practice at night since she had reached the age of forty some time ago and still could not get enough of the lies men told her. She bound her jaw firmly against wrinkles, as people do with the dead, and desperately brushed her hair and braided it without ever taking her eyes off the mirror in the hope of seeing there, just once, the face she used to see, her bygone beauty peeping out from under the mask of the present. One day, the melancholy, frowning, discontented shadow would vanish from those bright leaves of glass, and she, the White Woman of Löcse,* to whom eligible young men had told long streams of lies, would enter the fortress gate and move quietly forward to reassume her place. Sadly, the shadow remained unaltered, however much she braided her hair or rubbed colour into her cheeks with a rabbit’s foot. The wardrobe full of white garments reached to the ceiling and the locks clicked as solemnly as the fortress gates while Artemisia sought for her night-clothes in the drawer. A small mirror hung on the wardrobe door — someone had won it at a fair — looking in it now she discovered Sindbad standing at her shoulder.

  ‘What a surprise!’ she cried out. Then with a sweet and most affectionate smile she raised the candle to Sindbad’s face.

  ‘You’ve grown old. Time passes. Whatever happened to you? Whose feet are you kneeling at now? Has one of my immoral old friends consented to adopt you as her cavalier servente? It must be that little brunette you told stories to the afternoon you begged me to bring her to you? Do you remember you were telling her about the black-scarved girls of Venice. Oh, how you’ve aged.’

  Sindbad smiled patiently at her. ‘And if you could see yourself, you poor thing. When I was a boy I fell in love with a village girl. She was sent to the city where she could learn sewing and stitching. She was away for half a year. By the time she returned her face was ruined by cheap paint, her hair was dyed green and yellow and some of her teeth were gone. Much like you, poor thing,’ Sindbad thought to himself
and tried not to look at her shoulders, her neck, and under her arms since she had just raised an arm and her sleeves had slipped back.

  ‘I remember this dress,’ murmured Sindbad with a tired indifference. ‘It is the one you wore when you tried to kill yourself. You had tied the string around your neck and knelt down under the door-handle. I happened to come in at that moment.’

  ‘Nonsense!’ she exclaimed. ‘I saw you coming across the market square, after you had left me and escaped. I had written to you, asking you to visit me one last time. That is when the little incident with the string occurred. If this doesn’t work, I thought, I will give you up.’

  Sindbad gazed thoughtfully into the woman’s eyes. ‘Did you really think, my dear lady, that I would believe in this so-called suicide? …’

  ‘Heaven knows,’ Artemisia answered with bowed head. ‘Men are idiots and will believe anything. Even that a woman would kill herself for a man’s sake. Every attempt at suicide begins as a joke or a game. There are times the door fails to open in time, or the gun happens to go off … What woman would be fool enough to die for a man?’

  Sindbad laughed silently. In that case he was perfectly justified in leaving the women he had seduced without the slightest pang of conscience … Were not all women alike? With the passage of time, after a little loving, they were all the same. Their wicked little natures, their contempt for some ridiculed suitor, their defences against laughable sentimentality: eventually they were always driven to name-calling and mockery. In old age they talk slightingly of the grandly moustached suitor in his yellow boots, and make particular remarks on the amusing appearance of the visiting stranger who meant everything to them and for whom they would have given their lives at the time.