Csardas (20 page)

“Disgraceful,” he sputtered. “The sooner the war is over the better, if dangerous creatures like that are to be left roaming the street.”

“He was wounded, Uncle Alfred,” Malie answered slowly. “He was a soldier and now no one wants him.”

“Nonsense! The authorities look after the wounded and disabled. It is only a case of applying to the right people. There is no need for anyone who has served his country to descend to that. He is most probably a deserter.”

He was dismayed to see tears rolling slowly down Malie’s cheeks.

“My dear! You mustn’t let it upset you. I will report the matter to the gendarme at once and they will take the fellow in so that he doesn’t offend respectable people.”

Malie clasped her hands together and shook her head. “It’s the war, Uncle Alfred, the dreadful, terrible war! Will they ever come back to us? Will they all be killed? The young men have gone... the postcards come, and the letters. Some have already been killed. Pali. Do you remember Pali? He danced so badly and his hands and face were always wet because he was so nervous. He is dead now. Will they all die? Will none of them come back?”

“Malie, my dear!” Distressed, he remembered his mission. He longed to turn and go home, but at home Gizi was waiting. “Malie.” He swallowed hard. “I must tell you—it is so difficult, but you must know—your Aunt Gizi has discovered.... It is Kati.... She didn’t betray you.... Please try to understand, my child. I have to tell your father. Gizi knows. If I don’t inform him, she will....”

White-faced, she seemed almost to have stopped breathing.

“I shall explain to your papa, tell him in my view no possible harm.... Could never understand his objection....” He faded into apologetic mumbling. Within a few seconds Malie’s brightness had drained completely away. She was a slumped, drab little girl with huge eyes and he felt ashamed of himself for not knowing what he should have said when Gizi faced him with this task.

“I am sure, once he understands—I will explain, you see—I am sure he will not forbid the correspondence. It is just... not right that Kati should be concealing this matter.” He felt better when he said that, as though reminding himself that he was only doing his best to protect
his
child. He held on to the thought with all the strength he could muster. “Yes. Kati. If your—when your papa knows Kati has shared in this deceit he will be shocked.”

Her face screwed into sudden fury. “How could you!” she screamed. “How could you, Uncle Afred? How could you come to... to betray me? Oh, you are a bad man! A bad, bad man!”

She broke from him and began to run.

“Amalia! Come back!”

“He won’t see them!” she called over her shoulder. “Whatever you say, I’ll get there first! I’ll destroy them.” Sobbing, she ran along the road and Alfred, feeling sick and most unpleasant, took a few feeble steps in her direction. Just before he reached the Ferenc home he turned right, into the square, and entered a café in order to fortify himself with a glass of brandy.

The interview with his brother-in-law was as disturbing as he had expected. Without the brandy he couldn’t have managed at all; as it was he tried, feebly, to soften matters for Amalia. Through his halting, stumbling explanation, Zsigmond sat with a face as white as Malie’s had been. Then he rang the bell.

“Please have Amalia come to my study,” he said tonelessly to Marie, and the plump little Austrian maid hurried away, slamming the door too loudly in her nervousness.

“Only a girlish prank,” muttered Alfred. “Naughty, of course; shouldn’t have done it. But no harm. He’s a good boy, a fine-looking boy, no reason to be ashamed... intentions honourable... told me so before he departed for the front. Good officer....”

Papa’s cold stare fixed itself on Alfred and successfully froze his mumblings. “Karoly Vilaghy is not suitable for my daughter. I have been unable to crush this—affair, it seems. On two occasions it has been necessary to confine Amalie to her room. The last time, with his departure, I hoped the war would solve the matter for me. It appears I have been too lax.”

“Oh, yes! But look here,” blustered Alfred. “I mean, what’s wrong with the lad? Good family—my relatives—”

“Not good enough.” Papa’s reply cut rudely into Alfred’s protestations. “I investigated Karoly Vilaghy. You seem to think, all of you, that I prevented this relationship for no other reason than my own amusement. I demand obedience from my children, but within that obedience I am prepared to consider, where possible, their own peculiar tastes and predilections. My daughter and this—this young man have behaved so—”

Anger brought him to a temporary silence. Colour flooded and receded over his face several times. He breathed deeply, then continued.

“After their behaviour last summer, the idea of a union between them was repugnant to me. Nevertheless, I investigated. The Vilaghys have no money, are mortgaged to the limits of their property, and have no prospects.”

“Oh, but really!” blustered Alfred. “You yourself—when you married—that description could have applied equally well to Marta.”

“Marta was a Bogozy,” said Papa flatly. “The Vilaghys are nothing.”

“Now look here—”

“I cannot consider Karoly Vilaghy as a husband for Amalia, any more than you could consider him for Kati.”

Alfred’s incoherence, his bumbling discomfort, vanished. “Kati is a Racs-Rassay,” he replied with dignity, “a Racs-Rassay and the richest girl in the county. There is a great difference between the status of Kati and Vilaghy. For Kati I intend something better!”

“Then why should he be worthy of Amalia?”

The tension of the morning finally severed Alfred’s self-control. The tirade of humiliation poured on him by his wife, the guilt over Amalia, the uncomfortable feeling that the beggar had left, built to a crescendo of indignant pride. A dark seed of inborn aristocracy in him, the unspoken, unadmitted, unacknowleded barrier between him and his brother-in-law finally burst into unforgettable words.

“Because Amalia has a Jew for a father, and Kati does not!”

It was said, regretted instantly but said. Sickness, disgust, shame welled up between them. Crippling things they had pretended never to think of were revealed instead of being left to fester unseen and unrecognized for the rest of their lives. Always it had been there, covered, held down with many layers of family ties, business discussions, shared transactions, and manly conviviality. Now it was said. The facade that had propped them up for so long was smashed. So much was understood and hated, so many nuances of resentment and rank. Alfred had married a Jewess, but his daughter was still a Racs-Rassay. Zsigmond Ferenc had married a Bogozy, and it was not enough. His daughters and his sons would always be the children of a Jewish banker. And even more: all the hate and resentment, so carefully concealed, neither admitting it even to themselves all these years, was now released, welling up in their hearts. Ferenc money: Jewish money that had saved the Racs-Rassays and the Bogozys, money that had built a new dynasty and repaired an old one, money that the effete, overbred nobility could not earn for themselves. And the cleverness, the brightness, the skill: Gizi with her sharp tongue and keen-edged brain doubling her dowry and building Alfred’s empire; Zsigmond, providing a fortune, buying land, proving that he could do what Alfred could never do. And beneath that something deeper still, something basic and primeval and more vital than any matters of race or wealth or family: two men, facing each other, two males, one with a feeble and inadequate daughter; the other, a Jew, a patriarch, with four fine, strong children.

“Forgive me, good friend! It was unpardonable. I did not mean it. I am married to your sister; my wife, a good wife.... I try to defend my cousin, the young lieutenant, too vehemently and lose my temper. I ask you, Zsigmond, to forget my ill words and let our families continue in love together.”

He was a Racs-Rassay; even now, flabby and weakened by years of dependence on Gizi, he could summon something of noble graciousness.

“Not myself, you understand, not my attitude at all, Zsigmond. But the world—society, you understand—would not appreciate your objections to the young man, would think it strange. Not me, my friend. You know my feelings of appreciation, the work we have done together, the farms, the estates, most gratifying.”

“Yes.” Silence.

“I—er—”

All pretence at conversation ceased. Alfred sat down and stared at the Turkish carpet set in the middle of the polished floor. They would have to go on, continue their lives the way they had done before, share things, pretend they were happy together, but it would never be the same. The silence ceased to be oppressive and became pervaded by a kind of misery. The sound of feet outside the door came as a welcome relief to both of them and their heads turned together as Malie, without knocking, burst into the room.

“You cannot have the letters! You are going to make me fetch them here, but you can’t!” Her hands, balled into fists, were clenched into the sides of her skirt.

“Fetch the letters, Amalia,” he answered tiredly.

“No. I cannot.” Triumphant misery burst from her. “It is too late. I have torn them into pieces, and now they are flushed into the water closet!” Her mouth trembled. “All my letters, all I had of him, and they are gone. Because of you they are gone.”

“Amalia, you will not write to this young man any more. You will not see him should he return from the front. There is no question of the association developing. I will not permit it, and this continual... defiance must now cease. Do you understand?”

It was so strange. For the first time Papa was not in the insane, terrifying fury that disobedience usually induced. He was cold but dispassionate, as though discussing a business arrangement in which he had complete control but little emotional interest.

“I must ask for your word on this, Amalia.”

She had nothing of Karoly’s now, nothing to hold and read, to say,
This was his; this came from him; his hand has
touched these pages.
The letters, drowned in the lavatory, had left her with no tangible evidence of his beloved presence. Perhaps he was already dead and she would have nothing to hold and say,
My love was real; he lived.

“I shall not give you my word, Papa.”

He looked up at her then, but more in surprise than in rage.

“You have no choice, Amalia.”

“I do, Papa.” She was shaking.

“While you live in this house, until you are married and have authority of your own, you have no choice, Amalia. You will do exactly as I tell you. Now go.”

He heard her gasp of indrawn breath; then she stepped forward.

“I shall not do what you ask, Papa. I cannot. I shall not marry him, because there is no way for me to do this at present. But I will not stop writing. I will no longer involve poor Kati in this matter. I will ask for the letters to be sent here.”

The fury finally began to generate. Amalia and Uncle Alfred saw the stiffening back, the transparent eyes darken. Amalia had a swift recollection of the beggar with a flapping sleeve, and Papa no longer seemed so omnipotent, so invincible. She was still afraid of him, but she was even more afraid that Karoly might soon be dead.

“I can leave home, Papa. I have been reading the papers and talking to the Women’s Charity Association. It is all different now; ladies are working and it is respectable because of the war. I can work in a factory, or train to be a nurse, or—there are many, many things. The man who brings the meat. Did you ever notice that now it is his wife who does it? He is dead, her husband, and now she does his job. And at the station, too, a woman is acting as guard.” Her knees were trembling so hard she had to sit down. Never in her life had she defied him before. Only her love for Karoly kept the small thread of courage from snapping. “I do not care any more, Papa. I will not disobey you on anything else. I will be good always. But I want my letters from him. And I will go away and work for the war so that I can have my letters. I will live with Grandma Bogozy.” That was a pathetic and idle boast. The Bogozys, terrified that Zsigmond Ferenc’s money would cease to rescue them, would have packed her home at once. “Or I will go to Budapest and live in a room near a factory.”

That was ridiculous too. They all knew it was ridiculous—beautiful, graceful Amalia, with her finishing-school manners and her three languages, her music and dancing, trying to work in a factory and earn her living. It was ludicrous.

“Or if I am no good in a factory, I could work with children,” she continued in a shaking voice. “I look after Jozsef and Leo much more than Marie or the nursemaid. I could go into a private home and look after children, be a governess. There are lots of things I can do.”

It was still ludicrous, but it wasn’t that ludicrous. The war was already beginning to rock the structure that had supported everyone for so long. Of course Amalia couldn’t go away from home and find work. She would never survive in a world of strong aggressive people. But a small pocket of disquiet began to stir in both Alfred and Papa.

“You are nineteen, Amalia,” he said furiously. “You will do as I say.”

“No, Papa.” They could see that her whole body was shaking. She sat in the chair, feet, head, hands, shoulders, all quivering in nervous paroxysm.

“Leave the room at once!”

She ran across the floor to the door. They heard her feet hurrying down the passage and sobs, released from tension, breaking from her throat.

The two men stared at one another. The dreadful thing was still there between them, as it would always be, but now other things could be superimposed upon it.

“I think she would do it,” said Alfred slowly. “It is bad, the war; things have changed. Look how it is in Budapest now. Women are driving cabs; I even saw a street sweeper, a woman, the last time I was there. In the offices too—my office, the one off Andrassy Avenue—women now, clerks and bookkeepers, all women.”

Zsigmond was silent.

“Why not ignore it, good friend? Letters can do no harm.”

“She has disobeyed me,” he replied stonily.