They Were Counted (39 page)

Bending towards her, and looking deeply into those strange onyx eyes, Balint said, very slowly: ‘I was there.’

‘You were? But then why …?’

‘Why? I watched you for a long time, and you seemed different, a new Addy, someone I’d never seen before. I saw you
immediately
I passed the entrance, but I couldn’t come any closer. I just had to watch. You seemed to be someone I didn’t know, a
stranger
, not my Addy at all, but someone different.’

‘Different? In what way someone not myself?’ Her smile
faltered
as she caught the intensity in Balint’s voice.

‘You showed me something I’d never seen before, a new side to yourself … Besides those others were there. I couldn’t intrude, I could only stand and watch. You were so beautiful …’ Then, so as not to sound too commonplace, he added: ‘… so beautiful to watch. Suddenly I felt that I saw many things that I’d never seen before – things about you that I’d sensed and wondered about, but which had never been clear to me. It was the way you moved.’

‘While skating?’

‘Maybe it was the skating that showed me. But it was in the way you moved that I sensed an Addy driven across the ice, by an uncontrollable force of nature, swept along by a power greater than herself, yearning, searching for something … something outside herself …’ He looked steadily into her face, his whole
expression
a question.

‘Oh no!’ said Adrienne lightly, her dark brows contracting somewhat. ‘I’m not searching for anything!’ Then she smiled again, thinking back to the evening on the ice. ‘But, you know, AB, when I’m skating I’m not myself. I go crazy with the
movement
, I think of nothing else. I just want to go faster and faster, more and more! Oh, how wonderful never to stop!’

‘That’s what I saw, that’s what I sensed, something inside you that had to break out, that needed only the vortex of speed,
something
from deep down surging from depths you knew nothing of, an unconscious urge that had to be obeyed no matter where it led you. When I was up in the mountains I sat alone by a great fire whose flames erupted into the sky, seemingly impelled by a power that would never be quenched. Was that real, or was it just the
effect
of the colour and the light? Could it be explained by a
chemical
formula? Where did the impulse come from which made the fire seem like a volcano, which made the leaping flames seem to reach out for an unknown, infinitely unobtainable goal? Where does it come from, this urge to run, to fly, to strain after
achievement
without even asking what it is one is seeking to achieve?
Nobody
can answer this question. You can only feel that it’s there, true and eternal in all of us. And look,’ he added playfully, ‘what a coincidence! You’re wearing a flame-coloured dress!’

Adrienne laughed. ‘Don’t think I was aware of all this; and it isn’t just for you, AB!’

‘Of course, but I am a part of it all the same. There is a
connection
, for you as well as for me, even if you weren’t thinking of me when you chose the dress, even if you weren’t thinking of
anybody
. You had an impulse that made the choice for you, just as in all nature where natural impulses further nature’s own
purposes
.
That
impulse made you choose this dress, just this one, no other – perhaps because you like it and know it suits your dark hair and white skin. Be honest; didn’t you think, when you put it on, that all the men’s heads would turn and that all the women would be jealous?’

‘And how do you know I didn’t think of you when I chose it?’

Adrienne intentionally threw out this flirtatious remark in the same tone with which she had chatted with her other admirers at the ball, consciously trying to diminish the tension that was
building
up between them, to trivialize a conversation that had by now gone beyond the superficial. It was not so much Balint’s words but the intensity with which he spoke that impressed and at the same time confused her. Balint’s voice, so warm and passionate, expressing everything that normally she tried to avoid, disturbed her because, for once she felt herself moved and, instead of
resenting
it, had even felt a kind of warm response when he had dared to speak of something so personal as her skin … her
skin
!

Balint refused to notice her change of tone. Once more he looked into her eyes, then asked: ‘Have you read Bölsche?’

‘Yes! It’s a wonderful book. Why?’

‘Bölsche has written everything I’m trying to say. In
springtime
all nature’s creatures put on ornament and parade
themselves
. Members of the same species vie with each other to become the most beautiful, the most desirable. This isn’t planned, it’s instinctive, emanating from some unconscious inner
command
from … well …
Lebensbejahung
if you will. Look at me!’ he went on jokingly. ‘When I tied my white tie tonight, wasn’t I doing the same as the cock pheasant in spring when he grows two extra little feathers on each side of his head?’

‘You always refer to animals, but we’re not animals!’

‘Of course we’re not. And more’s the pity, because unlike them we add so much extra to what in animals is pure and natural. All the noblest motivation exists in animals; motherhood, defence of the nest, of the young, even of the community. It’s all there in nature without having to be taught. It comes from instinct, not from big words and impressive phrases. A kingfisher will risk his life to distract a polecat from the young in the nest; a roebuck confronts a wolf that snaps at the new-born faun; and the young hinds select a stag bull not because he is rich or well born or
because
their mothers choose for them, but because he is the one, and the only one, they fancy.’

Balint did not look at Adrienne as he spoke. His eyes seemed fixed on the far end of the room, but his words were spoken more softly and more slowly than before. He went on: ‘With the
animals
all is pure and natural. There is no foreign element, no
theorizing
, no prejudice, no complicated theory … and above all no speech to spoil everything. The animals all have their emotions, of course, but they’re lucky not to be cursed with ideals as well!’

‘Don’t you think it’s odd, you preaching about speech, AB? You, of all people! And what are you doing now? Don’t you call all this theorizing?’

‘Of course, but then I have to! I don’t have a great roar like a roebuck! But if I did,’ he said, laughing, ‘I assure you this hall would reverberate as from a blast from an organ!’

Adrienne drew back a little and straightened her back. She searched for words, obviously unconvinced even if she did not know how to refute what he said.

‘All right. Of course there’s some truth in what vou say. Put it like that if you must, but it’s not the whole truth. There’s a plan behind it. Oh, I know there’s beauty in birdsong and deer calls and mating instincts in the spring, but you forget something … or don’t choose to mention it. Behind all this natural beauty there’s no real free will; it’s all programming. I’ll tell you a story. We came to Kolozsvar this year by road. On the way we stopped at a village. It was market day and there was a booth in front of which stood a man beating a drum and calling out, “Come along! Come along! Come and see the Sea Lion, the terrible Lion of the ocean! Come along! Only ten copeks to see the terrible Sea Lion!” So we paid and went in, and what did we find? A lonely little seal!’ Adrienne laughed bitterly. ‘But we’d paid our ten kopecs, and no one would refund us that!’

‘I don’t see the connection.’

‘You don’t? It’s quite clear to me. Everything you said so
eloquently
, all your wonderful sonorous beautiful words, spoke of only one thing. You talk of the call of nature, the truth and purity of those unconscious programmes, their seductiveness undefiled by reason or thought or speech. But that’s no more than a
beginning
, a hint, a promise. Only later you can see it for what it really is … a baited trap, a swindle. That’s what nature consists of, just like the busker taking our ten kopecs with a false promise!’

Balint looked closely at her face, reminded by her words of their talk on the terrace at Var-Siklod and on the bench at her father’s house. He realized, suddenly, that he must feel his way carefully, that ‘baited trap’ was like a warning signal, and he had seen it before.

‘That really isn’t true, you know. Not at all. On the contrary the more you pay – and you must always pay – the more valuable the prize when you finally get it. Human beings are born to be disappointed. We complicate everything too much. We expect too much, cloak our feelings in too many words, hide behind
conventions
, pretend … always we pretend. Sometimes we know only too well what we are doing, but all too often we don’t, not really. We may think that we have noble reasons for our actions, we justify ourselves saying that it is for pity’s sake or for the
ultimate
good of others or some such cliché we’ve been brought up to believe; but it’s all nonsense, excuses or rules dreamed up by philosophers – or priests. This has nothing to do with nature. It’s all alien, imposed on ourselves by ourselves, human interference cooked up by old men sitting at desks. What you say is against all reason, it cannot be, it must not be. I was thinking about it up in the mountains.’

‘By the camp fire?’ asked Adrienne with an attempt at irony.

‘Not this time. Beside a waterfall. Think of a deep canyon, dark and narrow like a well. All around is snow and ice. Even the rocks seemed frozen. I looked up and …’

He stopped as Pal Uzdy came up to them. Though it was
getting
late, Uzdy was as immaculate as when he had just left his dressing-room, his collar impeccable, his face cool. Of course he did not dance, indeed he rarely even sat down but stood leaning against a doorpost if people were dancing or against the wall in the supper-room while others ate, always apart, a spectator. He was so tall that his cadaverous diabolic face could be seen over the heads of everyone else. Now he moved slowly and deliberately to where his wife was sitting with Balint. He spoke to Adrienne as if she were alone. Balint might not have existed for all the sign he gave of noticing his presence.

‘I’m going home.’

‘You are?’

‘What time would you like the carriage?’

‘I really don’t know. The ball will go on until morning. For the girls’ sake it’s hard to say …’ Adrienne faltered. For a
moment
she seemed frightened of something.

‘Naturally, of course!’ Uzdy appeard to agree.

‘I could ask the organizers …’ suggested Balint, feeling that he should say something.

‘There’s no call for that,’ said Uzdy without turning his head and still looking at his wife. ‘Stay as long as they want to, of course! … I’ll send the carriage at seven. The horses can wait
until
you’re ready to leave. Enjoy yourselves!’ Abruptly he bent his long body in a stiff jack-knife bow and brushed Adrienne’s hair with his lips. As he straightened up he glanced for the first time in Abady’s direction, and a faint ironic smile seemed to hover under the drooping moustaches. From his great height he waved a limp hand to Balint and repeating ‘Enjoy yourselves!’ he turned and walked away as slowly and deliberately as he had come.

For a moment neither of them spoke. Then Adrienne turned back to Balint with searching eyes and, gasping slightly like
someone
who is feeling faint and who needs water, said: ‘What were you saying? A waterfall? Go on, tell me! Go on! Go on! Quickly …’

‘I was standing beside the rocky pool at the base of the fall. It was very dark down there. Everything around me was covered in ice. Into this lifeless, petrified world there poured a great column of water seemingly from inside the earth, pushing its way through solid rock, breaking through the wall of granite. The water leapt out victorious, triumphant, unstoppable, liberated, unending, throwing out garlands of spray and vapour as it fell and then rushing on over the stones below me, following its fate, going wherever it had to go, wherever it was driven, down the
mountain
valleys, across the plains, going where nature led until it flowed into the vast waters of the ocean. Before my eyes was the triumph of life and motion over all obstacles … and I thought of you, just as I had by the fire. Of you, who are throbbing with … I’ve always felt it. On the terrace at Var-Siklod and when you were skating. Long ago, when you were still a girl in your mother’s drawing-room, it was already there, unformed, waiting. I could feel it, that powerful urge inside you …’

He was silent for a moment, then very faintly, in a whisper, he said very slowly: ‘I love you, Addy!’

Adrienne had been listening to him, leaning back in the
armchair
with her head propped up on one hand, her chin supported by her long supple fingers whose pressure made her lips seem even fuller than usual. Her eyes were half-closed like someone listening to a symphony, and when Balint reached out and touched her right hand which was resting lightly on the arm of her chair, threading his fingers between hers, she accepted the caress with no sign of the alarm she had shown the last time, at Mezo-Varjas.

‘It’s only now,’ he murmured, ‘only now that I realized I was in love with you, and always have been ever since we first met though I didn’t know it until now. There’s never been anyone else. I’ve always loved you and nobody else, never ever!’

And for a long time he kept murmuring those two words ‘never ever’ like rain-drops falling in endless repetition, monotonous rhyming little words to replace the passionate phrases of a
moment
or two before.

Little Dinora Abonyi came into the room with light steps. She had torn a flounce on her dress and was on her way to have it
repaired
in the ladies’ room which could only be reached through the library where Balint sat with Adrienne. Balint heard someone coming and pulled his hand back from her’s.