Csardas (16 page)

“No,” she faltered. “None of the garrison have left yet. I asked Uncle Sandor.”

“I do not know how I can manage to see him or speak with him. He is a regular officer of hussars; I am only a mobilized soldier. I do not even know what part of the garrison he will be in.” As he saw her face his voice softened. “Understand, Malie, try to understand. Have you any idea of the confusion there? Oh, very well, I will try, but I cannot promise. If I see him I will try to speak. What do you want me to say?”

“Tell him—”

Suddenly there was nothing she could say. Tell him she loved him? She pictured Adam rushing across a crowded parade-ground, saying,
Amalia Ferenc loves you,
and she fell silent again.

“Tell him I shall pray for him,” she said at last. “And tell him that he is more important to me than Papa, and I will act accordingly.”

Adam nodded, but his eyes were on Eva, sitting laughing with Felix at the other side of the room. “You will soon be back, Adam.”

Malie smiled, and he nodded again, briskly this time. “Oh, yes. I must be back soon to see my sugar crop harvested. There is no one but myself who will care about it.”

“Good-bye, dear Adam. You will remember... Karoly. Remember, please.”

At last he looked at her, his kind eyes understanding and patient. “We don’t choose very well, do we, Malie?” he said quietly. “We both seem to be unlucky when it is a matter of loving.”

She followed his eyes to Eva, Eva in the yellow dress with her dark hair springing away in tendrils from the braids. She wanted to offer him comfort—the misery in her own heart was such that she was painfully aware of his unhappiness too—but there was only one thing Adam wanted to hear. And even if she said it, said, “Eva cares for you, Adam. I am sure she cares for you,” it was so patently untrue he would think her a fool.

The young men left, all the young men with whom they had danced and skated and drunk coffee. They came to say good-bye to the enchanting Ferenc sisters and Papa shook them all by the hand, gratified that his daughters provoked such respectful admiration. The town was still noisy, gay, awash with peasants and horses and more motorcars than they had ever seen in their lives. At breakfast Papa read out the official reply to Russia, which had ordered mobilization too. The reply left no doubt in anyone’s mind that Russia was the aggressor and had wronged them. There was still time; if Russia sent her soldiers back to the steppes, the war could be stopped—except that now no one really wanted to stop it. The Russians must be taught a lesson as well as the Serbs.

The first battalions began to march from the garrison—the first men from their town, their county, to go to the front and do their duty. Through cheering crowds and women throwing flowers, the cavalry in their field uniforms clattered to the station against a background of regimental music.

They stood at the window of the upstairs drawing-room watching the men and horses, pointing out to each other the faces they knew. “There’s Laszlo, look, leading his troop. He’s seen us. He’s smiling. And Janni Szabo! And there is Uncle Zoltan’s son. When did he come up? He could have come in the coach with us! And there—”

Eva stopped, but it was too late. Everyone, including Papa, had seen Karoly riding ahead of his men. From Amalia’s lips came a tiny involuntary moan, and then she pressed close to the window and stared down through the panes of glass. “He’s not looking up,” she said in a small voice. “He isn’t even looking to see if I’m here.”

Papa was very angry, both angry and confused. “Come away from the window, Amalia.”

“He isn’t even looking up. He thinks I do not care. I haven’t written and Adam has not delivered my message. He will go away and think I do not care.”

“Amalia! Come away from the window at once!”

She moved away from the window, stared uncomprehendingly at Papa, and then suddenly ran from the room. Eva thought she had gone to the bedroom, but a few moments later they saw her running along the cobbled road in the direction of the station, no hat and just a white lace shawl thrown over her muslin dress. Papa, white-faced, turned to Mama.

“Follow her! Get her back! She is behaving like a street woman!”

“Let her say good-bye,” said Mama wearily. “What does it matter? He will probably die and then you will not have to make them unhappy. The war will do it for you.”

Eva thought Papa was going mad for a moment. He pulled Mama away from the window so roughly that her head swung against the frame. He dragged at the blind; it clattered down and banged hard against the ledge. Then he strode towards the door.

“You’ll never find her in the crowds. You have lost her, but she will come home when the train has gone and then you can punish her again... and again... and again.” Mama slumped into a chair, weeping. “Why do you destroy us, Zsigmond? You love us, I know this, therefore why do you destroy us?”

They had both forgotten Eva was there. She cowered in a corner, afraid to draw their attention because already, in these few moments, there was an unbalanced atmosphere in the room. Thin rays of sun slatted through onto the carpet, but apart from that it was dim. She remained quiet and inconspicuous, awaiting a moment when she could leave.

Papa’s face was tormented. His eyes darted feverishly from side to side, looking at nothing, everything. “You do not understand. You have never understood, because you are a Bogozy—lazy, immoral, decadent. I have created a class of my own, a family of my own. But I have to guard you, all of you, because you are Bogozys—and Racs-Rassays—useless, idle, proud people.”

“Why do you hate us?” moaned Mama. “Why did you marry a Bogozy if you hate us so much?”

“I married you—” Papa stopped. He gazed at Mama in the dim light, seeing her drooped on a chair, still graceful even in despair. “I married you because you were—the loveliest creature I had ever known. And you were a Bogozy. No one believed I could marry a Bogozy. I wanted you.”

“Then why do you destroy us, Zsigmond? Why do you destroy your daughter?”

“Because she is a Bogozy too,” he answered, suddenly cold again. “She has the bad blood, the carelessness, the... the immorality of you all, and I must protect her, guard against the Bogozy influence, the looseness, the immorality.”

Slowly, slowly, Mama raised her head and gazed at him. She was as tremulous and helpless as she always was before Papa, not strong enough to fight him but still alive enough to understand him. “So that is why....”

She stretched her hands out before her and shook her head.

“After all these years, that is why you came to hate me. You have never forgotten that night, that one time.”

“Never.”

“You thought I was... careless, immoral.”

His face was white and strained and full of hate. “My sister, Gizi—she would never have done it.”

Mama’s eyes were huge with tears. For a long, long time she had trained herself to live in a world where Papa could not hurt her. And now, because her daughters were growing up, because Amalia and Eva had allowed themselves to tumble down the precipice of emotion, she was once more vulnerable to pain.

“Your sister never loved Alfred as I loved you,” she said simply. “You hate me because you think I was immoral. You never considered it was because I loved you.”

“No doubt Amalia believes she loves the lieutenant too. But I shall not allow them to be alone together, as your father allowed us.”

Mama put one hand to the back of her chair and pulled herself upright. Like a sick, elderly woman she moved across the room towards the door. “I shall be happy again,” she said softly, reassuring herself.

Eva was terrified. She did not want to understand what Mama and Papa had been talking of. Already she was burying it away, down in the part of her mind where she buried other unpleasant things. She wanted to get out of the room, because if Papa realized she had heard their conversation he might—she couldn’t imagine what he might do, but her skin crawled at something deeper, stranger than she could understand. Silently she moved round the darkened sides of the room to the door. She need not have worried. Papa was staring sightlessly at the shutters and did not hear her depart.

There was a band playing in the large open area before the station. The bandsmen, in red and blue uniforms, puffed and banged and blew, and the noise they made helped to drown the whinnying of horses and the shouting of men. She weaved her way through the crowds: through groups of soldiers who were just standing, smoking, eating sausage and bread; through women holding children in their arms; through harassed officers assembling their men into units. Everywhere was noise, whistles, steam, the cranking of engines and rolling stock, screaming, shouting, and over it all the band playing Strauss marches.

In her stomach were the first stirrings of panic, not because of the noise or people but because, having disobeyed Papa, she might not be able to find Karoly. To risk all this and not be able to see him! A small sob caught at her throat and she swallowed quickly. An officer with a board and pencil in hand pushed hard against her and she grabbed at his sleeve.

“Lieutenant Karoly Vilaghy? Where would—”

“Stand to one side. Excuse me.” He smiled briefly and automatically, to show that he was a gentleman albeit a busy one, then shouldered away and was swallowed up in a mass of field grey and rifles.

“Karoly?” She pushed and hunted through a sea of screaming, shouting humanity. An old woman stood, lost and hopeless, but there wasn’t time to help her. A soldier with his girl, straight from the country in her long black skirt and stitched blouse, embraced shamelessly and in oblivion. A small boy screaming with delight was riding on the shoulders of a middle-aged soldier.

“Karoly?”

She pressed through the double doors to the rail tracks—four tracks, three of them occupied, one train facing south and two north—how could she know where he would be? Where were the trains going? To Serbia, Russia, or just to another allocation centre? How could she find him when she didn’t even know which front he was posted to?

And then there were whistles, shouts, the rumble of engines, people calling from the tracks alongside one of the northbound trains. Flowers were being thrown into windows, flags waved; there were last embraces and tears and soldiers jumping quickly onto the mounting steps, pushing their way into the carriages so that they caught a last glimpse of those left behind. A bell rang and a bewildered guard tried to run along the track and move everyone back. With a mighty lurch, like a prehistoric monster rising from sleep, the train began to move away.

“Karoly! Karoly!” Oh, God, suppose he was on that train! And she was on the wrong side and couldn’t even see clearly who was in the coaches. She rushed along the length of the train on her left, to the end where she could cross the track. A ramp was up against a cattle car and horses were being led onto the train.

“Karoly!”

Now she must search systematically: two trains remained, and if she didn’t allow herself to panic it was logical that—were he still here—she would find him. Up one side of the train, along the flat, baked earth, look up through every window, then to the side to peer through the crowds. But they would keep moving; that woman she had seen a long way back just a minute ago. She wanted to order everyone to stay where they were so that she could conduct her search in an orderly fashion.

Halfway through checking that train, it too began to pull away and again she wanted to scream. Now there was only one train and if she couldn’t find him it was all wasted; the trouble with Papa would all be for nothing!

She began to run, hurrying to make her way through the crowds and over the empty track to the other line. It was quieter now, with only one train, and some of the women began to melt away. But she still couldn’t see him. He must have gone....

“Malie!” A touch on her shoulder, a hand, a familiar smell—how could he have a smell that she recognized?—“Oh, Malie!” and he was there, looking unfamiliar in field grey but oh so familiar with his thick, fair hair and wide shoulders. “I couldn’t find you!”

“In the restaurant.”

The one place she hadn’t looked. His arms were round her and she pressed against his coat, hugging him, terrified that it might be the last time she would ever see him. “Malie, I love you so much!”

Karoly, Karoly. Papa would never understand. Poor, poor Papa.

“I sent a message—Adam Kaldy. I said... I said I would pray for you.”

“I love you so much, Malie.”

“And I you.”

“Don’t let him separate us. Promise me you will remember me.”

“Oh, Karoly!” She was laughing and crying—laughing because here, in this terrible railway station, she was able to say what she liked without fear or inhibition. “I would come with you now if I could.”

“A camp follower!” He hugged her to him again, wrapping her in his arms and lifting her a little so that her cheek was against his.

“I’ll wait, no matter what Papa says or does. Write to me—write to Kati. She will bring me the letters. And if... if there is no answer, if Papa finds a way of stopping that too, write to Roza at the farm. She can read and she will find a way of letting me have the letters. Uncle Sandor will bring them to me.”

“Oh, Malie! Now I am happy. You have come to me and I am happy. Nothing matters, does it? It will come right—the marriage fee, and your papa. Just love me, Malie. Everything will be all right.”

His large body, his arms, his face, his eyes. Remember them all, engrave them on your mind in case it is the last time. Remember the words, remember that he loves you, remember how he looked when he spoke, for now, at this moment, he is wholly yours.

The whistles began again, the engine, the steam, the bells. The frantic guard began his sheepdog tactics up the sides of the train. A last grasping of the beloved body, his mouth on hers—without passion because now there was only the frenzied necessity of expressing their love. “Darling Malie.”

He pulled away and jumped onto the steps of the moving train. The white lace shawl caught in the buckle of his belt and went with him. He tried to unravel it but already he was moving away and she shook her head and waved at him. She saw him smile, lift the shawl to his lips, and mouth the words,
I love you.