Satantango (11 page)

owe. 2 cases 31.50

3 cases 5.60

5 cases 3.00

Fully absorbed, he gazed at the column of numbers sloping right to left with pride while feeling an infinite hatred for the world that made it possible for filthy scoundrels to target people like him for their latest outrage; normally he was capable of sublimating his sudden bouts of fury (“He’s a good-natured man!” his wife used to say to neighbors in town) and contempt to the greater ambitions of his life: in order that these should come true, he knew he should be ready for anything at any time. One misjudged word, one hurried calculation and everything would be ruined. But “sometimes a man can’t govern his temperament” and trouble always comes of it. The landlord was happy enough with his given condition but had suddenly discovered how to develop the foundations of a great ambition. Even in his youth, in fact as a child, he could calculate, right down to a penny, the benefit to be gained from the hatred and disgust that surrounded him. And having discovered this — it was obvious — he couldn’t then make the same mistake! Nevertheless he was subject to occasional fits of temper and whenever he was in the grip of one of these he would retire to his store-room so he could vent his rage without inopportune witnesses. He understood circumspection. Even at times like this he remained circumspect in case he caused some damage. He’d kick the wall or — at worst — would smash an empty wine-rack against the metal door, let him “have his fit” there! But he really couldn’t allow himself this now because they might be able to hear it in the bar. So now, as so often before, he took refuge in numbers. Because there is in numbers a mysterious evidentiary quality, a stupidly undervalued “grave simplicity” and, as a product of the tension between these two ideas a spine-tingling concept might arise, one that proclaimed: “
Perspectives do exist.”
But did there exist a series of numbers that might defeat this bony, gray-haired, lifeless-looking, horse-faced, heap of trash — that piece of shit, that parasite who belonged in a cesspit, known as Irimiás? What number could possibly vanquish that infinitely treacherous scoundrel straight from hell? Treacherous? Unfathomable? There weren’t words for him! No description could do him justice. Words wouldn’t do it — it wasn’t a matter of words. Sheer strength was required. That’s what was needed to put paid to him! Strength, not a lot of feeble chatter! He draw a line through what he had written but the numbers behind the lines remained legible, sparkling with significance. It was no longer just a matter of the beer, soft drinks and wine to be found in various cases, as far as the landlord was concerned. Far from it! The numbers were becoming ever more significant. He couldn’t help noticing that as the importance of the numbers grew, so did he. He was positively swelling. The greater the significance of the numbers the “greater my own significance.” For a couple of years now the consciousness of his own extraordinary grandeur had constrained him. Limber now, he ran over to the soft drinks to check that he had remembered it all correctly. It worried him that his left hand had started shaking uncontrollably. He had eventually to face the oppressive issue of, “What to do?” “What does Irimiás want?” He heard a hoarse voice in the corner that made his blood freeze for a moment because he thought that, on top of everything else, those infernal spiders had learned to speak. He wiped his brow, leaned against the sacks of flour and lit a cigarette. “So he drinks free for fourteen days and he dares show his mug here again! He’s back! But not just any old how! It’s like he thought it wasn’t enough. I’m going to throw these drunken pigs out of here! I’ll turn off all the lights! I’ll nail up the door! I’ll put a barrier over at the entrance!” He was quite hysterical now. His mind was sprinting down the usual self-made channels. “Let me see. He came to the estate saying, “If you need money you should plant onions everywhere.” That’s all. “What sort of onions?” I asked. “Red onions,” he said. So I planted onions everywhere. And it worked. Then I bought the bar from the Swabian. Greatness is always compounded of simple things. And four days after I open up he comes in and dares tell me that I (yes, I!) owe it all to him, and he gets drinks on credit for fourteen days without even a word of thanks! And now? Perhaps he’s come to take it all back. TAKE BACK WHAT’S MINE! Good God! What’s the world coming to when anyone can walk in one day and without so much as a by your leave, tell you he’s the boss now! What’s this country coming to? Is nothing sacred anymore? Ah no, no my friends! There are laws against that kind of thing!” His eyes slowly cleared and he calmed down. Calmly he counted the cases of soft drinks. “Of course!” he cried slapping his forehead. “Trouble comes when you get into a bit of a panic.” He took out his ledger, opened his notebook and once more put a line through the last page, starting all over again with the same pride.

9 x 16 s. @ 4x4

11 x 16 b. @ 4x4

8 x 16 w. @ 4x4

Owe. 3 c. 31.50

2 cases 3.00

5. c 5.60

He slammed the pencil on the desk, slipped the notebook into the ledger, slid them both into the desk drawer, rubbed his knees and opened the bolt of the steel door. “Let’s see it through.” Mrs. Halics was the only one to have noticed “how long he had spent in that dreadful room” and now her piercing eyes were following his every movement. Halics was listening, startled, to the driver’s loud story. He made his body as small as possible, sinking his hands deep into his pockets, so as to reduce the area open to assault, in case someone “should break in on us now.” It was quite enough that the driver should appear in this extraordinary weather, so tousled and excited (he hadn’t visited the estate since last summer), exactly the way some strangers in ragged ankle-length coats might enter a quiet family dinner to announce in tired voices the confusing and terrifying news that war has broken out, and having done so lean against the cupboard, drain a glass of home-brewed
pálinka
, never to be seen in the region again. Because what should he make of this sudden resurrection, this feverish rushing around in circles. He didn’t like everything changing around him: he took it badly. The chairs and tables had moved, the pale imprint of their legs remained on the oily floor: the cases of wine by the wall were shifting into a different order and the top of the counter was unnaturally clean. At other times the ashtrays “might as well be stacked in a pile” since everyone sprinkled ash on the floor anyway, but now, behold! Every table was bright with its own ashtray! The door was still wedged, the cigarette butts had been swept into a corner! What was all this about? Not to mention those damned spiders, that make it impossible to sit down without having to sweep cobwebs of one’s clothes . . . “What do I care in the end. If only that female creature would go to hell . . .” Kelemen waited for his glass to be filled before he stood up. “I’m just going to give my waist a bit of exercise!” he said and loudly groaning bent back and forth a few times, then, with one grand gesture, upset his
pálinka
. “Believe me, it’s as true as I am sitting here. The place suddenly went so quiet even the dog slunk behind the stove without even a squeak! Me, I just sat there, my eyes popping out, not believing what they saw! But there they were, right in front of me, large as life and twice as natural!” Mrs. Halics gave him a cool look. “Just tell me then, were you any the wiser for it?” The driver turned round in anger. “Wiser for what?” “Did you not learn anything?” Mrs. Halics. sadly continued, and with the Bible still in her hand, pointed to Kelemen’s glass. “See, you’re still on the booze.” The old man snorted. “What? Me? Me drunk? What makes you think you can speak like that to me?” Halics gave a great gulp and intervened by way of apology. “Don’t take it seriously, Mr. Kelemen. She’s always like this, I’m afraid.” “What do you mean, don’t take it seriously!” the man snapped back: “What do you think I am?!” The landlord dutifully stepped in. “Take it easy. Carry on please, do carry on. I’m interested.” Mrs. Halics turned to her husband, clearly upset. “How can you sit there so calm, as if nothing had happened?! That man there has insulted your wife! Can you believe it?!” The contempt she radiated was so absolute that the words stuck in Kelemen’s mouth, even though he wasn’t quite through with the subject. “Now . . . where was I?” he asked the landlord, then blew his nose before carefully folding his handkerchief again, crease to crease. . . . “Oh yes, how the girls behind the bar started making rude comments and then . . .” Halics shook his head. “No, you hadn’t got as far as that.” Kelemen angrily slammed his glass down on the table. “I can’t go on like this!” The landlord cast a warning glance at Halics then waved at Kelemen. “No need to make a fuss about it . . .” “No, indeed. I’m through!” he retorted and pointed to Halics: “Get a load of him! Like he was there! He knows better!” “Forget them,” the landlord assured him: “They don’t understand. Believe me, they don’t understand.” Kelemen was mollified and started nodding. The drink had warmed him to the bone, his puffy face had grown red and even his nose seemed to have swollen . . . “So, there we were, the girls behind the bar . . . And I thought that Irimiás would give them a box on the ear then and there, but no! They were just like this lot here . . . I recognized them all: there was the driver of the firewood truck, two stops down from the forest, then the gym teacher from the nearby school, a night waiter from the restaurant and a good few others. So. I make no bones about it, I admired Irimiás’s restraint . . . but to be fair, to be fair to him that is, what was he to do with them? What do you do with people like that? I waited till they took a sip of their blended, because that’s what the pair of them were drinking (yes, I tell you, blended) then, once they’d sat down at a table I went over to them. When Irimiás recognized me, I mean . . . I mean he immediately embraced me and said: Well, my friend, fancy seeing you here. And he waved the bar girls over and they came skipping over like they were crickets or something, though it wasn’t table service, and he immediately ordered a round.” “A round? . . .” the landlord asked in astonishment. “A round,” insisted Kelemen: “What’s so strange about that? I could see he didn’t feel like talking so I started chatting with Petrina. He told me everything.” Mrs. Halics leaned forward anxious not to miss this. “Oh yes, everything. He’s just the kind of man people tell everything,” she dryly remarked, And before the driver could turn round to face “the old witch,” the landlord leaned over the bar and put a hand on his shoulder. “I told you, take no notice. Meanwhile Irimiás? . . .” Kelemen controlled himself and made no move. “Irimiás merely nodded now and then. He didn’t say a lot. He was thinking about something.” The landlord took a gulp. “You say he was. . . . thinking . . . about something? . . .” “Yes, quite so. Eventually he simply said: Time to go. We’ll meet again, Kelemen.” Not long after that I myself left because it was impossible . . . I can only put up with so much bad company and in any case I still had some business in Kisrománváros with Hochan, the butcher. It was already dark by the time I set off for home but at the shambles I popped in The Measure. I bumped into the younger Tóth boy there, who had been my neighbor on the estate at Postelek. It was he who told me that Irimias, or so he said, had spent the afternoon with Steigerwald, the gun dealer who went broke, and that they were talking about some kind of ammunition, at least that what the Steigerwald kids told him in the street. So then I set off home. And before I got to the fork at Elek — you know the Fekete’s place? — and I’m not sure why myself, I looked back. I immediately knew it could only be them though they were still some way off. I went on a while but only so far that I could see the road forking and it was true, my eyes were not playing tricks on me, it really was them. They turned down the proper road without a moment’s hesitation. Then, once I got home, I realized where they’re going, what for and why.” The landlord leaned forward with satisfaction and kept a skeptical eye on Kelemen: he guessed that what he heard was just a part, a very small part, of what had actually happened and that even the bit he heard was probably made up. He had enough respect for Kelemen to know that the man was probably saving the best for later when it would have much more effect. After all, he reasoned, no one tells you everything up front, which meant he never believed anyone, and certainly not the driver now, not a single word, though he did pay considerable heed to what he said. He was sure that even if he wanted to tell the truth in a straightforward fashion the man was incapable of doing that, so he never assumed too much of the first version of events, merely noting that, “Something might have happened.” But what precisely happened, that could only be determined by a maximum, joint effort, by hearing ever newer and newer versions of the story, so that there was never anything to do but wait, wait for the truth to assemble itself, as it might at any moment, at which point further details of the event might become clear, though that entailed a superhuman effort of concentration recalling in what order the individual incidents comprising the story actually appeared. “Which way, where, and why,” he asked with a sly smile. “Plenty to be getting on with, don’t you think?” came the answer. “Could be,” the landlord coldly replied. Halics drew closer to his wife (“What terrible things to hear, dear Jesus! It’s enough to make a man’s hair stand on end . . .”) who slowly moved her head to examine the flaccid skin of her husband’s face, his cataract-gray eyes, and low protruding brow. Close up, his sagging skin reminded her of those horrible slaughterhouses, of slabs of meat and ham folding in on each other; his cataract-gray eyes of water covered in frog-spawn in the courtyard wells of long-abandoned houses; and his low jutting brow of “the brows of murderers whose photographs you see in the national papers and can never forget.” And so, whatever momentary fellow feeling she might have had for Halics immediately left her to be replaced by another, scarcely appropriate feeling whose object could be summed up in a single sentence:
the Grace of Jesus!
She dismissed the harsh sense of obligation to love her husband, “because a dog has more honor than he has,” but what next? It must, after all, be written in the book of fate. There might perhaps be a quiet corner of heaven prepared for her, but what of Halics? What could his sinful crude soul expect? Mrs. Halics believed in providence and placed her hope in the powers of purgatory. She waved the Bible. “It would be better for you to be reading this!” she declared severely, “while you still have time!” “Me? You know, that I don’t . . .” “You!” Mrs. Halics cut in: “Yes, you! At least you won’t be completely unprepared for the end times.” Halics was not moved by these grave words, nevertheless he took the book from her with a sour grimace because “one might as well get some peace.” On receiving the weight of the book in his hands he gave a nod of acknowledgment and opened it on the first page. But Mrs. Halics snatched the book from his hands. “No! Not the Creation, you idiot!” she cried and, with one well-practiced movement, went straight to the Book of Revelations. Halics found the first sentence rather difficult but didn’t spend time struggling with it because, Mrs. Halics’s attention being less keenly focused on him, it was enough to pretend to read. And though the words never made it as far as his brain, the smell of the pages had a pleasing effect on him, and he could listen with half an ear to the conversation between Kerekes and the landlord, and between the driver and the landlord (“Is it still raining?” “Yup,” and “What’s up with him?” “Drunk as a newt”) because, the terror roused by the prospect of Irimiás having evaporated, he was slowly recovering his sense of orientation and had some idea of the distance between the counter and himself, as well as a notion of the dryness of his throat and of the security of being sheltered in the world of the bar. He felt immediately better that he was able to sit here, whiling away his time “among other people,” certain in the knowledge that harm was less likely to befall him in company. “I’ll have my wine by tonight. Who cares about the rest!” And when he saw Mrs. Schmidt at the door, another shudder of “mischievous little hope” ran up his soft spine. “Who knows? When all is said and done I might even get my money.” But, being under the sharp eye of Mrs. Halics, he didn’t have much time for dreaming, so he closed his eyes and leant over the book like a school dunce facing an exam, struggling with his mother’s uncompromising glare on one side and the temptations of the hot summer beyond the classroom on the other. Because in Halics’s eyes Mrs. Schmidt was the embodiment of summer, a never-to-be season unattainable to one acquainted only with “the ruins of autumn, a winter without desire” and a hyperactive but frustrating spring. “Oh, Mrs. Schmidt!” the landlord leapt to his feet with a faint smile and while Kelemen was swaying here and there, looking on the floor for the door wedge so that the door could be kept closed, he led the woman over to the table he tended to work at, waited for her to sit then bent close to her ear so he could breathe in the powerful, rough scent of cologne rising from her hair that just about overcame the bitter tang of her hair gel. He didn’t really know which he preferred: the scent of Easter or the exciting aroma that, come spring, leads a man — as it does the bull in the field — to the focus of desire. Halics couldn’t even begin to imagine what had happened to her husband . . . “What horrible weather. What can I bring you?” Mrs. Schmidt shoved the landlord aside with her “delicious, practically edible elbow” and looked around. “Cherry
pálinka
?” the landlord persisted confidentially, continuing to smile. “No,” replied Mrs. Schmidt. “Well, maybe just a drop.” Mrs. Halics followed every movement of the landlord, her eyes sparkling with hatred, her lips trembling, her face burning; the fury in her whole body now suppressed, now rising, with the irresistible sense of injustice over what was owing to her, and now she couldn’t make up her mind what to do, whether to march out of “this notorious den of vice” or to give that lecherous swine of a landlord a sharp box on the ears for trying to inveigle innocent creatures into his wicked web by craftily getting the innocent soul drunk. She would much have preferred to rush to Mrs. Schmidt’s defense (“I’d sit her on my lap and be nice to her . . .”) so she should not be subject to the landlord’s attempts “to force himself on her,” but there was nothing she could do. She knew she must not betray her feelings because they were bound to be misunderstood (weren’t they always gossiping behind her back about precisely this?) but feared the poor girl might be seduced by such wiles and dreaded what would await her at the end. She sat there, her tears welling up, her body overblown, the weight of the whole world on her shoulders. “And have you heard?” asked the landlord with disarming courtesy. He put the glass of
pálinka
down in front of Mrs. Schmidt and, as far as possible, tried to hide his potbelly by breathing in. “She’s heard! She’s heard all right!” Mrs. Halics blurted out from her corner. The landlord sat back in his place with a solemn expression, his lips tight, while Mrs. Schmidt delicately raised her glass to her mouth using only two fingers before — as if having properly considered the matter — throwing back its contents and swallowing it all in one manlike gulp. “And are you all sure it was them?” “Absolutely sure!” the landlord retorted: “No mistake.” Mrs. Schmidt’s entire being was filled with excitement; she felt her skin tingling over, a myriad scraps of thought swirling chaotically in her head, so she grabbed the edge of the table with her left hand in case she should betray herself in this great rush of happiness. She still had to pick her own things out of the big military chest, consider what she would need and what not, if, tomorrow morning — or perhaps this very night — they were to set off, because she was not in any doubt whatsoever that the unusual — unusual? fantastic rather! — visit of Irimiás (how like him! she proudly thought) could be no accident. She herself remembered his words to the letter . . . but could they ever be forgotten? And all this now, at the last possible hour! These last few months since the terrible moment she had first heard the news of his death had completely destroyed her faith: she had given up all hope, abandoned all her best-loved plans, and would have resigned herself to a kind of poverty-stricken — and preposterous — bid to escape, just to be away from here. Ah, but you stupid people of little faith! Hadn’t she always known that this miserable existence owed her something? There was after all something to hope for, to wait for! Now at last, there would be an end to her sufferings, her agonies! How often had she dreamed of it, imagined it? And now here it was. Here! The greatest moment of her life! Her eyes shone with hatred and something like contempt as she gazed at the shadowy faces around her. Inside, she was almost bursting with happiness. “I’m leaving! Drop dead the lot of you, just the way you are. I hope you get struck by lightning. Why don’t you all just kick the bucket. Drop dead right now!” She was suddenly full of big, indefinite (but chiefly big) plans: she saw lights; rows of illuminated shops with the latest music, expensive slips, stockings and hats (“Hats!”) floated before her; soft furs cool to the touch, brilliantly lit hotels, lavish breakfasts, grand shopping trips and nights, the NIGHTS, dancing . . . she closed her eyes so that she might hear the rustling, the wild hubbub, the immeasurably joyful clamor. And, under her closed eyelids, there appeared to her the jealously guarded dream of her childhood, the dream that had been driven into exile (the dream relived a hundred, no a thousand times, of “afternoon tea at the salon . . .”) but her wildly beating heart was, at the same time, beset by the same old despair at all those delights — all those many delights — that she had already missed! How would she now — at this stage of her life — cope in entirely new circumstances? What was she to do in the “real life” about to break in on her? She was still just about able to use a knife and fork for eating, but how to manage those thousands of items of make-up, the paints, the powders, the lotions? how should she respond “when acquaintances greeted her”? how to receive a compliment? how to choose or wear her clothes? and should they — God forbid — have a car as well, then what was she to do? She decided to pay heed only to her first instinct and in any case, she would just keep her eyes peeled. If she could bear to live with a man as repulsive as that beetroot-faced halfwit Schmidt, why worry about the hazards of life with someone like Irimiás?! There was only one man she knew — Irimiás — who could thrill her so deeply in both bed and life; Irimiás who had more virtue in his little finger than all the men in the world put together, whose word was worth more than all the gold. . . . In any case,