Csardas (75 page)

“Worried in case I die,” she snarled. “Worried in case you find yourself superseded by your nephew! That is why you don’t want me to die!”

She saw a quick flicker of triumph in his eyes, but it was hastily controlled, extinguished.

“Not at all, Mama. I have no fears about my future. I just wished to see you well again.”

“Cha! You are afraid of your nephew, afraid of your heir.” Venom began to loosen her tongue. “You are envious, Felix. I have seen the way you look at your nephew—yes, and at your brother too! You have not fathered a son for the Kaldys, and now you are envious of those who have.” She was gratified to see a faint flush raised on his cheek.

“I? Envious of that—that trollop and her tainted brats?”

“Envious!” she screeched. “You could have had a son of your own. It could have been your heir if you had done what I told you to do! You should have divorced Kati! Divorced her and fathered a child on someone else!”

“Divorce will not be necessary now,” he whispered, and then stopped, the secretive smile she dreaded so much spreading over his features.

That night she lay on her bed, watching the crack of light under the door. Whatever he was doing was doubly dreadful now. Before she had dismissed his madness, his Arrow Cross friends, as no more than an unpleasant diversion. But now she had seen the power of these people; she had seen them in action. The Germans were spreading like disease over the face of Hungary. What fresh evil was he plotting now? What terrifying new developments were being devised in the upstairs room?

Two days later when he went away again, she noticed the pupils of his eyes were pinpointed with concealed excitement, the way they had been when the Arrow Cross men came to see him.

“Good-bye, dearest Mama,” he said fondly, stroking her hair and staring out of the window, out across her lands, her farms, her river and trees and soil. “You must try to be more tranquil, accept things as they are going to be. When I come back everything will be right again. We will be the way we used to be. Hungary will be a wonderful country, and you and I will be happy together, just us.”

Her body iced over. Fear drained away all strength from her body, all blood from her heart. She was too afraid even to challenge him, ask him what he meant. She tried to control her body’s shivers. Instinctively she felt it would be better if he was ignorant of her fear.

“Good-bye, darling Mama.” He bent his head, kissed her, and was gone.

What had he meant,
“just us”?
What fresh terrible denouement was about to be sprung on her? What new disgrace was he going to wreak on the Kaldy name? She was helpless, helpless.
Curse my body, my sick pain-filled body that handicaps my spirit, saps my courage. If only I could walk, go upstairs and see what he does there, see what evil is perpetrated in this house.

Throughout the morning she propelled her chair back and forth, back and forth, through the great entrance room, staring up at the passage that led to his room—her husband’s room. The servants, used to her frustrations, her caged strength, ignored her vigil at first, but after a little while the strangeness communicated itself to them and they scuttled nervously past her, trying hard not to stare at the figure wheeling frantically over the area.

She had to get up there. Somehow she had to see what he had done. She had to know, even if it was too late to do anything. But how? To ask the servants to carry her would be a sign of betrayal in the family. How could she ask Tamas to carry her to her son’s desk and leave her? Felix would be sure to learn when he returned, and now—she was ready to admit it—she was afraid of what he might do.

She propelled the chair to the bottom stair, reached out for the rail, and gripped with both hands. She placed her swollen, crippled feet on the stair and tried to heave her body up. The pain screamed through her. She was so used to pain that she had finally come to accept it as a necessary adjunct to her body, but this new, fresh agony obliterated everything else. She gave a small, soft scream and fell back into her chair, sweat breaking out over her body. Hermin came running from the downstairs room.

“Madame! What has happened?”

“Nothing. Go away.”

Hermin was her own servant. Could she rely on her loyalty? Would Hermin gossip about the mistress going upstairs to Mr. Felix’s study? Yes, Hermin was like all the rest of her kind, no loyalty or respect for the privacy of those she worked for.

Another hour of frenzied wheeling, of tension and conjecture and horrifying speculations. When would Felix come back. Today? This afternoon? When he came back it would be too late. Perhaps it was already too late?

“Just us, the way we used to be.”
What did he mean? What of George? What of her grandson! Upstairs. She must get upstairs and see.

She swallowed. No matter what might happen when Felix returned, she had to see.

“Tamas! Hermin!” They came at once, so swiftly it was obvious they had been lurking close by, watching her, wondering what was wrong.

“I must go upstairs. Tamas, you will carry me and place me on the chest at the top of the stairs. Hermin, fetch Tibor and Endre and tell them to take my chair up immediately behind me.”

“Madame, yes. Yes, madame!” Eyes round, voice tremulous. Were they all afraid of Felix?

Tamas, his peasant’s face impassive, registering no emotion at all, bent and scooped her gingerly from the chair. She felt a flash of agony; then she felt exultation because she was being held by strong arms and her sense of movement, or power, drew added strength from the man’s body. Behind she could hear the two men bouncing the chair up the stairs. Hermin, flustered, was trailing along behind; she couldn’t see her but she could hear her. “Don’t fuss, Hermin,” she snapped, with a brief flash of her old confidence, and then she was lowered into the chair and they stood watching her, a quartet of stupid faces, wondering what to do next.

“Don’t stand there! Continue with your work. I shall ring when I wish to be carried down again.”

They clumped away, and when the last had vanished she turned the chair and wheeled it slowly towards the study.

It was the way she remembered. Several fine antelope heads on the wall, a case of her husband’s guns which she had redeemed from a gunsmith when Kati’s money had come into the family. There were animal paintings on the panelled walls, a huge seventeenth-century bureau, and Felix’s desk, which had a well beneath a flat top. Her chair fitted comfortably into the well.

The stacks of papers on the desk revealed little: lists of names and addresses that meant nothing, circulars, letters and official communications from the Arrow Cross Party. The drawers were sure to be locked. How could she open them? She tried and was surprised to discover they were all open. Whatever was here he treated with assured indifference. Who of importance would look at anything he had to read? No one would come here who could form a threat to his plans, whatever they were.

The top drawer held a small, smooth, German revolver. It was modern and offensive, the sort of thing gangsters used in the very few American films she had seen. She gazed from the revolver to the beautiful old hunting guns on the wall. That was how a gentleman shot, with a craftsman’s gun. Not with this brash, vulgar, killing toy. She clipped back the magazine and saw it was loaded. Had it ever been fired? Had her aristocratic son ever pulled this... piece of machinery from his pocket and killed anyone? Did all Arrow Cross men walk around with these things festooned about their bodies like American policemen?

She placed the revolver back in the drawer and opened the one underneath. A brown leather folder was on top. It was embossed with the emblem of the Arrow Cross, another manifestation of Felix’s declining taste. She opened it and stared at the typewritten carbon copies clipped inside. She read them and did not understand, the words blurred into something so familiar it did not make sense, a list of names so well known to her she didn’t understand why they should be written down.

Zsigmond Ferenc, banker, retired. 74. Jewish.

Leo Ferenc, journalist. 34. Jewish father.

David Klein, banker. 66. Jewish.

Amalia Marta Klein, née Ferenc. 48. Jewish father.

Karoly Klein, currently in Labour Corps serving in Russia. 20. Jewish father. Half-Jewish mother.

Jacob Klein, bank clerk. 19. Jewish father. Half-Jewish mother.

Eva Sarolte Kaldy, née Ferenc. 47. Jewish father.

Terez Amalia Kaldy. 17. Half-Jewish mother.

George Felix Kaldy. 16. Half-Jewish mother.

Katalin Gizelli Kaldy, née Racs-Rassay. 48. Jewish mother.

Nicholas Rassay, son of above. 14. Father unknown but probably Jewish. Half-Jewish mother.

She stared at the list, not comprehending, noting in an abstract way that it had been prepared very efficiently. By the side of each name was an address, even including the school where George was a weekday boarder. Only the spaces beside Karoly Klein and Leo Ferenc were blank, “whereabouts unknown.” These people she had known all her life. It was strange; it did not register. Why was Marta Bogozy not there, or Adam, or Felix, or herself?

The horror of what she was reading blanched slowly over her brain, made sense in a dawning of terrible scalding pain. The top of the page burnt into her eyes, the letters jumbled, straightened, plummeted into her belly and bowels.

Those listed below are, with the exception of Zsigmond Ferenc and David Klein, classified as Christians of Jewish origin. They are corrupt and dangerous elements and have tainted the blood of pure-bred Magyar families. Their economic, social, and financial positions have rendered them undesirable in the new society, and it is essential that they be deported before influence can be exerted on their behalf to protect them from due legal processes.

It went on, pages and pages of the report, listing their life records, their income, the dates of their marriages, the names of their properties. And at the bottom, showing clearly through the smudged carbon, was the signature of her son, Felix Kaldy. Her son, on the last page. And on the first page, George Kaldy, her grandson, her heir. The scream bubbled up from deep within her, from a fount of madness that could not, would not, accept what was written before her.

“No! God, no! Aaah!”

Feet on the stairs: Hermin and Tamas, white-faced, frightened. “Madame?”

“No! Wait. Must think. George. Save George. School, phone school. Hermin, my telephone book; get my telephone book. Hurry, hurry!”

The operator spent hours trying to get the number. He was infuriatingly painstaking and came back every few moments to apologize and ask her to hold on. She rocked to and fro, moaning, feeling floods of terror, pain, agony washing over her, threatening to drown her consciousness in merciful oblivion. When the director of the
Gymnasium
came through she was nearly incoherent.

“My grandson, George Kaldy. You are to let no one take him away. You must hide him until my son comes.”

“Who is this, please?”

She swallowed. Control... calm. Luiza Kaldy, capable of dealing with anything. “This is Madame Luiza Kaldy. My grandson is in danger and you must let no one remove him from school other than his father.”

“George Kaldy is no longer here.”

“Oh, no!”

“We received a message from his father four days ago. He was sent home then.”

She replaced the telephone at once and dialled Adam’s number. It rang and rang—oh, God!—there must be someone there; why were the servants not answering? But she must control herself. Yes, control. She couldn’t help if she panicked. If George had been sent for it was sure to be all right.

“Hello?”

“Eva? Is George there? Has he returned from school?”

Eva’s voice, bored but also a little puzzled. “Yes, Adam recalled him a few days ago. Why didn’t he tell you, I wonder? He thought, with the war so uncertain, it would be safer to—”

“I must talk to Adam. At once.”

“He’s in the granary.”

“At once!”

She could still command Eva when she had to. Another interminable wait followed. Control, control. What to do? What to do?

“Mama?”

“Adam.” Her voice dried suddenly, went dead. She tried to croak the words out, force them up from her chest, but all that came out was a wild rasping sound. Everything else had settled—her bowels, the sweat—but her voice wouldn’t work.

“Mama? Are you there? Are you all right?”

“Get George away, Adam. Hide him. Terez and Eva too.”

A pause. She could hear him breathing, slowly and regularly, and she suddenly remembered Adam as a child. Whenever he was nervous he breathed like that.

“What have you discovered, Mama?”

“Papers. In Felix’s desk. Papers.”

“Who else, Mama?”

“Everyone. The Ferencs, the Kleins, Kati and her bastard.”

“Have you telephoned them?”

“No. George—I was worried about George. What—”

“I have made provision, Mama. I will visit you when everything has been done.”

The flat voice was abruptly cut and she was alone with the silent receiver in her hand. She was calmer now. Adam would look after everything. He had “made provision.” He had always made provision. Quietly and without fuss he had done what had to be done. He would telephone where necessary. He would look after George. Her family, her blessed little family, would be safe, George and Terez too, bright, sparkling little Terez. A wave of affection even for Eva washed over her. Eva had provided George and over the years had proved a reasonable daughter-in-law. They would all be saved. Adam would save them. He was a good son, a strong loyal son who had saved them before; after the war he had saved them. Why was one son like Adam and the other—? A drenching sense of shame, disappointment, betrayed love, shock. What had she done? Adam. Felix. Was the evil already there or did something happen? How were they different? Where had their ways diverged? Felix had been schooled as a member of the nobility, Adam as an artisan. Why?

Hunched in her chair she brooded, until the daylight went and Hermin came in to try and persuade her to go downstairs. She refused and went on thinking—of her youth, her marriage, her widowhood, the years which had been obsessed by one desire, to see her son sitting in his rightful place. She looked back, trying to separate the truth from her years of self-delusion, trying to see herself, to see the woman she had become.