Parallel Stories: A Novel (125 page)

Well, at least it came out right again.

Again but only once and only by chance; she was actually preparing for something else, not this. She was preparing to take Mrs. Szemz
ő
’s impossible idea seriously: now I may be talking nonsense, but you tell Médike that not only should you sing Monteverdi, but you should also switch to contralto. And with that, Mrs. Szemz
ő
rose from the piano and began excitedly to look for the right sheet music. In the escritoire, the only piece left of the furniture Madzar had built, from which the unknown saturant was still emitting a faint scent.

Gyöngyvér also got up from the piano to get the sheet music but in the meantime she remembered where Mrs. Szemz
ő
kept the blankets. And the black dog on the bridge attacked Kristóf, knocking him against the railing and licking his face again with its huge tongue. The young man instinctively shoved the dog away; the touch of the strange beast inflamed his mouth, but his move came too late. His palate turned blistery, he thought he’d choke to death on the spot, but the dog thought that now they could begin to play.

It was snarling at him in happiness.

The next morning Mrs. Szemz
ő
arrived in Mohács, and not alone.

Then Ágost was startled by the sound and noticed with surprise that he was alone in the bed in the maid’s room. At least he could make himself comfortable. He was a little cold, he realized, irritated, where is she with that blanket, he thought wistfully, but then he fell right back to sleep.

At 11:20 in the morning, four minutes before the expected arrival of the woman, the unsuspecting Madzar was already waiting on the platform at the old railway station shaded by aged chestnut trees, sporting his father’s best summer suit, a light-green tropical worsted. He had worked until dawn in his father’s workshop so he could show Mrs. Szemz
ő
at least the sketches of all the objects he was making for her. He held his father’s panama hat in his hand, twirling it nervously. During the long night he had managed to assemble roughly every piece of furniture except for the desk, the folding screen, and the davenport, including the all-important delicate couch of which they both expected so much. If only he could put together in fitting layers the experience of several centuries. The practical question he had to answer was this, in what manner does a relaxed body lie on a couch. His body shuddered in the early dawn light; the weird exhibit he had prepared surprised him. The hastily assembled pieces of austere furniture were propped up with other objects and implements and stood forlornly among the machines. He knew that no one in the world had ever received such a worthy confession of love, and fortunately no one besides him could know this; a stranger could not possibly understand. Mrs. Szemz
ő
will not understand either. Yet secretly he hoped she would.

The panama hat, however, was too small; until the very last minute, his mother begged him not to put it on unless he wanted to become the laughingstock of the town.

Come on, Mother, then what the devil should I do with it.

Hold it in your hands.

The sky was a little cloudy on this Wednesday but the heat was great, with hardly any breeze because of the heavy humid air.

A real Hungarian summer, whose smell and heat he had thought so much about when he lived in Germany and Holland.

His ability to discipline himself notwithstanding, he felt he would have a long wait for any anticipated fulfillment. First the train had to deliver Mrs. Szemz
ő
, then the two of them would have to stroll back along sunny Danube Row to the parental house, and only then, finally, in the workshop could he show her the neat, elegant objects so enriched by their inner life. Beyond the railway station, beyond the black hills of the coaling dock, on the estate of Archduke Frederick of Lorraine two harvesting machines were at work; one could hear the harvesters’ drawn-out shouts locked in the machines’ monotonous noise. In the summer seasonal laborers from Göcsej worked on the archduke’s land. Perhaps those were not shouts but the singing of laborers as they lay in the shade of acacias waiting for the midday sun to relent a little. Here, on the flat expanse of Sátorhely, where according to the old historians the Turkish and Hungarian armies had marched against each other in 1526, the fertile, much envied fields stretched all the way to the grape-growing hills. Madzar was not alone on the platform; other people were waiting for the train too. In his excitement he paid no attention to the exceptional human sounds, and there were many other kinds of noise as well. The tipcarts at the coaling dock were rhythmically clanging and clicking; from the loudspeaker at the nearby swimming pool the melody of a popular tune radiated as far as the station. In the surrounding landscape irregular pulsating shouts sounded like a work song filled with accusations, or like a recitative proclaiming the desolation of fate. When the short train with its stocky engine approached and then pulled into the station, activities intensified; railway workers and porters moved out from the shade, and to his astonishment he quickly recognized, in the slowly moving window of a first-class car, Mrs. Szemz
ő
’s two sturdy, aggressive little sons, surrounded by young girls or rather young ladies. They were literally hanging out the window, eagerly showing something to the brightly dressed girls who in the wind created by the train were holding on to and waving their hats. One could also see two well-fed rats running between the basalt track bed and the concrete wall of the platform, along with the train. In the noise of the braking train, Madzar had no time to become used to the thought that Mrs. Szemz
ő
was not alone.

He felt like blaming Mrs. Szemz
ő
for this first surprise, as for a serious misdeed, and also like making excuses for her.

When the conductor finally opened the doors, Dr. Szemz
ő
’s bald head and beaming face shone down on Madzar.

In his utter confusion he did not understand anything. He had been through many things, but for the first time in his young life he felt he would perish, he could not bear it.

He felt as if he had been caught with his desensitized feelings showing, without time even to blush. Mrs. Szemz
ő
cannot be without her sons and the sons cannot be without each other. What should he do now, he wondered, but he had no time for such questions. At any rate, his familiar world was turning upside down, about to fall on his head. Something was happening, or was beginning to happen, independent of him, which he could not comprehend. It was as if in this very exceptional moment he confessed to himself that he could not be without Bellardi. First, he had to greet Dr. Szemz
ő
, to acknowledge and reciprocate the man’s obvious pleasure in seeing him, which must have been genuine, seeing that Madzar was building a big new home for him with the best available materials and equipped with the highest achievements of modern technology. At last he glimpsed Mrs. Szemz
ő
, who, in the company of a very fetching, fragile woman about her age, was coming toward him.

They smiled at him from the midst of their intense conversation.

It soon became clear that the woman had been one of Mrs. Szemz
ő
’s classmates in school. Laughing and cutting into each other’s words, they were telling Madzar that only two days earlier they had been together at an open-air concert on Margit Island, and now they had met on the train completely by chance. They were laughing about how insane such coincidences were.

Every summer she brings her pupils, students at the Hungarian Royal School of Industrial Design, to Mohács, and they, she and Madzar, might have met before.

The woman rather dazed Madzar.

You know, I’ve lived abroad for a long time, he said politely and a little as if excusing himself.

They are all studying textiles, the woman explained, shining her large bright eyes on him, and for years the city had been kind enough to put the rooms of the empty hospital for infectious diseases at their disposal.

Which is ideal, enthused Mrs. Szemz
ő
, who felt she should mitigate somewhat the excitement generated by this unexpected encounter.

Ideal indeed, and not only because it’s comfortable there and the silk factory is nearby, not just that, enthused the rail-thin, black-haired woman dressed in layered silk. You’ll see for yourself what a splendid chestnut-tree park the building has, just splendid, she cried, and with her enormous eyes glanced at the architect, who surely knew this splendid park.

There, outside, we can do our watercolors under the trees, to our heart’s content.

Madzar was looking at the scar on the woman’s face.

Otherwise, we use the empty wards as studios, when it rains.

Luckily we don’t have to be afraid of some devastating epidemic. The two women laughed together.

Originally that property belonged to the prince of Montenuovo, Madzar remarked quietly, to be part of the conversation somehow. This family, you should know, has a special standing in Mohács, where frugality would not be exceptional. The Montenuovos disliked plants that were merely decorative. For them, every plant had to make its own profit. That is why they had so many chestnut trees planted, back in the day.

He wanted to step between them, both to observe them and to end this senseless female shouting and giggling. As if to his shame he had no choice but to put himself in the middle of their chaos and cacophony. Again things were happening some other way, not his. A woman had again done something to him, and had brought another one along to boot. He was outraged, and for a long moment the two women sent searching, penetrating looks from under their large hats at the man who seemed to be emanating aversion and rejection. They also smiled at him politely, appreciating and at the same time assuaging his embarrassment.

Sizing up the expert who will be their splendid guide in the next few days.

He’d probably enjoy being their tourist guide.

It would be truly ideal, if only he were willing.

And while they continued to chat like this, they kept looking at him from under their hats and wondering what had gotten into this attractive though rather preposterously dressed man.

Her pupils would be so glad if he looked at their work.

With your belated permission, my dear architect, I told Miss Dobrovan that I had seen your wonderful drawings.

So it’s no secret to me that you have a great talent as a draftsman too.

She is flashing her bright eyes at me so that I won’t look at her scar.

Madzar did not fail to see that the women were playing an old, well-rehearsed game.

But the scene was brief, with every word passing smoothly and quickly among them. They prattled on as if their words scarcely touched them. And then they had to be busy with the luggage, giving orders as to where to put what. Hired carriages were waiting in front of the station. The porters put the bags and suitcases of the young ladies and gentlemen, along with their easels and drawing boards, into a bus. Waiting for the Szemz
ő
s was the Hotel Korona’s black-lacquered, crest-adorned light carriage with its cheerful coachman and two black horses, groomed to a high shine.

The spoiled little city boys ran to them, they wanted to make friends with the horses or at least to stroke their nice shiny coats. But the horses were leisurely and contentedly feeding from the nosebags hung around their necks. They swatted at horseflies with their tails, their skin quivering, or, by way of warning, kicked a bit in the rapturous boys’ direction.

Madzar did not understand how the black hackney could be waiting for them since he hadn’t ordered it the evening before, but he was also busy thinking that the boys might soon get into trouble. Anxiously he watched how the horses endured the boys’ aggressive adulation.

But I expected only you, he said stealthily to Mrs. Szemz
ő
. His stifled voice was filled with rebuke.

I reserved the nicest corner room for you.

As if asking, how could I have known you’d be coming with your entire family.

Which was something Mrs. Szemz
ő
did not understand. She had so many other things to worry about in any case.

Where did you reserve and what sort of room—in other words, she didn’t know what to do with the amorously reproachful emphasis in his sentence. No doubt she was embarrassed occasionally by her own quite erotic fantasies about Madzar, that they would do this and then that, and how the man would behave in this or that position, but their real contact neither allowed nor called for such delicate intonations and details. Cautiously, seeing Madzar’s agitated state, she quickly came back with a question as to whether he had received her telegram.

Of course he did, came the man’s indignant, aggressive reply.

Why would he be here if he hadn’t.

I should have wired earlier, Mrs. Szemz
ő
added apologetically, and speaking a little too loudly. Doing this at the last minute wasn’t very considerate of me, I admit, and her hand in the white doeskin glove rested for a brief and intimate moment on Madzar’s arm. As she had done a few weeks earlier in the empty seventh-floor apartment from where they could look out, between the blocks of the Palatinus apartment buildings, at the same Danube.

It was dizzying to look at the same river here, and this shared feeling—existing simultaneously in past and present—dazed them a little, as if from the renewed thrust of another insult.

And the reason I didn’t was so as not to burden you too much, Mrs. Szemz
ő
continued her sentence. So that you wouldn’t have time to make any preparations, and she was surprised to see how simple it was, despite the proximity of her children, to keep her composure. And wouldn’t even think of changing your schedule because of our family’s little excursion.