Tainted Tokay (6 page)

15

E
lisabeth refused to let Benjamin call Bordeaux to check in and insisted that they start their sightseeing right away. Their first stop: Saint Stephen's Basilica, dedicated to the first king of Hungary. Once they were there, Benjamin found himself fascinated with its resemblance to Saint Paul's Cathedral in London. The winemaker held forth on the similarities—the central dome and two bell towers topped with pinnacles—until Elisabeth pulled him by the sleeve toward the back of the church to show him a strange relic. Set in a small glass box was the mummified hand of
Saint Stephen.

“I read about this in one of the guidebooks, Benjamin. On Saint Stephen's Day every year, they take this hand out for a walk. Actually, it leads the annual parade. Do you believe it? When Stephen was canonized in the eleventh century, they exhumed his body and lopped off his arm. The hand wound up traveling all over Eastern Europe before winding up here. I don't know what happened to the rest of his arm. People who aren't so religious call it t
he monkey paw.”

Benjamin exam
ined the hand.

“Back then, people trafficked in relics,” he said. “These days, they traffic in many
other things.”

He slipped a coin into the moneybox, and a light illuminated the mummified hand, which was cur
led in a fist.

The light went off after half a minute, and Benjamin turned to walk away. But before he could move, he spotted someone just to his right. It was a kid with unkempt raven-colored hair. He was holding out his hand. Startled, Benjamin didn't do anything. He looked like so many of the youths who hung out at tourist sites, yet his eyes had an unnerving intensity and he was smiling. Benjamin dug into his pocket for a coin and offered it to the boy. The kid took it, and Benjamin realized that he was actually much taller than a child. He looked like he was seventeen or eighteen years old. May
be even twenty.

“Deutsch?” the su
pplicant asked.

Elisabeth s
hook her head.

“English?”

Benjamin's linen trousers and well-polished Lobb shoes had most likely given him away. Still, Benjamin told the youth that
he was French.

“My English better than my
français
,”
the kid said.

He followed them out of the basilica, and in the sunlight there was no longer any question about the beggar's age. He was well past adolescence. Benjamin could see that he had an athletic build under his blue jogging suit. His pale yellow T-shirt sported the logo of a Budapest mar
tial-arts club.

The young man was focused
on Elisabeth.

“I know every place in Budapest. I'm a good guide. I was born here. Want to see bridges? I show you bridges. Want a
kavé
? I s
how you
kavé
.”

He claimed to be a computer science student and a good soccer player. He dropped the name of the famous French player Zidane as a sort of golden ticket. But it would take more to convince Benjamin to see this rather roguish boy as an ally much
less a friend.

Elisabeth, on the other hand, seemed quite susceptible to the charisma of the young man with an angelic face and a full head of lustrous black hair. She asked how much he
would charge.

“No charge, ma'am,” he said, flashing a smile. “I do it
for pleasure.”

Benjamin didn't believe that for a minute. He felt a tinge of annoyance when his wife took a twenty-euro note out of her purse and handed it over. Really? They were doing fin
e on their own.

“Thank you,” the young man said, flashing yet another smile. “My name is Zoltán. I give you b
est tour ever.”

His English was hardly flawless, but his mannerisms suggested a certain sensitivity and a semblance of
education, too.

Benjamin wasn't quite comfortable with surrendering to Zoltán's guidance, but he grudgingly went along. He had promised Elisabeth a good vacation, and if this was what she wanted t
o do, so be it.

Zoltán led them out of the basilica, and as they descended the steps, Benjamin recognized a familiar face from the ship. It was the man with the sketchpad. He was standing in the square, and he appeared to be drawin
g the basilica.

“Honey, that man over there was on the ship with us,” Benjamin said. “Let's
go say hello.”

He took Elisabeth's arm and walked over. The artist looked up, nodded, and s
topped drawing.

“I see you're enjoying the sights,” Benjamin said. “My name is Benjamin. This is my wife, Elisabeth, and….” Benjamin turned to introduce their guide, but Zoltán was nowh
ere to be seen.

“Oh, our tour guide seems to have disappeared,” he said, turning to Elisabeth and giving her an I-to
ld-you-so look.

“He's over there on the steps,” Elisa
beth whispered.

“I've been enjoying this sight in particular. Connor Adamson's the name,” the man said, shaking Benjamin's hand and noddin
g to Elisabeth.

“May I have a look?” the winemaker asked. “I was admiring what you did on the ship. I used to be an
artist myself.”

Adamson handed him the sketchpad, and Benjamin and Elisabeth silently studied the man's drawings. “I can see you have a gift,” he said after
a few minutes.

“I don't know about that. It's just something I like to do when I'm traveling. I'm actually a graphic artist and do most of my work on the computer. So what brings yo
u to Budapest?”

“We're visiting. Taking in the city before we move on to T
okaj. And you?”

“Just visiting, too. Being stuck behind the computer in England so much of the time, I like to get out and see the rest of Euro
pe when I can.”

“Are you staying at the Astoria?” Benjamin asked. “Perhaps we could meet for
a drink later.”

“Thanks, but I'm afraid I can't. I'm having dinner with my fiancée's cousin
this evening.”

“Is your fiancée trave
ling with you?”

“No, I'm afraid she's not.” The smile vanished from the artist's face, and he looked back at his sketchpad. “S
he's in Syria.”

“Oh,” Benjamin said. “You must be very wo
rried for her.”

“Yes, but we're keeping in touch, and I'm trying to get her here safely. With some luck, she'll be
with me soon.”

“Well, then, I wish you the very best,” Benjamin said. “We'll let you get back to
your drawing.”

Benjamin and Elisabeth said their good-byes and started heading in the other direction. Elisabeth looked around for Zoltán, who seemed to appea
r from nowhere.

“How awful for that poor man,” Elisabeth said. “And his fiancée! He must be terrib
ly distressed.”

“I imagine so,” Benjamin answered. “The conflict in Syria and the refugee situation are heart-wrenching. I'm sure he wants to get her to Europe as quickly and easily as possible.” He turned to Zoltán. “Zoltán, you should have stayed with us. That artist is quite skilled. He's penned a perfect sketch of you. So, you promised us a tour. Shall we g
et on with it?”

Zoltán shot a glance at the artist. Turning back to his clients, he raised his arms and ushered them in the other directio
n. “This way.”

He led his clients from one memorable spot the next. Elisabeth especially enjoyed the Central Market Hall, where she admired the embroidered textiles and purchased some paprika. After several hours of sightseeing, however, she was worn out, and Benjamin needed to catch his breath. Only their tour guide appeared to be indefatigable. Elisabeth suggested cooling off with a soft drink, and Benjamin pointed to the terrace of a large café. Zoltán
dissuaded him.

“
Kavé
for tourists!
Borozo better.”

Elisabeth consulted her smartphone. “It's a bar, dear. I'm all right with
that. Are you?”

Benjamin nodded, and the Cookers let themselves be steered to the end of a narrow street. They entered a tavern that wasn't much to look at. The walls were painted blue, and the few sticky tables were being used as armrests by the old folk who were riveted to a plasma-screen TV, where an important soccer game w
as playing out.

Elisabeth ordered a soft drink. Benjamin was about to order for himself, but Zoltán placed a hand on his wrist, as if to say the winemaker should trust him. They were friends, after all
, weren't they?

A beautiful blonde with Slavic eyes took a ladle and filled two glasses with a yellowish liquid that hardly lo
oked drinkable.

The two men clinked their glasses and raised them to their lips. Zoltán grinned. Benjamin sipped, winced, and turn
ed to his wife.

“It's a dry furmint, a white Hungarian grape variety that's only made here. Elisabeth, my dear, why don't you put a bottle in our luggage. It'll come in handy for unclogging the sinks a
t Grangebelle.”

16

W
hen the Cooker couple, saddled with their guide, met up with Claude and Consuela in the salon of the Hotel Astoria, Benjamin realized that his friend's mistress had gotten her way yet again. Better to wander and “capture the soul of a city,” she had said, than to waste the day in poorly ventilated museums. Benjamin couldn't help noticing that she had several
shopping bags.

Indeed, Consuela had spent much of her time in high-end boutiques and had picked up some Herend porcelain—charged on Claude's credit card,
most certainly.

“You know boutique-hopping isn't my thing,” Claude told Benjamin. “So I went off by myself to experience some of Budapest's
quaint cafés.”

“What
did you find?”

“I went to the G
erbeaud first.”

“How was it?”

“Too much like the Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots in Paris—spoiled by writers and intellectuals who used to gather there to brag and promote their latest pack of lies. They're tourist haunts now. I managed to stay half an hour. Then enou
gh was enough.”

A Hungarian friend who worked in film had told him to check out the café Spinoza and the Eckermann, but he had only walked by them, not bothering to stop and taste the mousse or the famous coffee. These meccas of the Budapest intelligentsia had modernized, which bothered Claude enormously. The Internet had woven its web everywhere. Computer screens had replaced the chessboards and decks of cards. Claude missed the days when cafés smelled of absinthe and patrons pondered their moves in a
cloud of smoke.

“I finally found salvation at the New York Café, a space so ornate, it almost seems magical. I wish you had been with me, Benjamin. You would have loved it—the crystal chandeliers and the ceiling adorned with Gustav Mannheimer and Franz Eisenhut paintings. The brass banisters are covered with red velvet that match the upholstery on the chairs. I've never seen a ca
fé as elegant.”

While Claude was detailing his explorations, Consuela was busy showing off her purchases. Benjamin glanced at Elisabeth and could see boredom written all over her face. His wife enjoyed shopping as much as anyone else, but it didn
't consume her.

Zoltán was taking it all in with an almost silly smile. Elisabeth, realizing that she hadn't introduced their tour guide, interrupted the separ
ate narratives.

Claude had an amused expression on his face as he appraised the man, whose jogging suit clashed with the posh ambiance of the Astoria. Consuela, meanwhile, was sizing him up the way a woman of experience might scrutinize her prey. Then, turning to Claude, she said in her native tongue, “
¡Cuerpo de los dioses con
ojos asesinos!
”

Benjamin's rudimentary Spanish allowed him to sense the brute sexuality that Consuela saw in this boy. He was sensual and dangerous at the same time. Benjamin was a bit wary, and he noticed that Claude was giving their guide a su
spicious look.

Yet Zoltán had impressed Benjamin with historical and architectural information that an ordinary person wouldn't have known if he hadn't studied somewhere. He had a rustic simplicity that appealed to the winemaker and even more so to his wife. His smile was warm, and his teeth were straight, and although Benjamin was no style expert, he was aware that Zoltán's goate
e was on trend.

Benjamin was becoming convinced that Zoltán was not a city boy. His mannerisms betrayed him. He was almost certainly one of those kids from the countryside who came to Budapest—or Prague, Bucharest, or Warsaw—to seek a better life. Ironically, it was hardly an admirable life. They were ready to deal drugs, fleece tourists, and beg and prostitut
e themselves.

The day had been exhausting. The Cookers wanted to dine alone in a restaurant in town. Claude and Consuela planned to do the same. That left Zoltán, and it was time to
say good-bye.

“I'll come back tomorrow. Take you to
Gellért baths.”

Benjamin hesitated but finally agreed to the guide's proposition. They would meet at ten the next morning. He was about to send Zoltán off, but Consuela didn't seem ready to see him go. In fact, she hadn't taken he
r eyes off him.

“Claude, why don't we have a glass of Champagne with the tour guide? He might tell us something we don't know a
bout Budapest.”

Claude exchanged a glance with Benjamin, and the winemaker read the resignation in his eyes. Faced with this
fait accompli
, Cla
ude acquiesced.

“Benjamin, before you head up to your room, could you spare me a cigar?” Claude asked. “I'm runnin
g out of fuel.”

“Romeo y Julieta, Exhibición
No. 4. Willthat

do?”

Claude looked from his mistress to the young man, who was stari
ng back at her.

“How could any cigar be more fitting?” he answe
red, taking it.

At eight o'clock, when the elegantly dressed Cookers came down to the hotel lobby to catch a cab to the Múzeum, the restaurant they had their hearts set on, Consuela, Zoltán, and Claude were still at the bar. All three were laughing. The Champagne was apparently breaking down the language barriers and sweeping away Claude's misgivings, if only temporarily. Benjamin recognized the golden neck of a vintage Dom Pérignon in the ice bucket. At least Consuela was faithfu
l to something.

Dinner at the Múzeum was sumptuous and lavish. Benjamin ordered duck breast with green peppercorns and walnut-bread soufflé. Elisabeth had a delicious meal of veal
paprikasch
that she praised so highly, the chef told
her his secret.

“You need lard and to add the sweet paprika before
anything else.”

“Yes,” Elisabeth said. “That will bring o
ut its flavor.”

“I see you're an accomplishe
d cook, Madam.”

When she told him they were from Bordeaux, the chef
's face lit up.

“Yes, Bordeaux! Ch
âteau Margaux!”

That was just about all he knew about Michel de Montaigne's birthplace. Still, the chef, his oiled mustache, and his Magyar accent, had added charm to this dinner copiously washed down with wine from the M
atra Mountains.

After dessert, Benjamin took several minutes to admire the Károly Lotz frescos on the high ceilings of the nineteenth-century restaurant. The trip was beginning to feel like the proverbial
Hungarian Rhapsody
. Elisabeth was enjoying herself, and Benjamin was finally relaxing. Leaving the restaurant he put his arm around his wife's shoulder and kissed her neck. The night
air was sweet.

The hotel lobby at that hour was practically deserted. Alone at the bar, Consuela and Zoltán were clearly drunk. They were laughing noisily and exchanging lustful looks. Benjamin figured Claude was back in his room, too inebriated to fret about his girlf
riend's antics.