The Rebels (23 page)

He stood up and put his hand behind his back, standing as the Prockauers tended to do, and walked up and down the room. Mother watched him timidly. It had been Lajos’s habit, as it was his father’s, to put his hands together behind his back and crack his fingers. Of course he can’t do that now, she thought with forbearance. She was frightened because there was no discipline now. Any moment now they might rebel, come over, and gently, without any violence, lift her from the bed, deposit her elsewhere, and fall to searching the mattress and the bolster, and there, before her very eyes, seize the silver, the jewels, and the money, her cries and entreaties falling on deaf ears, the boys triumphantly ransacking the whole apartment—and should she scream for help they might even stuff a napkin in her mouth to shut her up. Something had happened. She had lost her authority over the boys. She gazed at the various photographic images of Colonel Prockauer’s military career as if beseeching his help. It was, when you came down to it, easier with Prockauer. She understood that what wrecked a life were those unpredictable moments when a person loses courage, remains silent, fails to open his or her mouth, and allows events to take control. Maybe she should have asked Prockauer not to go to the front. Being a high-ranking officer he could, presumably, have stopped the war.

Every nook and cranny of the long room was stuffed with unnecessary furniture, objects to which the foul smell of the sickroom clung, the smell of isolation and neglect. This, the room in which Mother lay, was where they had to eat. Once, in a circus, she had seen a woman in an evening dress control two wild wolves with no more than a look and a whip. She felt she had to engage her sons’ eyes, and that once she had done so order might be restored: one flash of her own eyes would draw the boys back into her magic circle. But the boys avoided her eyes. The contact was broken. She no longer had power over them. They were silent when they entered her room nowadays. She knew this silence spelled danger. They had been silent for months. She was wholly ignorant of the reason for their peculiar absences: they did not share their thoughts with her. They were preparing for something. Maybe their plans had already come to fruition and they were only waiting for the opportune moment when they could rise in rebellion, they might even have accomplices, the maid, or some other person. Maybe they had already agreed that on some given signal they should seize her and pick up her thin body, though maybe Tibor could do that by himself while Lajos searched the mattress and the bed with his remaining hand. But they wouldn’t dare touch the ready cash she carried on her own body, she quickly thought. She clenched her hands. She felt the onset of fear and started shivering.

Suddenly she sat up and pushed the bolster under her back.

“Get out,” she said. “I’ll give you money. Now out with you!”

The one-armed one shrugged, gestured to Tibor, and they returned to their room. Mother listened carefully, her hands on her chest. They’re on the alert now, she thought. They might even be spying. Fortunately she had positioned her bed so it could not be seen through the keyhole. Whenever she was obliged to give them money she sent them out of the room. Her hand tightened on her breast and she wondered what she would feel at the very end. She thought back to the moment of Tibor’s conception, in the eighth year of their marriage, after several months of sleeping apart. Prockauer returned one afternoon from the training ground wearing his riding boots, dusty, whip in hand, his brow lightly perspiring, and threw his military cap on the table. They were alone in the room. Little Lajos was outside, playing in the garden. They had hardly exchanged a word for several months. Prockauer slept in the dining room on a divan, while she slept with little Lajos in the double bed in the bedroom. They were past the stage of looking for excuses to loathe one another. They struggled with it for a long time, but by the eighth year all loathing had faded, as had the times they had fallen back into each other’s arms. The constant battle that was consuming both their souls, the war they were fighting with and against each other, had run out of steam. For the past few months they had silently, calmly, almost forbearingly, as if out of a common sympathy, settled down to simply hating each other. She was sitting in the rocking chair by the window attempting to remove a grease spot from Prockauer’s yellow breeches, a particularly fine pair of twill breeches, the grease spot presumably caused by the oiled saddle, somewhere near the knee. This spot, which was larger and eye-catching, much like everything else in Prockauer’s life, seemed more than usually vivid to her now as she recalled it. She felt peculiarly compelled to remove such spots. Prockauer came up to her, quite calmly, and without saying a word, put out a hand and grabbed the scruff of her neck, raising her some way from the chair the way he would have lifted a sleeping dog, gripping it where it was least likely to hurt. While struggling in Prockauer’s embrace her body was infused by a delicious pain that told her she was alive, that she was still living, inhabiting this specific moment, and that what would follow would be a downward slope that led, possibly, to death. She thought back to that moment now, to that one moment of perfect consciousness, struggling in Prockauer’s arms and, somewhere between sleeping and waking, felt alive, quite alive for a moment. Never again was she to experience such a feeling. Tibor was the product of that moment. Prockauer had touched her a few more times later, but she couldn’t remember those occasions. Gently, with some trepidation, she opened her nightshirt and brought out the pouch: this was what she now had to attend to. The pouch was attached to her nightshirt with a safety pin. She sought out fifteen crowns, deposited the coins on the icon on the bedside table, then, somewhat assured, leaned back on her pillows.

She called to them in a weak voice and timidly pointed to the money. Lajos stared at her without saying anything, then sat down in a chair opposite her bed. Tibor counted the fifteen crowns, nodded, and pocketed the coins.

“I know we have no money, Mother,” he addressed her cordially. “I wouldn’t in fact ask you for any. I have to go out now. When I return this evening I would like you to provide me with the sum of six hundred crowns. Do you understand? Six hundred.”

“Six hundred crowns,” said Mother rather fast, as if addressing a natural request in a perfectly relaxed manner.

“Will you give it to me?”

“Six hundred crowns,” she repeated. Her hand grasped the air. Six hundred. She collapsed back onto her pillow and stared straight ahead of her with a frozen smile. Their father is fighting on the front. Six hundred. She let out a few faint shrieks and vigorously shook her head.

Tibor sat on the bed next to her, put his hands together, and waited for her to calm down. “Don’t excite yourself, Mother,” he said. “I see you don’t understand. But don’t get overexcited.”

He stood up.

“Something will come along.”

“Six hundred crowns,” Mother repeated. “Six hundred silver crowns. Good lord. St. Louis.”

She had to be laid down on the pillow again. Incomprehensible sounds bubbled from her lips. Tibor put his hands on his mother’s brow and indicated to the one-armed one that it was hopeless.

“There’s one hope left,” he said and leaned close to Lajos. “I’ll speak with him this afternoon.”

The one-armed one solemnly nodded but never took his eyes off their mother who was gasping quietly now, her closed eyes mimicking sleep. Just as solemnly, he leaned forward with an expression of utmost curiosity and carefully examined his mother, as if he had discovered some new feature on her. Curiosity and confusion mingled in his smile: he was wholly absorbed in her.

“In The Peculiar tonight,” said Tibor quietly by way of farewell, and tiptoed towards the door.

“Tonight,” echoed the one-armed one, but his eyes never left his mother and he placed a finger to his lips, demanding silence. Once Tibor had closed the door he stood up silently to look down on her. He gazed at her for a few seconds, listening for any noise, his curiosity taking on an officious air. Suddenly Mother looked right at him and the two pairs of eyes met with hardly any distance between them. They regarded each other, round-eyed, the way people stare at each other for the first or the last time. A sudden rigid horror blazed in Mother’s eyes, like two safety lamps, and her dull eyes started to burn. She raised a hand to her breast in defense. The one-armed one sat down again, as if determined not to move from here until he had discovered something.

The maid entered and cleared the table. Mother wanted to give some instructions, she wanted to sit up, to say something. Her eyes followed the girl with undisguised anxiety but the one-armed one raised his finger to his lips and indicated that she should be silent. Mother began to shiver, her teeth were chattering. Once the maid had gone out he pulled his chair closer to her and leaned forward.

You have to give us the money, Mother, he said, his voice calm and quiet.

There was no severity in his voice, no hint of threat, but Mother immediately closed her eyes as if in a faint. From time to time she opened them to find the boy still there, still calm, insistent, his gaze never leaving her, and she closed her eyes again. They remained like this for a long time, unmoving. Mother stopped trembling as the odd sidelong glance assured her that the boy was still at his post. Time passed infinitely slowly. Mother drew the nightshirt tightly about her chest, closed her eyes, seeing nothing, hearing nothing. She knew there was no longer any point in doing anything, but before surrendering herself she would stiffen, play dead as a termite does when it senses danger. The one-armed one drew the chair still closer, propped himself on the edge of the bed, and made himself comfortable.

Á
BEL SLEPT AT
T
HE
P
ECULIAR
. T
HERE WERE NO
curtains so he woke early. Through the glass the mountain and the pine forest had just emerged from their covers in the warmth, their shapes lazy and rounded, like a plump girl’s. He sat down at the window in shirtsleeves and held his face up to the sun. One could get drunk on the sun on an empty stomach. He had slept deep and remembered nothing. Such giddy happiness flooded through him that he didn’t dare move in case the giddiness vanished. His body warmed through, his frozen limbs relaxed.

He had to be in town by ten. The class photograph that was to join the others in the gallery, the gallery that included their fathers, was to be taken in the yard of the institution. He picked up his clothes. The building was deserted: the owner was hanging lanterns in the garden. Aimlessly he walked up and down the room among the accumulated hoard of things. It was all junk, boring, rubbish. He spun the globe and waited for it to stop. He carefully put his finger on Central Africa. Good heavens, he thought. What does it matter that the actor has kissed Tibor Prockauer?

He hadn’t gone home that night. When they parted in front of the theater he took a few steps homeward then turned and took the route leading to The Peculiar. He ran part of the way to get out of town as fast as he could, then slowed by the river. The night was warm and bright. He never considered going home. Perhaps I shall never go home again, he thought vaguely. There’s a change coming, something different from everything up till now, something other than Etelka or Papa or the teachers or Tibor or the actor, perhaps something much simpler and nicer, everything’s up for grabs, the whole thing needs careful, independent, rational thought. But that’s just a feeble consolation, he thought. The various buildings of The Peculiar glimmered white in the moonlight, picturesque, improbable. He crept quietly up to the room, the musty closeted smell mingling with the scent of rum, choking him. He opened the window, threw himself across the bed, and immediately fell asleep. The actor was coming towards him, his chest bare, his wig crooked. Tibor’s head fell back. Ábel was tugging at the actor’s arm. It’s cooled down! It’s a starry night! He was bellowing.

The dream faded. He slept deeply, his body still.

He put on his clothes and set off for town. He was hot in his black formal garments. A tuft of hair was sticking from his pocket. He drew out the wig, then, looking round to make sure no one could see, threw it away. The hairpiece lay on the road like a squashed furry animal. He raised it with his toe and gave it a disgusted kick. Whoever once grew this tuft of hair, he said to himself, is, from this moment, dead forever. He hurried past the repairman’s fence. He had lost his hat somewhere the previous night. The air was pure and clean, the sound of bells swam in it. May eighteenth. Friday. The photographer. He wanted to have a word with Tibor afterwards. Then it’s Havas at two. He might look in on his aunt. In the evening they would come out to The Peculiar. None of this was of particular interest really. He stopped, looked round, and for a moment considered going back to The Peculiar and waiting for them till evening. But then he thought he had to speak to Tibor. He lengthened his stride.

Over the fences peeped the branches of various fruit trees. The previous afternoon’s rain had beaten down the flowers. He passed the swimming pool, then stopped on the bridge to look at the yellow-colored river of his childhood, now in flood, the long grass bending over it into the water, his nose crinkling to the sharp sour smell.

Judge Kikinday, the man the mandarin had condemned to death, was just crossing the bridge.

Ábel leaned over the rails. If there was any justice Kikinday would have died long ago because it was three years now since the mandarin had sentenced him, in the belief that that would be the simplest course to take. Kikinday had himself sentenced several men to death, and hanged seven, overseeing the executions personally. The last was a Gypsy.