They Were Counted (41 page)

Lying now in her room as the afternoon light was fading the memory of these scenes came back to her so vividly that her soul cringed with disgust. This loathsome memory was all that Adrienne had ever experienced of love, and now she was filled with dread at the thought that this was what Balint would wanted of her and, what was worse, what she herself had allowed him to expect.

How could she have given Balint hope that she, of all people, would ever permit him to do this to her? She must stop it at once. She must not cheat him or lead him on. She must put an end to this terrible situation before this strange love for him that she felt welling up in her drove her unconsciously into his arms. She knew that this would happen, and she knew too that if it did she would hate him for ever. If she were to preserve her love for him she must act at once and, though she had barely realized that this was her real motive, she made a swift decision. Jumping out of bed, she hurried into the drawing-room, stumbling through the growing darkness to her desk. The clock struck a quarter after four. There was so little time! On a leaf of paper she wrote: ‘
I have
a
bad
headache
and
slight
fever.
Can’t
take
you
to
the
ball.
Get
someone
else.
Love.
Addy.
’ Slipping the note into an envelope, she addressed it to Judith Miloth, marking it ‘Urgent. Deliver at once’. Then she went back into her bedroom, lit a candle, got back into bed and rang for her maid.

‘Please have this sent at once to my sister Judith,’ she said.

‘Wouldn’t her Ladyship like something to eat? It’s ready…’

‘No. No, I don’t want anything. Wait! A little beef-tea. I think I have a temperature!’ Adrienne realized that she had better start playing her part at home if she did not want her servants
inadvertently
to betray her.

When the soup was brought she drank it swiftly and went to sleep. Soon after seven she was woken again by the arrival of her sisters, both already dressed for the ball, hoping that they could persuade her to go with them.

‘Do come, Addy! It will be so boring with Papa, and we can’t find anyone else so late. You’re not really ill, are you? Not too ill to come with us? Please, Addy!’ They both spoke at once and Mlle Morin, who had come with them, added her own plaintive soprano warblings.

Adrienne lay back looking coldly at them from the mountain of lace-edged pillows. She did not reply, thankful that her face could hardly be seen in the faint candle-light. Judith went on: ‘Papa is cross as pie, and there really isn’t anyone else!’ Then, very determinedly, she said, ‘I absolutely must go tonight. I’m engaged for supper.’

With a knowing smile Margit asked: ‘Have you taken any aspirin?’

Adrienne hated lying, so she just said, rather crossly ‘Do go now and leave me alone!’

Margit looked back from the door and asked, ‘Who were you having supper with? I’ll take him over if you like. I haven’t got anyone.’

Adrienne did not answer, but she gave her youngest sister such an angry look that Margit hurriedly left the room and closed the door behind her.

 

Adrienne counted the chimes as the church clock struck, first eight, then half past, then nine o’clock. Now they must be dining. Half past nine. Ten o’clock. Now they would be striking up the csardas, and if she had gone to the ball, she would have been alone with him as she had on the previous day. Could it have only been yesterday?

Staring unseeingly at the dark ceiling she conjured up the scene in the deserted supper-room. Balint’s face, lean and hard, a young man’s face with a thin, straight nose, narrow blond moustache, fairer than his hair which he wore longer than most of the other young men. How shiny it is! she thought, remembering how his head had glowed in the candle-light. How silky it must be! How intently he had gazed at her with those steely grey eyes, and how serious was the curve of his lips as he spoke those magic sentences of love and adoration.

She longed to be with him again and asked herself over and over why she had given up so easily, hidden herself away and
pretended
she did not long to be with him and sit dreamily with eyes closed as he talked, letting those beautiful words flow deep into her heart. He would be bitter and angry that she had not come, though he could not know – and thank God for it – what her real reasons had been. But why hadn’t she gone herself to tell him, to explain the confusion in her heart? Balint Abady would have
understood
that he must not expect… Now probably he was
thinking
that she had led him on only to forsake him. There would have been no real harm in seeing him again tonight, for he would soon have to go back to Budapest to attend Parliament, or to the mountains to visit his forests, or … So why not allow one more meeting, just one, perhaps the only one? Now it was too late! She had given him up and he would know it because she had not come; and she had gone through all this only to throw away the only joy she had ever known. She had never ever… ‘Never – ever’, his words rang in her head, endlessly repeated, as her throat tightened and the tears gathered in her eyes, slowly running down her cheeks and falling one by one on her breast. When she could bear it no more she turned, strangled with sobs and buried her face in the pillows, her black hair tumbling about her head, and cried, one crying fit following another until sleep came to blot out her sorrows.

The clock tower chimed the passing hours but Adrienne heard nothing.

 

When she woke in the morning the hair about her face and her pillows were still wet from her tears.

T
HE ASSEMBLY ROOMS
of the Casino were full of people waiting for the evening’s festivities to begin. Today was the Ash Wednesday Ball. It was already after eight-thirty but, though the dinner had been ordered for eight o’clock, the Miloth party had still not arrived.

Farkas Alvinczy, as official organizer, was looking at his watch every few minutes, for though the caterer had already twice sent word that the dinner would be spoilt if it were not served at once, he was anxious that everything should go right. Five more
minutes
, he said, but he was not pleased that something seemed to have gone wrong on the last night of the season.

Alvinczy turned to his fellow organizer, Baron Gazsi. ‘What shall we do? If we don’t start soon the dinner will be ruined!’

‘It’s very awkward. We could send word, or telephone?’

‘They don’t have one, but we could send a carriage to meet them. Perhaps something has happened. One of their horses may have fallen and they’re stuck somewhere,’ said Farkas, again looking at his watch.

‘I’ll do it,’ said Gazsi, turning to give an order to one of the waiting footmen. Hardly had he done so when a stentorian voice could be heard at the entrance.

‘What a mess! But it’s not my fault. How are you, my boy? They dragged me here by force! Me! An old man at a ball!’ The big double doors were flung open and there appeared framed in the doorway Judith and Margit Miloth with old Rattle behind them, keeping up a constant flow of talk in his loud voice. The group of waiting young men, with Adam Alvinczy, Pityu and Balint in the lead, swarmed round them.

‘Where’s Adrienne? Didn’t she come?’ Adam asked Margit, who raised her little hawk-like nose and, looking at Abady though replying to Alvinczy, said: ‘It seems she has a headache – and a temperature!’

A hint of a smile hovered at the corners of Margit’s mouth, which made Balint think that she did not believe a word of it and was making fun of him.

‘A headache! Did you ever hear such nonsense?’ roared old Rattle. ‘Just like her mother, never without a headache or a migraine! Got one tonight too. Ah, women! Women! Never
marry
, my boy, or you’ll get like me, always at their beck and call! Get dressed, they say, without a by-your-leave. What? Sit at a ball ’til dawn, at my age? These old bones ought to be in bed. A coffin! That’s where I should be!’ He shook hands all round, full of life and good spirits, gesticulating widely as with a huge smile under the walrus moustache he continued to shout over the heads of the company who had now started filing into the dining-room. ‘These stupid servants of mine couldn’t find my tails! “What the Devil do you think I should wear, you ox!” I said, “I can’t go naked! D’you think I’ll prance about in front of all the ladies in a fig leaf? I’d be thrown out on my ear! What d’you think I am, a gypsy brat? They can go naked, not me, you ox!”’

Everybody laughed, everybody but Balint who was filled with anger.

Bitch! Flirtatious bitch! he said to himself. Obviously this
headache
was just an excuse, Margit’s secret little smile proved that. Here he was, the victim of the oldest trick in the world. All over you one day, kick you in the teeth the next. What a fool he was to be taken in! Play cat and mouse with him, would she? Tease until you plead, and then let you back until the time to get thrown out again. Oh, but with him this little game would not work, he knew how to have his revenge and he wouldn’t spare her, not now! He’d play the same little trick on her. He had hesitated to declare his love because he wanted to spare her the problems such a love would provoke. He had thought that Adrienne was
different
, sincere, true and straight, not to be played with like the other married women he had known. This was why he had tried not to fall in love with her. Well, no more. His scruples had been
ridiculous
, for this evening proved that Adrienne was indeed just like all the others; and he knew how to treat them! They were all alike, shallow and untrustworthy.

Balint looked around to find a supper partner so that no one should gossip about his heing stood up by Adrienne. Perhaps the little Gyalakuthy girl was free? He would seek her out.

As it happened Dodo was free. No one had asked her and the organizers were just then looking for someone among the young men who were attending their first balls. She was overjoyed when Abady approached her, even though she thought that he had been sent over to rescue her, and putting her hand on his arm she cast a grateful glance at Farkas for having found her such an escort.

They went down to the large Casino dining-room where Abady found two places at the table farthest from the door,
sitting
diagonally across from where Judith Miloth was sitting with Wickwitz. Their presence reminded Balint of what Dodo had told him at Var-Siklod. When the first course had been served the
music
began. As at Siklod, it was Laji Pongracz who led the band. Under cover of the popular gypsy music, Balint turned to Dodo and said: ‘I didn’t dare hope to have supper with you!’

Dodo looked at him, astonished. ‘But I told you everybody avoided me, didn’t I?’

‘There’s one who doesn’t. Over there!’ he said as he glanced at Wickwitz across the table.

The girl shrugged her shoulders. After a little pause she said: ‘How is your cousin Laci? What is he doing? I would have thought he’d be here now.’

Balint told her all about Laszlo’s work at the Music Academy in Budapest.

He spoke gaily, light-heartedly, for he wanted the whole world to see how merry he was so that it should not guess he was eating his heart out with misery and anger. Exaggerating somewhat he told Dodo everything that Gyeroffy had outlined to him when they had been together at Var-Siklod, all his dreams, ambitions and plans. Dodo listened enthralled, drinking in his words. And when Balint had said all there was to say about Laszlo’s ambitions he
recounted
how they had been together at Simonvasar, though he told the girl nothing about Laszlo’s love for his cousin Klara. It had always been against his nature to gossip about such matters, and especially now, when his anger made him despise all things to do with love, he steered well clear of the subject and concentrated on telling Dodo about the pheasant shoot, about his hosts and the guests they had assembled at the castle. Balint did his best to be as amusing and entertaining as possible, but more for the
benefit
of anyone else sitting near them than for little Dodo herself.

As it happened, no one was watching him except Dodo, and she only wanted to hear about Gyeroffy. When Balint told her Laszlo was now organizer of the Carnival Balls in the capital, she sighed and said: ‘Wouldn’t it be wonderful if Mama should take me to Budapest! Oh, how marvellous it must be!’

‘Don’t you believe it! Girls from Transylvania aren’t made very welcome there … or men either, for that matter! Besides you might fall in love with someone, and that would never do!’ Balint laughed in sympathetic mockery.

‘Yes, it could happen.’ Dodo said in a subdued voice.

‘Really? That Nitwit is good-looking enough. I could quite understand?’

‘Not him!’ interrupted Dodo. ‘Not at all! He isn’t after me anymore.’

‘Who, then? I thought

Dodo burst out laughing: ‘You men never notice anything! Why, Judith Miloth, of course!’

‘Not possible! I’ve never seen…

‘Look at them! Do I have to spell it out for you?’

Balint turned slowly so that he could watch Judith with Wickwitz. She was talking to him in a low voice, rather hesitantly it seemed, but Balint saw nothing out of the way in her manner, only that her expression was perhaps a little more serious than usual.

 

Lieutenant Baron Wickwitz had gone back to his regiment in
November
. He had paid off those dirty debts – in the army all debts to tradesmen were dirty as opposed to those incurred by
gambling
which were considered honourable – and so was back in uniform. He had gone to see his colonel and, with a wooden face, had told him that he was now free of ‘embarrassment’. The
colonel
, who knew well that Wickwitz had no means of his own, had wondered where the money had come from but was sufficiently relieved that he would no longer have to expel the young man from the regiment that he did not enquire further. All the same he wondered how he had managed to raise the ten or twelve
thousand
crowns that he had estimated Wickwitz had owed.

A month later Wickwitz had again asked to see his
commanding
officer, and once again he had asked for leave, this time for two or three months as he intended to get married and he would need this time to get everything organized.

‘Die
kleine
Gyalakuthy
– the little Gyalakuthy girl?’ asked the
colonel
, who had heard something of Wickwitz’s activities in
Transylvania
. ‘
Na
,
gratuliere
– congratulations!’

Wickwitz did not undeceive him, though he knew that Dodo would not marry him, at least not now. It would take at least two years’ hard wooing on his part and it would always depend on whether someone else took her fancy. If no one else came along, then perhaps … but not now; and Wickwitz could not wait. He did not have enough time.

The reason he could not wait was that the money he had used to square his debts had been obtained from a dangerous and equivocal source. It was Dinora Abonyi’s money and if it were not repaid – and if the means he used to get it became known – then he could not avoid being cashiered. All this had happened at the end of the autumn just when his six months’ leave was expiring and when he had to go back to his regiment. He knew that if he
returned
to Brasso without money to pay his debts he would be forced to resign his commission. And then he’d be on the streets.

Wickwitz had turned to Dinora for help. It was not the first time. On several occasions during the summer and autumn he had touched her for a few hundred, later a few thousand crowns, for ‘petty expenses’, of course. And she had given them gladly. Now the fatal date for his return to duty approached and with no rich marriage to justify his absence and solve his problems,
something
drastic had to be done. Dinora was rich, good-hearted,
extravagant
… and she had no idea what words like a ‘bank draft’ implied. When Wickwitz told her that if she signed some bank drafts for him to cash he would be able to pay her back
immediately
what he had borrowed from her, she trustingly agreed. It all seemed so simple! You put your signature on a paper and your problems were solved. If Nitwit had asked for cash it would have been different, because Dinora was such an easy spender that she never seemed to have any ready money. And what was more this meant that as soon as Wickwitz had repaid what he had borrowed from her she would be able to settle that bill from the dressmaker who was becoming tiresomely insistent.

So Wickwitz had gone to Weissfeld’s bank in Maros-Vasarhely with three drafts for eight thousand crowns each.

Soma Weissfeld received him immediately. However, when he saw Countess Abonyi’s signature, he paused for a moment,
removed
his pince-nez, polished them meticulously and replaced them on his nose with fussy little delaying movements.

‘May I ask why … why have these drafts not been signed by Count Abonyi. It is usually he who signs and of course we know his signature well. Please understand, the Baron must excuse me, but this is rather awkward, rather delicate.’ He looked at Wickwitz with narrowed eyes while a somewhat suspicious smile pulled at the corners of his mouth.

Wickwitz managed not to lose his temper. He explained that the Countess did not want to involve her husband in this matter – she had run up a number of debts (this was true) and he might be angry with her. Of course she was a rich woman but she did not want to sell her crops immediately, he added with quick
invention
, but when she did she would see that the bank was repaid.

Weissfeld did not believe a word of it, but as he knew that Maros-Szilvas was Dinora’s own property inherited from her Malhuysen ancestors, and that it was extremely valuable, he decided that the matter was none of his affair. Accordingly he cashed the drafts, handing over to Wickwitz something over twenty-three thousand crowns. Egon returned to Maros-Szilvas with this sum, giving to Dinora four thousand, one hundred and sixty-two crowns and sixty cents. Dinora did not want to accept the two crowns and sixty cents but Wickwitz insisted, saying that it was a debt of honour and that he would consider himself
disgraced
if he owed a single cent to a lady. He told her that he had noted down exactly what he had borrowed so as to keep his
accounts
in order. As it happened this was true. He knew that his debts in Brasso amounted to exactly fifteen thousand, three
hundred
and seventy-seven crowns, and he would keep the difference as he would now have to find somebody who would pay back Dinora’s drafts and, until that person was found, he would need money to live. After all, he would never solve his problems if he didn’t go to balls and meet people – and no one could live without a cent in their pockets.