Miklós Bánffy - They Were Found Wanting

‘My mother,’ he said. ‘My mother has had a doctor sent out from Kolozsvar. It’s a plot … against me! She says he’s coming to see our daughter, but I know she’s lying. That’s why I came out to find you, so that they wouldn’t find me alone — not alone, not for a minute alone!’

He put his hands on her shoulders and they were shaking with terror. Then, barely audibly, he whispered, ‘The old witch wants to put me in the madhouse, just like my father! You mustn’t let that happen! Please don’t let it happen! If you are with me they won’t dare!’

‘Surely not?’ said Adrienne. ‘You must be imagining it. Why on earth should she?’

‘But she does, I tell you. She does.’ Uzdy was now howling like a frightened animal. ‘I’ve suspected it for a long time, and now I know. I opened her letters and read them … That’s why she’s got him here; I know. But let’s go now! Come on!’ and he grabbed his wife’s hand and walked off so fast with his long legs that Adrienne could hardly keep up with him.

In the centre of that round lawn that was bordered by the carriage drive he slowed down, put his hands in his pockets and strolled casually towards the house as if nothing was the matter. The change was so abrupt that Adrienne would almost have believed that she had dreamed what had just occurred between them had he not turned briefly towards her and hissed, ‘Stay with me. Stay always with me.’

In front of the house Countess Clémence was talking to a man Adrienne had never seen before. When her son and daughter-in-law came up she introduced the man as Dr Palkowitz, a professor from Kolozsvar, and said she had called him in to see her grandchild, explaining rather breathlessly and at length that the little girl had become very nervous, was not sleeping well, suffered from nightmares and often woke up frightened in the night; and therefore she had thought it best, just to be sure, to consult a specialist, though it was nothing, of course, just a precaution. It was always better with children, wasn’t it, to have them looked at from time to time.

She said far more than was necessary, and far more than her usual taciturn manner allowed her. She spoke, too, in an affected way, as people who are not used to deception are often apt to do. Finally she added, ‘I might as well have him look at me too, while he is about it!’ and laughed self-consciously as if it were all rather trivial.

The doctor, a small, chubby, merry-looking man, carried on the fiction himself, saying, ‘Of course, why not? When a doctor visits a country village he expects to have to look at everybody. I’m quite used to that. It often happens.’

Then Uzdy spoke up, with a submissiveness Adrienne had never seen before. Stooping slightly, he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and looked first at the doctor and then at his mother. He was like some huge, skinny wolfhound who senses trouble and tries to avoid the inevitable beating by cringing subdued at his master’s feet. When he spoke his manner was strangely sweet and obsequious. ‘Perhaps the doctor ought to have a look at me too? All right, why not? Let’s do it now, right away. That would be best, wouldn’t it, Mama?’ Then he turned directly to Dr Palkowitz and said, ‘Come along then, down to my room if that suits you. And Adrienne too, of course, if she’ll come. Yes, she too, of course,’

With somewhat exaggerated waving of his arms he gestured them towards the front door and into the house, making the doctor go in first. In the corridor he kept Adrienne beside him, holding her hand as tightly as if in a vice. The smile never left his face.

Old Maier was waiting for them. To him Uzdy said, ‘Tell them to harness up the other pair of horses in half an hour.’ Then he turned to the doctor and explained, ‘That way you’ll be home by early afternoon. That’d be best, wouldn’t it? We don’t want to take up too much of your valuable time, do we?’

At the angle of the corridor they turned right towards the stair that led to the ground floor. Adrienne would have preferred to turn back there for she hated those stairs which her husband had used every time he came to his wife’s room. The treads creaked and it was a sound to which she never became accustomed however often she heard it. And every time she heard it, she shuddered. She herself never used that stairway. But now, as she had given her promise to Uzdy, and as the doctor was with them, she could hardly turn back. Uzdy led them to his room where all the windows were heavily barred, like all the others in that wing of the house because it was there that Uzdy’s mad father had lived out the last years of his life. It was small and unpretentious, furnished only with the bare necessities. A narrow iron bed was set against one wall. Uzdy made the doctor sit down on a chair while he himself sat on the bed, drawing his wife to sit beside him. He was all politeness and humility, and made little bows as he spoke.

‘Here we are! Please sit down! Now, ask your questions — in your own time, of course.’

The doctor gave a embarrassed little cough, and then began nervously, ‘Er-er-well, in her ladyship’s presence. Well, it’s a little unusual.’

He was unable to say more because Uzdy at once interrupted him, at the same time clinging tightly onto his wife’s arm, saying, ‘We have no secrets from each other, do we, Addy? We are absolutely one, one! Isn’t that so, Addy? Please start your examination, doctor.’

The usual questions followed, about sleep, capacity for work, and even some more intimate matters. Uzdy answered everything calmly and apparently quite satisfactorily. He spoke slowly, seeming to weigh each word carefully, but Adrienne sensed that he had rehearsed it all and wondered if the doctor, who was now meeting Uzdy for the first time, had noticed it too. Next came the testing of the reflexes — knees, eyes, walking about with closed eyes — followed by listening to the heart and lungs with a stethoscope. Uzdy went through it all patiently, and only Adrienne noticed how fiercely he looked at the doctor’s hands whenever he touched his head or put the stethoscope to his heart.

The examination was a long one. Finally Dr Palkowitz drew himself up and declared, ‘I congratulate your Lordship. You are in perfect health, a trifle nervous perhaps, but that is quite usual for all intellectual people. I’ll just prescribe a light sedative which you might take for a while. I can’t think of anything else!’

He took out his fountain-pen and swiftly wrote some words on a paper. There was no time for Adrienne, but as the doctor knew he had been called in only to examine her husband, he did not press the matter.

‘The carriage will be ready and waiting,’ said Uzdy. ‘You’d better leave at once so as to catch the train!’ and he led them straight out through the service door, through a store filled with stacks of wood, and into the stables. The carriage was standing ready at the stable doors and the doctor climbed in and sat down. All the time Uzdy kept up a stream of obsequious thanks, saying, ‘I really am most flattered by your visit, honoured indeed! Thank you! Thank you!’

When the carriage had disappeared through the gates of the stable yard, then Uzdy straightened himself up to his full height.

Slowly he and Adrienne walked back to the house.

When they were half-way there Uzdy stopped. His face shone with triumph as he looked down at her and said, ‘I’m most grateful, Addy, I really am. Now you’d better go in … go to your own room.’

Adrienne turned and went swiftly into the house. She felt far more at ease and had been reassured by the doctor’s opinion. She was glad to be alone now, for that hour and a half in her husband’s room had been an ordeal; and as soon as she had sensed that terrible suppressed excitement rising again in him she had been terrified he might suddenly lose control of himself. It had been a great relief when all had passed off so well. Perhaps there really wasn’t anything seriously wrong after all? But if this were so why, as she was about to enter the house, did he call out after her, ‘Remain in your own room! Don’t move from there, do you understand!’ in almost menacing tones? And why was his face so distorted, with swollen veins, and dark red in colour? Suddenly her composure was shattered by the thought that nothing had changed and that his controlled manner during the doctor’s visit was nothing but a charade. And why should he order her to stay in her room?