Miklós Bánffy - They Were Counted

‘God damn it! Don’t be such an ass!’ bellowed Ambrus Kendy at Laszlo; and to Nitwit, who was already on his feet with his hand on his sword, he roared: ‘You, too, don’t you be idiotic either. Can’t you see he’s dead drunk!’ Uncle Ambrus, who knew what he was doing, tried to stop the quarrel before it got too serious. Anyway, he hated to have his drinking bouts disturbed.

Baron Egon did not even hear Uncle Ambrus. Laszlo, though reeling and held back by the others across the table, was still shouting: ‘Blau! Scoundrel! Blau! Blau!’ until his legs gave way beneath him and he fell back into the arms of Akos Alvinczy and Isti Kamuthy. All Wickwitz could think of was that Gyeroffy knew everything about him, and that therefore he would have to kill him, right now in this very room, before he was able to say more. But the table was between them and several of the young men had come round and were holding him back too. There was nothing he could do at that moment. If he drew his sword they would all surround him and stop him at once. So he drew himself up as straight as he knew how, clicked his spurs together, bowed to the assembled company in front of him, turned and, making his way slowly through the other tables where everyone was sitting in stunned, frightened silence, left the hall.

The next day at noon an infantry captain and a senior lieutenant waited on Gyeroffy. Wickwitz, who knew his Army Regulations, was aware that as an officer on active service he was obliged, if publicly insulted, to ask only other officers to act as his seconds. This was just as well, for soldiers don’t ask questions, don’t intervene in such affairs and certainly require no explanation. For them the Tatbestand — the cause of offense, was enough. Wickwitz had reported what had happened to divisional level, which in turn sent back an order that the commanding office of the infantry regiment stationed at Kolozsvar should select seconds in this affair. The colonel, as it happened was on leave, but the second-in-command, one Lieutenant-Colonel Zdratutschek, was in charge during the colonel’s absence. Wickwitz went to see him and explained the insult offered to him, and which was serious chiefly because he had been in uniform at the time and that therefore it was the ‘Kaiser’s Rock’ — the official dress of the emperor’s service, which had suffered the insult. This was a good argument with Zdratutschek who became red with rage, named two officers at once and told them, off the record, that they must insist on the most severe conditions. ‘ Dieser magyarischer Rebellen-bagage — these rubbishy Hungarian rebels,’ he shouted, ‘must be taught a lesson! We’ll show them!’ For Wickwitz this support was not an unmixed blessing for the irate lieutenant-colonel ordered him to shut himself up and see no civilians until the duel had been fought, which meant that he couldn’t see Judith. This was annoying, but Wickwitz hoped that he would be able to deal with Gyeroffy that afternoon and so be free to contact Judith in the evening.

However, things did not go anything like as smoothly as everyone expected. Gyeroffy’s seconds, Major Bogacsy, the assessor at the county court, and Joska Kendy, found that Wickwitz’s conditions were far too harsh to be acceptable. Three shots, the first from twenty-five paces, the second from twenty paces, and the third from fifteen paces, and, should there still be no definite result, a fight with heavy cavalry sabres until one or the other was disabled — and this without bandages. Despite the fact that Gyeroffy had no objections, his seconds refused to accept these proposals for, as the arch-expert Bogacsy stated, the duelling code prescribed that such murderous conditions were to be allowed only when the offence had included actual bodily harm. This is what the Code Duverger said, and the Code being his bible, the major was not going to budge an inch. ‘Gyeroffy has no say in the matter,’ he declared and that was an end of it. Instead, Major Bogacsy demanded that a Court of Honour be convened to decide how the duel should be conducted. This time it was the turn of the soldiers to object. They said that they would submit to no authority that was not military. More discussion followed, for this last demand was not acceptable to the civilians. Major Bogacsy resigned his place, as he was a soldier on retired pay, and was replaced by Uncle Ambrus, who declared that there was only one kind of honour, that everyone knew what it was and that he, Ambrus Kendy would not yield, even to Almighty God himself.

Three days passed, three long days for all concerned.

The whole town was buzzing with the news of the affair of the impending duel. Everyone talked of it, discussed it and had their own views on the rights and wrongs of the affair. In the coffee-houses and on the streets people talked of nothing else. Even the students at the university took up the cause.

The subject was no longer what sort of satisfaction Wickwitz was entitled to demand from Gyeroffy, but rather how monstrous it was of the military to browbeat respectable civilian gentlemen and refuse to accept their age-old code of honour. Daily Uncle Ambrus could be heard in the Casino castigating the soldatesca — the soldiery, to everyone within earshot. The club was packed and the big drawing-room was full from noon until late at night. The older men sat round the fireplace, among them Sandor Kendy, Daniel, Stanislo Gyeroffy, Laszlo’s former guardian, Count Adam Alvinczy, father of the young Alvinczy quartet, old Rattle Miloth and, of course, Uncle Ambrus. All these were of one mind, and they were supported by Tihamer Abonyi and Major Bogacsy who, since he had to retire as a second, became even more passionately involved in the case never stopping for a moment to expound the issues involved and taking the opportunity to give everyone a good lecture on how these things had to be done. Chubby-faced Kamuthy was another who seemed to think of nothing else and he, and the others who were present on the fatal evening, explained it all to each other over and over again. Only Joska Kendy kept his mouth shut, nodding occasionally as he drew on his pipe.

Balint, too, spent most of his time at the Casino, not because he much wanted to take part in all these passionate discussions but because he needed to know what was going on so that he could report it all to Adrienne.

Gyeroffy himself was not to be seen. He shut himself up in his hotel room and refused to see anyone except his seconds. Even these only received curt answers to their questions and absolutely no explanation as to why he had called Wickwitz a ‘scoundrel’. In vain, too, did they ask him what he had meant by the word blau — blue, which they hadn’t even realized was a proper name. Gyeroffy refused to reply and made it perfectly clear that he just wanted to be left alone. As soon as they had gone he took his brandy bottle out of the wardrobe and drank deeply.

Finally, on the afternoon of the fourth day it seemed that some sort of agreement had been reached between the soldiers and Laszlo’s seconds. It was not completely satisfactory but seemed to give hope of a solution. The officer-in-charge let it be known that he would agree, though not officially, to the substitution of a Weapons Commission for the Court of Honour demanded by Gyeroffy’s seconds. It was emphasized that the army officers would not consider themselves bound to accept any decision reached by such a commission. They would, nevertheless, receive official instructions in accordance with such a commission’s findings. The colonel accepted this compromise not because he liked it but as a result of a message from the divisional general saying that, in view of the growing unrest in the town, an immediate solution must be found and the matter put to rest. Accordingly, it was arranged for the Weapons Commission to meet at half-past two so that at three or just after the duel could take place.