Miklós Bánffy - They Were Counted

Then he stopped, and looking at Balint with a shy smile, he said, ‘But I’m afraid that I must be boring the Count with higher mathematics that are beyond the range of his studies?’

‘Not at all. I’m very interested. Though I studied law, mathematics was my second subject. That’s why I went to Martin’s lectures at Kolozsvar. So you see I do know enough to follow and appreciate …’

‘Oh! Oh!’ Jopal’s face clouded and he looked at Balint reflectively. ‘So you studied mathematics, did you?’

‘Not very much! Just the elementary aspects of these problems … Eiffel’s and Langley’s theories. Just enough to know that this problem can be solved. That’s why I would like to support your work.’

Balint was trying to be encouraging, but the effect was just the opposite.

Jopal strode up and down a few times, hurriedly stamping out the designs and formulae in the sand, looking more and more pensive and muttering to himself, ‘So! So!’ Then he stopped and turned to Balint.

‘Thank you for your offer, but I can’t accept. No! I’m sorry, but I can’t accept.’ He hesitated for a moment and then added, ‘I’ve already promised to go to a friend. I’ll go to him.’

It was obviously a lie. Clearly he didn’t want to come. Perhaps he thought that Balint planned to rob him of his secret.

For a moment they looked each other straight in the eye.

‘Then you are not coming to Denestornya?’

‘Ah! If you hadn’t admitted that you too are a mathematician. You too!’ The ideas that were crowding into his head made the arteries on his forehead swell and his lips draw back tight as if he were getting ready to bite. He bent forward and shouted in a fury of passion: ‘It’s monstrous! Unfair! You sneak back and cunningly make me talk, and all the time you only want to spy on me!’

‘I just wanted to help. Really! I had no other motive.’

Jopal interrupted him, still shouting: ‘Help me? Help me? That’s what every spy says. You think I don’t know?’ And he paced up and down pouring out more and more violent abuse and working himself up until he was completely out of control. Balint had no idea how to react. It was so absurd that he almost found himself laughing, and his initial anger faded away.

The girl Julis, hearing the noise, came to the kitchen door and looked out bewildered. Her surprise was obvious when Balint turned to her, lifted his hat and began to walk away with an ironic smile on his face. Andras was still jumping about in his rage and shouting. As Balint walked up the hill he could still hear the inventor hurling ever ruder insults after him.

Balint reflected that this was altogether too much to bear. But if he had hit him perhaps the poor man would have called for seconds and demanded satisfaction. And the idea of a duel with someone of the middle class who had never held a sword would have been too absurd. And how could he, Balint Count Abady, fight a man he had only tried to help? Why, even the seconds would have laughed. Wiser to take no notice as if it were not worth another thought. He walked quickly away and soon crested the little hill.

Still, as he walked down into the town, he could not quite shake off his vexation that his good intentions had been taken so ill.

BALINT AND LASZLO left Vasarhely early the next morning. While Laszlo went to visit his land up the Szamos river beyond Kolozsvar, Balint left the train at Maros-Ludas, He had sent a telegram to his mother asking for a carriage to be sent to Ludas to meet the morning train as he intended to visit the district for a few days.

Why had he said ‘a few days’? He had nothing important to do in the Lelbanya district, but the real reason was that he did not want to feel bound to return as he would have done had his mother expected him. Without fully admitting this, Balint tried to convince himself that it was necessary for him to visit Lelbanya to start the co-operative he had always promised himself would be one of the first improvements he would inaugurate. This ought to be discussed with the people on the spot; and then there was the scheme for a cultural centre. These useful projects would justify his being their Member of Parliament.

But, deep inside himself, though he would not acknowledge the fact, he knew that this was not the real reason why he wanted ‘a few days’. During the week, in the middle of the autumn work in the fields, few of the people he wanted to see would be at home. One afternoon would be enough. The truth was that from Lelbanya he would be within an hour’s ride of Mezo-Varjas, the Miloths’ place. Adrienne had not invited him to go, but she had said that she would be there for a few weeks. She had said it: so he would go.

Uneasily aware of his own hypocrisy he made a point of visiting the mayor and the two clergymen of the district. He explained his plans to them; and very convincing they seemed, for when he started to expound his ideas the details seemed to spring to his lips as complete and detailed as if he had studied them for months. But later, when he was eating in the little restaurant, it was as if the co-operative and the cultural centre had never existed: his mind was filled with other things.

He was worried about Adrienne. What was troubling her? Why did she seem so disillusioned? She had married Pal Uzdy of her own free will — she had chosen him herself. No one had forced her. Presumably she had been in love and so she had married him: why else? But, if that were so, whence came that inner revolt, that tension, the bitter tone in her voice when she spoke of the purpose of life and its aims? Perhaps her husband had turned out to be cruel. Perhaps he even struck her. Balint would not have put it past that evil-faced satanic man. As the thought came to him, he involuntarily clenched his hand into a fist on the tablecloth.

And why did she still retain that girlish, maidenly appearance? She did not have either the assurance or the mature look that came to most girls with marriage and motherhood. The oddly shy movement on the terrace when she pulled the stole up round her bare shoulders was not the normal assured gesture of a fulfilled woman.

Something was wrong and he must find out what it was. Perhaps he would be able to help; he would deeply like to. Perhaps Adrienne would tell him, and then he would be able to advise and reassure her, or his unselfish understanding might find a realistic solution to her problem, whatever it was. Obviously he must try to help — and the best way would be to go over to the Miloths’ place that afternoon.

The two glossy bay horses that the Countess Roza had sent from Denestornya trotted along the smooth well-worn road. The lake, edged by reeds, was on the right of the road and in the distance lay the village of Varjas, a group of thatch-roofed houses surrounded by plum trees. On one side of the valley was the outcrop of rock on which stood the Romanian church with its toothpick spire, and on the other, above the village, were the gardens of the Miloth estate. All around to the west hills rolled towards the sunset as soft as waves. The carriage rounded the last turn in the road by the lake. Ahead on the left the boundary to the Miloth property, a thick hedge of acacia trees planted in a straight line up the hillside completely obscured the view ahead. All at once, as the carriage approached the acacia thickets, there was the sound of galloping horses. Five riders, bare-back and masked like bandits, suddenly appeared from behind the trees.

The riders were all dressed in extravagant and peculiar clothes. The leader wore a Turkish turban, the others had wide-brimmed Boer felt hats or fur caps with ear muffs and one had a red fez. They wore odd coats: dressing gowns and rubber macintoshes. This most awe-inspiring sight was somewhat diminished by the fact that three of the bandits wore silk stockings and high heels. Galloping towards the carriage they cried out ‘Your money or your life!’ in high girlish voices, while the last, who was perhaps, after all, a man, sounded a blast on a hunting horn.