Antal Szerb: Love in a Bottle

The scholar finally noticed her when she leant over to him to put some sugar in his milk. His first response was to cover the mug with his hand in terror; but then he acquiesced, and even thanked her.

“No one ever puts sugar in my milk,” he observed plaintively. “I always have it without. But sugar is very good, if you can get it.”

“But if you want it, why don’t you ask?”

“Me, ask for sugar? I’m afraid that wouldn’t go down well with the master.”

“But when you find a good master, who looks kindly on you?”

“I’ve met very few of those. I know I look like a scarecrow. But I don’t ask for much. All I want is a bite to eat and somewhere to lay my head. When people oblige I never thank them, and if they don’t they live to regret it. I just keep moving on — there are plenty of other villages and my legs are long. I never sit anywhere long enough to warm my seat.”

Sensing the miller’s gaze fully upon him, he stopped.

“So where are you from, master scholar?” was the question. The scholar behaved as if he hadn’t heard.

Soon enough, people lost interest in him, their thoughts full of their own happy plans.

But Ajándok fussed around him even more devotedly, finding a cushion for him to sit on, as if he were a specially honoured guest, cutting his bread for him and pouring his milk into her own ornately decorated mug. He even managed to thank her, in his scarcely audible voice. She blushed at this display of magnanimity, and gazed at him with such a loving look that he reddened slightly in return — the faint glowing of embers beneath a layer of ash.

“Have you come very far?” she suddenly asked, timidly.

“I certainly have,” he replied. “Through seven forests, from the land of seven cities. In Transylvania I studied up to the thirteenth grade… I lived in a cave with twelve companions… a dark cave, with bears and owls… we were barely human ourselves… and the nights were bitter cold… Then we moved on… crossing over flimsy footbridges… carrying torches… up into the heart of the mountain.”

His speech came in fragments, as if he wanted to drop the subject at every turn but was unable to withstand Ajándok’s loving gaze. “In the heart of the mountain we came upon a threshing wheel… we stopped before it, all thirteen of us… we knew one of us would have to die… either myself or one of the others… so we all climbed up and stood on it… and it started to turn… then suddenly, ‘Jaj!’—my best friend fell… he screamed at us as he lay there among the whirling blades… it was all up for him… But we survived… twelve of us now… and now we could go… anywhere in the world we wanted… for whatever foolish reason. But this is not a fit story for you, my little sister. It’ll give you bad dreams.”

“Never mind that — tell me more. Where did you go after that?”

“Where did I go? I couldn’t tell you the number of countries — you would be an old maid, my dear little sister, by the time you’d heard it all. As King Solomon said: ‘To grow in wisdom is to grow in suffering.’ The fact is, since I first held this book under my arm I’ve not had a moment’s rest. The breeze starts to rise just before dawn, and I think, perhaps on the slopes of some faraway hill there’ll be a fountain of wine to quench my thirst; or in some snowy cave of ice, who knows? perhaps I might at last have my wish and get some sleep, and find what I need — a longboat waiting for me on the shore of the Óperencián sea to take me to my rest on the eternal waves. So long as there are country roads under my feet, I shall never find rest.”

Ajándok asked, rather petulantly, why he had come there if the world was so much wider elsewhere.

“Everyone who goes wandering, my little sister, does so because there’s somewhere he wants to get to. The end of the world is just that, the end of the world, and they say that once you get there you will be able to find rest. When I finally reached this wide plain I saw this mill standing in the distance and I felt happier than I had for years. My dear little sister, you are a miller’s daughter, you can never have known how wonderful it is to be no longer pursued by the wind, when you have lost the power of your wings and are sleeping under the open sky… and suddenly there stands the mill, with its sails.”

It had grown very late. Wishing one another a peaceful good night, people rose from the table. Lidi’s cheeks burnt in anticipation of the promised kisses that the autumn would bring, and everyone knew that her dream of Bálint would be one of roses. All that awaited Ajándok was the cold bed of a child.

The old lady led the scholar Máté to his sleeping place, a bench covered with sheepskin. He stretched himself out along it, pulled his cloak over him, and in that manner fell instantly and soundly asleep.

Silence pervaded the entire mill. The chairs and long table could now stretch out and rest too. Soft, rustling sounds were heard. The happy dreams of warm bodies came to life. Down the cracked and crannied chimney, over the hearth, in and out of the mountains of grey ash, those dreams, the miracles and nightmares of flowery St John’s Eve, glided silently.

Then the great bell tolled. It seemed determined to flood the whole plain with its outpouring. Twelve o’clock.

Ajándok rose, pulled on her dress, took out the bundle, and tiptoed out of the mill.

The moon was so bright it was like a second day, in a whiter, more silent world where the flowers were less lush. But she did not look behind her, and as she stepped out she no longer felt afraid, and her grief melted away. She felt sure that on just such a moonlit night, in a landscape sent down from another world, the person she was expecting would be sure to appear.

And there stood the well. Inside its crumbling rim the frogs croaked their ancient watery songs. It was said that the well was as ancient as the mill, and the mill was so old that even to think how old it was would take for ever.

She said the three Hail Marys, put the bundle down beside the well, rested her head on it and savoured the smell of the dried herbs. And there she lay for a long, long time, in great peace, as if on her own bed. On her white brow the nimble fingers of tiny dreams spun a bridal wreath… until, after who knows how long, or when she became aware of it… there was a man standing next to the well, a tall, pitch-black figure, his eye raised heavenwards in rapture. The moon stroked his face with its soft hands, and made him as handsome as the prince of some far-off Western land.

She stood up. She knew. This man was her bridegroom.

It was the scholar.

She went up to him, and without knowing what she was doing — she was still in a dream — took his hand. With unhurried deliberation, like someone taking a vow, she declared: “You are my betrothed.”

He gave a start, then stared at her as if she were a miraculous being risen from the well. “Is that what you want, Ajándok?”

“It’s not I who want it. I don’t want anything. It was the magic that brought me to you, by night, on flowery St John’s Night. You are the man I was told I would see. My husband-to-be.”

“As you say, Ajándok. It is true. It was no chance wind that brought me to this place. But all the same — do you know who I am?”

“You are a wanderer, and a weary one, seeking rest. I know that you are my bridegroom.”

“But think about this carefully, Ajándok, and may God bless you. You see this book under my arm? In it you may read terrible things. And I am the one who frightened you earlier, in the attic — it was my way into the house.”

“God bless that moment!”

“But I am not an ordinary person. No girl has ever loved me. I am a vagrant. I don’t know how to live in one place!”