Peter Nadas - A Book of Memories

Two huge black cars came to pick us up at the hotel. And although I managed to end up in the same car with the girl, I soon had second thoughts about joining them. Apart from the secret, largely unexpressed joy of seeing each other again, there was nothing much my friend and I could talk about. For one thing, I was tired, and also distracted by the girl. What's more, they were rather loud under the influence of something they'd had earlier, while I was still in need of a drink. And the strenuous effort to conceal from each other the joy of seeing each other created an unpleasant tension between us. As for the girl, I could only watch her, keep an eye on her, but could not really get any closer. She let me know that any advance on my part would be met by a refusal. One thoughtless move and she'd rebuff me so spectacularly, I'd have to give her up for good. Which also meant that she didn't want to give me up. She hadn't made up her mind yet. We kept avoiding each other's eyes, but we couldn't avoid the desire for each other's glances. The whole time we kept each other in a state of tension. The only thing I permitted myself to do was politely to take her fur-collared coat from her when she took it off. She thanked me with the same noncommittal politeness. The tension was mutual, because we both tried to hide from the others our mutual interest. We couldn't succeed completely, not only because the four people and the interpreter accompanying them had already had an afternoon of copious drinking behind them, but also because they shared the special intimacy that develops among people traveling together. I remained a stranger among them.

One member of the group, a bearded young man who appeared anxious to call attention to himself at every turn, was especially eager to show me up. It's possible the girl had sounded so cool on the telephone because she wasn't alone in the room. The bearded young man was watching me, and I was watching them. Later it turned out that my suspicions were not unfounded. My friend and the third man in the group were watching and waiting to see where all this was leading to. And the interpreter, an unfailingly kind and solicitous lady, kept a watchful, maternal eye on the entire group. Reminding them of my position as a guest, I politely let them go first, and took a rear seat deep inside the box, next to the lady interpreter. The girl sat in front of us, leaning forward on the railing. From time to time I had to look at her bare neck. Her unruly hair was gathered in a bun. And she sensed every time my glance lingered on her neck; she'd move imperceptibly. Or rather, she seemed to dictate to me when I should be looking at the stage and when at her bare neck.

When the last shreds of the fog's silks and rags had lifted, the ideological significance of the vanishing fog-curtain also became evident. The rags-and-riches motif was now repeated onstage: rich and poor folk were whirling about and mingling in apparent confusion, though in still identifiable clusters. Princesses like golden puppets, drunken boyars wrapped in furs, merchants and lascivious priests frolicking with courtesans in flimsy silks, half-naked beggars, contortionists in dirt-encrusted rags, wounded soldiers writhing in blood-soaked bandages, peddlers hawking their miserable wares, and here and there, among gaping loafers and street people, provincial grandees in gaudy folk costume, demure maidens and handsome lads. All this abundance made me sick to my stomach. I felt like leaving. I felt like going to Pervomayskaya. Where I was expected. Where I wouldn't feel so out of place. Where in the morning three women in large pink satin bras and even larger pink satin panties paraded around the house and I could scratch and mope to my heart's content. Searching for a deeper clue to my discomfort, it occurred to me that for a disciple to sit in a theater just one day after his master's demise was an unseemly thing to do.

The whirling and dancing were still in progress when the bearded man put his paw on the girl's hand resting on the railing. He leaned over and whispered something into her ear. I could see they were accustomed to such intimate whispering, though it immediately made their two companions curious. They craned their necks, wanted to be in on whatever was going on. The bearded man, without letting go of the girl's hand, began to explain something to them. And my friend, after catching only the first few words, quickly moved closer and over the bearded fellow's shoulder whispered something to the girl. They both laughed. But the girl tilted her head so that I could catch a glimpse of their merriment, and at the same time she pulled her hand out from under the bearded man's paw. And that gesture, too, was meant for me. She made up my mind for me: I couldn't leave now. But all this fidgeting and chuckling and carrying on made me extremely uncomfortable. I belonged to this group yet had nothing to do with it. I understood their game but wanted no part of it. Because from this point on, everything that happened onstage made them laugh. I couldn't completely ignore the solemn atmosphere in the theater, but from then on I was compelled to see the stage with their eyes.

No doubt it isn't a particularly brilliant artistic concept to use irreconcilable class struggle and the conflict of social classes as the basis for a ballet piece within an opera. It's also true that the opera's overture didn't quite work as ballet music. Yet the group's judgment of it rubbed me the wrong way. I was also afraid they might create a scene. And I was right. After a while the interpreter, startled out of her patriotic rapture, tried with alarmed and cautious touches of her fingers to make them come to their senses. But this only added fuel to the fire. The poor woman was like a kindhearted schoolmistress who is herself terrified that the principal might get wind of the rowdiness of her charges. They didn't dare look at one another, and probably didn't much look at the stage either. The interpreter didn't understand any of this, she kept hushing and admonishing them in her softly accented Hungarian. Their backs and shoulders were shaking with suppressed laughter. Now and then the laughter would pop, erupt, and be immediately stifled, but that only hastened and amplified the next explosion.

I don't know how many dancers were on the stage — a great many. It's rare to see so many dancers all at once. But when after the overture the victoriously entering soloists were followed by fresh throngs singing away jubilantly and carrying church banners and military insignias, creating an incredible mass of bodies, and when, to top it all off, to the accompaniment of booming church bells a red sun rose, pulled by. wire, over the crenellated walls of the Kremlin, all hell broke loose in our box. They began punching one another, their laughter turning to snorting and belching. Trying to calm them, the frightened interpreter was also punching them. In neighboring boxes a counter-movement was brewing; general consternation now found expression in indignant hissing, muttering, and muffled cussing. I lost my head, sprang up, and fled.

This row of boxes did not give directly onto a corridor but onto a brightly lit lounge with red silk wall hangings. I was incensed, indignant, but also relieved to know that whatever happened to them, I was out of there. I got my coat. But just as I was putting it on, the silk-covered door of the box was flung open and, with a resounding bass aria serving as background, the four Hungarians, clinging to one another in their uncontrollable fit, literally fell out of the box. For a second I could see the interpreter desperately gesturing behind them, but then one of them slammed the door on her. The four continued laughing and pushing and shoving and stumbling into one another, in turn shrieking and whimpering, with tears in their eyes. Four unruly children sent out of the classroom. As far as I was concerned, I wanted to put an end to this impossible scene, the sooner the better. The girl and her bearded friend fell holding on to each other, against the wall. After the impact, the man sank to the floor. I would have made my getaway then if my friend, on purpose or by accident, hadn't let go of his partner in a way that had him fall against me. I had no choice but to catch him. For long seconds we stared into each other's eyes. I couldn't hold back the contempt and hatred that loomed out of the shadows of our remote childhood, as the joy of our reunion had only an hour earlier. I felt my own hand — or rather, I realized I was — grabbing his shoulder. I shook him. Clowns! I was yelling at him, bunch of buffoons, that's what you are! Miserable buffoons! His face relaxed at once, and he glared back at me with the same implacable hatred. And you are a lousy opportunist gone sour, he said. A shitty little Julien Sorel, that's what you were and that's what you still are. A filthy playboy. And he said something else, too. The hatred was still in his eyes, but his voice had a phony cynical ring I hadn't known before. It came hissing out of him. In the sudden silence the others could hear it, too. I couldn't have picked a better time to tell you, he hissed in that odd voice, but I was madly in love with you, you chickenshit.