Péter Nádas - Parallel Stories

You could protest, you could be ashamed that you’ve been like this with every woman. You could promise me it won’t be like that anymore because, for my sake, you’ll pull yourself together and turn over a new leaf.

I’m sure that would work in a kindergarten, Gyöngyvér, but I beg you, I can’t disappoint you so much.

Disappoint me, the woman asked, shocked.

It would show you what a mistake you’ve made, how you’ve miscalculated everything.

What mistake have I made.

You’ve picked a spoiled man, and you wanted a different kind.

The woman did not reply; she was clearly pondering something very seriously.

You could start looking for another man right away, the man continued, one who’s not so spoiled.

Maybe you’re right.

I’m sure I am.

But of course I can’t forgive you just like that.

If you can’t, you don’t have to, replied the man, and brushing the woman’s hand off, he jumped up from the floor.

After all, you can take your revenge anytime, any way you want to.

And with that, he threw himself on the bed, lying on his back. With his legs spread wide apart, he enjoyed his victory like a child.

Surprised, Gyöngyvér remained squatting by the wet bedcover.

The bedcover was rather embarrassing.

There was a small balcony off the kitchen; she’d hang it out there to dry.

In the afternoon, in the evening, sometime, she’d have to wash it.

What you mean to say is that I’m a silly goose who doesn’t understand her own wishes, doesn’t have enough common sense to grasp her own situation.

I’ll think about what I meant, but in the meantime, dear, you could bring me a blanket, I’m cold.

Maybe a sheet, I probably won’t find anything else, Gyöngyvér replied hesitantly.

She was beginning to be anxious about what was happening.

What had they done; what lies would she have to tell; when would she have a chance to wash the blanket in secret.

Altogether, what had the two of them done here.

God, how could she make all the telltale signs disappear. I know where she keeps the bed linen, she said aloud, but I don’t know if I can find a blanket.

She wanted to deny him the blanket, because denial felt good.

She wanted to deny him warmth.

In an apartment like this I’m sure you can find a blanket, probably more than one, said the man, yawning contentedly. Please, don’t bring me a sheet, and bring a glass of cold water too.

Anything, before I dry out completely.

He turned to the wall and curled up in a ball. It would be so nice for me under a nice warm little blanket, he whimpered. All I want is a nice warm little blanket, nothing else. And water.

And then you too should come under the blanket. And don’t bring the water in a glass, let me drink from your mouth.

Without a word Gyöngyvér left with the wet bedcover and stayed away for some time.

She felt like weeping, though she couldn’t know why, didn’t know what to cry about.

She continued tasting for herself his humiliating words and his insane cadences.

I let somebody take advantage of me again, she thought. She was ashamed of going along with the game, especially since she did not believe the man had wanted it, though he was a beast and in retrospect she thought he wouldn’t be ashamed of anything. He had deeply hurt her self-esteem, with his self-confidence or maybe his shamelessness. He spoke as if he had free access to and was at home in many strange apartments.

Unlike Gyöngyvér, who could not get her bearings even in places she thought she knew.

I must not let anyone take advantage of me ever again, she kept saying to herself, her anger turning against herself.

She did not put the light on; she hopped around naked and barefoot on the parquet and the stone tiles.

First, with a single quick movement she spread the soiled bedcover out on the kitchen balcony and locked the door on it.

I’m a pig, she said to herself, not very convincingly since she enjoyed her body, its suppleness and its easy flow.

She felt as if during the night she had grown by at least five centimeters.

Quickly she took water to him and then quickly left him alone again, though it was nice to watch him slurping the water eagerly, the spoiled beast, whom she continued to spoil, stupid as she was.

She stopped in the hallway crammed with furniture and tried to imagine where this man would find the damn blankets he was talking about.

When they were sneaking into the maid’s room, the man couldn’t have had more than a quick glance at this hallway.

She had to be careful not to overwhelm this man with senseless rebukes and thereby further betray herself, making it easier for him to take advantage of her. She hastened across the hallway, on whose rustically sanded, pale gray bare walls only one sconce gave a cold, unfriendly, dim light. Mrs. Szemző obsessively believed that with this light she could scare off burglars or sneaky thieves.

In fact she could not shake the fear that in her own apartment she might find herself face-to-face with strangers or bump into living bodies in the darkness.

That is why this weak light had to be on all night.

For a while, the living bodies inside the sweltering cattle car supported the living dead.

According to regulations, the gendarmes* were to count off 90 Jews and jam them into each cattle car, but they crowded 116 into this one so as not to have to attach another car to the train at the Veszprém station.

This was duly recorded in the notebook of Chief Counselor Elemér Vay, whom His Excellency the regent of Hungary had personally appointed to observe the process of deportations throughout the country. Beginning in April 1944 and following the itinerary prepared for him by the Interior Ministry, the chief counselor traveled from city to city along the proposed deportation lines.

His verbal reports could not of course include such insignificant details as one overcrowded cattle car.

He did not want to talk and could not have talked about it to anyone.

During his three-month inspection tour he returned only twice to Budapest, where His Excellency received him in a more than friendly atmosphere, for tea with the family. At the conclusion of the tea and accompanied by His Excellency’s daughter-in-law, the always composed and cheerful Countess Imola Auenberg, he strolled over to His Excellency’s study, where he could briefly summarize the impressions he had gained on the inspection tour. The countess had been friends with Elemér Vay’s young wife in her youth, and it was at her recommendation that the retired counselor had been recalled for this special mission.

His Excellency was very pleased with the reports from this high-ranking civil servant, who on more than one occasion had proved more than competent in the execution of confidential missions and whose loyalty was unquestionable.

At the conclusion of their last meeting, he made the chief counselor promise that if there were incidents of atrocities or arbitrary actions taken by gendarmes during the evacuation of ghettoes around the country, the counselor would telegraph a report immediately, using the usual codes and addressing himself to the countess. His Excellency’s personal opinion was that within a few months a burning and weighty problem would be settled once and for all; arbitrariness and injustice were not commensurate with the chivalrous Hungarian character.

Ever since, Mrs. Szemző has wanted to see what the unavoidable moment might bring, the inevitable moment.

She told herself that the details would surely be of interest to a pathological anatomist or an expert in forensic medicine, and then she had to think about the person, identical to herself, who had the chance, for a few months in the Buchenwald camp, to work as an assistant to Professor Nussbaum, the prosector. Who had examined how, in a given situation, living bodies deal with the bodies of people who have fainted or died, in which case, according to popular belief, they are no longer aware of anything. It always seemed to her as if she had only read about these cases, rather than that she was remembering them as a real occurrence in her life. She also remembered Dr. Dénes Schranz, who could not have known in advance about this abomination when he wrote his book about the various and extraordinary phenomena of death.