Péter Nádas - Parallel Stories

And now her voice changed too. For me, she’d be waiting with lunch for me, she asked, her voice no stronger than a breath, her eyes wide and wet.

As if they had mutually insulted the other’s sacred, grand human secret and foreignness.

Neither of them understood the other, and that hurt them both, or rather they both had to pretend not to understand the other. In Madzar’s mind arose the painful suspicion that indeed he was fatally misunderstanding or had fatally misunderstood something, though he could not comprehend what. It would have been senseless to ask who had deserted whom since their last encounter. At any rate, Mrs. Szemző looked out to the water, to the water flowing past ever since then, displaying on its surface the power of the driving current and the unevenness of the riverbed. It is my fault, ultimately, only mine, she thought, continuing to cry out inwardly. Their respective work had revealed themselves to each other, and she had ended up too close to this man.

Their glances, made painful with self-accusation and mutual incredulity, met once again.

They did not have much time for clandestine glances or stolen moments in which somehow to comprehend this, their very first public lovers’ quarrel. As contrary to their intentions, they found themselves in an impossible situation and had quickly to extricate themselves from the incomprehensible awkwardness, but they could not clarify anything: swishing her silken skirts, the black-haired lady approached to take her leave of them. But not before she made Madzar promise that the next morning he would come and join the students for sketching and watercolors. And in a moment she had read it all on their faces, perhaps more than was realistically possible, but she gauged everything by their stiff posture, in which one could not separate reality from opportunity. The two of them tried hard not to let her see anything. Nor could they have forgotten Mrs. Szemző’s energetic husband in his white linen suit, standing only a few steps away, busy with the porters and sending urgent glances in their direction because of the children. This is no time for long conversations. But luckily the two boys, all excited by the horses, were running back toward their mother. They ran to her in their identical white shirts and dark-blue pants fitted with suspenders, as if the horrible realization hit them like a blow to their bodies that a total stranger was now threatening their absolute power over their mother. They hung on her neck, pulled her down with their weight, telling her to come see the horses and, mainly, not to leave their father’s side for even a moment. They were demonstrating to the stranger, brazenly and shamelessly, their unbelievable power over everything. Madzar could see with his own eyes that this Mrs. Szemző was not an independent person; her two sons had her branded and shackled. Dr. Szemző, on the other hand, could relax and feel that they were all safe for at least a few moments. In all this emotional and social chaos and cacophony, the black-haired lady, swishing her yards of silk and rattling her ivory bracelets, whose name Madzar did not catch at the first or second hearing, arranged to be at the Hotel Korona with the Szemzős in an hour and a half.

For a drink, as she put it.

By then it would be clear whether they’d all go together for lunch somewhere, or to some restaurant, which someone must have already arranged with someone else.

But not with him; all this had been done without him.

This new information stunned Madzar, but he took a firm grip on himself. He politely accompanied them in the hackney to the hotel, enthusiastically pointing out and explaining things to the boys, so as not to feel his own pain.

Standing in the hotel lobby, which was dark, wainscoted, pleasantly cool, the Szemzős told him by way of good-bye that after supper they wanted to pay a visit, if only to make the acquaintance of his mother. Of course they’d come without the boys so as not to be too much of a burden.

Oh, not at all.

There was some give and take about this — perhaps they should all come for supper. They oscillated between yes and no.

And would he kindly excuse them for missing lunch, begged Mrs. Szemző, which Madzar could not understand — indeed at that moment he didn’t understand anything and nor could Dr. Szemző.

What lunch did we miss, darling, the latter asked.

The head of the hospital, a dear colleague of her husband, is expecting them at the Drágffy restaurant for a fish lunch, explained Mrs. Szemző almost desperately, so that at least one of the two men would understand the situation.

And the longer they tortured themselves with the obligatory politeness, the more embarrassing and painful the situation became, though individually none of them could have specified why.

As if here, in the city of his birth, perfect strangers were shutting him out of his own life.

He has the reputation of being a courteous man and therefore his life becomes one of slavishly satisfying other people’s wishes.

This is how Madzar was fuming inside.

But Dr. Szemző was also taking a good look at the place where he had wound up, asking himself what he was doing in this decaying country hotel.

Well, then, until eight tonight, all three of them were saying, making their parting sound light and cheerful. They were about to move out of the humiliating situation, but trouble never comes singly. Down the red-carpet-covered steps came Chief Counselor Elemér Vay.

Baron Bellardi had hastily introduced Madzar to Vay on the Carolina , and the chief counselor vaguely remembered that, yet he had no idea who the plain-looking young man was who was now receiving him with a smile at the bottom of the stairs. They could not avoid exchanging pleasantries; after all, they had been introduced. But why would Chief Counselor Vay have remembered such a person. In general, he didn’t care whom he talked to, just as he hadn’t cared on the Carolina whom Bellardi might introduce to him. Unimportant people did not interest him, and since he had spent more than forty years at various levels of public administration, he rarely erred about people. And he remembered having quickly registered that with this acquaintance of his, Baron Bellardi had once again made a blunder.

In the new situation, however, Madzar could not but obey the rigorous rules of civility and introduce to this high-ranking, authoritative government official the couple at his side, who smiled obligingly, and then help them exchange a few brief, smooth, and totally noncommittal lighthearted remarks. He saw to it that all four of them, expressing the very best wishes and compliments, mutually bowed to one another and then parted, in the merciless coolness of the bowing ritual and the friendliest possible spirit.

As befitted the chief counselor’s rank, an automobile was waiting for him outside the hotel, a sparkling dust-gray Mercedes Nürnberg with its enormous, immaculately glittering black fenders and comfortably wide running boards; the prince of Montenuovo had sent it.

By now, Madzar was seething. No one saw any of this on his face, of course, whose features were set to support an affable smile. All of them were showing their teeth; this was the odd way in which they reassured one another of their peaceful and friendly intentions. As if to say, just this one last time, that they were willing to forgo their dangerous bestiality. Elemér Vay was not overly pleased by this chance encounter, however, though responses like this could never be seen on him, and he made his way through the lobby looking quite content. He was clean-shaven; he had brought a cloud of scent with him, and now he was taking the cloud away with him. His suit, of the finest gray cotton, was freshly pressed; the crease of his pants could cut like a blade’s edge. Around his neck he wore a much too colorful silk cravat, unsuited to his sober appearance; it was a gift from his young wife and contrary to his social position, as it were, and it pleased him to wear it. His brown-and-white two-tone shoes had been polished to a glittering shine by his manservant, who had made ample use of his spittle in the effort. Given the strictly confidential nature of his conferences, the chief counselor could not deem this chance meeting pleasant.