Gyula Krúdy - Life Is A Dream

By now the barman was completely in the Colonel’s power, swayed by some kind of magic spell cast by the stranger’s voice that he could have listened to all night. He only needed to check in the icebox. Yes, the icebox of a small tavern often contains these small sticks of salami, remnants that sometimes wait around for weeks until they find their connoisseur, while at other times they are taken right away by some cab-driver in a hurry who will pull them out of his coat pocket while waiting for a fare somewhere.

Thus the Colonel’s uncanny appetite led him all the way to a helping of sharp Liptauer cheese with a penetrating aroma, spread in thin slices on a salt roll; most cheeses are usually harder. He was about to conclude his meal when a hansom cab came to a spinning stop in front of the Grey Arabian and a pale-faced, lanky young man leaped out.

Had the Colonel possessed the least receptivity towards the way civilians dressed he would have surely noticed the recherché quality of the young man’s outfit. He wore a black cloak with a high lapel befitting the hero of a nineteenth-century novel. He also sported a Byronic shirt collar and lacework cuffs. His blue necktie had white polka dots and was loosely knotted about his neck, and his vest was an honest-to-goodness embroidered white vest. He seemed to have taken every item from the wardrobe of some theatre. Possibly on permanent loan. His legs were as spindly as some comedian’s. The tight black pants emphasized the thinness of these legs. His boots had effeminately high heels.

This ashen-faced young man burst into the premises as if looking for help. His frenzied features betrayed an insurmountable fear, as if he were trying to run away from something. His long hair tumbled over his forehead and ears. The face was smooth-shaven, passionate, yearning …

— Well, he might as well be a musician, thought the Colonel, whose attention had been instantly drawn to the young man the moment he leaped from the hired carriage, even though as a rule he was not in the habit of paying attention to fellow mortals. He felt a certain attraction to the strange young man; he would not have minded if, for lack of a better place, the young man had joined him at his table. But the newcomer, without looking left or right, headed straight for the bar, as in an emergency at a pharmacy. His writhing fingers fumbled at a coin and with the urgency of an alcoholic he tapped on the galvanized iron counter. The barman half turned from the Colonel to size up the young man.

‘A glass of your strongest slivovitz, please,’ said the young man in an otherworldly voice. ‘That’s right, plum brandy,’ he added, his acrid laughter seeming to mock himself for landing in a situation that demanded plum brandy.

The Colonel, although he had just ordered his second wine spritzer (perhaps intending to resemble in this respect, too, the dissolute journalist), quietly shook his head, wondering about the fate of a man so young wasting away in taverns.

But the young man had all this time ignored the challenging glances the Colonel cast his way. He stared goggle-eyed straight at the bartender’s face as if that was where he expected to find reprieve from life’s tribulations. However the bartender handed him the shot of brandy without the least sign of sympathy. The young man snatched up the glass, raised it to his lips and was about to toss it back when his glance unexpectedly fell on the Colonel’s sardonic, arrogant face. Although the Colonel had probably not meant it, his expression was most insulting, as indeed it was most of the time. Alas, a life in the haut monde demands such expressions — they are nothing but masks. Some people show their true faces only when death removes the mask.

As soon as the young man glimpsed the Colonel his face was seized by such terror that one would have thought he had seen the devil, or death itself. The shot glass slipped from his hand and broke with a crash on the slanting floor, even though it was a thick and sturdy one. The young man’s hands flew up to cover his eyes as if he could no longer stand to see what was in front of him. Blindly tottering, he turned and crashed ghost-like through the door. ‘Head for the barracks!’ he yelled in a hoarse voice to the driver, who cracked his whip at the horses, as sudden as death itself. (Indeed, subsequent discussions revealed that no one in the neighbourhood knew this driver, even though every cab-driver of any standing had been to the Arabian, even if it took him out of his way.)

‘Hey! What about paying!’ screamed Janos, and even the owner sprang up from his tranquil game of cards, for this sort of thing rarely happened in his tavern and must not be tolerated even if it was only a matter of a few kreuzers. The owner was about to tell Janos to run after that cab, even if he had to go all the way to the barracks, when the other stranger, the Colonel, now quiet and grave, motioned to him: ‘I’ll pay for that drink.’

The Colonel’s words, although he spoke very quietly, created a stir in the tavern. What secret connection linked these two strangers? What mystery were they hiding? At last a sagacious old cab-driver (retired) resolved the problem with native common sense. ‘Most likely he’s the boy’s uncle!’ he opined, thumbing in the Colonel’s direction. And the game resumed, since the assistants from the clinic still had not arrived. Some days there is no end of autopsies.

The Colonel by now sat in his place in silence as if a depressing presentiment had seized hold of him with the young man’s entrance in the tavern. Although never accused of having an adventurous mind, the peculiar notion now flashed through the Colonel that the young man might have been the journalist he had to fight on this day in a duel to the death. After all, the Colonel had never seen the journalist; it was at the Casino’s behest that he was to do his utmost to gain redress, even if it ended in death.

Janos, still worked up over the previous scene, stood behind the bar and addressed his complaint to the Colonel, seeing the owner was again absorbed in his card game. ‘We’d be in a fine pickle if all our guests slammed their glasses to the floor and ran off without paying!’

The Colonel merely nodded at these words while pulling out his pocket watch again. He still had more than a quarter of an hour before the duel; he planned to arrive exactly on time. (It was two minutes’ walk from here to the barracks.) Truth to tell, the Colonel had no interest whatsoever in mingling with civilians, duelling seconds, and doctors any longer than was necessary, and anyway the duel was unavoidable, a done deal. His seconds (two other Colonels) and his doctor Emil Kosztka were sure to be in their places. No one has the right to suppose that he, a retired Colonel of the Hussars, could possibly arrive late because of pusillanimity. He merely wished to avoid unnecessary chit-chat. He would fire on command, then wait, hands in pocket, to see if his opponent was able to return fire. Most likely he would not be. Although he heard it said that once a dying man mustered his last remaining strength to fire a shot, and hit the mark. Stuff and nonsense; that sort of thing happens once in a hundred years.

If he were to find himself, in the riding ring inside the barracks, indeed facing that barmy-looking young man, with the white Byronic collar and long white shirt-cuffs providing an ideal target, standing in front of his pistol — if indeed that paltry, irresponsible young man were to be his opponent, that would be most unpleasant, but would not change the situation at all. After all, the Colonel had nothing to do with the fellow personally, or with his kith and kin, his lover if he had one, or his father or mother. The Casino had decided in this matter, and against the Casino’s decision there was no appeal …