Part 31 (2/2)
”Very nice! And your wife?”
”She will join me.”
”And you seriously think so? You think she'll come and settle down with you in a hut with a clay floor and a straw roof, like the one you are living in now.”
”It's a palace compared with what we lived in in our Debreczin days.
When my wife did the cooking--for we had no servant--we loved each other better than ever. In a little house loving hearts are nearer to each other than in a large palace.”
”It was possible then, no doubt. I have experienced the same thing. But this is quite different. When a man has such brilliant hopes, want is no affliction. It will be over soon, he thinks. But to enter upon misery with the knowledge that it will last till death, is beyond the power of resignation. And particularly with a woman! Believe me, I know my own s.e.x. Your wife, who now stands at the summit of her artistic fame, cannot quit her brilliant career. No! If you were an angel she could not.”
I could not defend my point of view against her. Stern reality was on her side; on my side were only faith and imagination.
”I believe in my wife's promise to deliver me out of my difficult position.”
”I can't imagine how. She cannot do what I can do for Balvanyossi--in other words, accuse herself and say: 'It was not he who proclaimed freedom on March 15th. It was not he who wrote those heart-stirring articles to the nation. It was not he who edited those newspapers; not he who went to battle with the armies; not he who inspired the Honveds at the siege of Buda: but I.' Your wife cannot take your fault on her shoulders.”
I couldn't help laughing.
”I would not let her.”
”But let us suppose that a great _artiste_, a renowned beauty, might perhaps manage by some means or other to procure an amnesty for her hidden husband” (and as she said this she discharged murderous, envenomed darts at me from the corners of her eyes), ”what will be your subsequent lot when you return to Pest as a rebel amnestied at the intercession of his wife? The earth and the sky which you used to adore have vanished. No poet, no newspaper, no publisher: what will you do?
Will you enter a lawyer's office again to copy deeds, issue summonses, and serve writs at so much a day? Or will you translate comedies (under official protection) at fifty florins each for the National Theatre; or paint fas.h.i.+onable portraits of butchers' wives at five florins apiece?
Or, perhaps, you'll do nothing at all, but live simply under the wing of your wife as 'the actress's husband,' and see a woman bending beneath the load of sustaining a household--accomplis.h.i.+ng the most exhausting work; coming home after her day's acting is over, tired to death, excited, unstrung. See her, poorly though she be, hurry from one provincial town to another, acting uncongenial parts, so as to sc.r.a.pe together a little money wherewith to satisfy the Jews with whom she has to haggle for the material for her costumes. And the husband must look on at all this with his arms folded, or, if he does anything at all, may perhaps paint the flowers for her costumes, which she herself will then sew on with her own hands.”
”It will not last for ever--other times will come.”
”Other times! You think other times will come, eh? Now, that is what I fear most of all. I know you well. You are not the sort of man who can content himself with the thought--what is past is over! You will never forget what you used to be, still less what you meant to be. The glory of fame is not forgotten as easily as a p.a.w.ned jewel. You will again fall into those straits from which you have been set free.”
And the woman saw right into my soul. My face is so maladroit that it never could keep a secret. You can read my features like an open book.
When I am frightened, it is vain for me to pretend that I am plucky.
When I'm in a rage, it is useless for me to affect calmness--n.o.body is taken in by it. I cannot even haggle over a bargain properly, people can read from my face what I have to give. This woman could see where my soul was wandering in secret, far, far away, in a gloriously arisen Hungary of the future. And she regarded this talk of turning farmer as little more than the incoherent delirium of a fevered visionary.
”Let it be as you say,” I said.... ”If I live I will build a tower out of the ruins of my country's glory; if I die, my grave will become an altar. Vainly does this coward flesh of mine tremble in every nerve. I am neither a hero nor a giant. The report of a gun makes me tremble; I grow pale in the presence of death; grief draws tears from me--but I will not depart from my set path. If I cannot write under my own name, I will write under the name of my landlord's dog. I will be 'Sajo.'[87]
We'll bark if we can't speak, but we'll not be silent.”
[Footnote 87: My works ”_Forradalmi es csatakepek_,” ”_Bujdoso naploja_”
were written under the pseudonym _Sajo_.--JoKAI.]
The lady, in terror, seized me by both arms.
”For Heaven's sake, take care! A step backwards, and you'll fall over the rock.”
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