“It’s a mystery.” To which he added shortly afterwards: “Women, you can bet it’s women: that’s all it can be.”
There were, of course, other customers, respectable people, about whom there was nothing to tell, and others about whom there was, though Köves just listened without really taking it in, and he was not even convinced that he was hearing what he did hear: he both believed it and he didn’t — ephemeral glimmers in a continually ebbing and rearranging wash of waves of voices, images and impressions, and people would have no doubt misconstrued his absent-mindedness, which was in truth a discovery, admittedly a somewhat gloomy, somewhat melancholic discovery, yet nevertheless sweet, like the taste of long-gone happiness, but all of a sudden he found he was being slapped on the shoulder by someone and urged “Chin up!”
“We’ll get by somehow,” said Sziklai looking pensively at Köves. “There are two ways,” he went on: “the short and narrow, which leads nowhere, then the long and roundabout way, which leads to who knows where, but at least one has the sense of moving ahead. You should bear that in mind,” he added promptly with a touch of care-laden anxiety.
“Why?” Köves asked, grumpily, like someone whose tranquillity is being threatened, yet with the faint smile of someone who has not yet given up all hope.
“Because,” said Sziklai, “I reckon it’s amusing and could be put to good use in a piece.”
“What sort of piece?” Köves reluctantly posed the question, perhaps hoping that by posing it he would be able to elude it.
“That’s precisely the point,” said Sziklai. “I reckon a piece should be written,” and Köves started to regain his senses, though only slowly, like a poison administered drop by drop.
“What kind of piece?” he inquired.
“That still needs to be thought over,” said Sziklai, although it appeared that he may well have already thought it over, because he carried on at once: “A stage play would be gratifying, but tricky; the cloven hoof would be glaringly obvious straight away. I reckon it needs to be a light comedy: that’s what will bring success.”
“Success?” Köves questioned, hesitantly, as if he were getting his mouth round a strange, near-unpronounceable word in a foreign language.
“Of course,” Sziklai looked at him impatiently. “One has to make a success of something. Success is the only way out.”
“Out of what?” Köves asked, and for a moment Sziklai scanned his face mistrustfully as if he were searching for some secret.
“What a weird sense of humour you have,” he eventually said, evidently brightening up, like someone who had come to some conclusion: “but you have a sense of humour. I don’t, or at least it limps along when it’s written down on paper. But on the other hand,” he continued, his eyes constantly on Köves, and Köves became more and more ill at ease, because he sensed a demand in Sziklai’s gaze, if nothing else, then at least for his attention: “On the other hand, I’ve been reading up on dramatics for some time. You can study it, you know,” Sziklai gave a dismissive wave, “it’s a load of baloney, only on my own I’m getting nowhere with the dialogues. I don’t even have a really good idea,” he went on, with the tension increasingly getting the upper hand over Köves, an ominous presentiment that he was gradually being sucked into something, a plan perhaps, that was being hatched far away from him yet still was going to claim his energies: “Old bean,” he heard Sziklai’s triumphant cry, “we’re saved: we’ll write a light comedy!” to which Köves said:
“Fine.” Then, as if in self-defence, “But not now,” and they agreed on that. First they needed to sort out their affairs; Sziklai signalled to Alice and, despite Köves’s protests, he paid the bill, adding a big tip to the sum.
“What’s this? Robbed a bank, have we, sirs?” the waitress asked as she buried the money in her apron.
“Marvellous character.” Sziklai followed her with his eye, as if he were already seeing everything in the light of the light comedy to come, but then his face clouded over. “It’s just such a pity,” he added, regretfully.
“Why?” Köves enquired, at which Sziklai peered searchingly around:
“I can’t see him here right now,” he eventually said.
“Who do you mean?” Köves enquired.
“Her … how should I put it, her guy,” said Sziklai.
“Who’s that?” For reasons he was unclear about himself, this time Köves would have been interested to be enlightened — Alice seemed to have caught his attention to some extent, but all Sziklai would say, evasively, was:
“There’s lot of stories about him. And then,” a melancholic insight appeared on Sziklai’s face, “Alice is only a waitress, after all, and waitresses always need someone who can live off them.”
“I see,” said Köves. “Yes, I’ve heard about that sort of thing; the usual story, in other words,” at which they made their way outside, with Sziklai nodding a greeting to a table here and there as they crossed the place. On the street, they shook hands and agreed that one evening they would, as Sziklai put it, “find each other” in the South Seas; indeed, they could leave messages for one another with Alice, now that Köves knew her, and as soon as their affairs were settled they would make a start on the light comedy.
“Until then, rack your brains for a good idea,” Sziklai said by way of a parting shot, and with an easy smile, which may have been directed at the sunshine and the prospect of gratifying a sudden wish for solitude, Köves responded:
“I’ll try.”
CHAPTER FOUR
Permanent residence permit. Landlady, houseman
Köves went off to the authorities in order to get his temporary residence endorsed as permanent and to obtain ID papers to that effect: Mrs. Weigand, the landlady, had reminded him for the second time that, insofar as he wished to carry on lodging with her, he needed to attend to his official registration as soon as possible.
“Of course, I don’t know what plans you have,” she said casting her clear little pools up at Köves, and Köves smiled uncertainly, as if he had less idea about those plans than even Mrs. Weigand.
“To be sure,” he said, therefore, “I’m finding it very satisfactory here,” as if that were the reason he was there, not anything else, to which the woman responded:
“I’m glad to hear it!” as she picked some invisible thread or crumb off the tablecloth. They were standing in Köves’s small room — Köves had vainly offered Mrs. Weigand the sole chair as a seat, so he too remained standing — with the afternoon already getting on for evening, though not yet time to switch on the lights, and the landlady had just before knocked on Köves’s door. Köves had initially flinched slightly, thinking the boy was going to burst in on him again, but before he called out “Come in!” it occurred to him that it could hardly be him as Peter was not in the habit of knocking.
“You didn’t even mention that you’re a journalist,” the woman carried on, with a hint of mock reproach lurking in her voice and a timid smile appearing on her pallid, pinched face, as if she were in the presence of a renowned man with whom she ought to speak with restraint, and Köves, who had indeed mentioned nothing of the kind, was astounded at how well she was informed. How could that be? Did the grapevine work that fast there? Yet instead of asking for clarification, he considered it of greater urgency for himself to supply some clarification, as if he wished to dispel a disagreeable misunderstanding which almost amounted to mudslinging:
“Yes,” he said, “only I’m not with a newspaper.” Then, not caring what a letdown it might cause the woman (for all he knew she might have already been boasting that she had a journalist as her lodger), he swiftly tacked on: “They fired me.”