How long he stood there in the corridor, and how long he experienced the strange and evidently destined to be far from transient mood which overcame him like a sudden shock from the outside, as it were — Köves would have been hard put to keep an eye on, to be sure. The fact is, the footsteps which had induced this almost feverish state of stunned elation had not even died away when the door opened and he was called for, and Köves went in and behaved as though he were Köves, the newspaper correspondent, who was interested in nothing else but why the trains were running late, looked at charts, listened to explanations and, who knows, maybe even posed a few questions of his own, nodded, smiled, shook hands, took his leave — none of this disturbed him in the least, did not even impinge on him, as if it were not happening to him, or rather exactly as if it were happening to him alone since — he realized all at once, as he raced down the stairs and stepped out onto the street — it was precisely in this respect that some irrevocable volte-face had happened to him: everything which had happened and was happening had happened and was happening to him and could no longer happen to him without the incisive consciousness of this presence. He may still have been living, but he had virtually lived his life already, and all at once Köves glimpsed that life in the form of such a closed, complete, rounded story that he himself was lost in wonder at its foreignness. And if it was hope that this spectacle elicited from him, that could have pertained only to this story; Köves could only hope that if he personally was beyond saving, his story could still be saved. How could he have imagined he could hide away, detach himself from the gravity of his life like a stray animal from its chain? No, this was how he would have to live from now on, with his gaze riveted on this existence, and to watch for a long time, fixedly, wonderingly, and incredulously, watching on and on, until he finally spotted something in it which very nearly no longer belonged to this life; something which was palpable, confined to the essential, incontestable, and accomplished, like a catastrophe; something which would gradually become detached from this life, like a frost crystal that anyone can pick up and gaze at its final configurations, then pass on to other hands for inspection as one of Nature’s marvellous formations …
That was how Köves roved the streets, now dawdling, now breaking into a dash, aimlessly and yet, most likely, setting himself an aim as he was going, and of course he noticed that he was sometimes stumbling into obstacles, having to make his way round people, whole groups of people, there being many out on the streets and making quite a racket; he even saw a march, this time a genuine one, with the slogan WE WANT TO LIVE! on the banners raised on high amid the ranks of the marchers, and Köves felt a brief sense of cheerful, absent-minded advocacy at the sight, in the same way that he advocated sunlight, for example, even if his solitary occupation, of course, gave him little chance to devote particularly close attention to it. It was probably getting late, though it was still daylight when he turned into the street on which he lived, and he seemed to hear his name being called out among the other cries, though he started only when someone plucked at his arm: it was Sziklai, who, it became clear, had just dropped in to see Köves and had even left a note for him with his landlady, then he had stuck around for a while longer, running up and down the road, and had just decided not to wait a moment longer when who should he at last happened to see but Köves.
“Old chap!” he exclaimed, evidently extremely excited, his hard, olive-tinted face, and the sharp lines etched into it looking like a veritable wood carving, “Get your things together. We’ll be coming for you tonight with a truck!”
“What sort of truck?” Köves asked in a daze, as if he were not entirely sure that it was he who was being spoken to, and whose arm had been grabbed, and whether the person who was nevertheless being spoken to and whose arm had been grabbed really was himself. In the end, on tenterhooks and annoyed as he was, and laughing nervously at Köves’s amazement, Sziklai was obliged to tell him what had happened: the whole city had been stood on its ears, the fire brigade had been disbanded, the soldiers had gone home, the South Seas had closed, the borders were rumoured not to be guarded by anyone, and a group of people — including Sziklai — who had been waiting long, long years, knowingly or not, for a chance to escape from this city, which denied all hope, this life which belied all hope, had now got together and rustled up a truck, on which they would be setting off under the cover of the night, taking Köves with them.
“Where to?” Köves asked, at a loss to understand, and Sziklai came to an irritated standstill, having meanwhile set off almost at a run, and although he had little idea where he was going Köves more or less mechanically tagged along with him.
“Does it matter?” Sziklai fumed. “Anywhere!..” He set off again. “Abroad,” he added, and in Köves’s ear the word, at that instant, sounded like a festive peal of bells.
He walked on for a while without a word, head sunk in thought, by Sziklai’s side.
“Sorry, but I can’t go,” he said eventually.
“Why not?” Sziklai again came to a stop, astonishment written all over his face. “Don’t you want to be free?” he asked.
“Of course I do,” said Köves. “The only trouble is,” he broke into a smile, as if by way of an apology, “I have to write a novel.”
“A novel?!” Sziklai was dumbstruck. “Now of all times?… You can write it later, somewhere else,” he went on. Köves continued smiling awkwardly:
“Yes, but this is the only language I know,” he worried.
“You’ll learn another one,” Sziklai said, waving that aside, almost tapping his feet in impatience: it looked as though other urgent matters were calling him.
“By the time I learn one I’ll have forgotten my novel.”
“Then you’ll write another one.” Sziklai’s voice by now sounded almost irritated, and it was more for the record than in hope of being understood that Köves pointed out:
“I can only write the one novel it is given me to write,” for which Sziklai could no longer come up with, and maybe did not even look for, a counterargument. They stood wordlessly, facing each other in the street, a storm of shouts of “We want to live!” around them, then — was it Sziklai who made the first move, or perhaps Köves? — swiftly embraced. Sziklai was then swallowed up in the crowd, whereas Köves turned on his heels and set off back, at a shambling pace, like someone who is in no hurry as he already suspects in advance all the pain and shame his future holds for him.