Many people were crowded on the wide gallery of the main staircase, not, however, to watch the arrival of the royal party but rather to catch a glimpse of Burian, the Finance Minister of the Dual Monarchy who had that day arrived from Vienna. As the king’s personal representative he had come for discussions with the coalition government, and it was rumoured that this represented the crown’s final effort to achieve reconciliation. Not that Burian gave anything away. Even those who managed to talk with him questioned him in vain for he was a reserved, silent man whose bland expression revealed nothing, even though his short-sighted eyes twinkled merrily enough behind his pince-nez. In contrast to this non-committal and soft-spoken man, General Geza Fejervary was standing not far away talking loudly to a group of pretty women who had immediately surrounded him on his arrival. Fejervary’s unexpected presence had caused a sensation, for though he claimed that he had put in an appearance solely to please his granddaughters, no one believed that this was the whole truth. Boisterously he laughed and joked with the beauties who crowded around him, his tall figure towering above them.
The general was an imposing figure with a eagle’s beak of a nose above a white hussar’s moustache and a wide manly chest which was shown to its best advantage in his court uniform of white cloth faced with gold lace. Among his many medals was displayed the little cross of the Order of Maria Theresia, which as a young captain he had won at the battle of Custozza. This is a man, said the glances of the women who surrounded him, and they brought into play all their feminine wiles and obvious admiration for the overpowering maleness of his presence, laughing and flirting and ogling the old general, in the hopes of getting him to reveal what he must know of Burian’s mission.
The rumour had gone around that the general had been designated by the king to play an important role in this new effort at negotiation and so Balint at once decided to join the group around him. Though catching only occasional phrases from what was being said, Balint heard enough to catch the drift. One of the beauties, flashing her eyes boldly, was being more direct than all the others. She was saying that the ruler would have no alternative but to make concessions and accept the Hungarian point of view. Political arguments flowed from her lovely petal-shaped mouth and she ended by saying once again: ‘There is no other way! The King must give in!’
The old general laughed loudly: ‘Really? Really? You think that?’ he said. ‘What if something else is planned, something quite different? Ha-ha-ha! Quite different from what they expect!’ And he stuck out his mighty chest even further and twirled his white moustache with an air of triumph, his whole being infused with the confident spirit of one who has never lost a battle. Balint thought that he must have been like this when leading his men to victory, and it was with a sudden pang that he heard the general, supremely confident of his own invincibility, let out a roar of mocking, victorious laughter. Balint’s heart constricted. What did this confidence mean? What new, unexpected, violent solution was being brewed up in Vienna? What it could be he could not imagine, but that there was something was certain; Fejervary’s whole bearing was proof to anyone with eyes to see. Was it to this that Slawata had referred when he had written ‘…something quite different to anything the Hungarians expect is now being prepared.’? What could it be? New elections controlled by the army? An attempt to impose absolute rule, putting aside the ancient constitution which Franz-Josef had sworn a coronation oath to preserve? Neither seemed probable. Such measures were unthinkable, yet the self-satisfied laughter of the old military man had made an impression that was hard to erase.
It was Balint’s fate that evening that he could not escape from politics. Even when he asked Fanny Beredy to dance and then have supper with him and they joined several other ladies at a table near the buffet, the talk was all about politics. He was amazed to see how passionately these elegant ladies argued. They were all supporters of the conservative opposition. Many of them were extraordinarily well-informed, putting forward their views with well-reasoned arguments and sophisticated political acumen just as if they were lawyers arguing a case in court. Dry paragraphs of party views flowed from their rosy lips with astonishing precision and their desirable bare shoulders heaved with the vehemence of their arguments. In their hair, at their ears, and round their necks, diamonds sparkled as if to add hundreds of new arguments to their talk. They were all militant patriots, dedicated to and obsessed by the Tightness of their cause, all of them the more sure of themselves because one of the more influential newspapers had just published a leading article eulogizing the political acuteness of the Hungarian ladies and the importance of their role in the national struggle. This had given these society ladies much pleasure. ‘At last the press gives us proper recognition!’ said one lovely blonde, as she bit into a strawberry with her snow-white teeth. Though this statement only underlined the general feeling at the time, Balint found it worrying. To change the subject he turned to Fanny and asked about Laszlo.
‘I hear my cousin Gyeroffy often comes to see you these days?’ he said.
‘Yes. He’s a sweet boy and an excellent musician. We all like him a lot.’
‘Is it true that he’s gambling heavily?’
‘Yes,’ she smiled, ‘passionately.’
After a slight hesitation Balint said: ‘I rarely see him nowadays, though today we’ve met several times. Has he been losing a great deal?’
Fanny looked straight at him, her pussycat smile even more inscrutable than usual.
‘I don’t think so. My friend Devereux, who is a great gossip and knows everything, would certainly have told me if he had. No! As far as I know he’s on a winning streak at the moment.’
‘But I’m sure he has something on his mind. He’s worried about something, I can see it in his face … you don’t know him as I do.’
There was a flash of interest in her eyes, though she quickly dropped her eyelids to conceal it.
‘Yes, I’ve noticed it too.’ And she went on calmly, ‘However, you’re wrong about the reason. It’s not money. He’s much too reckless to count the cost or be worried about that!’ Her eyes narrowed to slits, long diagonal lines that swept obliquely upwards, and her mouth spread in a smile as if she were savouring the taste of honey. ‘Love!’ she went on. ‘That’ll be it! Love! Perhaps something’s gone wrong.’
‘Klara?’
‘Of course!’
‘Does she love him?’
Fanny shrugged her beautiful shoulders.