Skylark - Dezso Kosztolanyi [30]
When net and towel were finally removed, Ákos replaced the copy of Saucy Simon in which he had read many mischievous stories from the pen of some amateur scribbler, and looked into the mirror. His face darkened a little.
He hardly recognised himself.
A new man sat on the velvet cushions of the barber's swivel chair. His hair, although it had just been cut, seemed more bounteous than before. His moustache curled into a sharp and utterly unfamiliar fork, blackened by the Tiszaújlak wax, and as bright and stiff as if hammered from cast iron. His chin, on the other hand, was smooth, fresh and velvety. Every pore seemed younger. But different, too, and this unsettled him.
He examined himself mistrustfully with his small watery eyes. He simply couldn't get used to the unfamiliar expression his face now wore.
The barber noticed this.
“Will that be all?'
“Yes, that's fine,” Ákos mumbled in a voice that seemed to say the opposite.
He paid, took his cane and looked once more into the mirror. And now he saw that his face was red, too, and even a little fatter. Yes, decidedly redder and fatter.
His wife was well satisfied.
She too was doing her hair, and had just lit the spirit lamp on her dressing table where she placed her curling irons. She crimped the thin strands of hair on her forehead, more out of etiquette than vanity; that was simply what one did. She powdered her face but, her eyesight being weak, she had difficulty applying the powder evenly from the chamois. Here and there small floury patches remained on her skin. Into her hands, chapped from needlework, she rubbed a drop or two of glycerine. Then she went to look out her one and only festive dress.
This hung from the last hanger in her wardrobe, covered with a sheet. She would take it out only once or twice a year, for Easter, Corpus Christi or some similar occasion. Thus, in spite of having been made so many years before, the dress still looked as good as new.
It was made of lilac silk with black lace trimmings and white lace frills at the neck. It had leg of mutton sleeves and skirts that reached the ground. With it went a pair of elbow-length gloves. She pinned a gold brooch to her breast and hung diamond earrings from her ears–the family jewellery she had inherited from her mother. Into her new crocodile handbag she slipped her mother-of-pearl opera glasses and a lorgnette she had once bought as a present for Skylark, but which they always shared.
Ákos dressed ponderously. With him, dressing was always a trial. His wife had laid out his clothes for him, but still, to his vexation, he couldn't find this or that. He had trouble fastening his collar, then two buttons broke one after the other on his starched shirt front and he couldn't find his tie. At first he found his frock coat too loose, then too tight, and he longed to be back in his mouse-grey jacket. When he was finally dressed, however, and stood beside his wife, he was not displeased with his appearance. His silver wedding came to mind, when they had both set off to the photographer's. He looked fresh, refined and gentlemanly. Only his somewhat disrespectful expression troubled him, which he had already noticed at the barber's. In vain had he washed and brushed his hair, it simply wouldn't go away. His moustache seemed to rear higher and higher. If he pressed it down, it immediately sprang up again.
The Kisfaludy Theatre was housed in one of the tallest buildings in Sárszeg, at least half of which was occupied by the Széchenyi Inn and Café, with a ballroom upstairs. The rest belonged to the theatre, one entrance of which opened out on to a small side street.
Here the Vajkays slipped into the foyer to escape unnecessary attention, and from there to their two-seater box in the stalls. The usher opened the door for them and pressed a programme into their hands.
The woman sat down at the front. She opened the programme, which was hardly bigger than a lady's handkerchief,