They Were Divided - Miklos Banffy [16]
‘Is it really you?’ asked a muffled voice from deep among the pillows.
‘Yes.’
His hands sought her shoulder and started to caress the hair that curled loosely about her. Then he spoke again, thickly as if he could hardly get the words out:
‘This has no sense, no sense at all.’
For a few moments there was no reply. Then she clutched at him with both arms holding him in an embrace so tight she might have been a drowning swimmer clinging to her saviour. Their lips met in a long, hungry kiss.
Between them the stiffly starched shirt of his evening dress crackled softly.
Balint wanted to switch on the light but Adrienne was still too upset to let him do so.
‘Margit is waiting outside. I must tell her you’re all right,’ said Balint. ‘Besides, I must see my hair isn’t ruffled … and put my tie straight … I’ll need the light to do that.’
‘No, no! Not yet! You don’t need the light just for that … and anyway it doesn’t matter!’
‘But Margit may want to come in. It’ll be better with the light on.’
‘No, she mustn’t come! Not now! Tell her she can go home and come back later … but I’m not having any light, not now!’
There was nothing he could do to persuade her, so he smoothed his hair with his hands and did what he could to straighten his collar and tie. Then he went back into the bathroom.
Margit was lying at full length on the narrow bench beside the wall. She was fast asleep, with her head cushioned on her soft arm, like a faithful guardian at rest as soon as danger was past. She seemed to be sleeping so deeply that Balint felt it was cruel to wake her.
‘Is it all right …?’ she muttered before she was fully awake.
There was no need for Balint to say anything because Margit saw from his face that all was well and at once said, ‘I’ll be going home now,’ and her little mouth stretched wide as she yawned deeply. Then she slipped into her evening fur coat and with hardly another word bade Abady farewell and disappeared. How Abady was to leave the house if she locked the gate behind her and took away the key, she didn’t say, though whether this was because she was still so sleepy or whether she may have other reasons no one could have told, for little Margit never explained and never said anything that was not strictly necessary.
Balint turned off the bathroom light and returned to the dark bedroom.
The clock in the neighbouring monastery struck three. Its sound reverberated in the darkness almost as if it chimed in the room itself.
The sound woke them. They had fallen asleep entwined in each others’ arms, the curves of their bodies fitting closely together with the ease of long-standing habit, just as a pair of great cats such as pumas or panthers sleep coiled together in luxurious repose. Adrienne had found her accustomed place with her head tucked into Balint’s shoulder and her strong richly curling hair partly covering his lips and nose; but he slept all the deeper for, far from disturbing him, these wild locks of hers were like links in a magic chain that had bound them together for so many years. These lovers needed no one else, for both found everything that was needed in the other, every gesture and movement of their lovemaking, whether new or familiar, was accepted with trust and serenity, even their unity in the climax of love; and on this day it was just as it had always been whenever they had been able to come together to lose their own selves in each other.
‘It’s already three, I ought to get dressed,