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By Root 471 0

the top of the hill the afternoon light was already beginning to fade to a uniform greyness. They had arrived just where one of Balint’s ancestors had had built a little classical pavilion or summer-house which consisted of little more than a domed roof supported by stone columns. It was surrounded by some of the oldest pine-trees in the park and before it stretched a wide clearing bordered by plantations of different specimens of rare trees. At the bottom of the hill there wound the path they had ridden along that morning and beyond it could be seen the castle’s walls with, above them, the conical roofs which capped the corner towers. The old stonework was etched in deep violet against the pale evening sky and the patina on the copper casing on the roofs no longer shone green but seemed black against the saffron-yellow of the sunset.

They sat down, even though it was starting to get cold.

‘What a wonderful place this is,’ said Gazsi. ‘I’ve never been here before.’

They sat in silence for a little while. Then, though without knowing what train of thought led him to the subject, unless it was the contrast between the beauty and richness of Denestornya and the squalor and unhappiness he had recently witnessed, he said suddenly, ‘I saw Laci the other day, poor fellow!’

‘Really? Where? When?’ asked Balint eagerly.

‘Just the other day … when I was coming back from Szilagy.’

For a moment Gazsi said no more. Then he related how he had been passing through Kozard and that, in front of a largish peasant’s house on the right-hand side of the road, he had seen Laszlo Gyeroffy sitting on a broken-down garden chair. It was only just as he was driving past that he had realized who it was and, as it had taken a moment or two to make the coachman understand what he wanted, he had already been driven well past the house before he had been able to stop and get out. Then he had had to walk back, past some empty land, to reach the place where he had seen Laszlo. As he had nearly got close enough to call out a greeting Laszlo had got up, turned away from him and slipped quickly into the house.

‘I didn’t know what to do. Should I go in after him … or just go away again? I’m such an ass in this sort of thing. Well, I just tur-r-rned on my heel and left. What else was there to do? He saw me coming, so I r-r-reckoned that if he went in it must be because he didn’t want to see me.’

‘How did he look? How was he?’

‘I think he looked thinner, but I can’t be sure. There was a fence between us, and a little fr-r-ront gar-r-rden … you know what those houses are like. I just looked up the path, but all I could see was a bottle and a glass beside the chair. He must have been sitting there dr-r-rinking. When he went in I saw him clutching the door-r-rpost and thought that per-r-rhaps he was ashamed for me to see him dr-r-runk. That’s why I didn’t go in … per-r-rhaps it was stupid of me. I’m sor-r-ry now I didn’t follow him.’

‘I haven’t had any news for ages,’ said Balint. ‘I wrote a couple of times last summer, but I never got any reply.’

Then he told Gazsi all that he did know, which was simply that he had heard that Laszlo had sold his property, but that he still lived there in an old servant’s house he had kept. On his mother’s behalf Balint had written to Laszlo offering him a home at Denestornya, either in a separate suite on the first floor or else in his grandfather’s old manor-house close by; but they had never had any answer. No doubt this was the way Laszlo wanted it for perhaps he had thought that he wouldn’t be free to drink as he pleased.

‘You remember Azbej, my mother’s old estate manager? It was he that bought Kozard from Laszlo. He says he gives Laci some sort of annuity, but I don’t know how much. I am not in touch with Azbej any more,’ he added dryly.

For a few more moments they sat there together, not speaking but both of them thinking about Laszlo’s sad life. Then Abady got up.

‘Come along,’ he said. ‘My mother will be waiting for us for tea.’

Together they walked silently down the hill. When they had almost reached the