They Were Divided - Miklos Banffy [91]
Then he looked around the room and realized that its simplicity and bareness also signified contempt. Though like every provincial manor house in Transylvania it must once have contained some good pieces of furniture, there was now nothing of value in it. It was clear that such things had meant little to Gazsi for he had given all his good things to his sister when they had divided their inheritance – furniture, carpets, porcelain, everything. For himself he had kept only a couple of threadbare armchairs and a worn sofa. But along the walls there were long low bookshelves made of bare polished planks of natural wood, and on them were great quantities of books untidily stacked, much used and obviously much read. Balint went up to examine them and found to his amazement that they were mostly philosophical works by such writers as Hegel, Wundt and Schopenhauer. There were also some historical works by Ranke and Szilagyi, and a copy of Renan missing its cover, and several volumes of some German lexicon. Most of the books were tattered and some torn in half … and all were stained and dirty as if they had been covered in candle-wax or thrown about in anger.
Balint started to pick some of them up, but when it was announced that the doctor had arrived, along with the coroner, the prefect and the village notary, all of whom were needed to make out the death certificate, he went quickly out into the open
Outside it was a perfect day. The sky was so clear that it was almost blinding, very pale, white-grey rather than blue, and so savagely bright that it might have been trying to compete with the snow beneath.
So as not to remain surrounded by the crowd of weeping women, or be stared at by the village children who were gathered outside the house, he walked round to the side and took a path that led up the hill. It was already clear of snow and slightly muddy. After he had gone some hundred paces he found a bench under three young birch trees and sat down. Then he undid the sealed package.
Inside there were two envelopes and also a silver cigarette box with an inscription in gold: ‘The Ladies Prize, Debrecen, 1905’. He opened it and inside was a little pile of tobacco dust and a note which read ‘I leave you this as a personal souvenir. It is the only possession I value’ and underneath, in brackets, ‘You may think it ugly, so don’t use it if you don’t like it! Gazsi’.
In the larger of the two envelopes there was a long paper headed AMENDMENTS TO MY WILL below which was a precise list of his wishes for gifts to each of his servants, some other special provisions, and the fact that he wanted 1,000 crowns to be allotted for restoring the organ. These details had not been itemized in the Will held by the notary, though a lump sum had been set aside for them. The next paragraph dealt with arrangements for his funeral: he did not wish to be buried anywhere else but to be laid to rest somewhere in the garden near the house – and there was to be no memorial or epitaph. The last section dealt with his horses. Firstly he wrote that the little speckled gelding who was too old to work should be shot so that he would not fall into the hands of the gypsies in his old age. As to the thoroughbred mare Honeydew, Gazsi left her to Balint and asked him to take her away immediately. At the bottom of the page was that day’s date, the date of Gazsi’s death, and his signature, written in Gazsi’s large awkward writing.
The second letter was for Balint alone. Enclosed with it was Honeydew’s pedigree wrapped in a single sheet of writing paper, on which there were just a few lines about the mare. ‘As you agreed to let Honeydew foal at Denestornya,’ he had written, ‘I hope it isn’t presuming to ask you to keep her.’ Then followed a few light-hearted, joking phrases ending ‘… my sister is apt to be somewhat grasping, but I don’t feel she’d want this wonderful animal as she wouldn’t have much use for her!’ He ended with the words ‘Please don’t forget your promise about my nephews. I don’t want them to turn out like me’.
Poor Gazsi, thought