A World to Win Read online

  I smiled innocently as I said it, but they were busy exchanging unhappy glances. Count István obviously did have objections to Captain Zarescu, whether or not they had anything to do with the disreputable Lázár.

  Having thus cast a blight on the proceedings, I swallowed the last of my cheese and reached contentedly for an apple.

  I don’t enjoy being used — not without permission. I consider it rude.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “Miss Kettles,” Katalin burst out, almost as soon as the schoolroom door closed behind Zsuzsa and the children. “I have to speak to you.”

  “Yes?” I sat down at the recently cleared tea table, regarding her expectantly and not entirely seriously over my spectacles. She walked slowly towards me.

  “This afternoon — you — you suspect I planned it, to meet Alex — Captain Zarescu.”

  I sighed. “It’s none of my business.”

  She sank into the chair opposite me, frowning. “I know I was wrong to drag you into it...”

  “I would rather be asked.”

  “Of course. I’m sorry.” She looked at me from under her long, tangled lashes. “Will you tell my brother?”

  I said again, “It’s none of my business.”

  “It’s not even as if he’s my guardian,” she said eagerly. “I have a perfectly good father...”

  “And would he approve?” I asked sardonically.

  She opened her mouth, then closed it again and sighed. “No.”

  “I thought not. Oh, don’t worry — I have no occasion to speak to either of these gentlemen about you. Why on earth should I?” Katalin almost sagged with relief, so I took the opportunity provided by her temporary weakness to satisfy my own curiosity. “I would like to know why you need to meet him secretly,” I said as neutrally as I could. “Why is he so objectionable in your family’s eyes?”

  “Don’t you know?”

  I shrugged. “I suppose he is poor. And if he is a friend of Lajos Lázár, I presume his politics are — er — radical.”

  She sighed. “Both are true. And his father is a priest.”

  “So was mine,” I said, amused.

  “No, you don’t understand. He is an Orthodox priest. Alexandru is Romanian.”

  Bewildered, I heard the tragedy in her voice. “Is that bad?” I asked naively.

  “It is when I am a Magyar. Magyars despise Romanians as dirty, ignorant, lazy peasants.”

  I blinked. “I don’t believe anyone could so accuse Captain Zarescu!”

  “Of course not! He is a gentleman in every sense of the word! It is only antiquated prejudice. And, of course, the fact that Alex supports the Romanian nationalist movement makes it worse...”

  “You mean you are forbidden to speak to him simply because of his nationality?”

  “I may speak to him, I suppose, but I certainly may not marry him.” Her tone held bitterness now as well as profound unhappiness. I felt an uncharacteristic wave of sympathy.

  “You wish to marry him?”

  “More than anything in the world. But they wouldn’t let me, so all I can do is snatch clandestine meetings, like this afternoon’s.” She sighed again. “Do you think I’m behaving badly, Miss Kettles?”

  “Yes, I suppose you are,” I said, after a slight pause, “but to be honest, I don’t see what else you can do that isn’t worse.”

  Her face lit up with a quite enchanting smile. “I knew you would understand! I liked you as soon as I saw you! I can’t think how István came to employ anyone so sensible!”

  I shrugged. She was silent then for a time, deep in thoughts that were clearly not all pleasurable. At last, she looked at me again and took an audible breath. “I have no right to ask this of you, but — would you — perhaps — occasionally bring the children, and come with me to meet Alex? You see, I’m afraid Maria and István will get suspicious if I go out alone too often, and the children are such a wonderful excuse — there could be no talk against me if Alex and I were seen together with you, and them...”

  I met her gaze steadily. “No,” I said. “You have no right.”

  “But will you?” she persisted.

  I looked away, considering. I had my own reasons for wishing to disoblige her father, but I rather liked Katalin and encouraging her affair was likely to lead only to her greater hurt. On the other hand, I suspected she was already in far too deep to avoid pain.

  “How did you meet him?” I asked at last.

  She smiled. “He used to come to Szelényi when I was a child. He went to school in Kolozsvár, you see, and became friendly there with Lajos Lázár. The Lázárs are our people. Alex stayed with them sometimes at school holidays, and that was when Mattias and I were always hanging around Lajos, whenever we could escape from the castle — pestering him, I dare say! But he was always kind to us, and patient; he told us lots of things about the countryside and the animals, things we never knew. Lajos was different then: less — frightening.”

  I was intrigued to hear that he frightened her; I wondered if István’s excessive dislike stemmed from the same cause.

  Taking off my spectacles and calmly polishing them on my skirt, I said neutrally, “Exactly how terrifying are Mr Lázár’s politics?”

  “Oh, impossibly! He is a republican, he would abolish the king, the nobility, break up the Empire — he’d abolish the Church itself! Have you ever heard of the Young Hungary movement? They are outrageous radicals, aiming at nothing less than revolution — they say the poet Petöfi is their leader, but Lajos is certainly one of them!”

  Rather surprised by this passion, I put my spectacles back on and regarded her.

  “And Captain Zarescu?”

  “Oh no. Though I suppose he has some sympathy, feeling so strongly about the injustices of society. Anyhow, after we grew up, we didn’t meet for years till one evening we ran into each other in the theatre foyer in Pest. I knew him at once — it’s funny how instantly pleased I was to see him. Without thinking, I asked him to call — after all, he is an officer — and he did. Maria was polite to him, but I was advised not to encourage his encroaching ways — can you believe that?”

  I could.

  “Fortunately, Mattias began flirting with radical politics at university, and he met Alex in the Pilvax Café — which is where they all congregate to talk and swap their forbidden books! — and he used to bring him to the house sometimes.”

  She paused again. The Pilvax Café, I thought irrelevantly, was where one could usually find Lajos Lázár. Clearly it was a den of political vice, and to be avoided at all costs. Which was a pity in some ways, for although — naturally — I thoroughly disapproved of the enigmatic Lázár, I would not really have been averse to seeing him again. Accidentally, of course. It was true he disturbed me in some ill-defined way, but he also intrigued me, and I confess I wanted to know his opinion on a number of points, not least this of Magyar prejudice...

  Katalin was saying, “There’s no more to tell really. I fell in love with Alex and he with me, and when Mattias began to get wind of it he stopped inviting him to the house.”

  “His liberal politics didn’t extend that far?”

  “Only in thought,” she said, with a touch of contempt. “In practice, he wouldn’t dream of allowing a Romanian priest’s son to marry his sister. I can’t forgive him for that, you know. Whenever I remember it, I can’t bear to look at him.”

  She glanced at me from under her lashes again. It was a charming trick — I’m sure men everywhere would have offered her the world for a look like that. “So will you help me?”

  I, however, am female. And in any case I have always been immune. I regarded her thoughtfully.

  “Why don’t you just run away together? Marry him in spite of their disapproval.”

  Her eyes widened a little; she smiled. Her head even lifted as if she imagined herself proudly defying her family for love. But in the end, the smile died, and she shook her head ruefully.

  “No; we couldn’t. For one thin
g, my father would put a stop to Alexandru’s career prospects. He’s extremely vengeful about such things — I must tell you about my eldest sister one day...”

  “Oh?” I said calmly, though my heart was hammering in my breast.

  “Sofia. She was my half-sister, I never knew her, but Margit, my other half-sister remembers her. She ran away with a man my father disapproved of, and he never forgave her. He never spoke to her again, cut her off without a penny. And you see, that’s my other reason — I’m not really suited to a life of poverty.”

  I pulled myself together. “Not even to be with him?”

  “Oh, I’d try, but I know I would behave badly, and in the end, I’d drive him away. I have seen what irrational meanness can do to a marriage, to affection. I would do that, and I couldn’t bear it.”

  I wasn’t sure whether to despise her poor spirit or admire her unexpected insight. In the end I said only, “What happened to your half-sister, Sofia?”

  “I don’t know. He never speaks of her, but Margit thinks she’s dead.”

  I looked away. “Do you never think to find out?”

  “No,” she said with devastating simplicity. “None of us knew her, except Margit. She chose her life, as I must choose mine. I hope she was happy.”

  How magnanimous, I thought bitterly, but Katalin was already repeating urgently, “So will you help me?”

  I shrugged. “As well be hung for a sheep as a lamb,” I murmured.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Very well,” I said hastily, “I’ll do it.”

  “You angel!” she cried, enraptured. “My dear Miss Kettles — oh the devil, I can’t call you that now we are conspirators! May I call you Katie?”

  “If you wish,” I shrugged, but she was already dashing ahead.

  “I’ll move back here tomorrow — I usually do when István is home. Maria drives me mad after a few weeks.”

  I could believe it. My own endurance was considerably less.

  “So,” said Katalin brightly, “that should make everything easier.”

  Easier, I wondered, for whom?

  * * * *

  Well, my life may not have been simplified by the shouldering of Katalin’s problems, but it was certainly made more interesting.

  We had a positive spate of educational outings: to the new national Museum, to the beautiful old Matthias Church in Buda, and to the observatory on the Blockenberg Hill. We also went on a few rather less improving visits to The English Lord, which sold the best bonbons in the two cities. On all these expeditions, Katalin came with us, and at some stage was always joined by Alexandru Zarescu. They had very little privacy for lovers, but for the moment at least, just being together seemed to make them happy.

  What the family thought of Katalin’s sudden penchant for the governess’s company, I never found out. Frau Schmidt never said anything either, but as time passed and she came across Katalin in the school room more and more often, her expression of surprise was not entirely free of disapproval. Katalin, naturally, never noticed.

  Then, disaster struck.

  I was waiting for the children to finish the work I had set them, occupying my time by gazing out of the window at the sand storm rushing down the street. Pest is subject to these commotions, when the sand blows off the Great Plain and into the town, sometimes totally obliterating the streets for minutes at a time. The storms leave little piles of sand everywhere — even inside the house if you’re not fast enough in shutting the window, as I had learned from experience.

  I enjoyed watching this phenomenon, so I was not entirely pleased when Katalin came bursting in to the schoolroom. Naturally, the children were immediately distracted and I had to speak to them severely to make them continue, before dragging Katalin to the other side of the room to let her tell me her problem.

  “He can’t come today,” she said tragically, waving a letter in front of my eyes and then snatching it back as she recalled the private nature of its contents. I hadn’t known they wrote to each other as well — they really were indiscreet.

  “Can’t he?” I said with a touch of impatience. “Never mind — it’s happened before. You’ll see him tomorrow or the next day instead.”

  “No.” She shook her head; tears were glistening on the ends of her lashes. “He’s going away.”

  “Away? Where?”

  “Oh I don’t know — Vienna, I think. Only for a few weeks, but it seems so long, Katie!”

  “Well, when is he going?”

  “Tomorrow morning. He says I can send him a letter tonight at the Pilvax Café...”

  The Pilvax again. Meeting place of radicals and revolutionaries. I gazed a little blindly at the children, trying to talk myself out of it. At last I said, “Where had you planned to go tonight?”

  “Oh, some party, but I’ve already cried off. I can’t face it. I said I had a cold.”

  She wasn’t a very credible liar — I had never seen anyone look healthier. I regarded her thoughtfully. “Then you could go to the Pilvax,” I said.

  She stared back at me. “Go to the...” she began in amazement, and broke off. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously. Who would know you?”

  “Mattias if he’s there! But no, he’s going to that party with István and Elisabeth.”

  “Well then,” I said reasonably.

  I heard her breath catch. “I could, couldn’t I?” she murmured. I nodded, and she seized my hand. “You’d come with me, Katie?”

  “I suppose I’d better, to save your honour.”

  Her honour, at the expense of mine, I thought wryly. At least in my own eyes.

  * * * *

  I had dinner as usual with Ferenc and Frau Schmidt, excusing myself early on the grounds of letters which had to be written. I was becoming an adept liar.

  My one evening gown was quickly donned. It was no longer new and, as Aunt Edith had pointed out when I had insisted on buying it, it was quite impractical, being made of cream-coloured silk, but I had always liked it for it was both simple and elegant in shape, innocent of the excessive flounces so much in fashion, and with only moderate petticoats. And, now that I seemed to have recovered my health and spirits, its paleness brought out the colour in my cheeks in a way I thought not wholly unattractive.

  In a fit of vanity, I threaded a bright red ribbon through my hair, and was rather doubtfully admiring its effect in the glass when Katalin burst into the room, resplendent in her plainest evening gown — which, of course, cast mine into the shade in any terms you can think of — and holding a velvet cloak over her arm.

  “Are you ready, Katie? Do hurry!”

  I met her eyes in the mirror and sighed. “Do you really want the entire household to know that you left the house with the governess at this time of the evening? I think that might be carrying eccentricity too far.”

  “Oh.”

  No doubt her maid had dressed her too, in the full knowledge of her “cold” and her refusal to attend tonight’s party.

  “Quite,” I said. “Can you — er — creep out? Wait for me round the corner and we’ll find a fiacre.”

  In Buda-Pest, fiacres are rather smart vehicles drawn by two surprisingly small horses. Unfortunately, in the spring and summer they are open carriages, so we had to trust in the darkness and Katalin’s hood to hide her memorable countenance.

  “The Pilvax Café,” I told the driver as we got in, and he seemed to know where I meant.

  We bounded into motion, leaving my stomach well behind. It was only a short drive, which caught me unawares, for I had just had the belated thought that two unaccompanied ladies entering such a place — exactly what sort of a place was it? — might well be leaving themselves open to unwelcome interest or even insult.

  However, situated in a broad, tree-lined boulevard, it looked respectable enough from the outside. Katalin showed an irritating tendency to cling to me as, typically, she left me to pay the driver.

  “Do you think we should?” she whispered. />
  “He’s your lover,” I said baldly. “Make up your mind.”

  I almost thought she would back out; I found I was holding my breath, but as the fiacre sped off in a cloud of dust and sand, she straightened her shoulders and marched forward. I couldn’t help feeling it would have been a shocking anti-climax to have crept cravenly home.

  A liveried doorman bowed to us respectfully as he ushered us in. Though I looked at him quite hard, I could see no speculation or disapproval in his face, so I murmured thanks and swept past him.

  Both coffee-house and restaurant, the Pilvax was a large, open hall with vaulted ceilings, bright and well-lit. Tonight it was busy, but I was relieved to see the company did not consist solely of men. In fact it seemed to be quite unexceptionable, even fashionable, despite the few threadbare coats I spotted in among the sartorial elegance.

  A waiter hurried to meet us.

  “Captain Zarescu?” I asked him, since Katalin appeared to be temporarily dumb.

  “Certainly, Madame, this way, if you please,” he said cheerfully, and much to my relief. He led us towards one of the long tables, at which a group of young men sat with the remains of a meal and some wine, and various pieces of paper scattered about. With the aid of my invaluable spectacles, I picked out the Captain quite easily.

  He was idly playing with the stem of his glass and smiling faintly at the man next to him when the waiter spoke to him. Not unnaturally, his face expressed surprise as he looked up at us — but that was nothing to his amazement when he saw who his uninvited guests were.

  His chair ground on the floor as he swung it back and stood up. Two strides brought him to us and his hand was almost crushing Katalin’s.

  “Why, what is this? What brings you here?”

  Meanwhile I was quickly scrutinizing his companions. Some of them glanced at us with only minor curiosity; some didn’t even stop talking. They were a mixed looking group, but only Captain Zarescu was in uniform. The others were plainly and rather casually dressed for Hungarians, without any of the emblems of nobility which I had become used to.

  Lajos Lázár, I had realized at once, was not among them. I didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed, but something had gone from the evening.