A L ovely Tale of

P hotography
A Lovely Tale of Photography
•
a film novella
•
Péter Nádas

translated from the Hungarian by

imre goldstein

Twisted Spoon Press

prague • 1999
 Copyright © 1995 by Jelenkor Publishers
Translation copyright © 1999 by Imre Goldstein
Illustration copyright © 1999 by Daniel Heinrich

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used

or reproduced in any form, except in the context of reviews,
without permission from the publisher.

isbn 80 902171 6 8
 to András M. Monory

With the use of texts by Jean-Anthelme

Brillat-Savarin, Albert Camus, Helen
Hessel, David Hume, György Petri,
Bertrand Russell, and Adalbert Stifter.
time machine Ungainly bird, a helicopter is flying over the
roofs of the city now sinking into dusk. Flocks of sparrows and
pigeons start up and scatter. Rising and sinking; the chopper is
peering into narrow canyons of darkening streets. It glances into
a belfry just as the swaying bell clangs against the rigid clapper,
but the ringing is swallowed up by the noise of the rotating
blades. Seeing itself reflected in closed skylights, the chopper
peeks into rooms through open windows; it keeps passing and
returning to the same places as if searching for something, but
after each attempt it moves on, dissatisfied, unable to find what
it’s looking for.
Antennae, chimneys, scaly surface of roof tiles. In one room
a woman is setting the table; a teen-aged boy enters cautiously,
hugs the woman from behind, kisses her neck, and immediately
gets a resounding slap in the face. The boy’s lips part in amaze-
ment, but are swiftly pounced upon by the woman’s parted lips.
Then: an abandoned atelier in which thirty-two cats are sitting
and lying about, motionless; a roof terrace where some people
have gathered for an evening reception. The chopper is looking
for a face, a shoulder, a talking mouth; excitedly searching for
something, a smile, a clandestine handshake, the rising bubbles
in a slim champagne glass; looking for something, anything,
animate or inanimate, but it must move on. It keeps circling.
Descending now, it sends wet dripping sheets aflutter; it sees an
untidy garret, in which a young man is sprawled on his bed, then
it looks into a bathroom where a very old man, all skin and bones,
is standing in the bathtub, his stiff body motionless under the
water gushing from the showerhead, while a young girl, wash-
cloth in hand, is bending over, soaping, rubbing, bathing the

9
ancient body. The chopper is becoming more and more agitated.
Back to the party on the roof; gyrating, whipping up the air;
the whirling gusts muss up the women’s coiffures, knock a tray
full of champagne glasses out of the hands of a desperately bal-
ancing waiter; total panic ensues; among the fleeing, thronging
bodies the chopper finds no one it could seize. It flies on, leaving
in its wake the peaceful rooftops, the silence of twilight over the
city. A cat creeps up to a skylight, peers in.

picturetime Dead-still roofs, silent dusk, mute cat’s eyes.

Tiny click. The camera’s bladed iris is shutting down.
The cat moves on.

voice and movement There is a voice.

“On a nice, moonlit June night, a tomcat was walking on the
roof.”
There is a young man who lets go of the cord of the self-timer,
lifts the magazine out of the camera, slips in a new one, returns to
the bed and, all dressed up, plops down on it.
He has another, more brooding, voice.
“I waited, who knows how long I’d waited, and for what, what
kind of miracle. For hours I’d waited in the window of the untidy
garret. I was waiting for my agitation to subside, I was waiting for
the hand on the clock, for the moment that would finally stop.
The moment when, with perfect emotional equilibrium, I could
put an end to my short and unsuccessful life. I was waiting for the
hour, for the moment in which at last all the fighting words would
die in me, sentences would no longer boom or make music; when
I no longer talk, for there is no talking, no one talks, not with

10
God, not God himself, not with my lover, not my lover; when no
one remains, only the picture. The roofs, the moon, only the
movement which I make. Which I make. The kind of movement
a beaver-tailed roof tile makes as it falls from on high. Nothing
else.”
And he also has a rational voice.
“That’s not the way things happen. He would like to stand by
his open window but chooses, instead, to lie abed. He is agitated
precisely because the jumbled sentences, questions and answers,
are buzzing and booming, words chase and crush other words, all
adding up to what cannot be achieved. Imagination playing with
imaginary images. He could jack off, come in his own hand. Or
maybe he should get up and plant himself permanently in the
kind of picture he would like to see himself in. And like that,
while holding that fixed position, should his final hour be drawn
out until dawn; his final image should be his own darkness. This
ought to be the last effort, as well as the last refuge, of his will.
Nothing else should remain.”
In the meantime he has struggled to his feet and is now scat-
tering photographs and negatives in the wind; some get stuck
momentarily on the eaves then continue their fall. He turns the
camera toward the open window, focuses, takes up his position in
front of the lens and, offering up his full figure, now wrapped in
nearly total darkness, opens the shutter.
“And now I mustn’t move anymore; or now I can move all I
want. There should be nothing else but what there is.”

romance In a garret above the houses across the narrow street,

the flame of a single candle is flickering in the draft. The head of

11
a pale little boy on the pillow, his matted hair clinging to his fore-
head. Perhaps he’ll never be able to raise his lids again. The young
mother, sitting at the edge of the bed, is holding the boy’s tiny
birdlike hand. His body is shaken by occasional dry coughs, and
each time he coughs it appears as if he might look up, but he
doesn’t. When the attack subsides, his lids also stop quivering.
“Never again, never, never.”
The tiny hand falls back, lifeless; the mother runs to the open
window.
“Help me, God, if you exist. If you exist, help me. Who exists,
if you don’t? Or if you don’t exist, who will help? Help me, some-
body, anybody, man, animal, spirits, ghosts, devil, or angel, help
me now, be my strength for me!”
The little boy is pale, motionless. In the dark window across
the street, the young man moves out of the frame.
“Let nothingness go on recording nothingness.”
Takes his coat. Descends the dark spiral staircase. Standing in
the dead moonlit street, he knocks. A disheveled serving girl, her
lips parted, and cupping a candle flame, opens the gate. Two fig-
ures are hurrying on the dead, moonlit street; the young man in
front, the doctor behind him, their hasty steps make no sound.
Candle light rising on the wall of the dark spiral staircase.
Knocking, banging; the heart is pounding, the mouth is panting
loudly; then all sounds cease.
The doctor gently peels the mother off the little boy’s body.
He says nothing, but he does have a voice.
“First of all, the fever must be brought down.”
The mother folds back the cover. The young man dips a clean
white sheet into a washbowl of water, squeezes it out. The doctor

12
lifts up the small naked body, the young man and the mother
spread out the wet sheet. The doctor lowers the body. Four hands
fold the sheet back, smoothing it over the body. The doctor’s fin-
gers pry open the boy’s lids. White. No eyes.
“Then we must bring down the blood pressure. Terrible pulse.”
On the wet sheet over the wet body, leeches are filling up,
growing fat. The mother shrieks, runs to the window, the young
man hurls himself after her, holding her back.
There is a voice.
“A beautiful female body fell lifelessly into my arms, but only
its pain became mine.”
“He’s looked up, he is alive.”
“No, this is death, my dear lady.”
“All the same, I thank you, dear God.”

end of the romance A scream fills the night. But it’s over.
The mother lets go of the little boy’s dead hand, stands up,
takes the candlestick, shadows flicker across the garret walls as she
goes. She puts the candle in the window but the draft immedi-
ately extinguishes the flame.
And the window across the narrow street is also dark. In the
meantime the moon has risen high in the sky. And the young man
is standing naked and motionless by the window, in front of the
open lens of his camera.
He has a voice.
“I thank you, God, for not having to live through these coming
years. Everyone who, according to your wishes, won’t have to live
through them, owes you gratitude.”
And he has another voice, too.

13
 “As for me, I was waiting for daybreak, but could not suppress
my imagination. Dawn is coming, the moon is high, sensitive
silver grains are recording my mortal shadow. Je suis mort et je
suis toujours vivant. Love is a beautiful angel, but for the devoted,
betrayed heart it’s the angel of death. Rotten sentences. These
unchanging sentences. And while I’m thinking these rotten sen-
tences, the flame is sparked. My soul is with you, may it go up in
flames.”

rising in his soul Stupendous hissing; a deafening blast of

ignition accompanied first by sounds of implosions then by an
even, howling whistle. Beneath the balloon’s mouth the fire is
crackling, the balloon is filling up fast, growing taut, tightening
its moorings, as if to tear itself away from the earth.
The balloonist manages to outshout these infernal noises.
“To the hilt! What’s the pressure? More, more, give it more!
Got to be tight to the limit!”
From the gondola the voice of the very old man replies.
“It’s not there yet. I’ll tell you when.”
And there is another voice which those present, so busy in this
hazy morning twilight, naturally cannot hear.
“Though my nerves were stretched to the limit, I could no
longer control myself. And curse my will, too, yes, let it be cursed
forever. Only the prick is left — screw that, too. The only thing
I can still hold on to is my own prick. If my soul torments me like
this, why should pleasure be the solution, why can’t I, by simply
deciding to, take the life of my body? Why the will, of all
things? why should everything fail because of one’s will? And
then only fate would remain, blind fate? But who can put up

14
with so much humiliation, call it fate! from one’s own body?”
Leather sacks and wooden crates are lifted into the gondola.
Among the busy figures in the vast field, two young women are
standing still. The younger one, next to her lightweight plate
camera, is wearing a fur coat and an enormous hat fastened with
ribbons under her chin; her companion, at least ten years older, is
dressed in decidedly masculine garb. Some distance from them
stands a footman holding a tray with three champagne glasses.
While he hastens toward the women, the balloonist is being
helped into his pelisse.
“This is the last moment, dear Kornélia, you can still change
your mind.”
“Baron, please, see to my camera.”
The camera is lifted into the gondola.
The balloonist offers his hand to Kornélia, they start off on
the soppy grass, the footman follows with the glasses; Kornélia
and the baron get in. The graybeard, now leaning over the instru-
ments to check the air pressure, may be the very old man we saw
earlier while he was being washed in the bathroom. He nods; eve-
rything is all right. The side of the gondola is secured. The
balloonist reaches over, takes one of the champagne glasses, hands
it to Kornélia, then another to the studious-looking aged man,
and finally he raises his own glass above theirs.
“Well, then, adieu, old planet earth. Cast off the lines!”
In a terrible racket, the airship is shaking; the passengers
empty their glasses and toss them out of the gondola.
“Hold on, Kornélia, the earth won’t let go of us easily. But
first, do let down your veil!”
Shaking, jolting, the airship slowly rises, leaving the ground.

15
this, too, is a picture Above roofs and chimneys, in the
grainy vastness, a blurry, wind-driven, tiny airship. Its balloon is
swimming past the frame of the picture.

the vacant air There is a stray voice in this dazzling morn-

ing brilliance; now it is an ecstatic, doleful, distant cry.
“Those who want the future, jerk off into the wild blue
yonder.”
Kornélia wipes off her tears.
“You are crying, Kornélia.”
“It is as if I couldn’t speak. Perhaps I am happy. I do not know.
But also sad, at the same time. How I would have loved to have
brought everything with us, everything that we are now leaving
behind. Not to have had to make choices.”
“If I were to seal your words onto your lips, your happiness
could be my happiness, your sorrow my own. I’d simply drink
your tears. And what is not happening now, the way we are, would
last forever.”
“Be not discontented, dear baron. My gratitude is already ever-
lasting. But if you were to carry out what you have just proposed,
I’d have to rebuke you.”
There being no way out of their little game, they both break
into laughter; and then the game is resumed.
“Having entrusted your life to an aeronaut, you must learn the
rules of the air. You cannot possibly know them yet. There is still
so much I must teach you.”
“Only those who are knowledgeable are capable of learning.
And women are so ignorant. I’d rather you secured my camera
and equipment. That is something tangible.”

16
 “Are you advising me to be cautious?”
“I’d like to get started.”
“Gradually I’ll come to know your intentions.”
“Ever higher, ever farther. There should be no word, feeling,
or gesture that we wouldn’t observe from a bird’s-eye view.”
“And that is what you’d call tangible.”
“That, and nothing else.”
“It seems that, instead of raising us aloft, the wind is pressing
our ship down. And the rest is yet to come.”

the picture of the earth Everything we see is still

familiar to us. Wagon train on the dusty morning road; Gypsies.
Escorted by a few men on horseback; women on foot. Under
rags, their arms around one another, the children are still asleep
in the wagons. The shadow of the balloon slowly swims across
them, but down there they don’t notice it. There is some commo-
tion, maybe everybody is yelling, but that cannot be heard up
here. What’s visible is not necessarily audible. Above and below,
heaven and earth, are very different things.
An expectant mother from one of the wagons is taken to a
roadside shrub by the rest of the women. From up here, the shrub
hides nothing. The woman lies down, her skirt is lifted, she pulls
her outstretched legs up to her neck, the others bend over her. A
knife flashes in the sunlight, perhaps ready to cut the umbilical
cord. Then: a forest, a meadow, plough-land, river, a small creek.
Everything stationary is moving.
“The air current is changing. I guess it’s time to take out
Section Two of the map, my dear baron.”
“I’m studying it already.”

17
 The current thrusts the ship into an air-pocket. Kornélia,
chopping time into seconds, records everything she is breaking
away from.

in the storm As if a matte glass had slipped in front of the

camera’s matte glass. Clouds are rushing by. And there is a voice.
“It must have been some great ambition that has driven me
here. Still, I whisper all my words to you. I’ve become deaf, like
the clouds. You’ve remained deaf to my words, like the earth. You
cannot hear a single word of mine. Never so close, my dear, my
darling, yet ever farther away. I’m flying, perhaps I’m dying.
Brave Hungarian maiden, the first to take aerial photos of the
earth; you will be able to tell her story.”
The lens can no longer separate dimness from dimness. The
airship is quaking, shaking, lurching in sudden thrusts; dull,
hollow, silence; dripping. They can’t make out each other, hardly
a word passes between them.
Kornélia turns her back to this bottomless dimness and,
holding on to the rim of the gondola, keeps walking around, des-
perately, helplessly.
As if her nose, ears, and mouth had been stuffed with wet
cotton. When she gets back to her camera a thought seems to
stop her, but then, compensating for the jolts and tugs, she gropes
further.
“Be a man, Kornélia.”
“What should I be afraid of?”
“Voilà, l’enfer et le ciel en une. This is my realm. Look at it,
look around, there is no way you can escape from here.”
“That is how I wanted it. I willed it.”

18
 “The worst we have to fear is lightning. But don’t be so con-
ceited, no one is asking you about your will.”
Distant lightning illuminates the impenetrable dimness, the
thunderclap rattles the gondola as it is hurled on, accompanied by
the rumbling noise.
“There, you see, that’s how it happens. And if it had been a
little stronger, you wouldn’t be hearing anything anymore.”
“You won’t frighten me. I could not wish for a more beautiful
death than this.”
And the voice of the other replies.
“If at least one plate would remain, of all the plates of your
camera. After a crash like this no word and no plate remains. But
if one, a single one, did. And I know you won’t kill yourself
because of me, because you’re a coward.”
Silently they’re flying into nothingness.
“Where are we, baron?”
“If there were no clouds we should see the bay of Trieste.
Look down, you can’t see anything. Knowledge is greater.”
“What are you doing, Mister Engineer?”
“Taking cloud samples, Miss.”
“And to what use will you put them?”
“I make a note that I have taken this sample at such and such
a place, I analyze it, and draw conclusions, but as to what use, I
don’t ask such questions. I’ll just say that above the bay of Trieste,
in a southwesterly wind of thirty-two knots, at such and such a
time, at such an altitude, this was the water content of the sample,
and that it also contained such and such other matters, like grains
of sand, or pollen.”
“Pollen.”

19
 “I ascertain that this pollen is of a flower found only on the
rocky plateaux of the Apennines, while the sand has got here,
most likely, from the southeastern region of Tunis. As to what
happened on the plateaux, and when, that’s something the mete-
orological records will tell. I have to collect these dates and data,
compare them, note our altitude and velocity.”
“It is like trying to scoop out the ocean with a spoon. But what
conclusions can you draw if there are no two identical clouds? Or
are there?”
“Listen to me, Miss. First of all, since I do not determine what
exists and what does not, I neither claim that there are two iden-
tical clouds, nor that there are not. I merely gather data. And
should I feel like comparing some of this data, I would come up
with identical characteristics, or with differences and similarities.
That’s all there is to the world, Miss, that and nothing more.”
“No law, no God?”
“For anybody with such questions I have only one question of
my own: are you ready for breakfast?
“In such a terrible storm?”
The engineer laughs heartily.
“This storm, Miss, at our speed, will last only two more min-
utes, exactly.”
“Now how could you possibly know that?”
“I just do.”

above all the clouds “White on white.”

“What? What are you doing?”
“I am photographing white on white, do you understand?”
“I would like to see your face. You seem so pale, so white.

20
Please raise your veil. This request is made not by a man in love,
but by a concerned balloonist.”
“I’d have a much more prosaic request, baron.”
“I’d be honored if at last you called me by my name. And
insulted, if you refused.”
“Si je voulais vous demander ce que l’on fera quand je devrai
faire pipi, il serait peut-être vraiment mieux placé de vous appeler
mon cher Richard.”
Kornélia now does lift her veil, the better to see the flashing
white teeth of the baron who is laughing hard. Their lips meet for
a second.
“Dans ce trou, ici, ma petite. And we shall properly turn
around.”
“And also plug up your ears.”
“My silly little dear. In space, your tiny trickle will not tinkle.”

still higher, still farther “Come, Kornélia, look.”

“Excuse me, Richard, I think I’d be scared to look back at the
earth now.”
“But you could observe so many things by looking through the
cracks in the clouds.”
Fighting her dizziness, Kornélia prefers to stare ahead, into the
dense blueness. The engineer, his legs tucked under him, is crouch-
ing among the instruments, jotting down data in his notebook.
“Just as expected in this position. Exactly as we had figured,
milord.”
“Then we’ve reached the trade-winds?”
“Yes, precisely. I suppose we could lighten our load by another
sack.”

21
 “First I’d like to know what the altimeter says.”
“We’re at fourteen hundred feet.”
“But don’t forget, now it’s not just the two of us. Would you
mind telling me what our speed is?”
“I’d rather not.”
In the deadly silence only the muted snapping and rustling of
the cords can be heard.
“But if the Miss would care to look into the baron’s telescope,
she could see the peak of the Jungfrau slipping under us. And our
velocity is increasing. Not a cloud anywhere. Personally, I see no
danger in this fast current.”
Kornélia does not move, she even turns her head away from
the other two as if not hearing, or rather, not wanting to hear
them. Doctors exchange words in this way, over the patient’s bed.
“And do take into consideration the dangers of tolerance.”
“I was counting on only the two of us, milord.”
“Is this a rebuke?”
“A mere wish, sir, not even approaching a demand.”
The baron leaves his telescope, and, as if acting against his
own better judgment, empties the contents of a small sandbag
into the air.
“The effect is immediately registered.”
“Meaning?”
“Higher by six hundred.”
“Velocity?”
“High. Very high. Maybe you can help her through it with a
hot cup of coffee.”
Kornélia slowly lets herself slide down the side of the gondola;
shivering, she gathers her fur coat about herself and tries not to

22
let the two men see how her fever is shaking her body, or hear the
chattering of her teeth. She would like to lean her head forward,
rest it on her knees, but doing so makes her dizzy and nauseous.
In the meantime, the balloonist pours some strong coffee into a
closed pot which he places inside a larger pot that has quicklime
in it. He fills up the larger pot with water. The powdered lime
begins to sizzle, growing hot and heating the smaller pot.
“Listen, Kornélia. Don’t be afraid. Vous avez toujours du
courage.”
He pours some rum into the cup while also warming his numb
hands.
“J’ai boucoup de courage.”
“Will you take it from me, or should I help you drink it?”
“I think I’m very dizzy. But I’m even more ashamed of my
weakness.”
“You’ll get your strength back in no time.”
Kornélia does not budge, she seems to be staring straight
ahead; then slowly she tips to the side and remains that way. The
balloonist does not know what to do. He can’t put the coffee
down, yet he has to prop up Kornélia. The cup turns over, its
contents spill, trickling through the weaves of the gondola.
The face is deathly pale, telltale drops of bloody dew are
appearing on the whitened lips.
“Engineer, open the valves immediately.”
“Rub her, smack her, look at her fingernails, pour water on her.”
“Even if I did all that, it wouldn’t do.”
“If we can’t gain ten minutes, there will be death on the peaks.”
“If you won’t, I’ll do it myself.”
The balloonist grabs the silk valve line.

23
 “If it won’t close up again then we’re really in for it. Open it
for just a second.”
The valves open for a single second, close back up, and the
balloon is driven further above the craggy peaks.
It plunges again.
“For God’s sake, that’s enough!”

pictures of a peaceful parlor Formidable, desolate

cliffs. Waterfall cascading off the rocky walls. Flood-tide, water
whipped into various colors by a whirlpool. Bud-covered branches
reaching up; lazily spreading water lilies on the mirror-smooth
surface. The legs of a water bug sinking into the skin of the water.
Willows on the shore. Dusty road in the crimson twilight. Night
lanterns in the depth of the forest. Ghostly figures, apparitions.
The lady companion touches the young man’s arm.
“Das gnädige Fräulein läßt sich entschuldigen, und bittet den
Herrn um Geduld. Since she regained consciousness, and her
health, she never leaves the darkroom.”
“I can assure you that my patience knows no limit.”
“I must confess that mine is rather limited. Perhaps it would
be best if you simply left your calling card.”
“Sie werden mich entschuldigen, if I will not comply. If only
I could see her, only for just one moment. Then I’d leave, imme-
diately. I beg you, grant me this one moment.”
“I hope you understand that I must protect her from any new
emotional upheaval.”
“I shall be most careful.”
“You don’t mind if I’ll be the same.”
“I do understand.”

24
picture exchange Winter garden crammed with tropical
plants. Finches and parrots in fancy cages. Outside, a dry late-
summer stormy wind is blowing under the clear sunny sky, its
gusts burst into the garden, flapping the leaves, tendrils, and
branches of the plants.
A solitary, smooth, raw-wood table stands inside the winter
garden; there are only two chairs around it, now occupied by
Kornélia and Károly. They sit so far apart that they have to keep
standing up and bending over the table as they slide photographs
to each other; they take turns, in strict order, handling one pic-
ture at a time. No matter how great our curiosity, only from their
words are we allowed to guess what might be on the pictures. In
the course of their conversation the respective piles in front of
them slowly change places.
“I have never managed to capture the dawn so beautifully
before. With words it is downright hopeless. From now on, I
believe, I shall be your pupil, Miss.”
“Henriette hoped that I’d change my mind, while the baron
was urging me on. In a word, I think it was all the work of chance;
therefore, your praise should rather go to him.”
“As for me, I was hoping for both eventualities: that you stay
with me, and that I’d see you f ly away. One lives through
unspeakable torments when one knows what one should want,
but it is shrouded in mystery whether one should wish what one
wants so much.”
“So this is your room, your bed. I’m admiring your pictures, as
a loyal pupil, at the same time I’m bored with your philosophy.
How crude this is, how lonely, how touching.”
“At the very hour when I thought that my sun had set forever.

25
Never thought I’d be able to reveal it to you.”
“The most we can talk about is what our cameras have seen,
certainly not what you or I have seen at the same moment.”
“Yet the moment, when two shutters open, still binds us.”
“I’d say it increases the gap even more. Just as on this one
here, for example, where you see not so much a road but rather
my own self-consciousness.”
“The sky, it seems, has no details, only the grains are enlarged
over the vastness. I can give you the night in exchange.”
“Please, no picking and choosing. Do not hide that one,
either.”
“I wouldn’t want to offend your sense of decency.”
“You will, by being secretive.”
“This is a naked male body. If it weren’t only a picture I’d
throw myself at your mercy, but that’s all it is, a picture.”
“I would never have thought that so little light could create
something like this.”
“Still, you are blushing. I am the one who should be ashamed.
But I must confess I am enjoying my shamelessness.”
“Perhaps it is admiration that colors my face. You stand facing
God, while I record only His clouds. How timid and untalented I
am. Please, excuse me for a moment.”
Slowly and stealthily she gets up, rounds the table, and step-
ping softly she hurries to the door and quickly opens it. Károly
also kicks the chair out from under him. Henriette is standing
behind the door, and she has probably overheard everything.
“Don’t stammer.”
“I haven’t said a word.”
“Don’t answer back, speak when spoken to.”

26
 “I’m not even moving.”
“We shall try to speak louder. So you won’t miss anything.”
Kornélia shuts the door, letting her hand rest on the doorknob
for a second.
“I’m suffocating in this jail.”
She rounds the table again, as if to sit down, but she walks past
her chair.
“If I can’t fly, at least I should have crashed. Why did I not
perish, dear God? Why didn’t I explode of this inner pressure?
My body is a prison, my rooms are prisons.”
Károly would like to rush to her aid, but he does not know
what to do.
“I lock up my birds, keep them in prison. On this miserable
planet everyone is a jailer. I have my own jailer, you see? but I
keep guard over my jailer. My jailer is also being guarded, and I’m
left guarding my birds. And where would you lock me up, if you
could free me?”
“Should I take my leave now?”
“Open the cage.”
“No, I cannot do that.”
“Forgive me. I’m suffocating. I must be a sight, but please,
don’t go.”
She touches the hesitating man’s arm.
“It’s too beautiful a sight — when you are so angry. I do under-
stand you.”
“Once you gave me some friendly advice regarding my life
being an imitation of men’s lives. It was harsh and insulting, that
I remember. I was offended. Please repeat it.”
“Let’s drop it. It was mere foolishness on my part. I am still

27
ashamed of having been so haughty. Back then I was aware nei-
ther of your courage nor of my own cowardice.”
Their hands and arms begin to intertwine.
“You would have been a coward if you had thrown your life
away for me. And I’d be courageous now if I threw myself on your
body. My weak, enervated body. Even the sky thrust me away
from itself. What else would I wish for, how should I go about
wishing? Down here I am a prisoner, I am locked up, I cannot get
free, and I’m unable to die.”
“Do not talk like that, Kornélia.”
“Say my name again, Karol.”
Károly locks her in his arms, but the girl’s head, as if fright-
ened by the approaching lips, draws back. Her eyes close, her lips
turn white. The light body grows heavy in the masculine arms
and, driven by some inner force, begins to convulse.
Losing their balance, they fall, taking the chair with them,
their bodies thump, their heads bang on the floor. Henriette
rushes in.
Kornélia is emitting terrifying little sounds, her body is
writhing in chaotic rhythms. Without any further ado, Henriette
sits on top of the prostrate body and with a practiced gesture
reaches into the half-open mouth; her fingers grasp the root of
the tongue, preventing it from slipping back into the throat. The
body is writhing rhythmically underneath her.

train ride into the night Clatter, and more clatter.

Reflected in the window, the blue beams of night lamps are
dancing. Henriette, with her mouth open, is sound asleep. The
picture is shaken as the train jounces over switches. Like a thief,

28
Kornélia rises. Henriette starts for a brief second, Kornélia
quickly sits down. And again the clatter, only the clatter.
And there is her own voice.
“I know he is waiting for me. Or accompanying me.”
And there is another voice, which replies.
“I’ve accompanied her. I’m on her trail, I won’t budge.”
Again her own voice.
“Here he is, being rattled along with me, in this terrible night.”
And again the other voice replies.
“I can see her through the darkness. I can sense the fragrance
of her lips. I faint into my tumescence just by thinking of her.”
When Kornélia makes another effort to get up, trying not
even to cast a shadow on the sleeping Henriette, the latter stirs
again. With her hat in her hand, Kornélia freezes.
Henriette’s narrow, dry face sinks back into the clatter. Her
hands nestle into her lap, her fingers are twitching from the steady
rattling. Blissful little whimpers escape her lips. Clatter, clatter.

clandestine tryst Free at last, Kornélia is staggering,

stumbling forward in the empty corridor. From the walls of the
compartments her body is hurled against the window of the car.
The dim light of the gas lamps sways along with her every move.
Before leaving the luxurious first class carriage, she puts on her
hat and lowers her veil. One can see into the second class com-
partments, there are no curtains. Sleeping merchants. Fleshy
necks, strands of hair stuck to foreheads, rings embedded in thick
fingers, parted lips, and bad teeth.
From the far end of the corridor a young sleepy waiter, holding
a cup of tea, is staggering toward her.

29
 “Le thé, c’est pour vous, Madame?”
“Non, merci. Pas pour moi.”
“Au diable. Je ne sais plus qui en a commandé.”
The third class coaches are empty. On the very last bench a
small boy is sleeping, and past him there is only the end of the
train. Kornélia hesitantly stops by the boy, looks at him for a long
time, and is about to turn back when in the doorway leading to
the rear platform she catches sight of the young man’s familiar
profile.
Károly is looking out into the night. His face is a motionless
picture; only the train is rattling. Kornélia steps outside. Károly
slowly turns his head toward her.
“You didn’t think I would leave you.”
“I saw you getting on after us.”
“I expected you to wave back.”
“I’m following my father’s orders.”
“I know.”
“I’m engaged to the baron.”
“A stricter command is written in your soul.”
“I cannot want what I would want.”
“That alone is reason enough why I cannot part with you. To
keep reminding you of it.”
“You must part with me. Do not remind me of anything any-
more.”
“That’s how paternal sternness turns into your own command.”
“That is correct.”
“And then it’s all over.”
“What is over, Karol, is what has not even begun. Our dreams
should be over. I cannot want it in any other way.”

30
 “No, Kornélia. You’ll see: when you deny me, that’s when you
are dreaming.”
“Let’s not waste any more words on this.”
“That’s what I think, too.”
Károly opens the door of the coach. Outside, the night is
rushing by.
“May God be with you, Kornélia. The dream will continue,
Kornélia.”
And he jumps out of the train. The wind rushes in; Kornélia is
shaking, staggering, trying to hold on with both hands.
And there is a voice.
“Like this, then.”
And there is another voice.
“No, don’t say that I’m dreaming. I want to wake up, though
I’m dreaming. Not like this!”
And there is a voice.
“What ‘not like this’?”
And there is another voice.
“If that’s how the devil wanted it.”
Not only is her body shaking, along with the train’s rattle, but
also something within her body. She slumps to the floor of the
platform, rolls over, her head hangs off the steps, frothy saliva
drips down her lips; the wind catches her hat and the night whisks
it away.

camera obscura Sun penetrates the room only through a

tiny hole, around which the slats seem to glow white; the upside-
down image gently undulates on the opposite wall: a giant oak,
the poplars, the park. Sounds of a church bell nearby, the last

31