Eyes Like the Sea Part 41

The second sort of truth is that which pleases me, but doesn't please my friend.

The third sort of truth is that which pleases neither my friend nor myself, and which brings us to loggerheads at once. Let me ill.u.s.trate what I mean.

To take number one first, I might have said to friend Kvatopil: "My dear comrade, a const.i.tutional regime prevails in my house: my wife reigns, but I am _responsible_, and I could never obtain her majesty's consent to a bill authorizing me to go and have tea once a week with your pretty wife."

But this truth I did _not_ tell him.

But supposing I had said to him: "My dear lieutenant, I move in a completely different sphere to you. I should be infinitely honoured by your society, but I should not know what to talk to your colleagues about," that would have been the second sort of truth.

But I did not tell him that.

I told him the third sort of truth. I said: "My dear Kvatopil, if you want to know the reason why you don't get promotion, I'll tell you. It is because you are so friendly with me. I am a _persona ingrata_ in the eyes of the authorities. Only yesterday the police paid me a visit, packed up every sc.r.a.p of paper they could lay their hands on, and carried it off; they even took my pictures out of the frames. Then Police-inspector Prottman came and worried me for half a day by asking me what I knew about Kossuth's proclamation and the dollar notes. If you keep on visiting me and writing to me, and if I were to go and amuse myself among your brother officers, they would think it gospel truth that you were also concerned in the conspiracy. Fortunately, I always burn your letters of invitation, or Prottman would now be engaged in docketting them."

My friend was startled.

"I only invited you to a gla.s.s of punch!" he cried.

"Punch here and punch there! The police would be sure to read it '_putsch_.'[102] And look ye, comrade, to be perfectly candid with you, I think it would be better for you if you left off all this punch-drinking, for 'tis that which makes your nose so red."

[Footnote 102: A riot or sedition.]

Now _that_ was the truth which pleased neither of us.

"You think so, eh? By Jove, you're right! It has often seemed to me when I swallow down a gla.s.s of punch as if my nose were a.s.suming enormous dimensions and diffusing a radiance all about me. From this day forth I'll drink no more punch. My word upon it! What's to-day? January 23rd?

Note it in your diary: 'On January 23rd, Lieutenant Wenceslaus Kvatopil gave me his word of honour as a gentleman that he would never drink punch again.'"--And he left me no peace till I had entered it in my diary.

"Nay, more than that, no kind of brandy, or schnaps, or wine, or beer; in a word, no sort of spirituous liquor whatever."

All this I had to make a note of.

"And now for a whole year and a day we'll watch the result. Nothing else now but pure water."

For a whole year after that I saw nothing of Kvatopil, nor did I hear anything of Bessy.

One day, however, my lieutenant suddenly invaded me again; he was still the wearer of two stars only.

"Now, if it isn't really enough to make a fellow blow his brains out!

Again they have pa.s.sed me over. I went straight to the Colonel. 'Your Excellency,' I said, 'here have I been in the service for the last twelve years. I have faithfully performed my duties. I have never used bad language. I know the regulations. I am at the head of the riding school--and still I am set aside. I want to know what objection they have against me.'"

"Manly conduct on your part, comrade," I cried.

"And do you know what answer I got? You were quite right, after all."

"Your suspicious intimacy with me, I suppose?"

"Oh dear, no! Who the devil cares for your chatter about the police? Not you it is, but this red nose! Here it is still, and it stands in my way." And he viciously tugged at the object that stood in his way as if it were some stubborn remount.

"I don't understand."

"Then I'll make you. The Colonel replied to my interpellation with perfect candour. 'My dear Kvatopil,' said he, 'you have indeed the very best good-conduct report. There's but one fault which weighs heavily in the scale against you: you are too much devoted to drink.' 'What? I?

Given to drink? Why, for more than a year I have been drinking nothing but water.' 'Impossible!' cried the Colonel--'just look at your red nose!' 'I acquired that while campaigning out.' The Colonel shook his head incredulously. 'But I a.s.sure your Excellency that I am speaking the truth, I have written testimony to the fact.' 'Then I should very much like to see it.' So that is why I have come straight to you. My dear friend, I adjure you by your hope of heavenly bliss, if you love me, if you ever loved Bessy, if you would save the life of a human creature, to give me that note-book in which, a year ago, you entered the vow that I made on my honour as a gentleman, that I may show it to the Colonel."

I energetically resisted this proposal.

"My dear friend, all sorts of ticklish items have been entered in this note-book of mine which absolutely cannot be read by anybody but myself."

But he solemnly a.s.sured me that he would never while he was alive suffer the little book to leave his hands, and would only show to his superior that one page relating to his solemn engagement, so that at last I was obliged to submit to his discretion. He promised to return in an hour's time.

And he kept his word. In an hour he returned, gave me back my little book, embraced me and pressed me to his breast.

"My friend, you have made me a happy man. I have obtained my object. His Excellency, on reading the oath recorded in your note-book, laughed to such an extent that I could count at least four of his teeth that were stopped with gold. Great Heaven! he eats gold with gold, while I have to gnaw bones with bone! When he had somewhat recovered from his outburst of hilarity, he smacked me on the shoulder, and said: 'Mr. Lieutenant, a great injustice has been done you. You are not a drunkard. There has been a mistake. This must be seen to. And I promise you that at the very first vacancy you shall obtain your third star.'"

This promise raised my friend into the seventh heaven of delight. Hope gave him back the desire of life.

This now is the speciality of a soldier's life. We poor civilians can have no idea of the joy he felt, especially if we be nothing but simple-minded authors. For an author has only one star, and that is high above his head. If he can get it, he may keep it, 'tis his. If he cannot get it himself, n.o.body in the world can get it for him.

CHAPTER XVII

TEMPTATION

The most beautiful comet I ever saw was the comet of 1858. It was visible in the sky for a whole fortnight, from October 1st to 15th, and all the time the weather was as fine as could be, not a cloud in the sky. And meanwhile the comet drew steadily nearer to the earth, growing bigger and bigger, and in shape it exactly resembled a Turkish scimitar; at last it was quite visible in broad daylight.

I had very good cause for remembering this comet so well. In September of the same year I was seized with haemorrhage of the lungs, an alarming symptom in a young man. Our doctor, Sebastian Andrew Kovacs of blessed memory, said that it was not medicine that I wanted, but change of air.

I submitted to his directions, and at the beginning of the autumn I undertook an audacious expedition--to visit the Western Carpathian Alps on horseback. Our good old friend Gabriel Torok (he had been a Government Commissioner during the Revolution) and his two sons were my guides, for they had been all through those beautiful regions[103]

before. Five to six hours in the saddle every day for a fortnight, through pathless forests, up and down steep rocky precipices, wading through streams and mountain torrents, dancing of an evening at the b.a.l.l.s frequently given in our honour, in the big-heeled boots that we had worn on horseback during the day, gobbling bacon as we stopped to rest on the fresh gra.s.s, and was.h.i.+ng it down with a gurgling drink out of our brandy-flasks--that is what I call a radical cure for inflammation of the lungs.

[Footnote 103: Jokai has immortalized these wonderful landscapes in _Az Erdelyi arany Kora_, perhaps his best descriptive romance.]

It cured me, anyhow.

With my suite, which gradually swelled into ten strong, I visited Bihar, and found out the rocky grave beneath which reposes my good friend Paul Vasvary, who died such a heroic death.[104] I also saw the Hungarian California, the gold-diggings of Abrudbanya and Verespatak. I painted that marvellous basalt hill Detonata, than which it is impossible to imagine a more interesting formation. I was in _Csetatye Mare_, that overwhelming relic of the Roman power, a gigantic gold-producing hill entirely hollowed out by the slavish hands of a subjugated race. When they would have dug still deeper, the top of the scooped-out mountain fell in and buried beneath it both slaves and slave-holders. And there it stands now, a gaping chasm, like one of the circular Mountains of the Moon.

[Footnote 104: One of the victims of the Revolution.]

I love to look back on this delightful tour; and the lovely comet accompanied me in the sky all the time.

The result of my journey was that I returned home with perfectly healthy lungs. From the comet, moreover, I borrowed the idea of starting a weekly comic paper under the t.i.tle of _Ustokos_.[105] And this paper gave me something to do for the next fifteen years. During all that time it had great influence. With a preliminary and a supplementary censures.h.i.+p to deal with, it was only possible to say a word of truth or a word of encouragement in verse or by way of anecdote. Sometimes a printer's error served our turn instead. For instance, to the question, "What shall a Hungarian man do now?" the answer was, "_Varjon es turjon_" ("Wait and suffer"); but by a printer's error the "_turjon_"

became "_turr jon_," which the reader, in his own mind, would read as "_Turr jon_" ("Let Turr come"), and a.s.sociate it at once with the popular ballad sung from one end of the kingdom to the other, and which begins, "_Hoz Turr Pizta puskat!_" ("Pizta Turr he brings his musket!")

[Footnote 105: This comic paper still exists, but M. Jokai is no longer its editor.]

But the comet had another signification also.