Beware of Pity Read Online Free PDF Page B

gloves standing behind us? No, the good pharmacist was not exaggerating. You might think yourself at court in the Kekesfalva house. I have never eaten so well, or even dreamt that anyone could eat so well, so lavishly, could taste such delicacies.More and more exquisite dishes are carried in on inexhaustible platters, blue-tinged fish crowned with lettuce and framed by slices of lobster swim in golden sauces, capons ride aloft on broad saddles of piled rice, puddings are flambéed in rum, burning with a blue flame; ice bombs fall apart to reveal their sweet, colourful contents, fruits that must have travelled halfway round the world nestle close to each other in silver baskets. It never, never ends, and finally there is a positive rainbow of liqueurs, green, red, colourless, yellow, and cigars as thick as asparagus, to be enjoyed with delicious coffee!
    A wonderful, a magical house—blessings on the good pharmacist!—a bright, happy evening full of merry sound! Do I feel so relaxed, so much at ease, just because the eyes of the other guests, to my right and my left and opposite me, are also shining now, and they have raised their voices? They too seem to have forgotten about etiquette and are talking nineteen to the dozen! Anyway, my own usual shyness is gone. I chatter on without the slightest inhibition, I pay court to both the ladies sitting next to me, I drink, laugh, look around in cheerful high spirits, and if it isn’t always by chance that my hand now and then touches the lovely bare arm of Ilona (such is the name of the delectable niece), then she doesn’t seem to take my gentle approach and then retreat in the wrong spirit, she is relaxed and elated like all of us at this lavish banquet.
    I begin to feel—while wondering if it may not be the effect of the unusually good wine; Tokay and champagne in such quick succession?—I begin to feel elated, buoyant, even boisterous. I need only one thing to crown my happiness in the spell cast over my enraptured mind, and what I have unconsciously been wanting is revealed to me next moment, when I suddenly hear soft music, performed by a quartet ofinstrumentalists, beginning to play in a third room beyond the salon. The servant has quietly opened the double doors again. It is exactly the kind of music I would have wished for, dance music, rhythmical and gentle at the same time, a waltz with the melody played by two violins, the low notes of a cello adding a darker tone, and a piano picking out the tune in sharp staccato. Music, yes, music, that was all I still needed! Music now, and perhaps dancing, a waltz! I want to move with it, feel that I am flying, sense my lightness of heart even more blissfully! This Villa Kekesfalva must indeed be a magical place where you have only to dream of something and your wish is granted. So now we stand up, moving our dining chairs aside, and two by two—I offer Ilona my arm, and once again feel her cool, soft, beautiful skin—we go into the salon, where the tables have been cleared away as if by brownie magic, and chairs are placed around the wall. The wooden floor is smooth and shiny, a mirror-like brown surface, waltzing is the apotheosis of skating, and the lively music played by the invisible instrumentalist next door animates us.
    I turn to Ilona. She laughs, understanding me. Her eyes have already said “Yes”, and now we are whirling round the room, two couples, three couples, five couples moving over the whole dance floor, while the older and less daring guests watch or talk to each other. I like dancing, I may even say I dance well. Closely entwined, we skim the floor. I think I have never danced better in my life. I ask my other neighbour at dinner for the pleasure of the next waltz. She too dances very well, and leaning down to her I smell the perfume of her hair and feel slightly dizzy. Oh, her dancing is wonderful, it is all wonderful, I haven’t felt so happy for years. I hardly know what I am doing, I would like to