Free Skylark by Dezsö Kosztolányi Page B

How refreshing, how polished, how bohemian, and yet how courteous! She made a point of expressing her delight at having finally made his acquaintance. At this the actor sprang to his feet, gave a low, almost over-theatrical bow, and replied that, on the contrary, it was he who'd had the good fortune to meet such a genteel and distinguished lady.
    At the opposite end of the table the men talked politics. They spoke of state delegations, constitutional crises and of Prime Minister Kálmán Széll.
    “Ah, yes,” Környey sighed. “A visionary statesman and a first-rate brain.”
    Priboczay, who was an old forty-eighter, became visibly heated.
    “No doubt because he went to Vienna for the unveiling of the Albrecht statue. He, prime minister of Hungary. For shame!'
    “Tactics,” Környey replied.
    “Tactics,” Priboczay nodded bitterly. “And when they ordered our boys out to the Hentzi statue in Pest? That was tactics too, I suppose? Bánffy would never have done such a thing. Never. Your man's a common toady.”
    “
Raison d'état
,” Feri Füzes commented.
    Now Priboczay was really fuming.
    “Right, Law and Justice? Isn't that the party slogan?” he hollered to provoke the young government supporter. “Schwarzgelb mercenary, Viennese lackey!'
    Feri Füzes could not allow the Hungarian prime minister's name to be slandered in this fashion. Enough was enough. As a man with an almost superstitious deference towards all figures of authority, he ventured to reply:
    “And what of your famous Ferenc Kossuth? I suppose he's going to hand us a free-trade zone on a platter? Together with Hungarian supremacy?'
    “You leave him out of this. He's the son of our great father Kossuth. You wouldn't understand such things, my boy.”
    Feri Füzes blushed. Then, with a certain peevish superiority he observed:
    “I have every respect for Lajos Kossuth and his politics. But just like everyone else, Lajos Kossuth has his good points and his bad points.”
    And he looked about him for support.
    But at this everyone had chuckled, including Környey, and even the oldest and staunchest of sixty-seveners, for they all knew that Feri Füzes, although the perfect gentleman, had less than his fair share of grey matter.
    For a moment Feri Füzes was at a complete loss. Then he asked himself how such behaviour could possibly offend a proper gentleman, and looked for someone else to provoke. But the others soon placated him and he went on smiling his familiar smile.
    Ákos did not take part in the debate. What did he care for either Kálmán Széll or Ferenc Kossuth? Weightier concerns and deeper questions played upon his mind.
    He sat immersed in his own thoughts, his morning dreams still swimming through his head, his face heavily shadowed by his own bad conscience. He glanced towards his wife, who was already eating.
    Seeing this, he appeared to reach a momentous decision. He frowned, put on his spectacles and plunged into a fastidious study of the menu.
    He couldn't see it too clearly because, in places, the ink of the hectograph had smudged and faded. He reached into his upper waistcoat pocket for the magnifying glass he normally reserved for deciphering
litterae armales
, and, the strength of his spectacles thus doubled, examined the menu in detail.
    Applying no less rigour and self-sacrificing passion to the study of this document than to the search for some sixteenth-century Vajkay of Bozsó whose descent remained uncertain, he scoured the family tree of noble dishes for the entry he had been dreaming of unceasingly since the day before. On this occasion it was between the stuffed sirloin and the pork chops that the name “goulash” humbly but meaningfully stood. No sooner had he hit upon it with his finger than the waiter set it down before him.
    “Smells delicious,” commented Feri Füzes.
    The comment annoyed Ákos. What had it to do with Feri Füzes how the goulash smelled? Ákos would decide for himself. And with that he