‘There Was a Time…’
‘It was a good performance this evening,’ said Zköllmann conversationally, leaning up against the wall as if he intended to stay awhile. ‘You sounded particularly well.’
He paused for a reply but she didn’t speak.
‘In fact, you sang far better than you have for a long time,’ he went on. ‘The audience liked it.’
‘Did they?’ said Csilla.
‘You sounded like you did when you were younger and you used to put more feeling into your singing. You’ve improved in tone and clarity since, but you’ve lost much of the emotion.’
‘Have you turned critic too now?’ she asked.
‘That’s not in my line of business. There was a difference though and there must be something behind it. You must have had good news of some sort.’
‘There’s never any good news.’
She sat rigidly, waiting for him to finish bothering her and go. His conversation was oppressive and at the back of her mind lurked the possibility that Cecil might suddenly come back while Zköllmann was there.
‘That sounds like a platitude. And it’s true too, there isn’t such a thing as good news anymore. I do have some news for you, though, good or bad, as you choose to take it. I saw your brother this morning.’
‘You did?’ she said, her reserve falling away and her gaze, which had been kept studiously away from him, suddenly darting to his face. ‘Where? In the labour camp? Is he still alive? Is he well? What’s happened to him?’
Her eyes were bright and impatient; she felt herself trembling but for a moment she made no effort to conceal her eagerness.
‘No, he is not in the labour camp anymore,’ said Zköllmann. ‘He tried to escape last night but he was caught. Right now he is at the SO headquarters.’
The eagerness faded out of her face and something inside her seemed to drop like a heavy weight.
‘He’s there?’ she said.
‘Since two o’clock this morning.’
‘What are you going to do to him?’ she whispered.
‘We’ve had to keep him for informational reasons,’ said Zköllmann. ‘Another prisoner escaped with him and was fortunate enough to actually get away. So far, despite our efforts, your brother has refused to give us any clue as to where he is.’
Csilla covered her face.
‘Oh, poor Ferenc!’ she said.
‘Of course you remember what was mentioned to you before—last night, to be exact,’ said Zköllmann.
She made no reply and kept her face covered but she knew that he knew she was listening.
‘Are you still sure you won’t give us the information?’
‘Yes,’ was the muffled reply.
‘Don’t say it so quickly. You should think about it first. We don’t have anything against your brother and we’d spare him interrogation just as soon as not, but he has chosen to be difficult, so what can we do? I personally don’t think he will hold out very long.’
She took her hands away from her face and though her eyes were full of tears she spoke quite steadily.
‘He will never tell anything that would hurt another person,’ she said; ‘and neither will I—no matter what you do.’
‘I didn’t mean he would talk,’ said Zköllmann. ‘I meant he wouldn’t survive long. He has pneumonia.’
‘Haven’t you hurt him enough?’ she pleaded. ‘He hasn’t done anything.’
‘That rests with you.’
‘With me?’ she said, as if talking to herself. ‘Why must it? Oh, what can I do?’
‘Don’t be sentimental,’ said Zköllmann in a practical tone. ‘You’ve played the loyal spy admirably but you knew you couldn’t keep it up for ever. You’re breaking.’
‘Yes,’ she thought; ‘What is the use? He knows he has me. What shall I do? How stupid I sounded just now--why did I say that? I’m not making sense. My mind must be giving way; I shall not be able to hold out much longer. What shall I do? What shall I do?’
‘Remember I told you before,’ said Zköllmann; ‘that it would be over for you when you gave us what we wanted. Now you know what I mean.’
‘It won’t do you any good,’ she cried, standing up and confronting him. ‘I’ll never tell you anything. You must do what you will do—I can’t stop you. But I’ll never betray them to you for Ferenc’s life.’
‘You think not?’ he asked.
‘I know it,’ she said. ‘I may be weak—I suppose if you kept onto me for long enough I should give in, but before that happens I will kill myself.’
For a minute they faced each other. Csilla tried with all her might to quell her trembling and look him in the eye, and as she did so he gave her a look which said as plain as speaking,
‘You would, would you?’
Something came up in her throat just then. It was a cry—for what, she didn’t know: it couldn’t be for help for there was no one to help her. With the last strength she had left she managed to force it down and keep her lips pressed tightly together. She must never cry out before this man; never let him know how hard she was struggling to withstand him. She turned away and covered her face again. She heard the door open and close and when she uncovered her eyes she was alone. She waited a moment, then put on her cloak and went out.
At the stage door her accompanist stopped her.
‘Pardon, mademoiselle,’ said the Belgian; ‘a young man gave me this to give to you.’
‘A young man?’ she repeated.
‘Yes—actually, to be quite precise, it was a little boy. He gave no name.’
It was a bunch of red geraniums.
‘Thank you, Gerand,’ she said.
‘May I be permitted to say, mademoiselle, your singing this evening was wonderful—magnificent. Never have I heard you sing so well.’
‘Thank you, Gerand,’ she said.
‘Good night, mademoiselle.’
‘Good night,’ she said.
He left and the theatre was dark and deserted. One light burned backstage because the janitor had still to come and clean up. Csilla stood looking down at the geraniums. She felt very tired and the tears that stood in her eyes fell down suddenly onto the petals of the flowers.
She drew her cloak about her and left the theatre for the darkening streets.
* * * * *
Cecil quickened his pace to a run for the avenues were beginning to empty and the curfew would soon be in effect. Daleth’s restaurant stood on a street a little over a quarter of a mile from the theatre and it was here that Karotski had arranged to meet him and report success.
Daleth was not behind the counter playing his concertina this evening; he was brushing crumbs from one of the clean white tablecloths. Several diners were interspersed throughout the room eating their suppers hurriedly so as to be home before the curfew. Daleth turned as Cecil came in and, without a word, pointed to the door which led to the back staircase.
Karotski was waiting in Daleth’s room.
‘Did you see Major Erlich?’ asked Cecil.
‘No, I didn’t,’ said Karotski.
‘What happened?’
‘Tell me your news first. What did she say?’
‘It’s no good. She can’t put the other spies at risk. She couldn’t help me at all.’
‘Then we’re finished.’
‘Why? What’s up with the major?’
‘I went to his house this afternoon,’ said Karotski. ‘There was nobody there. I waited around until I found someone who could tell me where he was and finally his housekeeper showed up. I asked her a few questions and she told me everything. Erlich was arrested by the SO this morning.’
* * * * *
There were only a few vehicles still out on the roads. Csilla left the old section of the city and came to streets full of shops and restaurants, all closed or closing up. She walked as if in a dream, finding her way mechanically because she had been that way so often. A part of her seemed to have died that evening and the faint spark of hope that had warmed her for one short moment had burnt out. The sidewalk in front of her blurred and she stumbled as she came to the end of the pavement.
There was a rushing sound and the quick blare of a horn as an automobile swept past her. Suddenly she felt her arm grasped firmly and someone pulled her back onto the sidewalk. She looked up and saw no one; then looked down and saw Cecil.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked.
‘Where did you come from?’ she asked confusedly.
‘I came after you--I had to--is anything the matter?’
‘No, I’m all right,’ she said.
‘You looked as if something were wrong, and you almost walked right in front of that car. Can I walk you home?’
‘It’s too dangerous.’
‘It’s all right,’ he said, putting her arm through his and leading her across the street. ‘Don’t worry.’
‘You might be seen.’
‘It can’t be helped; I have to talk to you anyway.’
‘What is it?’
‘I can’t tell you here. Wait until we get to your house.’
He pulled his cap lower over his face with his free hand and quickened their pace. They were both silent all the rest of the way.
Miss Kaparthy lived in rooms in a row of houses on a street that ran down to the park. It was a quiet part of the city, just a few blocks from the government buildings and across the park from the iron bridge. There were trees and lampposts along the sidewalks.
‘Is this the one?’ asked Cecil, as they came up the steps of one of the houses.
‘Yes,’ said Miss Kaparthy. ‘Wait until I unlock the door.’
She put a silver key into the lock and the door opened to admit them into a dark hallway. Miss Kaparthy led Cecil into a small room opening off of it and turned on a lamp.
It was a cosy little flat furnished with definite feminine taste. There were flowers on the curtains and wallpaper and the furniture showed unmistakeable signs of a lack of masculine use—the antimacassars had not been balled up and tossed into corners, the pillows were not smashed, and there was no cigar ash anywhere to be seen.
Miss Kaparthy sank down onto a sofa while Cecil tentatively took an ottoman.
‘I’m sorry to have to bother you again like this,’ he said in some embarrassment, for the floral surroundings did not put him at ease. They reminded him of the parlours of some of his schoolmates whose mothers were very particular.
‘Why did you follow me?’ asked Miss Kaparthy. ‘I thought you were angry with me.’
‘Angry with you!’ said Cecil in confusion. ‘I thought you’d be angry with me for showing up at the performance. But I say, you were really good to-night.’
‘How did you find me?’ she asked.
‘Ka—I mean, someone—told me the way to your house and I thought I should be able to overtake you. You see, we’ve got to have your help. Otherwise, we’re all washed up.’
‘You mean to tell you how to contact the agents in the Hundred Circles?’
‘There isn’t any other way,’ said Cecil. ‘I say, are you sure you’re all right? You weren’t taken ill suddenly like people in books, were you? You look as if something were wrong.’
‘I’ll tell you what happened to-night,’ she said slowly, and Cecil, looking at her, thought she looked not so much ill as simply very tired.
‘Zköllmann came to see me this evening—’ she began.
‘Zköllmann!’ said Cecil indignantly. ‘Why doesn’t he leave you alone? Is that what made you—Oh, please don’t!’
He stopped and stared at her uncomfortably. She was crying. He hated it when ladies cried. It made one feel so dreadfully embarrassed: he hadn’t the least idea how to make her stop.
‘Please don’t—here, here’s my handkerchief.’
‘No, I have one,’ she said. ‘I shall be all right in a minute.’
‘Zköllmann came to see me, as I said,’ she went on. ‘He wants to make me tell him things about the spies in the Hundred Circles. It’s important to them and they’ll get the information any way they possibly can. That includes ways that…we would…’
‘Torture?’ asked Cecil.
‘A different kind of torture--it’s all mental. It’s the worst kind.’
She stopped and looked at Cecil.
‘I have a brother,’ she said.
‘You do?’ said Cecil in surprise. 'I thought you lived alone.'
‘I do live alone. I have no family but my brother. He is the only person I have left in the world.’
‘That’s why,’ she continued after a moment; ‘when I was caught as a spy, they didn’t kill me. They knew they could hurt me worse than that. They arrested my brother and put him into a labour camp. I never heard anything of him for two years and I thought he was dead. Zköllmann told me to-night that he is still alive and that they are going to torture him unless I do what they want.’
‘But you won’t!’ said Cecil anxiously.
She shook her head.
‘They’ve tried to make me tell them before but they are all the more determined now because of the war. I know I can’t tell them, and yet—yet if they come to me day after day—if they tell me that my brother…I don’t know but maybe I would tell them. I will hold out as long as I can, but I don’t know how much more I can bear!’
And she looked at him with the eyes of one who had borne a lot.
‘I told Zköllmann that I would kill myself before I gave in,’ she said; ‘but he didn’t believe me and I don’t know that I believe myself. I stood it to-night but how shall I stand it day after day? I’m afraid of what I might do! My poor brother!’
She had stopped crying but her lips were pressed so closely together that they were nearly white and her hands nervously twisted her handkerchief into a knot.
‘There must be a way to save him,’ said Cecil.
She raised her head and looked at him.
‘No, there is no way to save him,’ she said. ‘Have you seen the SO headquarters? No one gets out of there alive. It’s a horrible place.’
She shuddered.
‘But if we could free Pyromania—’ began Cecil.
‘But we can’t!’ she said. ‘I can’t give you the information. It’s even more dangerous to do it now, can’t you see?’
She pressed her fingers against her temples hopelessly.
‘I know I’m a coward, and I’m sorry,’ she said.
‘You’re not a coward,’ said Cecil.
‘I am,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid of them.’
‘But you haven’t given in anyway,’ said Cecil firmly.
‘Maybe I shall,’ she said.
‘No, you won’t,’ said Cecil. ‘I know you won’t.’
‘How do you know?’ she asked.
Cecil couldn’t answer. He did not want to think of her being crushed by the Javotskis. She was helpless and she needed him. He got up from the ottoman and stood in the centre of the floor with his hands in his pockets.
‘I’m going to save your brother,’ he said solemnly.
‘How?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know yet,’ he replied; ‘but somehow I’m going to—I promise you that.’
‘Don’t promise,’ she said. ‘It’s impossible.’
‘Don’t be afraid,’ said Cecil. 'I'll find a way.'
She looked at him for a long time without saying anything. Her mind seemed far away.
‘You’re so young,’ she said at last. ‘You don’t remember what Pyromania was like before the Javotskis came. There was a time when people could live without fear and hate. Once I was not afraid. I remember when I was a very little girl I once went to visit my aunt and uncle in the countryside. I went on the train and I thought I was going on a great journey. I played all day in the shade of a big tree and in the afternoon my uncle took me for a walk down a road between long fields of rye. We walked for miles—my uncle had to carry me back and I brought home an armful of flowers. I don’t know why I remember that day so clearly, when I’ve forgotten so many other things. I’ve always looked back on it as the happiest day of my life and always found that no matter how happy I’ve been, I’ve never felt again the same feeling I had then when I was five years old. I lived in a different world then. The world keeps changing so that I don’t know what it is or what it means, but I know that I was happy then and now I am not and that the world I lived in then is gone for ever. I shall never see it again.’
They were both silent.
‘I forgot,’ said Cecil suddenly; ‘I was supposed to tell you before only I just now thought of it.’
‘What?’ she said.
‘It’s about Zköllmann,’ he said. ‘We need your help to get rid of him. If we killed him, there might be a way of rescuing your brother. And at any rate we’ve got to kill Zköllmann. He knows too much about us.’
She was gazing at the floor thoughtfully.
‘You’ve seen the SO agents,’ she said. ‘They always come in pairs.’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Cecil. ‘They don’t dare to operate on their own.’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘They’re always afraid of being stabbed in the back—even Zköllmann. The only place he ever goes without another agent is to see me.’
‘Well, why does he?’ asked Cecil.
‘He knows me very well, that’s why. When there are two of them I don’t care—they can do what they like and I only laugh at them—but when there’s only one I can’t laugh, I have to be serious, and then I’m afraid of them.’
‘But that’s why we want your help,’ said Cecil. ‘The only time we can kill Zköllmann is when he's alone.’
‘But I can’t help you kill him all the same,’ she said.
‘You’d only have to tell us when he comes and we’d do it.’
‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘Please don’t blame me. I know you won’t understand, but I can’t. I couldn’t give up another person—even someone like Zköllmann—to be shot from behind. Maybe it’s because I’m a woman, but I couldn’t do it. It’s murder.’
‘He’s a murderer,’ said Cecil, but with scarcely any conviction.
‘He’s a horrible man,’ she said slowly. ‘I have never known anyone so cruel. But for all that, he is a person. I don’t want you to kill him.’
She looked up.
‘It’s strange, and I can’t explain it,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why I should feel the way I do. He may hurt innocent people—my brother too, probably—but I can’t feel that we ought to do wrong to try to make things better.’
Cecil was silent, thinking hard.
‘I know I’m weak,’ said Miss Kaparthy.
‘No,’ said Cecil. ‘I feel that way too. I don’t want to kill him either.’
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