Skylark by Dezsö Kosztolányi Page B

back with a bloody fist. They saw him from the window of the Széchenyi too, pulling his purple cardinal's robe up round his knees as he ran back to the theatre. It was quite a scene, I can tell you. It'll cost him a month's pay.” The others were dumbstruck and pressed for further details.
    “Olga will have nothing more to do with him,” Szolyvay continued. “She's getting married. They say Dani Kárász has asked for her hand.”
    So Dani Kárász, the son of the wealthy landowner István Kárász, was going to marry an actress. This excited them. They were hungry for more, but the comedian threw down his cigarette when he saw Miklós Ijas coming towards them from Margit Lator's dresser. They hadn't spoken since the appearance of his review. With all the dignity of a mandarin, Szolyvay withdrew.
    Környey caught Ijas by the arm and introduced him to Ákos.
    “I don't believe you've met,” he said. “Ákos Vajkay; Editor Ijas.”
    Ijas pouted. He objected to being addressed in this fashion.
    He bowed and raised his hat to Ákos.
    “How do you do,” said Ákos.
    “How do you do,” said Ijas.
    They walked as far as the patisserie together, sizing each other up, but without uttering a word. There they parted.
    Ákos bought a box of chocolates wrapped in gold ribbon and took it up to his wife's box.
    His head was swimming from all he had seen and heard. He hadn't really understood it all, there was simply too much to take in. He gazed bemused into thin air, and was relieved when the curtain rose and he could sink back into the artificial, but at least more transparent, spectacle of the play.
    The geishas, now dressed as bridesmaids, celebrated with song and dance Marquis Imari's wedding day, among them the girl whom Papa Fehér had been holding in his arms. All the little misses, fair and dark, fat and thin, turned their pretty snouts towards the gorgeous spectacle.
    Among them, commanding centre stage, stood Olga Orosz, soaring from triumph to triumph. All the action on stage seemed to revolve about her. She was the focus of every word and every gaze. And what a beautiful creature she was, too, what a wicked, godless little kitten! She wasn't even young any more. Past thirty, for sure, perhaps even over thirty-five. But her flesh was powdery and voluptuously weary, as if ten-derised by all the different beds and arms in which it had lain. Her face was as soft as the pulpy flesh of an overripe banana, her breasts like two tiny bunches of grapes. She exuded a certain seedy charm, a poetry of premature corruption and decay. She breathed the air as if it burned her palate, baking her small, hot, whorish mouth. It was as if she were sucking a sweet or slurping champagne.
    She hardly sang at all, only trilled and screeched the notes of some haphazard scale. But the audience were riveted. They would have thrown their very souls at her feet.
    Is there no justice? Upon the head of this abomination, this lecherous, almost biblical fornicator, surely sulphurous rains should fall? Instead she was swamped with flowers. Everyone knew all the details of her immoral existence and that her very soul was up for sale. They knew she belonged to the dregs of society, a filthy rag not even fit to wipe one's boots on. But what did they care? They worshipped her, idolised her, prized her above gentleness and kindness, she who was worthy neither of love nor respect, who scoffed at all things beautiful and sublime. No justice, no justice!
    Pressing his opera glasses to his eyes, Ákos wondered what he would do if he ever met her. Turn away perhaps, or measure her with a scathing stare, or simply spit on the ground in front of her?
    From these dark thoughts it was once again Wun-Hi who distracted him, dancing out on to the centre of the stage and this time really surpassing himself. Fanning his face with his long pigtail, he launched into the famous vaudeville song:
Chin Chin Chinaman
    Muchee muchee sad!
    He afraid allo trade
    Wellee wellee