A Place to Stand Read online

  ANN BRIDGE

  A place to stand and love in for a day, With darkness and the death-hour rounding it.

  ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING

  (Sonnets from the Portuguese)

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Author’s Note

  1

  On a morning early in March, 1941, John Kirkland got out of his car at the door of a large building opposite the Zoological Gardens in Budapest, said “3.15” to his Viennese chauffeur, passed through the rich-looking hall of the block of luxury flats to the lift, and was shot up six floors; during the lift’s flight he searched in his pocket for 30 fillér, which he handed to the liftman, who touched his smart cap, smiled, and said “I thank the gentleman.” Normally Mr. Kirkland compounded with the liftman, but this was a new boy, and after eight years in Budapest he had learned to submit to the maddening convention which demanded that liftmen in shops or dentists’ establishments, and butlers in houses where one dined or drank, or even footmen who handed you your hat must all be given a tip of some denomination, generally minute. “Chickens have to live on chicken-feed, I suppose,” Mr. Kirkland was apt to observe resignedly when explaining this system to visiting compatriots—he was an American, the Budapest head of the National Oil Company, an important United States concern in South-East Europe.

  Leaving the lift, he pressed the bell-button beside his front door. This was another tiresome thing, that your servants couldn’t bear you to use a latchkey—however János, the footman, flung the door open instantly, with a beaming smile which was really very engaging, and took his master’s coat and hat; John Kirkland washed, brushed his straight greying hair, and walked along the wide hall and into his wife’s sitting-room.

  Mrs. Kirkland was sitting by the fire working at a piece of embroidery. She was a plump, pleasant-looking woman in the early fifties whose natural simple motherliness was only ineffectually masked by the outer trappings of smartness—waved blue-grey hair, a Paris dress, fashionable little Budapest shoes below thick silk-clad legs, pale rose-pink nails, on stumpy well cared-for hands.

  “Oh hullo, John, dear. Have a cocktail. Tired?”

  John Kirkland ignored this question. As he stood in front of the well-furnished tray of drinks, rattled the cocktail-shaker to see if it was full, found that it was, and poured himself out a glass, he asked over his shoulder—“Seems a lot of glasses; anyone coming?”

  “Oh, just Bill Hershey and Tibor Zichy.”

  “What’re they coming for?”

  “Bill wanted to ask you about something, and I guess Tibor wants to ask when Hope’s coming home,” his wife replied, with a shrewd little grin.

  “Uh-huh.” Mr. Kirkland drank, then walked over to the open fireplace and gave a careful kick to the slender silvery logs which burned gaily in it.

  “Well, I don’t know that I ever wanted her to marry that young Tibor; he’s just a playboy, if he is a Count. But I don’t know why we’re letting her marry Sam,” he observed.

  Mrs. Kirkland held out her glass. “Give me another, dear.’ As her husband took it—“I think Sam’s darling,” she said loyally.

  “Sam’s all right, he’s a good boy,” Mr. Kirkland admitted over his shoulder, while he filled the glass carefully. “But he’s just a journalist, with nothing but his pay. Oh don’t tell me he’s an old Massachusetts family,” he said, handing the drink to his wife. “I know he is, and that’s fine; there’s nothing finer, in its way. But it’s not such a good way when they’re down and out, like Sam’s folks are. Hopey could marry anyone.”

  “Well, they’re so in love, dear, and it’s a great thing to marry for love; I don’t like these arranged marriages, for position and so on, that they make over here, and I hate the way some of our women marry just any man, to get a title,” said Mrs. Kirkland with energy.

  “Yeah—and the way some European men with titles marry just any girl for her money. I will say for Sam, I don’t think that enters—and thank God, he’s an American!” her husband responded, with equal energy.

  “Yes, and he’s just a nice straight journalist,” Mrs. Kirkland pursued. “He’s not mixed up in anything on the side, politics or anything. Nearly everyone here is mixed up in something—the men try to sell cars, or go in for politics, and the women run dress-shops.”

  Her husband laughed. “The women do better than the men, I’d say. But look, Alice: I think we should announce Hope’s engagement. That will make all these Tibors sheer off. What’s the sense of keeping it so quiet?”

  “Oh, they just wanted to have their secret to themselves for a week or so, John. Surely you can understand that?”

  “Well, maybe—but now that Sam’s been transferred to Istanbul all in a hurry, and won’t be around, I think we should announce it, Alice. It will be easier for the child.”

  “Let’s leave it till she comes back; she’ll be home tomorrow. I’d rather—” Mrs. Kirkland was going on, when János threw open the door and announced “Meester Hershay!”

  The big heavy Middle-Westerner from the American Consulate entered the room with his usual cheerful comfortable expression.

  “Oh hullo, Bill—glad to see you,” said his hostess; and “Come on and get a drink, Bill,” Kirkland said, shepherding him over to the tray. “Martini, or a high-ball?”

  “So Hopey’s gone down on a jaunt to Belgrade, I hear,” Hershay said, seating himself with his glass.

  “Yes, just for a short trip—to stay with the Minister and his wife,” Mrs. Kirkland replied.

  “Wonder if she’ll see old Sam. He rushed off there in a hurry, didn’t he? And now I hear he’s been transferred to Istanbul, and won’t be coming back here at all,” Hershey pursued.

  Mrs. Kirkland glanced rather helplessly at her husband, who threw her an “I told you so” look over Hershey’s head—he was still standing, glass in hand, near the tray.

  “Yes, pretty sudden. But these papers push their boys around a lot,” he said.

  “We shall miss him,” Hershey said. “Sam’s mighty nice.”

  “Oh, isn’t he?” Mrs. Kirkland agreed warmly.

  “When does Hopey get back?” the Consul asked.

  “Tomorrow morning—by that awful 6.30 train.”

  “Think she’d be too tired to come to the Arizona tomorrow night?” Hershey asked. “They’re putting on a new floor-show, and I’m making up a party for it—it’s always most fun the first night. Mrs. Linklater’s coming to chaperone!” he said, with a kindly grin at his hostess.

  “Why Bill, does anyone need a chaperone at your parties?” Mrs. Kirkland asked, archly.

  “Now, Mrs. Kirkland, are you sure that’s really kind?” Hershey said, putting a hand up to his greying hair.

  “Any party at the Arizona needs two chaperones!” said John Kirkland. “I can’t think why you all go to such a goddamned place.”

  “Oh come, Mr. Kirkland—the Arizona’s fun. The drink’s good, and the band’s good, and Madame Arizona is such a sight, walking around with that fox chained to her wrist.”

  “The food’s awful,” said Mr. Kirkland briefly.

  “Yeah—but we don’t go for the food. You can eat at other places, where they don’t dance; it’s no good thinking about the food at a night-club—they no sooner set down some lovely dish in front of you than the band strikes up and off you go, an
d leave it to get all cold,” said Hershey truly.

  Mr. Kirkland didn’t pursue the argument. Glancing at his watch—“Tibor’s late,” he observed.

  “Hunks’re always late,” said Hershey cheerfully.

  “Well, you and I have work to do,” Mr. Kirkland was beginning, when János again threw open the door saying—“Count Zichy,” and a fair, slim, youngish man walked in; he went over to Mrs. Kirkland and kissed her hand, and then greeted his host and Hershey in excellent English. He was not exactly good-looking, but the very pronounced modelling of his rather prominent cheekbones, the forward set of his lips, slightly protruding, the very way his eyes were set in his head made his face completely unlike the other three faces in the room. Mr. Kirkland almost hustled this second guest over his drink, though in a friendly enough fashion, and pushed the bell; a butler drew back curtains from a wide doorway, and the little party passed through into the dining-room, where the sun streamed on to the table, shining with glass and silver, and lit up great pots of forced azaleas in bloom, red, rose, and white, which stood round the room, till they were almost incandescent. Bill Hershey exclaimed at them—“Mrs. Kirkland, you do have the most wonderful flowers!”

  “A little man brings them—they’re pretty, aren’t they?” she said complacently. “I do love the flowers here—and they’re so cheap.” But the atmosphere had changed imperceptibly with the advent of the foreigner; there was no longer the completely easy interchange of talk between people with a common background, who know one another well—there was a social note in Mrs. Kirkland’s voice even when she responded to Hershey’s praise of her pot-plants, which had been lacking before.

  Count Zichy, however, shaking out his napkin, commented on the flowers on the table, which was half-smothered in low vases of snowdrops and aconites. “I like these, the wild flowers. They are so charming, so innocent. And so few people have them.”

  “Oh, Hope brought those,” said Mrs. Kirkland, pleased at this tribute. “She gets them in the market. She’s forever going to the flower-market—she loves it. And she likes the wild flowers too; she will have them.”

  “She is gone to Belgrade, is she not?” the Hungarian asked, making the good lady slightly flustered again; she half regretted having allowed her precious daughter to make that impulsive dash down to the Yugoslav capital to say goodbye to her fiancé before he left for Turkey. All these questions! Maybe John was right, and they would do better to announce the engagement.

  “Yes, just for a couple of nights—to stay at our Legation,” she said rather hastily.

  “Ah, then she will be back at the end of the week. I hope she is coming to this dance at the Park Club on Saturday—it should be very good. If she is not already engaged,” the young man went on, unsuspectingly causing his hostess a momentary panic, “my Mother hopes that she will join our party—we are dining first at the Kis Royal, and then going on.”

  “That’s very kind. I don’t know for certain—Hope tells me of her engagements, but I find it hard to keep track of them,” said Mrs. Kirkland, relieved. “I’ll tell her to call the Countess up—she’ll be back tomorrow.”

  “Oh, do not let her trouble, Mrs. Kirkland; we will telephone to her,” the young man said. “And my Mother will also write, of course. I very much wish her to be there; there should be some excellent dancing. The gypsies are coming—Berkés himself.”

  “I’ve heard he’s wonderful,” said Mrs. Kirkland—everyone had heard of Berkés, the old and famous leader of a very brilliant troop of gypsy musicians.

  “What time’s he coming—2 a.m.?” John Kirkland asked, sardonically.

  “Yes, I suppose about then, Mr. Kirkland,” the Hungarian answered in all simplicity—to him there was nothing in the least odd about the main part of an evening’s entertainment beginning in the small hours. “There will be dancing before, of course—but when the gypsies come will be the best part, the csárdás. Your daughter dances the csárdás, does she not?”

  “A little—she took some lessons. She’s crazy about it.”

  “Don’t you let her dance with Tibor, Mrs. Kirkland; he kills a dozen girls in a night,” Hershey said.

  “Now Bill, this is unfair. I do not. I change partners because girls get tired—it is an energetic dance, the csárdás especially when the music is good, as it is with Berkés.”

  The talk flowed on, in the bright comfortable room, over the good food and the light Hungarian wines, so fragrant and delicious—talk about dates for parties and amusements, for both men had further plans involving Hope Kirkland; talk and gossip about people they all knew. In this Mrs. Kirkland showed up well; she had the typical American capacity for assessing her situation in a foreign environment, even if not very consciously, and for doing the social side with great competence—you felt that she was quite at home in her life as she had made it, in this her exile. She was amused, too; Count Zichy, like most Hungarians, had a long and rather malicious tongue, and made the three Americans laugh a great deal—but when he told a funny story about a man at the German Legation, the tone of the conversation changed suddenly.

  “I wish your Government would take a rather tougher line with the Huns,” Mr. Kirkland said. “Surely they don’t want to get right into their pocket, like the Rumanians are? But they seem to be heading that way, letting all these ‘sealed trains’, as they call them, go through.”

  “Sealed nothing,” said Bill Hershey; “why, you can see the tanks quite plain on the wagons, under the waterproof covers—and at the West Station the officers get out and take coffee in the station buffet—I saw them with my own eyes. Someone said they were doing it, so I went and took a look, and there they were, stamping about in their Herrenvolk-grey uniforms. That’s a funny sort of neutrality, Tibor, you must admit.”

  “I wonder if the British know that,” Kirkland speculated.

  “The British know everything,” Count Zichy said briskly.

  “Well, I wonder what the Minister has to say about it,” his host continued, still speculatively.

  “Ah, that I cannot tell you—the Minister says very little.”

  “But Count Tibor”—Mrs. Kirkland weighed into the conversation with a certain determination—“Why do you let the German troop-trains through? What forces you?”

  “My dear Mrs. Kirkland, we are neighbours both of Austria and of Czechoslovakia, and we know what has happened there. It is not so easy to be ‘tough’ with the Germans, as your husband suggests, for the government of a small country, with a small un-mechanized army, whose capital is within three-and-a-half hours’ motor drive of Germany’s frontier.”

  “The Austrian frontier,” Mr. Kirkland put in.

  “Is it not all the same now?” the young man asked, almost bitterly.

  “Well yes, I suppose it is. I see your point, Tibor—but you were on the wrong side in the last war, and it didn’t do you any good. Surely you don’t want to do the same thing again?”

  “Want? What good is it to ‘want’, if one is small and helpless? Our neutrality is not based on 2,000 miles of ocean. A little nation like ours is simply crushed between contending forces, great rich Powers who can do as they choose—cut our country in two, and give half to others, as they did last time,” said Count Zichy—and now there was no doubt about the bitterness in his voice.

  Mrs. Kirkland rose. The last thing she wanted was to hear a long “spiel” about the partition of Hungary at the Treaty of Trianon, which any Hungarian, she knew, would indulge in if given half a chance. She had lived in Budapest for eight years, but though she had so adequately mastered the details, social and practical, of life there, she had never gone into the rights and wrongs of that particular grievance; when people began on it she just didn’t listen, it was so complicated—she nodded politely, and thought about her new frocks, or Hope’s. Europeans just had these endless squabbles; it was part of being European, she supposed. She liked living in Europe, or at least in Hungary; the servants were marvellous, and like the flowers, incr
edibly cheap—but all these endless fusses about frontiers and things were really a bore. “Let’s have coffee, shall we?” she said, and led the way through another curtained opening, not to the small sitting-room where they had gathered before lunch, but into a large drawing-room, also full of sun and flowering plants.

  All three men left early. Hershey and John Kirkland both had offices to return to, and Count Zichy, who worked in a bank, did not outstay them. “We will ring up tomorrow morning, when Miss Kirkland is back, about the Park Club,” he said as he took his leave. “Goodbye, Mrs. Kirkland—a thousand thanks for the lovely luncheon.” He kissed her hand and went.

  Mrs. Kirkland sat on after they had gone, looking with pleasure at her pretty sun-filled room, with its soft chairs and bright covers, its flowers and Herend china and good rugs. But her thoughts were on her daughter, even when she rose, automatically, to straighten a group of porcelain flowers on the mantelpiece. Hopey was very young to be engaged; only nineteen, and so pretty. Sam was darling, and he did come of a good New England family; it didn’t matter a bit his being poor, for Hopey would have plenty. All the same, in a way it seemed a pity for the child to tie herself up so soon, now with all her good times still before her; she was so popular—look at the way young Count Zichy and even staid old Bill were wanting to book her up for a dozen things. But Sam had been so insistent—and Hope seemed very much in love, too, and was determined to be engaged. Mrs. Kirkland had never found it easy to say No to her daughter about anything. Not that Hope was troublesome; she was a dear, sweet, good child, and loving to her parents—but Mrs. Kirkland had felt, lately, that this loving child of hers was getting a kind of instinct to go her own way. This she found a little disturbing. Probably it was just her age—girls felt quite grown-up at nineteen. It couldn’t be the result of living in Europe; for the mothers, here in Hungary, kept their daughters on a string in a way that girls at home had never dreamt of, and would never stand for. It was all rather pretty and graceful, those respectful manners—curtseying to older women and kissing their hands, or rather laying their hands to their soft young cheeks—really charming. She had thought of trying to make Hope do it, for after all they were living in Budapest—but Hope had said, with that new decision, that it would just look silly if an American girl did it. Oh well—Mrs. Kirkland gave a little sigh, one of those motherly sighs that betoken love and uncertainty, and leaned forward to ring the bell. She had got to go and see Countess Horvath in the Emil-Szanatorium (in Hungary “Szanatorium” is the name for a nursing-home) and she would have to call and pick up a pot of flowers on the way. When János came she ordered the car.