IV

We went to Buda-Pesth.

When I think of all that happened as a result of our going, the question

occurs to me: What _drove_ us there? That we _were_ driven, by some kind

of ironical fate, is a tempting theory if only because of the numerous

reasons against going which were either ignored or overridden. I don't

know even now why in the end I agreed to it. I positively loathed the

thought of getting up early in the morning and, after two days and two

nights of travel, embarking on a third day. Besides, I had left my work

to visit a sick friend, not a friend who cheerfully invited me to go on

holiday with him. Terry, of course, wasn't to know that. He thought I

had come to Vienna on business, and as I had vaguely assured him that

the business could be transacted at any time, the main avenue of

argument against the Buda trip was closed to me. All I could say was

that I was tired after the journey, to which he replied that nothing

could be more suitable for a tired traveller than a whole day on a

river-steamer. "Besides," he added, "I know how keen you were to see

Buda the last time you were here." (That was true enough.) "And--to tell

you the truth--I have never quite forgiven myself for not going with you

then. It was selfish of me...."

What could I say or do after that? When I told Mizzi we were going she

was both astonished and pleased. "And he suggested it himself?" she

said, as she wrote me out the address of a hotel in Pesth. "That iss _so_

good--and you are evidently such a big influence to him." (I think she

was wrong there, whatever it was that she meant.) "But, of course, one

week--it iss _nothing_. It iss when you are with him in Buda that you

must persuade him again.... I think you know how to do it--oh, I am so

glad that I sent for you!"

So we went on board the paddle-boat at the Praterkai the next morning.

It was one of those dim preludes to a hot summer's day, when the sun

climbs slowly through opaque mists, and the heat seems first of all to

rise up like an exhalation from the earth. As the boat chugged its way

downstream the air was deliciously cool and fragrant, and there was

something indescribably drowsy in the mist-hung panorama of fields and

homesteads. Terry sat with me on the top deck, and during the greater

part of the journey I was busy making up my mind about him. I think it

was his extraordinary buoyancy that was most disquieting, and that made

me realize, in the end, that Mizzi hadn't brought me on a fool's errand.

He was _too_ exuberant; _too_ talkative. Again, as on the evening

before, the things he said were the things I couldn't have believed he

would ever say. He told me, for example (and without being asked), that

he had done with women. He liked Mizzi because there was no nonsense

about her, because she never tried to "play the woman game" with him.

Not that it would affect him if she did, except that he would think less

of her.

I asked him if he ever heard from Helen, and he replied, almost

triumphantly: "Never. Never since that last letter that I didn't

answer."

I told him that she had taken to spending most of her time out of

England, and he interrupted, with his triumph fading into mere

excitement: "I don't want to hear about her. I tell you--haven't I

already told you?--that I've cut myself adrift from all that part of my

life? It's gone--it's almost forgotten--and now, with this far more

wonderful happiness, I don't want to have anything to do with it--even

in memory...." And he added, unnecessarily, that he had changed during

those years that I had not seen him.

It was then that I suggested that he should marry Mizzi. Rather to my

astonishment he didn't indignantly protest, or even repeat his assurance

that he had done with women. He said merely: "It's a hundred to one she

wouldn't want me. And, in any case, it seems a pity to interrupt our

friendship."

He said that sincerely, mind--without the slightest trace of cynicism.

V

I see now, as I think of it, that gold day of June, with the rippling

Danube under the breeze, and the sunshine glinting on the towers and

windows of Bratislava. I see the mists lifting towards midday, and the

ebb of humanity from the scorching decks to the _Speisesaal_, where the

wide-open windows are only an arm's length over the water. Everywhere,

like a seething tropical incense, is the tang of paprika; paprika

flavouring the soup: paprika stuffed with rice as an entrée; a slice of

paprika with the veal and a wedge with dessert; rust-brown paprika

pepper in all the cruets; golden Magyar wine and paprika--polyglot

chatter and flashing gold-filled teeth and paprika--Heavens, what a

meal--a strident C Major symphony of a meal.... And then the beat of the

engines suddenly hushed, and the boat gliding against some wayside

landing-place where all the local folk are gathered--red-bloused,

yellow-bloused peasant women and a _gendarmerie_ in blue.... Swift and

magical interlude--with the brown-skinned men, waist-naked, rowing in

the river, and the boatmen half-singing as they haul in the

gangway--"_Achtung_--_Achtung_...." Then off again into midstream,

chug-chugging under the porcelain blaze of the afternoon....

But at last, with tropic swiftness, the sun sinks low and dusk falls; it

is the grey Danube, and then the black Danube, with the forests rolling

down to the far edge of it. And the tang of paprika, lulled for a while,

is spreading and deepening again, until the boat is almost hushed with

it--as if the ghosts of all the lunches and dinners that have ever been

served on board have come back to haunt.... It is intolerable and

unforgettable, with the waiters slinking round and the bald heads,

glistening with sweat, and the clink of glasses, and the lights of Pesth

already aglow in the southern sky, and Terry lingering over his coffee

and telling me how pitiable it would be to interrupt his friendship with

Mizzi by marrying her....

All that comes back to me now, as I write, more clearly than I could

ever have believed.