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that she could go and rest in the shade—I put on her old hat with the branches, and she tied the other boughs to my hands, and so I stood, hour after hour. The heat is unbearable, in the Alfold in harvest time.’
    â€˜Good for you. What’s the Alfold?’
    â€˜The central plain of Hungary, down to the east of the Danube—the black-earth country, they call it; the soil is very rich. Detvan was on the edge of the Alfold,’ the girl said, that bright look again illuminating her face as she mentioned her home.
    â€˜And what did you and the learned Mother What’s-her-name do when you went to the Alfold, as I take it you did?’
    â€˜Oh, we were so fortunate! The lady we had worked for in Pest somehow arranged for Mother Scholastica to take a position as housekeeper and cook to a
wonderful
man, Father Antal, who had gone to be a village priest down there.’
    â€˜Why was he wonderful?’ Townsend asked—he was rather allergic to priests.
    â€˜Because he was holy, and learned, and wise, and also very brave,’ Hetta replied, with her usual clarity. ‘He managed to say Mass almost daily, in spite of the Commissars; the peasants hid bottles of their wine for the Mass in the thatch. He went quite often to see Cardinal Mindszenty in his prison—’
    â€˜Goodness, was he allowed to do that?’ the American interjected.
    â€˜Of course not—not allowed; he went disguised as a peasant, bringing in wood for the fires, or some such thing. It was a fearful risk.’
    â€˜Did you hear how the Cardinal was?’
    â€˜Not much—it was better not to speak of such things. I gained the impression that he was not really ill, but not well; the confinement and the distress about his people were
eating
him,’ she said—‘and the loneliness too, of course. It did him so much good when Father Antal went to see him; they were friends, they had studied at the same seminary—and it was a chance for him to hear a little truth, for a change. Lies, lies, lies, every day and all day long; these are suffocation. I think without the Father’s visits he might have died. This is partly why I would do anything for Father Antal. I loved cooking for him.’
    â€˜But were you the cook? I thought you said the nun was?’
    â€˜So she was supposed to be, but she was a terrible cook! First, she had no idea how, and further, she was always leaving the saucepans in order to recite the Office!’ Hetta said, with an honest girlish giggle. ‘So, one cannot cook! No, I did most of it.’
    â€˜And can you cook? How did you learn?’
    â€˜As a child at Detvan I was often in the kitchen with Margit, our old cook, who had been with us for ever; I used to watch her, and afterwards remembered, and did as she had done. Father Antal liked the food I made.’
    â€˜Sounds as if the priest had been just as fortunate as you and the scholastic mother,’ Townsend said. He poured himself out another drink, gave Hetta a second sherry, and returned to his chair. He was impressed by what she told him, although all the stress on saying Mass and so on passed him by completely, indeed rather alienated him. But he could not help realising that here was a first-hand behind-the-curtain story, from a person who had the power to make it vivid; he began to see all sorts of possibilities. He asked more questions—about the deportations, how much luggage people might take, and so forth; and also about how the village commissars were organised. Her replies were satisfyingly detailed and lucid, especially aboutthe commissars. ‘Everywhere are there not sometimes young men who are failures, and therefore dissatisfied? —and such turn often into
mauvais sujets
, small criminals; without conscience, and angry with a world in which they have no success. But give them the chance of
power
over other people, and they are delighted; they take this to be the success