Marjorie dresses fancifully only in the morning. She is a passionate adherent of evening dress. The men always come to dinner in black coats. I tried to rebel in favour of short-sleeved shirts with open collars, but had to accept defeat.

Once, concerning this matter, Eva Nicholson said something silly and over-excited to me:

‘You’re wrong to laugh at this. It’s not frivolous. It’s something more serious, it’s a matter of dignity; no, it’s a matter of salvation. If, because we’re on our own, because nobody sees us, we conceded a little of what you consider society manners, and a little more tomorrow, we’d wake up one morning living in the most terrible promiscuity. It would be unbearable. Without black tie and evening gown, nobody would have any real privacy. Privacy is such a fragile thing and it’s worth making sacrifices for.’

Though I don’t entirely follow Mrs Nicholson’s reasoning, I have to admit that their strict dress code evenings are relaxed and welcoming. I have a sense of freedom, well-being, of simple elegance.

Marjorie played Déodat de Séverac on the piano, the Debussy-ist she recently discovered. It’s amusing to watch young Pierre Dogany listening as he leans against the corner of the piano, visibly sad and happy. His strange head has both Semitic and Mongolian features. He really is handsome, this boy, and deeply appealing in his unrequited love for Marjorie. Marjorie looks at him directly, loyally, as if to say: ‘It’s nothing, Pierre, it’ll pass, you’ll see.’ At the end of September he has to return to Budapest to sit exams, and the prospect is already weighing on him.

We left late, together, and walked to the Duntons’. Then he walked a bit with me, towards the cabin. He recited some verses by Endre Ady but wouldn’t translate them for me. His voice trembled and I could feel how furious that made him.

Entering my room, I probably woke Dronţu who, from beyond, struggling out of sleep, couldn’t keep from shouting out to me once again:

‘See how you waste your nights? That Marjorie’s going to wear you out. And not one of you is up to the job. You call yourselves men …’

*

What a surprise, meeting S.T. Haim in the casino in Sinaia. A pipe on the construction site had burst, right in my work area, and I suddenly found myself with a few free hours. I didn’t feel like conversation or reading, and, as Hacker was leaving with the Ford for Predeal, where he has a sick daughter, I asked him to drop me off in Sinaia.

Same old S.T.H. Blond, kinky-haired, short, with extraordinarily intelligent eyes, alive to everything, the flash of a smile or the beat of a pulse; his agitated hands twitching with the impatience to express too much. ‘He has too many gestures and only two hands,’ Winkler used to say.

He had completely disappeared for the past few years. I can’t have caught sight of him more than a couple of times, from afar, in the street. He went abroad, travelled extensively, had a few love affairs, made some good business decisions. Now he’s working with some very profitable foreign engineering firms. His doctoral thesis in mathematics caused a bit of a stir in the university, but that was three or four years ago and I don’t think he cares much for maths these days.

‘I’m like those Jewish girls who play Beethoven and Schubert with feeling, then one day get married, stop playing the piano, forget about music, get fat and have children.’

I felt he was telling me this in anticipation of my question, but I don’t actually believe anything he says. In fact, he’s unjust with himself. Money, no matter how rich he may be, has had no effect on his air of being a free man, ready to lose everything and start from scratch.