“‘Thank you,’ I said, trying not to cringe visibly. ‘And I enjoyed every minute of yours. It really covered a remarkable spectrum. I wonder if you know my-er-mentor, Bartholomew Rossi. He’s English, too.’
“‘Well, of course!’ Hugh James unfurled his napkin with an enthusiastic flourish. ‘Professor Rossi is one of my favorite writers-I’ve read most of his books. You work with him? How very fortunate.’
“I had lost track of Helen, but at that moment I caught sight of her at the luncheon buffet with Géza József at her side. He was speaking earnestly almost in her ear, and after a minute she permitted him to follow her to a small table on the other side of the hall. I could see her well enough to make out the sour expression on her face, but it didn’t make the scene much more palatable to me. He was leaning toward her, gazing into her face while she looked down at her food, and I felt almost crazed by my desire to know what he was saying to her.
“‘In any case’-Hugh James was still talking about Rossi’s work-‘I think his studies of Greek theater are marvelous. The man can do anything.’
“‘Yes,’ I said absently. ‘He’s been working on an article called ”The Ghost in the Amphora,“ about the stage props used in the Greek tragedies.’ I stopped, suddenly realizing I might be giving away Rossi’s trade secrets. If I hadn’t halted myself, however, Professor James’s face would have brought me up short.
“‘The what?’ he said, clearly astonished. He set down his fork and knife, abandoning his lunch. ‘Did you say ”The Ghost in the Amphora“?’
“‘Yes.’ I’d forgotten even about Helen and Géza now. ‘Why do you ask?’
“‘But this is astounding! I think I must write to Professor Rossi at once. You see, I’ve recently been studying a most interesting document from fifteenth-century Hungary. That’s what brought me to Budapest in the first place-I’ve been looking into that period of Hungary ’s history, you know, and then I tagged along at the conference with Professor Sándor’s kind permission. In any case, this document was written by one of King Matthias Corvinus’s scholars, and it mentions the ghost in the amphora.’
“I remembered that Helen had referred to King Matthias Corvinus the night before; hadn’t he been the founder of the great library in the Buda castle? Aunt Éva had told me about him, too. ‘Please,’ I said urgently, ‘explain.’
“‘Well, I-it’s rather a silly sounding thing, but I’ve been very interested for several years in the folk legends of Central Europe. It started as a bit of a lark, I suppose, long ago, but I’ve become absolutely mesmerized by the legend of the vampire.’
“I stared at him. He looked as ordinary as before, with his ruddy, jolly face and tweed jacket, but I felt I must be dreaming.
“‘Oh, I know it sounds juvenile-Count Dracula and all that-but you know it really is a remarkable subject when you dig into it a bit. You see, Dracula was a real person, although of course not a vampire, and I’m interested in whether his history is in any way connected with folk legends of the vampire. A few years ago I started looking for written material on the topic, to see if there even was any, since of course the vampire existed mainly in oral legend in Central and East European villages.’
“He leaned back, drumming his fingers on the edge of the table. ‘Well, lo and behold, working in the university library here, I turned up this document that Corvinus apparently commissioned-he wanted someone to collect all knowledge of vampires from earliest times. Whoever the scholar was who got the job, he was certainly a classicist, and instead of tramping around villages as any good anthropologist would have done, he began poking through Latin and Greek texts-Corvinus had a lot of these here, you know-to find references to vampires, and he turned up this ancient Greek idea, which I haven’t seen anywhere else-at least not until you mentioned it just now-of the ghost in the amphora. In ancient Greece, and in Greek tragedies, the amphora sometimes contained human ashes, you see, and the ignorant folk of Greece believed that if things didn’t go quite right with the burial of the amphora, it could produce a vampire-I’m not quite sure how, yet. Perhaps Professor Rossi knows something about this, if he’s writing about ghosts in amphorae. A remarkable coincidence, isn’t it? Actually, there are still vampires in modern Greece, according to folklore.’
“‘I know,’ I said. ‘Thevrykolakas. ’
“This time it was Hugh James’s turn to stare. His protuberant hazel eyes grew enormous. ‘How do you know that?’ he breathed. ‘I mean-I beg your pardon-I’m just surprised to meet someone else who -’
“‘Is interested in vampires?’ I said dryly. ‘Yes, that used to surprise me, too, but I’m getting used to it, these days. How did you become interested in vampires, Professor James?’
“‘Hugh,’ he said, slowly. ‘Please call me Hugh. Well, I -’ He looked hard at me for a second, and for the first time I saw that under his cheerful, bumbling exterior there glowed an intensity like a flame. ‘It’s dreadfully strange and I don’t usually tell people about this, but -’
“I really couldn’t bear the delay. ‘Did you, by any chance, find an old book with a dragon in the center?’ I said.
“He eyed me almost wildly, and the color drained from his healthy face. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I found a book.’ His hands gripped the edge of the table. ‘Who are you?’
“‘I found one, too.’
“We sat looking at each other for a few long seconds, and we might have sat speechless even longer, delaying all we had to discuss, if we hadn’t been interrupted. Géza József’s voice was at my ear before I noticed his presence; he had come up behind me and was bending over our table with a genial smile. Helen came hurrying up, too, and her face was strange-almost guilty, I thought. ‘Good afternoon, comrades,’ he said cordially. ‘What’s this about finding books?’”
Chapter 41
“When Professor József bent over our table with his friendly question, I wasn’t sure for a moment what to say. I had to talk with Hugh James again as soon as possible, but in private, not in this crush of people, and certainly not with the very person Helen had warned me about-why?-breathing down my neck. At last I mustered a few words. ‘We were sharing our love of antique books,’ I said. ‘Every scholar should be able to admit to that, don’t you think?’
“By this time Helen had caught up with us and was eyeing me with what I took to be mingled alarm and approval. I rose to pull out a chair for her. In the midst of my need to dissemble before Géza József, I must have communicated some excitement to her, for she stared from me to Hugh. Géza looked genially at all of us, but I fancied I saw a slight narrowing of his handsome epicanthic eyes; so, I thought, the Huns must have squinted into the Western sun through the slits of their leather headgear. I tried not to look at him again.
“We might have remained there parrying or avoiding looks all day if Professor Sándor had not suddenly appeared. ‘Very good,’ he trumpeted. ‘I find you enjoy your lunch. You are finished? And now, if you will be very kind to come with me, we will arrange your lecture to begin.’
“I flinched-I had actually forgotten for a few minutes the torture that awaited me-but I rose in obedience. Géza dropped respectfully behind Professor Sándor-a little too respectfully? I asked myself-and that gave me a blessed moment to look at Helen. I widened my eyes and motioned toward Hugh James, who had also risen politely to his feet at Helen’s approach and was standing mutely at the table. She frowned, puzzled, and then Professor Sándor, to my great relief, clapped Géza on the shoulder and led him away. I thought I read annoyance in the young Hungarian’s massive suit-jacketed back, but perhaps I had already imbibed too much of Helen’s paranoia about him. In any case, it gave us an instant of freedom.