THE TWO OF THEM

My mother was twisting and squeezing her hands in pains of childbirth. I was her first child. The GP from Szany looked after us. He held out his hands to my mother. Twist and squeeze mine. Frigyes Gellei, a Jewish doctor, held me when I was born. Later at the time of my spiritual awakening, I would have liked to ask him how he saw and felt me, but he had died.

He was among the first ones to have been deported with his family. His wife was weak and died earlier. His elder daughter Éva pushed her little sister around in a wheelbarrow for some time. But the once plump, always cheerful Kitty was now a bag of bones, as she grasped the wheelbarrow. We did not have more news. At the end of the war, the father managed to crawl home, alone, looking for his family. He was given care and looked after for few days, but all help was in vain for he did not want to and could not live anymore. Many mourned for him.

I preserve the picture of Alajos Werner among the heavenly memories of my first year spent at the Academy of Music. The black cassock hung loosely on his apparition-like slim figure, he had his haircut “a la Liszt.” He was straight and hard, a clear crystal. I have never seen anyone similar to him in my life: He was always well above compromise or looseness. We were not afraid of him, even though his church musician students were made to study hard and criticised mercilessly by him. On Friday mornings the students played the organ and conducted the folk song mass by turns. We sang the songs of “Sacred art thou, Lord” like regular people. Mr. Werner’s criticisms would make the window frames crackle in room two but they loved him and called him Lojzi. He was often given fountain-pens as presents because he gave them away one after another or lost them. 

When one is young he or she imagines that the beauties of the world will always surround him or her. The Academy of Music will be always like this. Alajos Werner’s silver head would appear in front of room two on time. We would speed along from the corners of the cloak room with our sheets of the score. We were practising continually, but it was never enough. The world changed soon, the church music department disappeared, and so did Mr. Werner. Much later I heard about his prison experience and about how he was beaten in there. He was beaten many times because he was stubborn and obstinate so they said. But in what way? No answer was given.

Frigyes Gellei did not have the strength to tell about what happened to him and he did not have his family whom he may have told it. Alajos Werner was a priest and he remained silent and when he was released, he was not allowed to teach. Once we visited him at Máriaremete enquiring about the phrasing for singers. He showed, explained the incomparably beautiful sound secrets of his famous children’s choir from Szombathely. He would have taught us but he was not allowed.

Years later I got to the church at Máriaremete by chance, I was sadly kneeling there because of something trifling. A preacher in his surplice walked across the empty church. He noticed me and slowed down. He came to a sudden halt for a moment. Then he went on and disappeared in the confessional. He was allowed to hear confessions only, not to make music or to teach, even though he was incomparable, unique and best at these. 

Did Frigyes Gellei cure in the German’s death camps? He was an excellent doctor, conscientious, experienced, and clean-handed. The people of Szany respected and loved him. But we did not experience what he had. If I had been there, would he have taught me? I was born in his hands, he touched me first. My body can still remember his big, warm, doctor’s hands. Does the memory of the first worldly touch matter? I was never afraid of touching and it is a pleasure up to now if I can touch others.

I now understand that I would learn healing from Frigyes Gellei, and singing from Alajos Werner.