CHAPTER SEVENTEENDespite István’s impatience, we had not returned to Buda-Pest until the day of the elections themselves. This was partly due to the old Count’s reluctance to part with us: though he refused to leave Szelényi, neither did he wish to be alone again, with only Margit and the servants for company.
I wondered briefly if he was afraid after the peasants’ strange, silent demonstration, but he showed no other signs of that, and the peasants themselves seemed to have reverted to sullenly ignoring their lord and complaining about the poor yield of this year’s harvest. Most of them showed no interest whatever in my ‘return’, the exceptions, of course, being Lajos’s parents, who were touchingly pleased about my happy reunion with my family. Of Lajos’s reaction, I knew nothing; he had
