The Light After the War

by Anita Abriel

  “You borrowed money from the bank,” Vera repeated. Edith had never told her.

  “I had to come up with the rent for the space at the Majestic. The bank wouldn’t lend money to a woman, so Robert signed with me.” Edith looked at Vera. “I trusted him completely.”

  “What happened?” Vera asked.

  “Everything was going well until he opened a dress shop in Philadelphia. It did poorly from the start, and he couldn’t pay his rent. At the same time, sales in the shops in Boston and New York dropped and he got deeper in debt. He used the money I cosigned for to pay back his creditors, but it wasn’t enough. They came and took back all his dresses. Since I was the one who bought the fabric on credit, the suppliers are threatening to call in my debt, too.”

  “Robert can get another loan,” Vera suggested. “Or perhaps his wife’s family can help.”

  “I called Marcus and asked him to go to Robert’s apartment in Manhattan. It was one of those fancy doorman buildings in Park Avenue,” she gulped. “The superintendent said they moved out. The keys were on the counter and the furniture was gone. They didn’t give a forwarding address.”

  Edith’s shoulders shook and Vera comforted her.

  “You have all the fabric in your workroom. When you deliver those dresses, you can pay off the creditors.”

  “The orders haven’t come in yet,” Edith replied. “Any minute they’ll take the fabric, and I’ll be left with an empty worktable and some hungry mice.”

  “I’ll ask Ricardo to lend you money. It would be strictly business; we’ll have a lawyer draw it up.”

  “You can’t tell Ricardo anything.” Edith clutched Vera’s arm. “If Kitty and her friends find out, I’ll be finished in Caracas forever.”

  “What will you do?”

  Edith stood up and Vera was reminded how beautiful she was. Even with her smudged mascara, Edith had the poise of a model.

  She smiled. “First I want to admire my best friend’s mansion. Then we’re going to have lunch and come up with a plan.”

  “It’s not a mansion,” Vera giggled. They had five rooms downstairs, and two bedrooms upstairs. “What kind of plan were you thinking?”

  Edith put the cigarette case back in her purse. “A plan that won’t let any man take advantage of me again.”

  Vera showed her Ricardo’s study and the kitchen outfitted with the latest appliances and Vera’s office where she kept a typewriter. Upstairs there was a guest room that could be a nursery and a bathroom with a porcelain bathtub.

  “You bedroom is bigger than Signora Rosa’s top floor!” Edith said when they entered. The king-size bed took up the middle of the room; a silk armchair and an ottoman sat opposite. A balcony overlooked the garden. Doors led to separate dressing rooms.

  “Ricardo is used to having his own space,” Vera said, embarrassed. “He didn’t want us to get in each other’s way.”

  “What’s it like?” Edith asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You have to tell me,” Edith said. “What’s it like to make love to a man?”

  Vera looked up and there was a quick flash of pain in Edith’s eyes. She remembered the month before Stefan was put on the train to Strasshof. Edith had slumped in her room with an anatomy book, and Vera had been certain Edith was pregnant.

  * * *

  In April 1944, an early spring arrived in Budapest. Vera wore her yellow star on her school dress because it was too warm to wear her coat. Edith and Stefan used the warm weather as an excuse to linger in the botanical gardens. When Edith came home, her hair ribbon was often missing.

  Vera knocked on the door and poked her head in Edith’s bedroom. Edith was sitting on the floor. Her schoolbag was open and books were scattered on the rug.

  “What are you doing?” Vera entered the room. “We just finished dinner, your mother asked where you were.”

  “Stefan and I were studying.” Edith gestured at the books.

  “Then why do you have grass stains on your skirt?” Vera raised her eyebrow. “It’s all right if you and Stefan stay out late during the summer, but we have school now. You won’t pass if you don’t do your homework.”

  “What does it matter, soon we’ll be sent to the ghetto or worse,” Edith replied. “Stefan’s neighbor, Len Rabinovitz, was sent to the labor camps. He’s only seventeen, but they came for his older brother and took him, too.”

  “We don’t know when we’re going; it could all be a rumor.” Vera noticed a textbook with a picture of the human body. “What’s this?”

  “I found it at a used bookstore.”

  “Since when are you interested in female anatomy?” Vera flipped through the book. “Don’t tell me you’re pregnant!”

  She had been so moody lately and spent all her time with Stefan.

  “I’m not pregnant,” Edith insisted. “I just want to know how the female body works.”

  “Our mothers can tell us what we need to know.” Vera studied Edith closely. “Do you promise you’re telling the truth?”

  “I swear on the life of Anastasia.” Edith tugged a brush through her hair.

  Anastasia was the beloved cat that lived at the house in the country. Vera and Edith named her after the tragic Russian princess.

  Vera nodded. “All right, I believe you.”

  * * *

  A week later Alice asked Vera to go to the delicatessen and plead for an extra ounce of gnocchi. Vera had lost weight in the last two months and Alice worried she wasn’t getting enough to eat.

  “You lied to me.” Vera entered Edith’s bedroom without knocking. “I knew you were pregnant.”

  “What are you talking about?” Edith sat on the bed.

  “I was at the delicatessen and saw you huddled in the alley with Golda Peskowitz.”

  “So?” Edith asked.

  “She’s a midwife!” Vera exclaimed. “You were asking how to get rid of the baby.”

  “I wanted to know if she had anything for my mother’s cramps. They’ve gotten worse and my mother was too embarrassed to ask,” she answered. “It would be a miracle if I was pregnant. Stefan and I haven’t had sex.”

  “All those evenings you stayed out at the lake…” Vera said uncertainly.

  “We did lots of things, but never that,” Edith responded. “We had a long talk last summer and agreed to wait until we were engaged. Then a few weeks ago I changed my mind. I told Stefan I didn’t want to wait, and we got in a fight.”

  “You got in a fight?” Vera repeated.

  “Stefan said the only reason I would change my mind is if I thought he was going to be sent away and wasn’t coming back.”

  “That’s not what you were thinking,” Vera soothed her. “You’re young and in love. Lots of girls think about that sort of thing.”

  “No, he was right.” Edith’s voice caught. “All I thought about when he kissed me was what if he was sent to the camps? I’d live the rest of my life having missed out on truly knowing the boy I love.”

  * * *

  “You’ve never made love?” Vera asked curiously, folding Ricardo’s robe that lay on the bed.

  “I told you Stefan and I never had sex,” Edith replied.

  “I thought perhaps with Marcus before…”

  “Before I saw him kissing Leo at the jewelry store?” Edith smiled. “Marcus would never do more than kiss me,” she sighed.

  “There’s plenty of time,” Vera assured her. “You’re only twenty.”

  Edith shrugged. “I don’t mind; my career makes me happy. But now I’m ruined. I’ll be a poor spinster renting a room in Lola’s boardinghouse when I’m forty.”

  “Come on, we said we’d think of a plan during lunch.” Vera took her arm and led her to the staircase.

  Edith stopped her. “First you have to tell me. Is it as painful as our sixth-grade teacher warned, or is it the most exquisite feeling in the world?”

  “It hurts in the beginning, but then it’s nice,” Vera answered truthfully.
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  “It’s not about the kissing and moaning, it’s sharing the most intimate act with the man you love,” Edith said thoughtfully. “That’s what I longed for with Stefan, so I would never forget it no matter what happened.”

  “You’re right.” Vera flashed on the night in Capri with Anton. “When you’ve had that, you never forget it.”

  * * *

  Vera and Edith sat at the dining room table and ate.

  “I forgot—you have a letter.” Edith reached into her purse and gave Vera an envelope.

  “It’s from Captain Bingham.” Vera opened it. “He congratulated me and hopes our marriage is full of happiness.” She noticed something stuck to the back of the envelope. “This is for you.” She handed it to Edith. “It’s a cable.”

  Edith tore it open. “It’s from Marcus! He’s coming to Caracas! He says he has a surprise for us.”

  “What kind of surprise?”

  “He doesn’t say.” Edith stood up.

  “Where are you going? I was about to bring out cookies, and we haven’t thought of a plan to save your business.”

  “It will have to wait.” Edith kissed her on the cheek. “I have to ask Lola if she has an extra room and get to the airport. Marcus arrives tonight!”

  * * *

  Vera was fixing a milk punch—rum and mango juice and condensed milk—when the front door opened.

  “You’re home early.” Vera looked up. It was still a surprise to see Ricardo enter the house, as if she was acting in one of the plays she and Edith used to perform.

  “This is the dream of every man.” Ricardo kissed her. “To come home and see my beautiful wife standing in the living room.”

  “I fixed cocktails.” She handed him a highball glass. “Don’t be too harsh; it’s my first try.”

  Ricardo had introduced her to the recipe on their honeymoon.

  He took a long sip and smiled. “It’s just what I needed. A customer refused to pick up his car because he claimed he ordered beige upholstery. I showed him the order and he accused me of changing the color. It’s a Citroën. I can’t send it back to France.”

  “I’m sorry if you had a hard day,” Vera said. “Edith came over for lunch. You’ll never guess—our friend Marcus is coming to Caracas.”

  “Is Marcus the photographer Edith dated in Naples?” Ricardo wondered.

  Vera nodded. “He lives in New York now; he’s quite successful. He sent Edith a cable. He’s arriving this evening.”

  “We should invite them to dinner,” Ricardo suggested. “Maybe that’s why Edith isn’t interested in men. She’s still in love with Marcus.”

  Vera had told Ricardo about the photograph in LIFE magazine, but she hadn’t mentioned that Marcus liked men. Ricardo was opinionated on certain subjects, and she worried he might not approve of her having a homosexual friend.

  “Tomorrow I have to deliver a car to a customer in Valencia. I won’t be home until midnight,” he continued. “We’ll do it the next night. It will be our first dinner party.”

  Ricardo went upstairs to change for dinner and Vera took their glasses into the kitchen. It felt wrong to keep secrets from Ricardo: her past with Anton, the fake engagement ring, and now Marcus’s homosexuality.

  She peered into the oven and checked that the empanadas she had made were rich and fluffy. Wasn’t the point of marriage to make each other happy? It was better to keep some things to herself, especially if they would only cause trouble.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  December 1947

  The day after Edith came for lunch, Vera drove to her parents’ bungalow. Mr. Matthews had suggested she take three weeks off after the wedding, and she was glad she had agreed. There was so much to keep her busy.

  She was bringing her parents an extra serving bowl she and Ricardo had received as a wedding present, and tonight she was meeting Edith and Marcus for drinks. Marcus’s news was so exciting he wanted to tell Vera himself.

  “Look at you, all independent and driving that beautiful car.” Alice kissed Vera when she hopped out of the car. “I can’t believe you’re my daughter.”

  “I couldn’t accept the Lagonda, but Ricardo can’t drive two cars at once,” Vera laughed, admiring the green MG. “I never realized it was so freeing to drive. I can go wherever I like.”

  They walked inside. Alice had an apron tied over her dress and the scent of tomatoes and paprika wafted from the kitchen.

  “The house smells wonderful,” Vera continued.

  “I found the ingredients to make lecsó at the market,” Alice said. “I haven’t seen your father so excited since Arthur Rubenstein performed Chopin in Paris in 1920.”

  Lecsó was a Hungarian vegetable stew, her father’s favorite dish.

  “Where is he?” Vera handed Alice her packages. “I brought the bowl and a pipe. Ricardo received a pipe as a wedding present, and he already has two.”

  “Lawrence went to the barber.”

  “The barber? But he doesn’t have any hair.”

  “It’s not about the haircut, it’s the pleasure of sitting in the barber’s chair with hot towels on his cheeks,” Alice answered. “For five centimos Lawrence can put his feet up and listen to the barber compliment him on his beautiful daughter.”

  “The barber doesn’t know me,” Vera responded.

  “All daughters are beautiful to a clever barber,” Alice chuckled. “A shave gives Lawrence confidence, and he has a job interview this afternoon.”

  “What kind of a job?” Vera asked.

  A cloud passed over Alice’s face and she moved to the kitchen. “Rabbi Gorem’s cousin owns a construction company. Lawrence is going to be a clerk.”

  “A clerk! But he had one of the most respected law practices in Budapest.”

  “He can’t practice law in Venezuela without a degree from a local university,” Alice explained as she chopped onions. “And he has to improve his Spanish. I found work, too. I’m going to take on sewing.” She wiped her hands on her apron. “Lawrence is getting stronger and we need money. The law degree isn’t free, but our situation is only temporary.”

  “You’ve both been through so much,” Vera wavered. “I wanted you to rest and lead a good life.”

  “Sit down.” Alice pointed to the chair. “I haven’t told you about when I escaped from Flossenbürg. Eleven thousand Jews arrived in Flossenbürg from Auschwitz in January 1945, and the conditions were horrendous. Lily was dead and I had no one.” Her eyes darkened. “The sick and the healthy all slept in the same dormitory. By the spring, you couldn’t go to bed without a dead body being carted away. I developed a cough, but I hid it. I didn’t want someone taking my cot because they thought I wouldn’t need it.” She wiped her hands. “Then in April the guards seemed distracted; we could tell something was wrong. One day, they took us from the camp and said we were being moved to Dachau, two hundred kilometers on foot.” She looked at Vera. “By the second day my forehead was on fire and I could hardly swallow. Suddenly guards started running and I was sure the fever made me hallucinate. I learned later that the Allies had surrounded the forest and the guards fled. Can you imagine? We were finally free but I was so weak, I couldn’t walk another step.”

  “What happened?” Vera asked.

  “I fainted and another prisoner carried me to a house in a village,” Alice said. “I don’t even know his name; he left me and kept going. I was in and out of the fever for four months. When I recovered, the war had been over for months.”

  “The house was owned by a cobbler, Gunther, and his wife, Marie. They were German, but they were good people. Their son, Hans, was part of the White Rose resistance when he was a student at the University of Munich. The Gestapo put Hans on trial for treason. He was executed in 1943,” Alice said somberly. “The first day I felt well enough to get out of bed, Marie invited me to join them for dinner. Potatoes were the only food still plentiful in Germany, and Marie used it in everything: potato in vegetable soup when there were no vegetables, and cab
bage rolls with potatoes instead of meat, and potato with applesauce for dessert. But all Marie put on my plate was a boiled potato.”

  “A boiled potato?” Vera repeated.

  “Marie knew if I put too much food in my stomach, I would relapse,” Alice said. “For two weeks she wouldn’t let me eat anything but a boiled potato. No butter and no sauerkraut and no horseradish. It was the best thing I ever tasted.

  “Sewing is my boiled potato. It’s the simplest activity, but it brings me great joy,” Alice finished. “There is nothing more satisfying than pulling a needle and thread through a shirt or pretty dress. I would happily do it every day for the rest of my life.”

  “Why can’t things stay the same?” Vera asked. “Why can’t we be in the apartment in Budapest? Father would come home from the office and there would be cherry soup and cheese noodles for dinner. Edith and Lily would join us and bring Lily’s chimney cake, and afterward we’d play cards.”

  “Because you’re now a young wife with a good husband, and because I’m making lecsó.” Alice went back to chopping onions. “Lawrence is crazy for my lecsó.”

  * * *

  Edith and Marcus were seated at a table at the bar when Vera arrived at the restaurant. The sun was setting and the air was warm and sweet.

  “There’s the new bride!” Marcus jumped up and hugged Vera. He wore tight white pants and a yellow sweater. His dark hair curled around his ears and his green eyes danced with excitement.

  “Don’t tell me you didn’t bring the groom?” Marcus demanded. “How can I know if he’s worthy if I don’t meet him?”

  “Ricardo is working tonight, but he invited you and Edith to dinner tomorrow night.” Vera hugged him back.

  “I love dinner parties; it’s the best way to get fed in Manhattan.” Marcus sat down and picked up his drink. “I’m a growing boy and I’m always hungry.”

  “Marcus is the new ‘It’ boy in New York art circles,” Edith chimed in, her cheeks glowing from the pleasure of being with Marcus. “Everyone wants him at their table: he dined at the Knickerbocker Club with the Vanderbilts.”