Ascension

by Steven Galloway

  László entered the front room just as Salvo returned the chair to its proper place. László had not seen any of the balancing. He set about picking up his winter clothing from the floor, setting his coat on the hook by the door. He looked at Leo, who was rubbing his lame foot. “Cold today,” he said.

  “Too cold,” Leo replied.

  “Maybe hell’s frozen over,” László said. It was supposed to be a joke, but his tone of voice hadn’t given any cue. Both boys’ faces paled and their mouths dropped.

  Leo looked to Salvo. “Did that happen?”

  Salvo shrugged. Anything was possible.

  “No, don’t worry. This isn’t hell. It’s only Hungary,” László said. Once again, it was a joke that was above the heads of children. Cynicism is always lost on the young ones, he thought. “Winter will be over soon.”

  Again Leo looked to Salvo. “Ask God for us if this is hell.”

  Salvo’s breath caught in his throat. László looked at him, puzzled. “You’re talking to God now?”

  “No,” Salvo said. His hands began to shake.

  “God used to talk to the Roma. Maybe he will again,” Leo said.

  László seized Salvo by the shoulder and pulled him into the kitchen. With a look, Esa knew this was trouble.

  “Who has been telling Romany stories to my son?”

  “I’m sorry.” Salvo said. László’s fingers were digging into his shoulder, which was rapidly going numb. Tears began to well up in Salvo’s eyes.

  “Your stories are not to be in this house. Filth. My son will not be a thief. He will not be a liar. He will not be dirty and he will not be poor.”

  “Yes, Uncle.”

  Esa remained quiet, but she was becoming angry inside. She had been Roma once, and she was neither dirty nor a thief nor a liar. László had no right to say such things.

  “You want a story? I’ve got a story for you, then. There were these three travellers: a Hungarian, a Jew and a Rom. They went to a farm one night, looking for a place to sleep. The farmer told them that he only had two beds; one of the travellers would have to sleep in the barn. The Hungarian wasn’t selfish, so he said he’d sleep in the barn. When he got there it was full of animals, and it was too foul to sleep in. He returned to the farmhouse and told the Jew to sleep there. The Jew went to the barn, but there were pigs there and it was not kosher for him, so he came back to the farmhouse and paid the Rom to take his place.

  “So the Rom went to the barn to sleep. After a while there was a knock at the door of the farmhouse. It was the cows and the pigs and the chickens. ‘Look,’ they said, ‘let us sleep here with you. We can’t sleep in that barn with a dirty Rom.’ ”

  Esa watched László’s mouth form a sneer, and she struggled to keep silent. This was not her battle. She had decided she would lose this fight a long time ago. Her choice had been made, and she had chosen László over her people. She didn’t know if she had done the right thing, but it no longer mattered. She loved her husband. This meant she must continue to love him, even during times like these. That was how things worked, whether she was Roma or gadje.

  Satisfied he had made his point, László released his grip on Salvo’s shoulder.

  “You understand what I’ve said?”

  Salvo felt his arm prickle as circulation was restored, and he rubbed the sore spot with his good hand. “Yes, Uncle.”

  László nodded and strode out of the room. Salvo choked back tears. Maybe his uncle was right about the Roma. No good had ever come from his being one. Only trouble, only misery. His aunt had stopped being a Rom, maybe he could too. But he did not want to. His father was Roma, as were his mother and brothers and sisters. They had died because they were Roma, and he would not be made ashamed of what he was. Instead he would become more Romany than ever. Someday, he would become like one of the Roma his father had told stories about.

  Esa watched Salvo’s face and felt a twinge of sorrow for what she knew the boy was enduring. She said a silent prayer that he would come through this torment with his spirit intact. “Come and sit,” she said, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Have some sausage.”

  Etel Ursari would never remember being locked inside the burning house. She had no memory of András opening the trunk, lifting her out and carrying her from the house, keeping his body between her and the still figures that had been their parents. Her earliest memories were of a winter spent in a hunter’s shelter deep in the forest, of being hungry and cold. She could not recall the faces of her parents, or of Salvo. Only András.

  For nearly two years they had stayed hidden, András fearing for their lives if they should be found. They ate what András was able to forage, risking a fire only when absolutely necessary. He dared not even trust other Roma. Eventually they ran out of options. The woods were becoming increasingly dangerous as more and more people fled the turmoil of the war’s aftermath. András decided that they would be safest in a large city, far away from the provincial town that had destroyed their family. It was a hard thing; at twelve years old he was an orphan, penniless and in charge of a baby girl.

  Hardship was something Etel knew from her first memory, a fact that stood in front of her since thought began. It was not worn as a burden, and there was no regret attached to it. It simply was, and things went forward from there, it naturally being assumed that life was a wrenching endeavour that lent no favours to unfortunate Roma.

  András, though, had known other things, and he was unable to put his sorrow aside. Though he had long considered making the trip to Budapest to seek out his aunt, he did not go. Either this place was not done with him or he was not done with this place. He vowed revenge; he savoured the prospect. His days were spent waiting, full of patient anger, his chest heavy with a dull ache he was sure would never go away.

  In the spring of 1921, shortly before Etel’s third birthday, they made their move. It was their intention to make their way to Budapest, where there might be work for András, and even the possibility of family. First, though, there was something András wanted to do. Young as she was, Etel knew immediately that it was something serious, something that was beyond her reckoning. She could tell that her brother would rather not have brought her along, but there was nowhere else for her to go. They waited until well after the sun went down. There was no moon, and as they moved quickly through the streets of the town that had once been their home, Etel grasped tightly to András’s back. In his arms he carried a large, sloshing, metal can. She did not have to be told to make no sound.

  As their destination approached, András remembered running down a muddy road in the middle of a thunderstorm, seeing the charred house, seeing his mother’s eyes wide open, his father’s mouth agape. He had heard Etel’s cries from inside the trunk, felt a wave of relief when he opened the lid and saw her, frightened but unharmed. He was seized by panic, fearing that his parents’ killers would return to finish the job. He wondered where Salvo was, scooped Etel into his arms and fled to the forest.

  These memories were placed aside when they reached the church. András put Etel on the ground beside a thick tree at the edge of the clearing, telling her to stay out of sight. András moved quickly around the back edge of the church, dousing the siding with kerosene. He stood still for a long minute, staring up at the steeple with no cross at the top. Etel heard nothing until the sharp snap of a match igniting, and a whoosh as the hungry wood consumed its flames. Before she even realized what he’d done, András was scooping her up and carrying her into the woods.

  Peering over his shoulder she could see the church burn; she could smell the smoke of the fire and feel its heat. When they were a distance away, cries of alarm rose from the church, but by then it was too late to stop the fire. It never occurred to Etel to wonder whether anyone had been inside. It had occurred to András, but he didn’t care. They moved slowly through the woods, choosing stealth over speed, going all night without stopping. András had no idea if there were pursuers behind him, but he felt it best to
assume that there were. Etel watched over his shoulder for signs that they were being followed. All she could see was fire, long after it had disappeared from view.

  They worked their way towards Budapest, staying clear of towns and main roads wherever possible. They slept in farmers’ fields and spent a comparably luxurious night in an empty barn. Etel wondered where the animals were. András knew they had all been slaughtered.

  About a week later, they were trudging along a desolate side road when the sound of wagons came up from behind them. András ushered Etel into the underbrush, where they crouched amongst the brambles, waiting for the wagons to pass.

  After a while a pair of horses came into view, good strong horses. They pulled a brightly painted wagon driven by a man wearing a gaudy hat. Several more wagons followed. A man rode a white horse beside the third wagon. He was dressed in new clothes, and he looked like he ate regularly. Behind him were four or five more wagons, and voices could be heard from all around. It took András a second to realize that the voices were speaking Romany. Etel did not know the difference between Romany and Hungarian, her language being a mishmash of the eastern dialects that András knew bits and pieces of.

  When the man’s horse came astride the spot where András and Etel were concealed, his rider bade him stop. The man remained frozen as the wagons continued, and then, as if smelling the children, he turned and looked straight at the bushes that hid them. He whistled sharply between his gleaming teeth and the wagons stopped smartly, like soldiers on parade. He slid off his horse, his hand moving to his side, where the hilt of a knife thrust upwards from his belt.

  “Who is there?” he said in Hungarian, his voice solid and commanding.

  András froze, wondering how the man had known they were there. Etel, however, let out a frightened squeak, and immediately the man was joined by three other men whose clothes were not as good as his. “Robbers,” one of them hissed in Romany. He had a rifle, and he raised it at the children’s hiding place.

  “No,” the man answered, “I do not think so.” He placed a hand on the rifle, gently pushing its barrel downwards. “Come out,” he called again.

  Etel made as if to move forward, but András grabbed her arm and held her still. The rifle again rose, and this time the well-dressed man made no move to stop it. A shot exploded from the rifle and the ground sprayed dirt in their faces.

  “Stop,” András called in Romany, instantly wishing he hadn’t. Now they were revealed. Rough hands pulled them from the brambles and stood them in front of the well-dressed man. He looked at András first—a long, hard, assessing look that made András sure the man could see into his bones. Less attention was paid to Etel, but enough that she felt close to tears, though she never cried. “Roma,” her brother had often told her, “do not weep for fear.”

  The man nodded and his cohorts released them. “You are Roma?” he asked.

  András nodded.

  “Funny thing. A few days ago, we went through a village that was looking to harm Roma. One in particular, a boy about your age. Seems he had burned down a church. You know about this?”

  András said nothing, but his hands began to shake.

  “We were lucky to get away. They knew we had nothing to do with it but did not care. To most gadje, we Roma are all the same.” The man grabbed András’s hand, and before the boy could pull it back, the man held it to his nose and inhaled deeply. “Kerosene,” he said, a slow chuckle rolling from the back of his throat.

  András smelled his hand, detecting no scent of kerosene. “I smell nothing,” he said.

  “Neither did I,” the man answered, “but your actions tell me everything.”

  András looked down at his feet, ashamed to have been tricked so easily. The man squatted down and brushed Etel’s hair out of her face. “What is your name, little one?”

  Etel stood up as tall as she would go. “Etel Ursari,” she said.

  The man smiled. “Ursari. You are a bear, then?”

  Etel growled her meanest bear growl, intending to intimidate, and the man laughed. He stood up. “I am Anosh Mór. I lead these Roma. If you like, you may travel with us.”

  “We’re fine,” András said.

  “I don’t think so. People are looking for you.”

  András looked at Etel, and felt his stomach tighten from emptiness. He knew that he had little choice but to trust this man.

  “We have food,” Anosh Mór said, and András’s mind was decided.

  Anosh Mór was called simply “Nosh” by everyone else. The twenty or so who followed him were mostly related in one way or another. The family had come from Russia to Hungary in the early part of the century, and since the war they had travelled throughout the continent, sometimes away from this army or that, but mostly to wherever a fast profit could be made. The war had been good to them on this account.

  When there was a scam to be had, everyone worked, even Nosh. He was an expert horse trader and had a million tricks for making a poor horse look well. Grey on a horse’s muzzle was dyed black again. One horse that was lame in his left foot had a tiny nail driven into its right foot, so that it was unable to favour either. The best trick of all was the trained mare who, at the first possible opportunity, would bolt from her new owner, only to be brought back in short order by an honest stranger, who usually received a small reward for his trouble. After this happened three or four times, the new owner usually came to the easily found caravan of the Mór Roma and demanded a refund, which was grudgingly given. The honest strangers were of course Mór Roma themselves, but hardly anyone ever noticed, most considering themselves lucky to receive a refund on the bad horse. If the new owners did not return the horse for a refund, then the mare would be stolen in the night, and the Mór Roma would not be so easily located. Even if they were, the mare would be nowhere to be found, though a similar horse of another colour would be in plain view.

  András got a rush from these schemes, not in their success but in their execution. He enjoyed duping the gadje immensely, regardless of the prize. The Mór Roma had treated the Usari children well, almost as though he and Etel were two of their own. There was a distance that András sometimes noticed, though, a look that held a quiet malice, as if the Roma knew some larger truth that he did not. It concerned him but these times were rare, and without anything more substantial he was of the opinion that a good thing need not be tampered with.

  When they were in larger cities, the youngest of the Mór Roma were given crutches, slings and eye patches and sent out to the streets to beg. András was surprised how much could be earned once he learned how to play the game. Etel always earned the most, though. People would push past the throng of them only to stop at Etel, who stood silently with a bandage over both her eyes, a bowl at her feet. They nearly always put a coin in her bowl without her moving a muscle.

  At first Etel didn’t mind the begging. She didn’t give it a second thought, because as far as she was concerned she wasn’t even there. With her eyes covered over she lived in her dreams, imagining for herself a life that did not involve being at the mercy of others. She imagined that she lived the life of a gadji, or at least what she thought the life of a gadji must be like. But as she got older it became harder and harder to keep back the world around her, and after three years with the Mór Roma she could do little else but stand still and sing herself songs in her head.

  It was in the fall of 1925 that László Nagy’s hard work came to fruition. For the previous four years he had spent as much time as he possibly could perfecting his craft, staying late after his shift at Sándor Glassworks, often working through the night. The foreman was a kind man, and he did not object to László using company equipment for his own purposes, as long as it didn’t affect his work. After all, the more László learned about glass, the better an employee he would be. He even watched with interest as László perfected various techniques for colouring and shaping his hand-blown glass, and every once in a while, when a setback was suffered, the foreman
felt nearly as badly as László, though he never let on.

  Since the preceding spring, however, László had been keeping the subject of his work a secret, and although the foreman occasionally caught a glimpse of a piece of something here and there, he had never seen exactly what László was making until that day after work when László took him aside and showed him his magnificent creation.

  Similarly, neither Salvo nor Leo knew what László was up to. All they knew was that he seemed to be in a much better than usual mood lately, and that he was hardly ever home. As both these things were sources of comfort for the two boys, they did not put much effort into questioning László’s whereabouts. Esa, however, was fully aware of her husband’s work, but even she had no idea what to expect the day that László finished.

  The door to the apartment opened quickly and unexpectedly, which startled Esa. She had been in the kitchen preparing a midday meal, fully expecting László not to arrive home until late at night, so she had not made a portion for him. Leo’s foot was aching, so she had made him soak it in warm water and salts. Salvo had helped her lift a basin into the front room, and the two boys were there now, Leo trying to teach Salvo to read, Salvo paying half-hearted attention. Esa was wondering if maybe she should ask Leo or László to teach her how to read when the door had burst open. She immediately thought that the police were there to take her away. When she saw that it was László she was relieved, and thought herself rather silly. Why would the police take her away? she chided herself. She had done nothing wrong. After completing this mental reprimand, she noticed that László was carrying a wooden box about two feet wide and tall, and she wondered what was in it. “You’re home early.”

  László nodded, appearing to Esa to be out of breath. There was a strange look on his face, an expression she could not recall ever seeing before. She wasn’t sure what sort of mood the look was indicative of; there was a smile on his face, or at least the hint of a smile, which for László qualified as a beaming grin, but his forehead was scrunched down so that his eyebrows protruded awkwardly from his head, much like the way the snow on a roof can bulge over the eaves, seeming to defy gravity for a time before collapsing under its own weight. Esa decided that whatever László was feeling, it was new and extreme, and for a fleeting moment she envied him the scope of his emotions.