Hugo looks around again: the mountains are covered with trees, and on the broad plains peasants are harvesting golden grain, working together at a steady rhythm. In a moment Otto will join them. In these areas there is apparently no need for words. Otto is happier than he was at home. Here he blends into the seasons. There are no exceptional events. There is no mother to proclaim, morning and night, “If this is what life is, I’ll give up my share.” Here everyone eats full meals, and the animals submit to the discipline of the working people. No one argues or contradicts anyone, and in the evening, they gather up their belongings and return to their huts.
Suddenly Otto gives Hugo a look that says, Take me out of your thoughts. Your thoughts are no longer my thoughts. I belong to this place. This isn’t a land of wonders. It’s a difficult country, but whoever clings to it is cured of pessimism. Pessimism is a serious disease. My poor mother bequeathed it to me.
“And what will become of all of us?” Hugo asks.
Otto gives him the practical look of a peasant, as if to say, That’s no longer my concern. “The Jews and their pessimism tried to send me to hell. Now, thank God, I’m rid of them,” he says, and then vanishes.
Hugo wakes up, apparently because of the commotion taking place in Mariana’s room. Mariana is shouting at the top of her lungs, and a man is threatening, “I’ll kill you if you don’t shut up. I’ll kill you. Don’t forget that I’m an officer. With an officer, you don’t argue. You do what he orders you to do.” That threat doesn’t silence her, either.
In the midst of it all, a shot is heard. The sound pierces the house and the closet. Mariana’s room freezes for a moment. There is no response to the shot from the corridor or from the yard, either. Only later does Mariana burst into loud sobs, and a few women enter her room. “Are you wounded?” one of them asks.
“I’m not wounded,” she murmurs.
“That’s a relief.” The same woman goes on to ask, “What did he want from you?”
Mariana, still sobbing, tells the woman what the officer demanded of her. She speaks in detail, and graphically. Hugo doesn’t understand anything she says. The women agree with her that they mustn’t give in to demands like those. There is sisterhood and much talk, which slightly diffuses the shock.
After that everybody leaves Mariana’s room. There is silence. Not a sound can be heard—just the dripping of the faucet in the yard. Through the cracks in the closet, the first rays of morning light filter in. They are long and touch Hugo’s feet. For a moment he forgets the shot and the shock. The wonder of light captures his attention.
Later Hugo hears a woman say, “He didn’t intend to kill her. He wanted to frighten her.”
“He was afraid that his shame would be revealed to his fellow officers.” The voice of an older woman is heard.
“If so, he meant to kill her.”
“What can you say? Our profession is dangerous. They should pay us a risk allowance.”
Laughter is heard, and the voices mingle with one another. Hugo knows there will be accusations, clarifications, threats, and, finally, Mariana will have to apologize and promise that in the future she won’t shout and will do exactly what the customer demands of her.
It’s strange that this knowledge calms his fears and that he is comforted in his heart. In a moment the white morning will be revealed, and everything will be as it was. In the afternoon Mariana will stand in the doorway of the closet with a bowl of soup in her hand.
18
The winds die down and snow falls without letup. Hugo stands next to the cracks in the closet wall and watches the thick snowflakes slowly floating down. The white sight reminds him of home on Sunday mornings: Sofia went to church to pray; his father, dressed in casual clothes, prepared a festive breakfast; his mother put on a new housecoat. The gramophone played Bach sonatas, and the blue porcelain stove roared and gave off pleasant heat.
Hugo loved that relaxed atmosphere, with none of the tension of rushed weekday mornings. On Sunday mornings worries were erased, the pharmacy was forgotten, and his mother didn’t even talk about all the poor people she took care of. The music and the quiet enveloped the three of them.
When Sofia returned from church, she would be all covered with snow. Hugo’s mother would help her shake off the snowflakes, and then prepare a cup of coffee and a piece of cake for her. Everybody would sit down beside her. Sofia would tell them about the service and the sermon, always bringing back a parable or proverb that had impressed her. One time she recited, “For man does not live by bread alone.”
“What impressed you about that verse?” asked Hugo’s father.
“We sometimes forget why we’re alive. It seems to us that making a living is the main thing. Or that physical love or property is the main thing. That’s a great mistake.”
“So what is the main thing?” Hugo’s father tried to draw her out.
“God,” she said, opening her eyes wide.
Sofia was full of contradictions. Every Sunday she would make sure to go to church, and sometimes also in the middle of the week, but in the evenings she liked to pass the time in the tavern. True, she didn’t get drunk, but she came back merry and a bit tipsy. Some of the men she had spent time with promised to marry her but changed their minds in the end. Because of those false promises, Sofia decided to return to her native village. In the village, no man would dare to promise marriage and not keep his promise. If a man promised marriage and didn’t keep his promise, they would lie in wait for him and beat him till blood flowed.
Hugo liked to listen to Sofia’s stories. She spoke to him in Ukrainian. She loved her mother tongue and wanted Hugo to speak it without an accent, too, and without mistakes. Hugo tried but didn’t always succeed.
Sofia was so different from his parents and his friends’ parents, as if she had been born on another continent: she spoke loudly and with broad gestures, and when it seemed to her that people didn’t understand her, she used her large face to imitate her neighbors and suitors. She sang, too, kneeling on the floor and making everyone laugh.
The cold in the closet is unrelenting. Mariana often comes late with Hugo’s cup of milk in the morning, and sometimes she goes into town and forgets him all day long. But sometimes she says, “Come to Mariana, and she’ll hug you, darling,” and so she brings him from the cold darkness to her vibrant breast. In the hours he spends in her bed, embraced in her long arms, marvelous oblivion envelops him. For whole days he looks forward to those hours. When they come, he is stricken, or paralyzed, and he doesn’t know what to say or do. But this doesn’t happen every day. Most days Mariana is drunk, grumpy, and she falls on her bed in a stupor.
So it is, day after day. There are gloomy days when Hugo sees only the closet walls and Mariana’s faded housedresses hanging on hooks. The narrow cracks in the closet walls reveal only the fence and the gray bushes that have shed all their leaves. This is a prison, Hugo says to himself. In prison it’s impossible to read. It’s impossible to do homework. It’s even impossible to play chess. Prison stifles thought and imagination. That realization has come to reside within him over the past few days. Since then he has been afraid that his head will slowly empty. He will no longer think or imagine. One day he will fall over like the tree in the yard of their house did last winter. But when Mariana finally remembers him, opens the closet door, and says, “What’s Mariana’s darling doing?” Hugo’s fears evaporate all at once, and he rises to his feet.
19
One day, when they’re still asleep in the broad bed, wrapped in each other’s arms, Mariana wakes up in a panic.
“It’s very late, my darling,” she cries out. “You have to go into the closet immediately.” When that happens, Hugo feels his body shrink, and he hunches over and walks to the closet without saying anything.
It’s quiet. Not a sound can be heard from Mariana’s room. For a moment it seems that in a little while the door will open, and Mariana will call out, as she sometimes does, Darling, come to me.
He soon realizes that Mariana and her partner are pleased with each other, and whispering. From the few words he catches, it’s clear that this time there are no arguments, no accusations, and everything is happening quietly, and with consent.
The thought that Mariana has sent him out of her bed so she can sleep with a grown man suddenly fills Hugo with envy and anger.
He feels so angry and sorry for himself that he falls asleep.
In his dream he sees his mother. She is young and beautiful and dressed in the poplin gown she loved.
“Don’t you love me anymore?” she asks with a provocative smile.
“I?” He is stunned, like someone whose secrets have been bared.
“You prefer Mariana to me,” she says, pretending to be insulted, the way she sometimes did. “I love you very much, Mama.”
“You’re saying that to be polite,” she says, and disappears.
When Hugo wakes from that nightmare, he knows the dream’s meaning. If his mother were near him, he would try to console her. But since she isn’t there, her words remain suspended in the darkness, like an accusation supported by evidence.
In the meantime, the man has been replaced by someone else. Now unpleasant voices come from Mariana’s room. The new man speaks sternly, and Mariana tries in vain to get him to understand her. Again the old accusation: alcohol. The man reminds her that she promised not to drink the last time, too. Once again she has failed to keep her promise. After that the storm calms down.
The first morning lights filter into the closet and fill it with stripes of brightness. In a little while Mariana will bring Hugo a cup of warm milk, he comforts himself. But Mariana, as she sometimes does, forgets him. He’s so thirsty that he calls out in a whisper, “Mariana.” Mariana hears his call, opens the closet door, and bursts in. “You mustn’t call me. I warned you not to call me. Never call me.” Anger floods her face and darkens it.
For a long time Hugo lies curled up in a corner. In the afternoon Mariana stands in the doorway of the closet with a cup of milk. “How does Mariana’s darling feel? How did the night go? Was it cold?” she says, as though nothing has happened.
“I slept.”
“It’s good to sleep. You don’t know how good it is to sleep. I’m going to town to visit my mother. My mother is very sick, and she’s alone. There’s no one to take care of her. My sister doesn’t bother to come and help her. I won’t be back until evening. I’ll bring you some sandwiches and a pitcher of lemonade. If anyone knocks on the door, don’t answer.”
Mariana brings Hugo a plate of sandwiches and a pitcher of lemonade.
“Have a pleasant time, my darling,” she says. And without another word, she locks the door and goes on her way.
20
Hugo remains standing in Mariana’s bedroom. Three months have passed since his mother left him here. Everything has changed in his life. How much it has changed, he doesn’t know. Hugo’s heart torments him because he hasn’t kept his promises to his mother. He doesn’t read, he doesn’t write, and he doesn’t do arithmetic problems.
While he’s standing there, Hugo realizes that the room hasn’t changed since he first arrived: the same pink slipcovers, the same vases with paper roses stuck in them, the same dresser with its drawers full of little bottles, cotton, and sponges. But that afternoon the room looks to him like the clinic where he was brought to get injections. Anna had a sweet little dog, and Hugo liked to play with him whenever he went to visit her. One morning word spread that Luzzi had rabies. All the children who had played with him or touched him were brought to the clinic.
Some of the children, seeing the hypodermics and hearing the patients cry, slipped out of their parents’ grasp and fled. The startled parents tried to catch them, but the children were quicker. They escaped to the cellar and hid there. But their hiding didn’t last long. The tall and cunning hospital watchmen closed the doors to the cellar and went from room to room, trapping them. The sight of the children being led back to the clinic stayed in Hugo’s mind for many days.
Later, Hugo sits on the floor and begins a chess game. Everything he used to like to do at home is hard for him to do here. Even to open a book is a task beyond his powers. He thinks a lot. Memory keeps bringing up his classmates, his teachers. But to take out a notebook and write isn’t in his power.
Hugo is sorry that Anna and Otto have changed so much. Every time he thinks about that change, a chill grips his arms and legs. Thinking about all the delicate embroidery that was spun between him and Anna, between him and Otto—the visits to their houses, the trips and the long conversations about themselves and about what was going on around them—the thought makes him so sad that he chokes. To prevent them from disappearing from his memory, he brings them back up in his mind and says to them, True, you’ve changed, but in my head you live as you were. I’m not willing to give up even a single feature of your faces, and for that reason, as long as you’re in my memory, your disappearance is only partial, and to a large degree abolished.
Suddenly, illuminated by the cold afternoon lights, the path Hugo had taken every day to school arises in his memory. It began on the long, shady boulevard with the chestnut trees, and it branched off among narrow, twisting alleys perfumed with the smells of coffee and fresh cakes. In the morning the taverns were closed, and the smell of beer and urine rose from the dark corners.
Sometimes he would stop at a bakery and buy a cheese pastry. The fresh, crisp taste stayed with him until he arrived at the school’s front steps. The way to and from school is now imprinted in Hugo’s mind with sharp clarity.
He usually walked back home with Anna and Otto, and sometimes Erwin would also join them. Erwin was Hugo’s height, and it was hard to know whether he was happy or sad. A restrained look of surprise was usually spread across his face, and he hardly spoke. The other children didn’t like him, and sometimes they picked on him. But Hugo had a feeling that Erwin held a secret within him. Hugo expected that one day Erwin would reveal his secret. Then it would be known to everyone that he wasn’t an indifferent creature, limited or lacking in feelings. Once, Hugo discussed this with Anna. Anna didn’t think there was any secret in Erwin. She believed he had closed himself off because he had trouble with mathematics and had a feeling of inferiority. A feeling of inferiority wasn’t a secret. Anna was smart. She knew how to express her thoughts like an adult.
Once, when they were on their way home from school, Hugo carelessly asked Erwin, “What do your parents do?”
“I don’t have any parents,” Erwin answered softly.
“Where are they?” asked Hugo, stupidly.
“They died,” Erwin said.
For many days Hugo regretted his questions; he felt as though he had been stricken. After that, he was careful not to be in Erwin’s company, and if he found himself with Erwin, he spoke little or not at all.
Hugo refused to think about what had happened to Erwin in the ghetto. One night they sealed off the orphanage on all sides, took the orphans out of their beds, and loaded them onto trucks while they were still in their pajamas. The orphans wept and cried out for help, but no one did anything. Anyone who opened a window or went outside would be shot. The shouts and weeping pierced the empty streets, and they could be heard even after the trucks had driven away and disappeared from view.
• • •
Thus Hugo sits on the floor and dreams about his friends and his school. The chess pieces are arranged on the board, but apart from the opening, he hasn’t made a move.
Mariana arrives toward evening and asks, “What did Mariana’s shut-in puppy do?” The smell of brandy wafts about her mouth, but she isn’t angry. She hugs and kisses Hugo, saying, “You’re better than all of them. What did you do today?”
“Nothing.”
“Why didn’t you eat the sandwiches?”
“I wasn’t hungry.”
Every time Mariana comes back from town, Hugo wants to ask her, Di
d you meet Mama? Did you meet Papa? But he remembers that Mariana doesn’t like him to ask about his parents. Only when she’s in a good mood, she’s willing to say, “I didn’t meet them. I didn’t hear from them.” Once, in a moment of anger, she said, “I’ve already told you. They’ll only come at the end of the war. The Jews are shut in and locked up in hiding places.”
Then she tells him, “My mother is very sick. I don’t have any more money for the doctors and medicines,” and she bursts into tears. When Mariana cries, her face changes and becomes a child’s face. This time she isn’t angry at the bastards but at her sister, who lives right near her mother but doesn’t take the trouble to go to her and bring her bread or fruit. She ignores her completely. The doctor who came to see Mariana’s mother told her they had to buy medicine immediately, because without it she would expire in a few days.
Now Mariana is about to sell the jewelry she received from Hugo’s mother. The jewelry is beautiful and very valuable, but it’s doubtful that she can sell it for its full value. “They’re all cheats,” she says, and there’s no one she can trust.
After a short pause, she adds, “My mother is still angry at me. She’s sure I’m neglecting her. What can I do? I work all night long to bring her food and firewood. A week ago I bought her fruit. What more can I do? I’m willing to sell the jewelry if the medicines will save her. I don’t want my mother to be angry at me.”
“Your mother knows you love her.”
“How do you know?”
“Mothers have a special feeling for their children.”
“In my childhood she used to beat me a lot, but in recent years, since my father died, she’s calmed down. She suffered a lot all those years.”
“Everyone has his own portion.” Hugo recalls that sentence.
“You’re smart, darling. All the Jewish children are smart. But you surpass even them. It’s good that God sent you to me. What do you say? Should I sell the jewelry?”
Blooms of Darkness Page 7