At night she allows him to touch her breasts. Her breasts are big and full, and they give off warmth and an inebriating smell. Mariana seems to like the way he touches her, because she says, “You’re gentle, you’re good, you love Mariana.”
Again she makes Hugo swear. “Whatever happens between us is a secret forever and ever.”
“I swear,” he cries out.
Now that there are hardly any guests, the nights are filled with soft darkness. On the rare occasions when a guest knocks at Mariana’s door, she quickly tells him she’s drunk too much and can’t entertain anyone. The guest turns away and goes to the next door.
Mariana is now laden with brandy. Her mood is exalted, her brain is feverish, and from her mouth come glowing utterances. She tells Hugo that she has worked in residences like this since she was a young girl. They were all the same: a guard at the door, a thin and unbearable madam, and the hostesses. Among the hostesses there were good ones and mean ones. Most of them were bitches. This was no surprise: two or three hungry men every night can burn up even the sturdiest woman. “Since I was fourteen, they’ve been devouring me,” she says. “Now I feel like lying in bed and hugging my big puppy and sleeping for hours and hours. There’s nothing like an uninterrupted night’s sleep.”
Again she surprises him. “You should stay a puppy,” she says. “Men who are puppies are sweet. When they grow up they turn into beasts of prey. I won’t let you grow up. You’ll stay the way you are. Do you agree?”
“I agree.”
“I knew you’d agree. I know you by now.”
One night she tells him, “There’s nothing else to be said: Jews are gentler. They wouldn’t abuse a naked woman. They’ll always touch her softly, whisper a good word in her ear, always leave her a few extra banknotes. They know that Madam takes most of the cash for herself. Your mother was always good to me. During the hardest days, she remembered me and brought me clothes, fruit, cheese. What didn’t she bring? She never forgot that the two of us once sat at the same desk, that both of us loved to play jump rope and ball. She never said to me, Why don’t you do respectable work? I actually expected her to speak sternly to me, but I was glad that she didn’t torment me.
“Like I said: the Jews are gentler. The Jewish students always tried to get me to join the Communist Party. Once I even let myself be convinced to go to their headquarters. They discussed and argued over things I didn’t have any idea about. To tell the truth, I wasn’t suitable for them. I grew up in mud, and like a mud-animal, I didn’t know any other atmosphere.
“You, thank God, grew up in a good home. Your parents let you observe, think, imagine. I ran away and went from place to place, always afraid and always ashamed. My father, God forgive him, used to beat me with sticks. It started when I was a child. He also hit my sister, but he beat me more bitterly. It’s no wonder I ran away from home.
“He used to follow me, and when he found me, he would beat me mercilessly. I can feel his lashes to this very day. Those are scars that never healed. My flesh still remembers them. He was a fierce detective. He wouldn’t return home until he found me. Sometimes he would look for me for a whole week, and when he found me, there was no limit to his cruelty.
“Why am I remembering him? It’s impossible not to remember him. His lashes are embedded in me, to the marrow of my bones. I don’t mean to disturb his eternal rest. Let him rest in peace in his grave, but what can I do? When I lie in bed, the scars wake me up and gnaw at me.
“My mother, of blessed memory, was better to me. She also suffered. My father didn’t spare her, either. He was always angry at her: ‘Why didn’t you pick the cabbage? Why is the barn neglected?’ The poor thing would apologize and ask for mercy and promise to do everything, but because she didn’t keep her promises, he would scream at her and sometimes slap her face. In time, when she got sick, he would say, ‘You’re pretending to be sick. There’s nothing wrong with you. You don’t want to work. From lying in bed so much, you’ll really get sick.’ But in the end he died before she did.”
Hugo hears all this and says, “In a little while, we’ll be surrounded by nature, without people.”
“But now it’s raining,” Mariana replies. “Better to stay here. Here there’s a warm stove.”
As the hours pass it rains harder. There are no preparations for nightly duties and no sudden visits from Madam. The women sit in the hall. They drink and sing. Hugo likes to listen to their Ukrainian folk songs. Sometimes a sob is heard from the hall, and everyone joins in. Only Madam isn’t pleased. Hugo sometimes hears her voice: “Without customers, we’ll have to close The Residence.”
“And what will happen to us?”
“Everyone will go her own way.”
Upon hearing her answer, the women sit in silence, and Hugo feels that the enemy is both outside and within. He wants to say, the way Mariana herself used to say now and then, Don’t be afraid. Fear is a shameful quality, fear is what brings us down to hell. You mustn’t fear people.
42
Winter comes before its time. Persistent rumors say that the German army has begun to withdraw. Trains stream from the front to the rear without stopping at stations. Even from the closet, it’s possible to hear their muffled rush.
“Now it’s impossible to leave,” Mariana says. “Now we have to stay here until the fury of the rains has passed. This rain will bring hail and, finally, snow. A person with no house would freeze.” Mariana is pleased to have no contradiction between her wishes and the conditions outdoors that force them to remain in The Residence.
If it weren’t for the guard, they would all curl up in bed and sleep even more. But for some reason the guard has changed his mind and now is warning the women that the Russians will whip them to death.
“Whoever sold her body to the Germans won’t be let off. You have to run away as soon as possible.” His tone of voice has changed recently, and he sounds less authoritative. Victoria’s advice is different: “You have to flee to convents and return to God.”
“How can we return to God?” A young woman’s voice is heard, but Hugo can’t identify it.
“Bend your knees and say, ‘Lord Jesus, forgive me for all the sins I committed. From now on I swear that I won’t sin or lead others into sin.’ ”
“Should we say it now or in the convent?”
“Now.”
“It’s strange to make an oath in this place.”
“Why is it strange? The moment a person swears not to sin, God begins to listen to him.”
Later he hears one of the women hissing, “A cursed life.”
“Is married life better? My sister’s husband beats her every day.”
“Men desecrate us three times a night.”
“Today, after ten years of desecration, I’d choose marriage.”
“Now the Russians will come and whip us to death. What the Germans did to the Jews, the Russians will do to us. The Russians have no God in their hearts.”
There are no more guests. There is tension and creeping fear. The girls sit in the hall, chat, drink, and play cards. They remember the guests who were nice to them, brought them boxes of candy, and didn’t ask them to do anything disgusting.
“In a little while, the volcano will erupt,” the guard warns them.
“Let it erupt. Our life is worth zero squared,” replies one of them, and everybody laughs.
Mariana’s mood is exalted. She drinks as much as she wants and regrets the days when she denied herself the marvelous potion known as brandy. You only live once, she says.
Hugo is also content. Mariana doesn’t stop hugging him, and every few days she stands him next to the door, measures him, and says, “You’ve gotten taller. In a little while hairs will grow.” When she drinks, she is free. She shows him the bottles of perfume she has in her drawers, the jewelry, and the silk stockings she received as presents. Hugo likes to watch her when she stretches out her leg and puts on a stocking. Sometimes she stands before the mirror wearing only pa
nties and a brassiere and says, “Isn’t it true that I haven’t lost my shape? I’m just the way I should be, not fat and not thin. A lot of women have doughy legs or a swollen belly. And now we have to teach Hugo how to love Mariana.”
“I love you,” Hugo quickly confirms.
“Wait, wait. You don’t know everything yet.”
After repeated warnings, the guard finally runs away. Madam announces that she’s now locking up The Residence. The kitchen will be closed, and everyone will have to take care of herself.
“And what will happen to us?”
“I can’t support you. I’ve already spent what I had. For more than a month, there’s been no income. I can’t feed seventeen girls. The bakery won’t give me bread, and the butcher won’t give me meat.”
“You’ll be sorry. You can’t close an institution. The German army will return and take revenge against everybody who spread rumors about its defeat and closed the institutions that served them,” one of the women warns her.
“What can I do?” she says in a different tone of voice.
“Don’t be hasty.”
“I’m not being hasty,” she replies. “I’ve been running this place for twenty years. Managing a residence like this is no small matter. I know what’s possible and what’s impossible. Now things have gone too far. The pantry is empty, and so is the cellar.” She bursts into sobs.
There is silence, and Madam withdraws to her apartment.
Later Victoria comes out of the kitchen and says in a whisper, “I have supplies for another week, if we’re sparing. After a week—God help us.”
“Thank you, Victoria, may God preserve you.” They bless her.
Mariana seems unaffected by the commotion. Since she began drinking again, her mood is steady—elevated, actually, but without any decline. Whatever happens hardly touches her. She tells Hugo about her childhood and early youth, and about the days when she was a girl in love with a boy named Andrei. He was handsome. One day his parents moved to a different village, and he forgot her. She cried a lot over him and kept looking for him. He disappeared and left her wounded.
“I won’t abandon you,” Hugo quickly confirms.
“Let’s hope not,” she says. Then she laughs and hugs him.
43
Now come the days they had all been looking forward to: everyone sleeps late, eats breakfast together, shares pleasant dreams, and keeps asking what good food is left in the kitchen.
Mariana doesn’t stop drinking, obviously seeking to recover what she had lost during the time of her abstinence. She often speaks about her youth, about the moves from brothel to brothel until she arrived at The Residence. She talks and talks, but her words make no impression. Her friends look at her as if to say, We’ve all been through that. What’s so special?
But when she says, “Now I want to introduce my young friend to you,” everyone is silent. Most of them already know the secret, or have guessed. Hugo is stunned. His mind always pictured the women of The Residence in the image of Mariana. Now they sit in the hall around the table, seventeen young women, each with her own hairstyle, looking like girls at a class reunion. At first glance, they remind Hugo of Sofia’s friends, young men and women who used to gather in their home on her birthday. They had come from the village and also went shopping while they were in town, thereby combining practicality with amusement. Hugo had been charmed by their way of speaking, their gestures, and their colorful village language.
After inspecting Hugo from head to foot, one of the women asks, “What’s your name?”
“Hugo,” he replies, pleased that he didn’t lower his head.
“A nice name. I never heard of a name like that.”
“It doesn’t sound Jewish,” another woman comments.
Kitty stands out in her childish clothing and with her big eyes. The others are wrapped in colorful robes, as though they just got out of bed.
“Shall we make Hugo a cup of coffee?” one of them asks.
“Hugo drinks milk,” says Mariana.
Mariana’s comment provokes loud laughter.
“What’s so funny?” asks Mariana.
“He’s a big boy. He’s a sturdy lad, a boy for coffee and not for milk.”
“Why don’t you say something?” one of the women asks Hugo.
“What do you want him to say?” Mariana tries to defend him.
“I thought he was a child. It turns out I was wrong. He’s a lad by any standard.”
“You’re wrong. He’s just tall.” Mariana protects Hugo again.
“I’ve learned the difference, thank God, between a child and a lad.”
That argument displeases Mariana. She takes his hand and says, “Hugo’s got a cold, he has to rest.”
“He doesn’t look as if he’s got a cold,” the woman replies provocatively.
“He’s got a cold, and a bad one,” says Mariana, extricating him from the women’s covetous gaze.
Hugo has hardly entered the closet when he hears the women’s laughter. His name and Mariana’s rise from the laughter. The laughter keeps swelling, and for a moment it sounds like gloating, because they managed to raise the veil from Mariana’s secret.
In the afternoon, Mariana prepares a hot bath and says, “Now I’ll wash my puppy. My puppy’s growing from day to day, maturing. In a little while he’ll be Mariana’s height. In a little while he’ll be even taller than her. I’m looking forward to that moment. Don’t be afraid, honey. Mariana’s swallowed a good bit, but she’s not drunk. I hate drunks.”
When she puts the big towel on his shoulders, she says, “You’re maturing. You’re maturing very nicely. It’s a pleasure to see you.” Hugo hears a didactic tone in her voice, as though she were explaining something to him about the laws of nature. Then she rubs his body with fragrant lotion and says, “My puppy smells like first fruit.” The phrase “first fruit” captivates him. He remembers another phrase, “bud and flower,” that Mariana also uses sometimes.
Now Hugo sees that most of the clothes in the suitcase are too short for him, and in some of the outfits he looks ridiculous. Mariana inspects the clothes and says, “Mariana will get you some older boy’s clothes. These clothes are simply too small on you. You’ve grown up properly.”
That night, after the bath, is a whirl of pleasures and dreams that come one after the other. Hugo has learned that dreams aren’t uniform. Pleasure is mingled with fear. Suddenly Mariana says, “Too bad we can’t stop time: if only we could always live this way, Mariana with her puppy. Mariana doesn’t need anything else. This is exactly what she needs. Hugo will grow up and defend her. The brave puppy.”
In time Hugo will say to himself, It was too hasty. For that reason the experience wasn’t absorbed in full detail. He regrets that the decorative bottles were lost. Sometimes bottles are no less important than their contents. Mariana’s marvelous mouth always gives off a smell of brandy and chocolate, sweet to the palate, and the passage from her neck to her breasts is short and full of softness. “Delight, dear,” Mariana keeps saying, “that’s what a woman needs, the rest is dessert.”
44
The next day Kitty comes in to visit him. The surprise in her eyes seems to say, What sin did you commit that you’ve been given such a severe punishment? You’re a sweet kid, and your place is at a desk in school, not in a dark, damp closet.
Hugo had previously noticed that astonishment. I’m a Jew, he wants to say, and Jews apparently are undesirable. I don’t know why. I presume that if everybody thinks we’re undesirable, there’s a reason for it. I’m glad that you don’t think so. That’s what he wants to say, but those simple thoughts refuse to garb themselves in words, and he replies with a shrug of his shoulder.
Kitty’s gaze widens even more. “Strange,” she says, “very strange.”
Hugo has noticed that Kitty’s attentiveness takes him back to his home and to the vocabulary he used there. He wants to use the expressions “let us assume,” “most probably,” and “there mu
st be something to it,” which were often heard in his house. But those words are meaningless here, as though they weren’t really words but simply their remains.
“What school do you go to?” Hugo asks, and immediately realizes the stupidity of his question.
“I’ve been out of school for many years,” Kitty says. “I finished elementary school, and I’ve been working since then.” She smiles, and the smile reveals her little teeth. The brightness adds a touch of youth to her cheeks.
“I’ve forgotten school, too,” he says.
“Impossible.”
“I promised my mother that I would do arithmetic problems, read, and write. I didn’t keep the promise, and so I’ve forgotten everything I learned.”
“A boy like you doesn’t forget easily.”
“That’s true,” Hugo replies. “You’d expect that a boy who had studied in school for five years, whose mother read to him every night and conversed with him—you’d expect him to continue to read, write, do arithmetic problems, but it didn’t happen to me. I’m separated from everything I had, from everything I knew, even from my parents.”
“You speak very beautifully. It shows that you haven’t forgotten what you learned.”
“I haven’t progressed, I haven’t progressed in any area. Lack of progress is marching in place, and marching in place is forgetting. I’ll give you an example. In algebra we were about to begin equations, and we had started to learn French. Everything is erased from my memory.”
“You’re excellent,” Kitty says, astonished by the torrent of words.
The things he told Kitty opened the seal on Hugo’s memory. He now sees his house before his eyes—the kitchen, where he liked to sit at the old table, the living room, his parents’ bedroom, and his room. A little kingdom, full of enchanted things—a parquet floor, an electric train, wooden blocks, Jules Verne and Karl May.
Blooms of Darkness Page 14