by Magda Szabo
I was not going to start explaining how much energy it takes to concentrate for hours, in the dog days of summer, in an airless hall, with the windows closed because of the noise outside. I asked the driver to start. Frankly, I felt rather cheated. I’d hoped that for once Emerence would refrain from needling me, and perhaps ask for something, perhaps a branch from the hedge round her old house, or some other memento. When I go home I always bring back a two-kilo loaf of bread. But she made no requests. As we pulled away, Viola gave a casual yap, as if he was quite sure the separation wouldn’t last for ever, and we’d both be sure to manage until the evening.
Our trip went very smoothly. We didn’t stop anywhere. I’d made a habit of not eating before my arrival because they almost always offered me something at the library, and it seemed rude not even to try it. Nádori was a lovely little village. I didn’t have to ask for the cemetery; it began on the outskirts, by the sign announcing the name of the town, with a scent of sage and wild flowers wafting from the dilapidated headstones. We stopped the car and I went in. A woman was watering flowers near the fence. She was old enough to have heard the names Szeredás and Divék, but she told me she hadn’t been born there, she’d only come to be married, and she knew nothing about the carpenter’s family. The cemetery itself was quite clearly no longer in use. Those turning to dust lay under mounds of dirt, most of them unmarked, their gravestones and wooden crosses dragged away or stolen; or, if the dead person was of any importance, they’d been exhumed by the family. Perhaps twenty resting places at most were as well-tended as the one the old lady was watering. But I continued to search for a while among the rabbit holes and molehills, and I did it quite willingly. There is something very appealing, not in the least bit sad, about an abandoned cemetery in the summer, and I strolled among the graves, overrun with weeds. But there was nothing to see. Where I did manage to make out the faint engraving, it wasn’t the name I was looking for.
However in Csabadul I was lucky straight away. As I stepped out of the car in the main square, I saw Emerence’s mother’s family name in red, on a sign right in front of me: Mr Csaba Divék, Traditional and Quartz Watches. Mrs Ildikó Divék, née Kapros, Costume Jewellery. A young married couple were working in the shop. If I had imagined I would cause a sensation by walking in with news of their relation Emerence Szeredás who lived in Pest — assuming this was the right place, and the late Rozália Divék, wife of József Szeredás did belong to their family — then I was mistaken. They hadn’t kept in touch with Emerence, but they knew who she was. The watchmaker suggested I look up their godmother, another Divék girl. She was the cousin of their Budapest relative. They’d been little girls together and she’d be delighted to see me, mainly because after the oceans of time that had passed she might discover what had happened to Aunt Emerence’s little girl, whom she hadn’t seen since they took her back to the capital.
I now had to be very careful not to show that there were gaps in my knowledge, and that I was hearing for the first time that Emerence had a child. Pressed further, they could recall only what had been passed on to them by those who had gone before. During the last years of the war she had appeared with a little girl in her arms, who then lived with the great-grandfather for about a year. The young people knew nothing about the family graves, but the watchmaker’s godmother would certainly remember everything.
Next I went to the library. As there was still a lot of time not just before the lecture, but before lunch, the librarian was happy to go along with my suggestion, and offered to accompany me.
The cousin lived in her own house. She had a distinct look of Emerence, the same tall, lean type, with the same dignified walk and bearing. You had only to look at her to see that even in old age she enjoyed life. The house was tastefully furnished, with light streaming in from the side windows, and one sensed the pride she took in her material independence. She offered pastries, lifting the platter from a fine old sideboard, and mentioned that the furniture had been made by Emerence’s father, who had been a carpenter, which I obviously knew, and also a cabinetmaker. Her grandfather had the sideboard brought over when the Co-operative was formed in Nádori and the carpenter’s workshop was altered to suit its needs. Now it was her turn to ask what had become of Emerence and the child after they disappeared. She thought there must either have been a very happy ending, or a very bad one, since Józsi’s boy, for one, had never seen the little girl. Their grandfather, she went on, as we tucked into the thick golden pastries, and sipped the familiar wine of the Alföld sands, had been a difficult man. He had never understood the danger faced by young girls working in Budapest, and when Emerence appeared with the child they thought he was going to beat her to death. In fact, if he hadn’t just had a stroke he might well have done so, but by then he was no longer his old self. Nowadays people took these things in their stride. Even if the family weren’t very happy they didn’t make a show of it. Both the authorities and society at large were protective towards the young, as I might have noticed. In those days the law sought to establish who the father was, but Emerence told them nothing and she produced no official documents for the child. If her grandfather hadn’t been so highly regarded, and hadn’t kept the town clerk supplied with a stream of gifts, she would have been in real trouble. But the clerk smoothed everything over. He conjured up some papers for the little girl to replace the documents “left behind” in Budapest. As the father was unknown, she became a Divék. In the end, the old man grew even fonder of her than of his legitimate granddaughters. Because the child had no-one else, not even her mother, she came to adore the old man. She climbed on to him and hugged him, and when Emerence took her away the old man burst into tears. Until his dying day he complained about having let her go when she was so dear to him. But all that aside, they would love to see Emerence at any time, either on her own or with the child, though by now she must be a young woman. Sadly, the grandfather had passed away, just as her poor husband had. They were the only Divéks living locally. The family was widely scattered.
The cousin then offered to take me to the graves, even in that sweltering heat. The old man and her own parents were there — Emerence’s family were in the Nádori cemetery, which had since been closed. At this point she lowered her voice, clearly troubled. No-one could be proud of the fact that their grandfather had opposed his daughter marrying a Szeredás for no reason anyone could see; the carpenter made a good living until his death, and could hardly have been held responsible for the terrible tragedy. But he had never allowed the man, or the twins, or his daughter, near him. The funeral had taken place in Nádori, and the whole family were laid to rest beside Szeredás, as if they’d been his victims. It was possible that she had got it all wrong, because she’d been a child at the time, and indeed there were people who wouldn’t go near a particular grave because they loved the dead person so very much they couldn’t bear to see it. The second husband still had no resting place. Emerence must have told me that he ended up in a mass grave in Galicia. But in any case, if her Budapest cousin wanted to follow it up she shouldn’t leave it too long, because the previous year Nádori and Csabadul had been merged into a single authority, and there were plans to plough up the old cemetery in the near future. She couldn’t say exactly where the Szeredás family were buried, because she hadn’t been there since a child, but we could take a look at the nearby Divék and Kopró graves. She had been born a Divék but married a Kopró.
Since I still had plenty of time I did have a look at the (very tasteful) obelisk. It was made of granite. Above the names it depicted, appropriately, the waters of Babylon, and weeping willows with violins hung from their branches. The cousin even made me a gift of two photographs. She took ages to find them, before they finally turned up in a drawer. Emerence’s mother had indeed been a beautiful bride, but what upset me most was an ancient snapshot, its edges cut in wavy lines, of Emerence with a little girl in her arms. The lighting was poor and only the child was in focus. Emerence, even then, was wea
ring her headscarf, but her dress was rather more colourful, clearly a hand-me-down from one of her employers that didn’t much suit her. Her face was essentially unchanged, but there was an attractive cheerfulness, rather than malice, in her eyes.
In the end, all the Divéks and Koprós came to my lecture. None had intended to do so, but it seemed appropriate since I had paid them a visit. The audience was unusually small. Those who did come listened without any sign of interest. Everyone was feeling the heat. As I delivered my text for the hundredth time, I kept wondering what had become of the child in Emerence’s arms.
As we started back, I asked the librarian if we could make a little detour to the station. If he was at all surprised, he didn’t show it. I walked all the way to the end of the goods platform, just as Emerence had asked. It was like any other, a series of raised concrete blocks, and completely deserted. On the way back to Nádori, the driver stopped at Emerence’s old home. It was still apparently referred to as the Szeredás house. It stood out clearly in the gathering dusk of one of those improbable summer evenings when the sun doesn’t linger but withdraws its rays suddenly, leaving variegated streaks of orange, blue and violet glowing behind the grey. We took a good look at this scene from the past. It was just as Emerence had described it — the painted façade, the trees round the side, the general line and height of the building. She had neither embellished nor understated. What was most surprising was her perfect recall of the proportions. She hadn’t dreamed up a fairy-tale castle in place of her charming old home. It was quite beautiful enough the way József Szeredás had built it, a house designed not just with affection but with love. It had all the force of a timeless statement. There was still a workshop where the old one had stood, but this one had a power saw standing inside, and chained dogs that barked a warning. The little garden was still there. The roses had aged into trees, someone had planted a pair of maples near the sycamore and the walnut had filled out and shot up. A swing hung from one of its branches and there were children playing beneath it.
I didn’t find the farmyard. A field of maize grew in its place, promising a fine crop. I stood gazing at the trees lined up in rows like soldiers, contemplating the memories the land must hold, with so much blood, so many dead, and all their dreams, all that failure and defeat. How could it bear to go on producing, with a burden like that? The works manager, a young man, had seen me stop the car and get out, and he imagined I’d come about one of his Komondor puppies, currently for sale. I told him I already had a dog and was looking over the building because someone in my street used to live there. As soon as he realised I didn’t want a Komondor he lost interest. I thought about asking him for a rose from the ancient tree, but in the end I didn’t. How could I know how far back her memories went, when to that day she had never mentioned that she had a child — or rather had had one? Standing in this place, in the unquestionable theatre of her early life, I tried to draw together the true co-ordinates of her being. But even here I couldn’t do it. She was no more at home here than where she now lived, and even if that were where she belonged, it was in circumstances that had made her shut her home off from the world. In the fading light, with streaks of colour glowing between the blue of dusk, only one thing was clear: for her, the village had disappeared. She had arrived in the city and the city had taken her in. But she hadn’t allowed it into her life either, so the only real elements of her existence that one might come to understand lay behind that locked door, and she had no intention of ever revealing them. I got back into the car, without plucking a single leaf for a memento, and we set off home.
I knew she wouldn’t be waiting for me at our apartment — she was too proud for that. She would sooner not hear what fragments of her former life remained, than show interest. I greeted my husband, who told me that he and Viola had polished off a lavish holiday lunch. Then I went across to the old woman. The dog ran down from the porch to greet me at the garden gate. Emerence didn’t even stand up, but remained airing herself on the laundry basket which served as a bench. I thought, just you wait. The atom bomb is about to fall. Still, you could have guessed that one or two details you had forgotten to tell me about your early life might have cropped up in conversation. First I gave an account of the watchmaker’s, then I pushed a bit deeper. I described her cousin’s agreeable circumstances; then added that her grandfather must have been a hard man, to punish the dead — who’d suffered enough. It was difficult to understand why a man would let graves to fall into ruin. Such behaviour wasn’t very pleasant.
Emerence stared into the distance, as if she saw something in the darkness that had nothing whatever to do with me. A wave of shame engulfed me. Why was I thrusting myself into her private affairs? What did I expect from her — a confession? During all those years she hadn’t allowed me to get one centimetre closer to her. Did I really want her to tell me about the child born out of wedlock, who had brought her only trouble and shame, and inescapable worry? Was I perverted? A sadist? Had I hoped she would boast about something she had until now felt she must conceal? She turned her back to the garden, and from then on looked only at me, holding Viola’s head against her knee. It seems laughable to write this down, but I had the feeling that Viola had known all along about Emerence’s daughter, because the old woman told him everything that I was curious to know.
“I’ve already told you,” she began, in a conversational tone, “I’ve had the money for quite some time, but I decided to wait until my own death; then Józsi’s boy can arrange for the crypt. I don’t hate my grandfather. He was what he was, jealous and cold. He never forgave my father for taking my mother from him. He didn’t like me either, but I don’t hold that against him. But you have to honour the dead. I’ll bring every one of them in. You’ll see, it’ll be a crypt like no-one ever built in Budapest. One of your painter or sculptor friends will draw up the plans, as I dictate them. The situation wouldn’t have got as bad as it did, because my grandfather would have been afraid people in Csabadul would talk about him behind his back, but then I brought the child down on their heads. The old man was as clever as Satan, and he knew how deep the shame was, and that he could hit at me even harder by neglecting the graves; so he let the wooden crosses rot away. I was living in Pest, so I couldn’t get to the cemetery.”
Well thank God, she had brought the matter up, so I could then hand her the pictures. She studied them both at length. There was no emotion visible in her face. I had imagined that she might be moved, or even blush, though I don’t know why I thought that. So far as I was concerned, she might have had a whole album of pictures of the child. What did I know about the contents of Emerence’s Forbidden City? But she wasn’t looking at the picture as a mother might, even less like a distressed mother whose past was at that very moment coming to light; it was more like a soldier who always won his battles.
“This is little Éva,” she explained. “The person I was expecting that day. She lives in America, and sends me money. She also sends me parcels, and I give most of it away. You get the useless things, like make-up and creams. This is how she was when I brought her back from Csabadul to Budapest. Now I don’t even want to see her face, since she didn’t come when I sent for her. If I invite her — as I did — then she should come, even if the whole world is blowing apart. If it hadn’t been for me, they would have smashed her head against a wall or sent her to the gas chambers.”
She pushed the photograph towards me, as if it was nothing to do with her.
“Did you think it was all so simple?” (She still clearly found it difficult to speak about.) “Up until then, everyone thought highly of me. I was everyone’s ideal, Emerence Szeredás — a clean, respectable girl living a sober life, who had learned to her cost what men were like. When that man left her, and then the barber ran off with all the money and the few valuables she had saved up over the years, she didn’t swallow caustic soda. She shook herself down as if nothing had happened and announced that never again would she be anyone’s property, or let
a man get near her — they could make fools of others and fleece them instead. No-one had ever laid a hand on me, so how pleasant do you think it was for me to pitch up at my grandfather’s with a child in my arms and tell them, ‘This is mine. You’d better feed it until the war is over, because I can’t look after it in Pest and I haven’t got time to sit around cuddling it. It can tear around here instead. I can’t help it if some nasty little crook put one over me, so here she is.’ I couldn’t keep her in Pest, it was too dangerous. I couldn’t just lock her up. A child needs to run around and breathe fresh air.”
There was a deep sighing in the bushes. Viola was asleep, with his head on Emerence’s shoes.
“You remember the Jewish laws, don’t you? The old people drank cyanide, and the young paid to get out. But they couldn’t make their way through the mountains on foot, practically on all fours, with a tiny baby, so they gave it to me. Mrs Grossman knew what my little Évike was to me, and what I was to Évike. The child cried if anyone else came near her. Even when she was in her mother’s arms, she wanted to be back in mine. But not all the Germans were gangsters. This villa belonged to a German factory owner. He paid for the Grossmans to be smuggled out. He installed me as caretaker here and entrusted everything to me before he went back home. There was a plan. I settled in here, the young Grossmans set off for the border, and then I took the child to the village. It was better for people to think she had disappeared with her parents. Don’t ask what sort of treatment I got when I arrived. It wasn’t an ordinary beating — I thought I’d never walk again. You can punch me and kick me, I told my grandfather, and tell everybody what I’ve done, only leave the child alone. I gave him the money and jewellery I had from the Grossmans for the child’s upkeep. There was so much he thought I’d looted it in the confusion of the war, that I’d stolen it from them. But don’t worry, he took it. They used it well, looking after the little girl for a good year or so, until the Grossmans came back and I was able to go for her. The poor things wanted to start life here afresh, but in the end they went away again. Out of gratitude they gave me everything they had left, including the living-room furniture I’d brought here for safe keeping. And then they disappeared. They were afraid to stay because Rákosi was beginning to start the circus up all over again. Did you walk along the goods platform?”