by David Layton
On the envelope, he wrote his parent’s last known address: 497 Mariahilferstrasse, Apt. 41, Vienna, Austria. He may as well have addressed his letter to God.
The letter clutched in his hand, Karl took a few steps up to the imaginary porch and let himself in to what would one day be his house. He walked through and out to his back patio. “I’ll sit here,” said Karl, and he squatted as if pretending to be seated on a chair and reached out for his cup of coffee. The men in Vienna sat at cafés drinking coffee; they did so after his own father had been banned from entering, and they probably continued to do so during the whole long war. They were doing so now that they were defeated, and therefore so would Karl, who had survived. He’d sit on his patio overlooking the sea and drink his coffee brewed and served to him by Maricel, his young son Abraham by his side.
People were talking about how one day Sosua would be worth something, when the tourists came. Of course, these were often the same people who were learning English so they could start a new life in America, but for a moment, Karl indulged himself in the absurd fantasy of running a hotel and becoming a millionaire.
He took his letter to the agency and the man in charge registered his name and that of his parents, dutifully writing them down in a crisp-paged ledger, one name after the next. When Karl was asked to examine the names and make sure the spelling was correct, he saw them all together again: Bernard Kaufmann, Margarete Kaufmann, Trude Kaufmann. Afterwards he posted his letter; just a few stamps were all that was needed to send it on its way, not a single person objecting to the impossibility of his actions.
He promised himself not to expect anything, but when nothing happened, Karl felt as if he were helping to bury three more bodies in the cemetery. Except on paper, they would never be together again.
A few months later, a truck filled with cinder blocks parked outside his property. Several Dominicans jumped off the backside of a Ford flatbed truck—it might have been the very one that transported Felix’s body to the cemetery—and opened up the gate.
Maricel’s father came to join the workmen, though Karl had not asked, and together they hauled earth and cement until the foundation blocks were in place and the floor frame squared off. They erected the wooden scaffolding. Then came the zinc roof, the new sheets, not yet oxidized, gleaming in the sun. One day they’d put on a proper roof with hardboard and tiles, but for now, this would do. Maricel busied herself with the grounds, cutting, pruning and, in a burst of optimism, planting new and tamer foliage to surround their property. Once it had been cleared, it was possible to imagine a proper yard. A finger of land jutting out to sea caught the surging waves. On windy days the sea spray burst into the air, catching the sun. This is where Karl built his bench.
The day came when a proper door was installed, something for Karl to open and close, and this time, he walked through a real home partly furnished with the two wooden chairs Miguel had insisted be placed in their new living room. Karl and Maricel, with Abraham in her arms, walked down to the edge of the property, along a path that was laid with flagstones quarried near Santiago, the town of Maricel’s mother. As they sat on his wooden bench, Karl heard the Atlantic churn against the coral cliffs, eating away at them.
“The war is over,” said Karl.
“We will be happy here,” said Maricel. And then, as if registering his doubts, she added, “I want you to know that you’re a good man.”
A bursting wail from Abraham seemed to contradict her statement.
With Maricel’s attention diverted, Karl turned his back on the house as if to make it disappear. Just as predicted, scarce funds were being directed toward Europe and Palestine, which meant that the Jews of Sosua needed more than ever to find a way to support themselves. He’d been transported to the other side of the world, given food and money and land; it was time to honour his circumstance, give it some purpose that felt right and personal to his life. The great work, which was survival, had been accomplished. Now came the task of living.
He’d built a house for his family. Now he could leave.
20
IT WASN’T EASY TO TELL FROM THE outside where exactly his house had stood, because everything on the street had disappeared, been disguised or moved around to such an extent that the only thing resembling his front door was a hotel entrance. It wasn’t just Karl who was losing his memory but the town. Yet the house’s original footprint—his footprint—was still here; it could not be removed.
Karl entered the lobby.
“Can I help you, sir?” a young Dominican boy in uniform enquired.
Karl tried to orientate himself. “I’m looking for my home.”
“Do you remember your room number?”
Karl remembered that he didn’t need a room number to find his own house.
“I don’t have one.”
“Are you a guest here?”
“I live here.” Karl said this in Spanish. “Vivo aquí.”
“Vive en la Republica Dominicana?”
“No. Aquí.”
Here. Right here. That’s where Karl lived.
He wasted no more time with the boy; instead he walked past the lobby and made his way toward the sea. Everything had changed but the crenellated coastline. It still met the sea with the same embattled scars. He recognized as his own the coral outcrop bare of vegetation. The hotel mustn’t have known what to do with this piece of land tainted with sea spray and so had left it alone. Karl shuffled forward, trying to get just the right view from the bench where he’d once sat.
“Kannst du mir mal noch ein Handtuch?”
It was early morning, but already people were sunning themselves, including a woman with skin the colour and consistency of baked apple strudel. She called for another towel. His once modest patio had collapsed into a kidney-shaped swimming pool.
The man whom she addressed pulled one from a stack and then, as if suddenly called away, walked in the opposite direction. Karl fought an impulse to go over and explain himself to her. Did she know where she was? Was she here precisely because she did know? Her accent reminded him of Ilsa’s boyfriend. She must come from the industrial north of Germany, but now she too was here, in his home.
So where was his home?
It wasn’t back in Toronto either. He’d spent three-quarters of his life in Canada, but he felt more at home in a place where his home didn’t exist. Buried somewhere were the flagstones leading to his house. He followed the path back to the lobby, and then, before more questions could be asked of him, he was out on the street.
He walked along the pavement, avoiding the sidewalk. He’d been walking these roads long before there was a need for such conveniences. Several houses, much larger and more solid than anything that had existed before, were situated behind hedges and metal fences. Another hotel followed and then, after he turned left into town, shops, apartments and rooms for rent. There was a sense of rambling prosperity about the place that he cherished, as if he’d had something to do with the outcome.
This was a proper town, with cars parked at the curbs and motorbikes patrolling the roads. It was a place with electric telegraph poles and telephones, air conditioning and swimming pools with fresh towels for the asking. The early morning sleepiness he observed in people he passed was an outcome of good fortune, not despair.
Karl, surprising himself, called out a “Buenos días” to the few people opening up their places of business for the morning. Without looking up, they returned his morning greeting. “Buenos días,” they called back to him.
One of them might have been his son.
The last photo that had been sent to him, a black-and-white picture taken when Abraham was still a boy, was so old that Karl had no idea who to look for. The one clue might be his skin colour. It would be lighter. But whose would he be comparing it to? His own skin? Ancient and withered, unable to sustain any pigmentation, even sun spots, Karl’s skin could best be described as colourless rather than white. Dominicans, on the other hand, had a wide variety of
skin shades. They were all mixed up, just like this town and its history.
Karl had sent Maricel money; Maricel had sent him back photographs. At first she delivered some of both herself and their child, pictures of her holding up his son’s hand to wave at the camera. The photographs were taken on the back patio with the hedges in the background, or in the house, the door always open as if waiting for his return. Did she believe he was coming back? Karl had needed an excuse to walk out the front door toward something resembling a normal life. He had promised to send for them when the time came. The time had never come.
After a few years, the photos Maricel sent were just of their son, as if she sensed she was disappearing from his view. Then, when he no longer even sent her the occasional letter, she stopped sending photographs at all. She knew what was happening, had probably always known but had hoped it might turn out differently. In the years after the war, one did not cohabit with a Haitian woman or father mulatto children circumcised by rabbis. There’d been no room for them in Toronto, no space that could contain such oddities.
The promise he’d offered Maricel was the last he’d ever made. He’d offered none to his Canadian-born son and none to Claire either. It was better that way, more honest and respectful.
He hadn’t known what to feel, and so he felt nothing. What was the point? Maybe when his son grew up, Karl would think about bringing him to Canada, but that was far in the future, and when it was less so, he understood that he’d been using the idea to make his actions less ignoble. He wished his son well, as he did Maricel, and the money he sent every month would ensure the boy would be given a decent education and a good head start. The community of Sosua would help him, treat him as one of their own, even if Karl could not.
Karl never allowed himself to dwell on the photos. They were put away, and, in the course of the various moves he made over the decades, they, like Maricel, like his first-born, disappeared. Even if Maricel had wanted to send photographic evidence, she no longer had his address. He reasoned that any emergency—one that had to do with money—could be handled by his bank. They would give word if a problem arose. None ever did. Maricel had accepted her fate. Karl tried to do the same.
The money was sent, and it was received. Karl had another child, a boy, and he gave what he could to him, all the while attempting not to resent his existence. Perhaps this was how Karl had shown his paternal obligation, by neglecting his second son on his first son’s behalf.
What had he thought, anyway? That he’d find his son in a house he’d left another century ago and say, “Buenos días, mi hijo”? Was he expecting his son to invite him in for breakfast? “¿Le gustaría un café, Papa?” Yes, he’d answer, I would like some coffee. And they would sit down at the table and enjoy each other’s company in some utterly unbelievable way.
It was not that way with the son he knew, so why would it be any different with the son he didn’t know? Well then, Karl asked himself, if that’s the way it’s going to be, what am I doing here? He’d come here for a reason, and he hadn’t come alone. Petra was with him. He’d slipped out of the room early in the morning, when she was still sleeping. She’d been up late the night before, overwhelmed by the heat and light and the promise it offered. She’d jumped in the pool after darkness fell, and he’d watched her from the hotel balcony, swimming in the lit water, wishing so much that it was his sister. He’d given her US dollars and told her that she could go out and explore the town. With money in hand, she’d cast him a dubious look.
“I’m worried about leaving you alone here.”
“This is my home,” Karl had said. “I can’t get lost.”
Now the sun reached higher in the sky. Karl was thirsty from walking on the road. He needed shade and something to drink. He’d find it at the colmado but everything had changed, and he was no longer sure of the way. Hotels along the cliff blocked his view of the sea and, with it, his ability to locate himself. He carried on walking in what he believed was the right direction and felt lucky when he spotted the administrative house where the Americans had their offices and doled out the weekly salary. It looked completely rundown. The galvanized roof was in bad shape, the shutters needed a new coat of paint, and there was furniture on the veranda, even a fridge, which upset Karl. The Americans weren’t ones to let things slide like this.
He knocked on the door.
“Dónde está el colmado?” he asked the Dominican woman who answered the door.
She must have been in her late fifties or sixties and stared at him for a moment before turning to shout into the dark space behind her. “Danny!” She continued standing by the door as if to block his entrance, until Danny arrived, holding a slice of nibbled toast in his hand. Bread crumbs littered his poorly trimmed beard.
“What can I do for you?” he asked.
“I’m looking for the colmado.”
Danny considered the question for a moment. “You Jewish?”
Karl had learned never to answer that sort of question. “Is the colmado close by?”
“That place hasn’t been around for, like, fifty years. It was a night club for a while. But then it went out of business. It’s a restaurant now. I don’t recognize you. Have you come from America? I lived there for thirty years. I’m a musician. I’ve played all over.”
He said this, Karl supposed, by way of apology for his current circumstances. Karl wished he hadn’t approached. Where were the other Americans? he wondered.
“The colmado is just up the road,” he said, pointing with his toast in the direction Karl had been walking. “But except for the building, there’s nothing left. It’s amazing the place is still standing.” He stared at Karl.
Just like you was what Danny meant. Karl sensed his remark was hostile.
“You have family here?” asked Danny.
Petra would be up by now, worried where he was.
“Yes,” he said.
“I’m Rebecca Berbaum’s son. Did you know her?”
When Karl failed to respond, he added, “I’m not her first kid. She married a Dominican after Mr. Berbaum died.”
Karl didn’t think it possible. How could Mrs. Berbaum, who wouldn’t let Karl walk into the barracks without taking off his socks, give birth to such a sloppy and erratic offspring?
“I know her,” said Karl.
“Yeah, she died eighteen, maybe nineteen years ago. My brothers live in the States. One’s a professor at UCLA. The other one lives in Miami. A lot of the kids from Sosua live in Miami. They do business.” Danny rubbed two envious fingers together.
“I need to get back to the hotel,” Karl said. He shouldn’t have left his room.
“I thought you wanted to go see the colmado.”
“I’m going now.”
“Go, then. And say hello to your family.”
Karl felt thirstier than ever, but when he got there, the doors and windows of the colmado were shut tight. He might find something to drink in Cherimicos and maybe somewhere to lie down for a while. He set off. It was getting hot. Normally he took the road at night with Felix, travelling beneath a starry canopy, but in bright sunlight, there were cars and motorcycles honking their horns at him as they sped past. It was a long walk, and he was exhausted by the time he turned into town. Except that he didn’t recognize anything and wasn’t sure if he’d taken the right road.
Where was Maricel’s house? The street before him was filled with restaurants, supermarkets, small bars with outdoor patios, wooden shacks that looked ancient but that he didn’t recognize.
Fanning off from this street were other, smaller streets and laneways that spider-webbed their way beyond Karl’s comprehension. He stepped into a small shop, but when he put his hands into his pockets, he realized he had no money.
Karl was sweating. He wiped his face with his shirt and nodded, to show the woman behind the counter that he was fully conscious and alert. He was lost again, as he had been in Toronto, and looking for home. He’d made a mistake last time, ending up at Cl
aire’s. He needed to make sure the same thing didn’t happen to him again.
“No tengo dinero,” he said.
There wasn’t much else to do inside the shop if he wasn’t able to buy anything, so he stepped back outside, and this time the heat hit him hard. He chose to walk back toward where he believed he’d just come from, and there he saw, a short distance away, a communal water pipe. There had often been women using it in the morning, a stack of metal buckets beside them ready to fill up, but now no one was there. Maybe, thought Karl, that was because it was so late in the morning. He turned on the tap, cupping his hands to catch the water, which at first was warm, but then, after he let it run for a moment, became refreshingly cool. He drank.
“Hey, old man! That water is no good!”
A young man from the village, someone Karl had never seen before, approached uninvited. Karl ignored him. He’d been drinking this water all his life. It had never done him any harm.
“Where you from?”
Why was everyone asking him this?
“I’m from here.”
“From Cherimicos?”
“No, Sosua. Soy de Sosua.”
“Ah,” said the man. “You’re a survivor.”
Was that the word they used for people like him? If so, it was true. He was.
“What town is this?” asked Karl.
“You don’t recognize it?”
Karl shook his head.
“This is Cherimicos.”
That didn’t seem right to Karl.
“Thank you,” Karl said. He was developing a throbbing headache.