The Collaborator

by Diane Armstrong

  As they sit in the kitchen waiting for the tea to cool, Annika watches her mother unwrapping a packet of biscuits she has brought. In the shape of Eva’s oval face she detects a resemblance to Eitan. The tragedy of Marika’s secret strikes her with new force: her mother knows nothing about her real family.

  Eva turns her searching gaze on her daughter. ‘Come on, own up, you must have met someone over there, or you wouldn’t have stayed away so long. Something about you is different. You don’t look as uptight as usual, so there must have been a holiday romance.’

  Annika had intended to wait a few days before telling her mother about Dov and her decision to move to Israel, but suddenly she can’t hold back any longer, and in her excitement it all tumbles out.

  Eva puts down her mug and stares at her in dismay. ‘I can’t believe what you’re saying. I thought you were too smart to let a holiday romance turn your life upside down. You’ve done some crazy things in your life but this takes the cake. Tell me I’ve got it wrong — you can’t possibly mean you’re thinking of going to live in Israel.’

  Annika represses the urge to retort that as usual her mother doesn’t trust her judgement.

  ‘I know this comes as a shock, and I understand how you feel,’ she says carefully, ‘but for the first time in my life I’ve met a man who is right for me. You said I looked different, and that’s because I’m happy. For once I know I’ve made the right decision. I’m not going to let distance ruin my chance of happiness.’

  ‘Distance? This isn’t just a matter of kilometres. You’re talking about living in a country on the other side of the world. And not just any country. You’ve never led a normal life or had normal relationships. Trust you to choose a man you’ve just met, and a country that’s so dangerous.’

  Determined to ignore the criticism, and avoid an argument that would only create rancour and solve nothing, Annika swallows an angry retort.

  ‘Look, I know how crazy this sounds, sometimes I can’t believe it myself, but when you meet Dov you’ll understand. He’s coming here next month because he wants you to meet him, and then you’ll see for yourself what a wonderful man he is.’

  Eva shakes her head. ‘I was so glad you were back, and you’re already talking about leaving. I don’t know why you’re rushing into this. It makes no sense to me. I just hope you know what you’re doing. Your grandmother will be devastated.’

  At the mention of Marika, Annika tightens her grip on the mug. She has to tread warily so as not to reveal too much. ‘Mum, there’s something else I have to tell you.’

  Eva frowns as Annika begins to talk, and looks increasingly stunned as she continues talking. She tells her Marika’s real name, her passionate affair with Miklós Nagy, the drama of the rescue train, and the tragedy of his death, but she doesn’t mention that Marika was pregnant on the train. Perhaps she would tell her after some time had elapsed, but hopefully one day Marika herself would tell her daughter who her father really was.

  Eva looks dazed, clearly struggling to comprehend what she has heard. Then she shakes her head. ‘I can’t believe the things you’ve just told me about my mother having a different name, and keeping it secret all her life. And the story about an affair with that fellow. It’s like something you read in a novel. How do you know any of it is true?’

  ‘I know it is,’ Annika says, and tells her what she heard from Shmuel. ‘Remember me telling you before I left that I saw her in the photo that was taken of the passengers who were rescued on that train? Well, Shmuel was on the train, and he remembered her. He told me the whole story. I heard it from Miklós Nagy’s grandson as well. It’s such a tragic story. He must have loved her all his life, because the last word he uttered on his deathbed was her name.’

  ‘Marika?’

  ‘Ilonka. That’s her real name.’

  Eva clutches her head as if to make sure it stays attached to her body. ‘I can’t make any sense of all this. It’s too much to take in. I just don’t understand. Why did Mother never mention any of this? And if they loved each other so much, why did they marry other people?’ She pauses. ‘I’ve just remembered something you told me — you said that when you mentioned that man — Miklós, was it? — she told you she never wanted to hear his name again. Do you know why she was so angry after all this time?’

  Annika opens her mouth to reply, but thinks better of it. She doesn’t want to risk an explanation that might reveal that Marika had been pregnant on the train. Instead, she says, ‘You didn’t want to upset her by raising the subject at the time, but maybe now you can ask her yourself. But tell me something. Did you ever suspect that Grandmamma lied about her past?’

  Eva puts down her biscuit and pushes her mug away. She gazes out of the window at two Indian mynas pecking at grass seeds on the lawn next door for a few minutes before replying. ‘Your grandmother was always secretive. When I was growing up, whenever I asked about my father, she was always curt and evasive, and I wasn’t strong enough to push her. I assumed she was too upset to talk about him, and I stopped asking. These days people search documents and archives, and send DNA to a genetic laboratory, but it never occurred to me to do any of that back then, especially as any mention of my father upset her so much. Whenever I read anything about the Holocaust, I used to wonder what happened to her in Budapest, and how she managed to survive, but she always clammed up. She said it was too traumatic and she wanted to forget all about it. You know how forbidding she can be. She never even told me that this Miklós guy saved her life!’

  Eva speaks in an unusually bitter tone, and Annika moves closer to her mother and strokes her shoulder. This is the first time the mask of filial loyalty has slipped and her mother has spoken openly of her resentment at her powerlessness in her relationship with Marika. Annika had always been contemptuous of her mother for living in Marika’s shadow, but now she senses her pain at being excluded from major events in her mother’s life, even the ones that affected her. She quails at the thought of what it will do to her mother, if she ever found out who her father really was.

  ‘You were always so devoted to her, I was jealous,’ Annika muses. ‘All my life I felt I was on the outside. I never realised how hard it must have been for you.’

  Eva swallows and looks gratefully at her daughter. They sit in silence, aware that sharing the story about Marika’s secret past has created a new bond between them.

  ‘I’ll go and see Grandmamma in a day or so,’ Annika says, and adds, ‘Will you come with me?’

  *

  Annika’s hand trembles and she has butterflies in her stomach as she stands outside her grandmother’s apartment in Bellevue Hill, her finger poised to press the buzzer. In the days since she returned to Sydney, she has been gathering the courage to visit Marika, going over and over in her mind what she will say.

  As Marika opens the door, Annika feels an unexpected rush of warmth. For the past few weeks, her grandmother has been a conflicting but abstract presence inside her mind, but now, face to face with her, she feels a surge of affection. The resentment and anger momentarily dissipate.

  With a cry of delight, Marika embraces her. ‘You have been away so long, Annika édesem, it’s wonderful to see you again. Let me look at you.’

  She looks at her grandmother, and for the first time she sees the sad depths of Marika’s dark eyes. As they enter the lounge room, she becomes aware of the melancholy atmosphere that hangs over the apartment, the heaviness of secrets and suppressed feelings.

  ‘You look good, I think you’ve lost weight,’ Marika says approvingly.

  Her grandmother’s obsession with her weight has always been an irritant, but this time Annika smiles indulgently. ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘So come and tell me all about your trip,’ Marika says as she places her culinary masterpiece on the walnut table in front of them. ‘I’ve made your favourite, dobos torte.’ She sits beside Annika on the brocade-covered sofa, and pats her hand.

  ‘Budapest is a beautiful city.’
As Annika says this, she and her mother exchange glances, and they both watch Marika for her reaction. Annika wonders if her grandmother will ask about the city where she was born and where she had the affair that has had such a catastrophic impact on her life, the city she last saw in 1944 and tried to block from her mind ever since. But Marika remains impassive, and waits for Annika to continue.

  ‘You were born there, weren’t you?’

  Marika shrugs. ‘Ancient history. Where did you go after that?’

  But Annika refuses to change the subject. ‘I went to that marvellous old synagogue on Dohány Street. It’s such an unusual building with a rose window and an organ. Outside there’s a touching Holocaust memorial in the shape of a tree with silver leaves. Survivors and their relatives have engraved the names of Holocaust victims on each leaf. Did you ever go there?’

  Marika shifts in her seat. ‘I never went to that synagogue.’

  ‘Where did you live? I wish I’d asked you before I left, so I could have gone to see your street.’

  ‘There’s nothing to see there. It would have been a waste of time.’ Marika’s voice is crisp. It’s a tone Annika knows well, a warning not to pursue this topic. But she presses on, describing the Danube, the Fishermen’s Bastion, Hero Square, and the magical nightly illuminations on Chain Bridge, Parliament House and the Castle on Swabian Hill, hoping to evoke some pleasant memory.

  ‘I never knew that Budapest was such a beautiful city,’ Eva remarks to break the silence, but apart from an occasional nod that owes more to politeness than interest, Marika doesn’t engage with Annika’s enthusiastic description.

  Annika perseveres with an account of the dobos torte at the Europa Café. ‘The café was gorgeous, like something from the set of a Viennese operetta, but their dobos wasn’t nearly as good as yours, Grandmamma,’ she says, scraping up the last smidgin of chocolate and toffee from her plate. Encouraged by Marika’s appreciative smile, she goes on to tell her about the chamber-music concert at Rákoczy Castle, and the elegance of the aristocratic owner.

  ‘Budapest must have changed so much since you were there, Mama, you probably wouldn’t recognise it today,’ Eva says.

  Marika remains impassive. ‘Probably not.’

  So Annika gives up and talks about her stay in Israel, another country Marika has no wish to visit. She describes the spiritual atmosphere at the Western Wall on Shabbat, the mesmerising view from the Mount of Olives and the cemetery where Russian oligarchs have bought plots in the hope of being the first to be resurrected. She talks about the exotic mix of people in Jerusalem’s souk, the jewellery boutiques and lively markets of Jaffa, and the quirky galleries of Neve Tzedek where she bought each of them a silver bracelet.

  This time she evokes a response, but it’s not the one she had hoped for.

  ‘First you didn’t intend to go to Israel, and then you stayed longer than you told your mother you were going to. Israel is a very dangerous country with that Intifada going on and rockets exploding all over the place.’ She turns to Eva. ‘We were worried about her, weren’t we?’ Turning back to Annika, she adds, ‘What on earth made you stay so long?’

  ‘It didn’t feel dangerous at all. I loved it. It’s frenetic and fascinating. There’s no other place like it, so full of life, with so much history. You can actually stand on the spot where David stood three thousand years ago, and where Christ was buried. Thousands of people still pray at the wall of the temple that Solomon built.’

  Marika eyes her shrewdly. ‘But that’s not why you stayed.’

  ‘Well, I met someone special. An Israeli journalist,’ Annika says, exchanging a quick glance with her mother.

  ‘A journalist?’ Marika pulls a face. She studies her granddaughter with her penetrating gaze. ‘So I suppose he’s the reason you stayed on?’

  In the past, Annika would have interpreted that as a criticism of her flighty nature and her lack of discrimination where men were concerned, but this time she takes the comment at face value. She knows she has to tread lightly. She doesn’t want to antagonise her grandmother at this stage of the visit.

  ‘You know how you’ve never approved of the men I’ve been involved with? You’ve always said you couldn’t understand why I chose such unstable, unsuitable guys. You used to say you wished I’d find someone intelligent and reliable that I could settle down with. Well, that’s exactly what Dov is like.’

  This time it takes Marika a little longer for the significance of her words to sink in, and when it does, her eyes flash with anger. ‘Settle down with? I hope you’re not telling me that you’re thinking of settling down with this journalist?’

  Before Annika can reply, she continues, ‘You’ve never had a good word to say about male journalists. You always said they were unreliable and drank too much.’ She looks at Eva for support but Eva is studying her hands and doesn’t meet her mother’s glance.

  ‘Dov is nothing like that.’

  Marika stares at Eva. ‘Did you know about this?’

  Eva nods but doesn’t comment. She steals a glance at Annika who feels encouraged by their unspoken complicity.

  Marika’s tone and her comments transport her back to the contentious past. She is a teenager again, her opinions trivialised and her feelings dismissed, being rebuked for her thoughtless behaviour. The most desperate battles are the ones fought with those you love, and the last thing she wants now is a fight with her grandmother, although her resentment is rising to dangerous levels.

  Determined not to lose her cool, she speaks as calmly and patiently as she can, listing Dov’s professional achievements and personal qualities as if she were applying for a job on his behalf.

  ‘Anyway,’ she concludes defiantly, ‘all that matters is that I’m in love with him and he loves and understands me. We’re going to live together in Tel Aviv. I’ve never been so sure of anything in my whole life. He’s coming to Sydney to meet you next month so you’ll be able to judge for yourself.’

  Marika shakes her head. ‘Don’t you realise how ridiculous you sound? None of this makes any sense.’ Once again she looks over at her daughter for support.

  ‘It makes sense to Annika,’ Eva points out.

  ‘You hardly know him,’ Marika continues. ‘You can’t just move to a different country because you’ve met a man you think you’re in love with. Have you thought of all the problems involved in moving to a different country where the language is different? How good is your Hebrew?’

  Annika is tempted to remind her that she did exactly the same, without the support of a man who loved her, but she bites her tongue in time. In the meantime, Marika is saying, ‘And how will you earn your living?’

  ‘I don’t think I’m in love with him. I know I am. He’s the man for me. Grandmamma, you make me sound like a thoughtless child, but I’m forty years old, and I know what I need. As for work, he told me I can get a job on his newspaper. They publish in English. I can’t wait to work on a real newspaper again. And when his daughter finishes school and her army service, they might migrate here.’

  Marika is obviously frustrated and puzzled by Eva’s attitude which demonstrates an unusual absence of support. ‘You’re not saying much about your daughter’s extraordinary plan. What do you think about this hare-brained idea?’

  Eva looks at her daughter. ‘Annika isn’t a child. If she thinks that this will make her happy, she should do it, even if we don’t like it. She hasn’t been happy so far, so it’s worth a try. After all, we want her to be happy, don’t we?’

  Annika regards her mother appreciatively. It’s the first time she can remember that Eva has defied Marika and stood up for her.

  Marika tightens her lips. ‘You say you can’t live without him, but how do you know you can live with him?’ she asks.

  It’s the first comment that Marika has made that hasn’t been critical, and Annika moves closer to her on the settee. Mollified by her grandmother’s concerned tone, she looks into her face. ‘I know Israel is far away, and yo
u’ll miss me, and I’ll miss you too. Of course you’re right, it is a risk and it mightn’t work, but I know I have to give it a try. You’ve often said that I’ve never had a stable relationship because the guys were never right for me, or because I was afraid of compromise and commitment, but this time I know it’s different. If I walk away from this, I’ll regret it all my life.’

  She notices a faint flicker in Marika’s eyes and wonders if her words have finally struck a chord. ‘You’ll like Dov, I know you will. He’s smart and caring, he’s what you call a real mensch. He has a lovely daughter...’

  ‘A daughter! So he’s married?’

  ‘He’s widowed.’ She is on the point of telling her grandmother how Nurit died, but decides against it. She doesn’t want to remind her of the perils of life in Israel. ‘I’ll come back to see you as often as I can. And you never know, you might even come and visit me.’

  Then she looks straight into Marika’s eyes and says, ‘I think when we come to the end of our life, we regret the things we failed to do even more than the things we did, and I don’t want to live with regrets. That would be a very sad way to live, don’t you think?’

  Marika looks down at her hands and twists her filigree Florentine ring around her finger. When she raises her head, Annika is still looking at her.

  Now that the argument is over and the tension has dissipated, Annika takes her grandmother’s hand and takes a deep breath.

  ‘Grandmamma, there’s something I have to tell you. While I was in Israel I found out a lot about Miklós Nagy.’

  Marika stiffens and pulls her hand away. ‘Why are you telling me this? It’s of no interest to me.’

  Annika hadn’t intended to start this conversation so soon or so bluntly. She had decided to broach it much later, and in a more subtle way, but she has crossed the forbidden Rubicon, and there’s no going back. The question is how much she should divulge.