by Miriam Sved
‘I have something surprising to show you,’ I said, just as he was saying, ‘We should speak more about the meeting in Vienna.’
Erzsébet came into the room. She was holding a novel, one of Jókai’s (I had been the one to introduce her to them), and she sat with deliberate casualness on the sofa directly between where Tibor and I were standing.
Tibor said to me, ‘Maybe we should go for a walk.’
Erzsébet immediately abandoned her pretence of reading. ‘Oh, Tibor,’ she whined, ‘I knew you would snatch her away. She has come to visit me too, you know.’
I promised again that I would find her after speaking with her brother, I would come back to the house when we had been for a walk up the hill. Again there was that pang of regret for having to give up Tibor’s family along with him.
We went out the back gate, which led to a cobbled lane and some steps up to a viewing platform, a low stone wall from which we could look over the city. You must remember the view from up there, hills cascading down to the river and the bridges strung across it like sparkling jewellery. We were breathing heavily from the climb. For a few minutes we sat quietly, catching our breath and looking out. But the letter in my bag was a dark tear through which any simple enjoyment in the day drained away.
I tried to make my voice light when I pulled the letter out and said to Tibor, ‘You won’t guess who has written to me.’ And then, when he looked at me questioningly, ‘Just read it. I won’t be able to do it justice.’
Tibor took the letter and unfolded it in his careful way. It was a single page, written on front and back. I watched him read, holding it out at arm’s length. He is slightly far-sighted but will never wear the spectacles he has for work. Watching him squint at the letter I had a fond flash of what he might look like as an old man, bushy browed and stern. He would have an eager phalanx of young people around at all times – students or grandchildren or perhaps, after the revolution, young comrades. He would be eminent, somewhat feared but respected. And could I see myself anywhere in this future vision? The distinguished professor’s helpmeet, or distinguished comrade’s partner? And all those grandchildren, where might they have come from? I blinked and tried to clear my mind of these foolish mental exercises.
When Tibor finished the letter he turned it back over to the front and examined the first page again, as though there might be a clue to its interpretation there. ‘Well,’ he said eventually. ‘This is unexpected.’
I forced a laugh. ‘That is an understatement.’ Then, when Tibor kept studying the letter in silence, ‘What on earth do you think he’s about? Does he really imagine that I’ll pack my bags and hand myself and my convenient American relatives over to him because of a letter?’ I was trying to sound comic, hoping to bring Tibor along on the joke. But when he finally looked up at me his face was all solemnity.
He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, a tired gesture. ‘Eszter, this might be a genuine opportunity – you should take it seriously. We should at least try to find out whether his claims about professional colleagues in America are solid.’
All the strained humour drained away instantly. ‘And if they are, what then? You think I should simply marry this man, about whom I know practically nothing, certainly nothing good.’ My face was suddenly flaming hot and I could feel the absurd possibility of tears. I tried to steady myself beneath Tibor’s gaze. ‘He is only interested in my American relations. He is opportunistic, and I didn’t tell you this before but I think he is an anti-Semite.’
Tibor was silent for a moment, peering down at the letter as though scanning for some verification. If he was shocked I could not tell. Then he rubbed his eyes again with that same tired gesture. ‘He cannot be too anti-Semitic if he is contemplating marriage with a Jew.’
I looked at him, unsure if he was joking.
‘I’m sorry, Eszter. I don’t mean to treat this lightly. Of course the decision will have to be yours alone. But I think you should consider it. I have been hearing from my contacts in England that war grows more likely by the day. Hopefully Hitler will be defeated quickly, but Hungary will be on the wrong side again and we don’t know what conditions will be like afterwards. It might be as bad as after the Great War.’
I snorted, which shocked both of us I think, and a futile anger washed through me: at Tibor for not letting me consider the professor’s letter as a joke; at the vast world, sweeping us along in its arbitrary currents. ‘Good,’ I said peevishly, ‘I hope the war does come. Then Hitler can be defeated and we can finally get on with our lives. And anyway, war is a reason for you to get out, and the other men. I am in no danger of being called up.’
He did not reply, only sat looking out over the city. He seemed to recede behind that curtain that I had seen come down when he was faced with irrationality, with some person or argument that did not rise to his sensible eye line. I looked at his jaw, which was set as though his teeth were clenched, at his eyes that were blank and staring, and I wanted to shake him. Were we really going to conduct this whole conversation without once making explicit what was strange about it? Without referring to ourselves as a couple, to him as a person with some interest in my marital decisions? To what I thought was our understanding?
I must try to be open and straightforward here about the nature of Tibor and my relationship, which had been strange in some ways that fit with the strangeness of the times and some ways that do not. Our relationship had never been formalised, let alone our engagement. Tibor, during our first year at the university, began to call on me at home. He would ask me to walk in the park with him or sometimes to accompany him to a cafe or political lecture. My parents were thrilled, of course; Tibor had a well-established reputation as a great student, and unlike many of my contemporaries he was studying in a field that they considered sensible and practical. And I was very flattered by his attention.
On our outings, Tibor would talk to me of his plans for the future: not just his individual future but the great revolutionary one, which he thought could not be far away. And in these plans it seemed that I was with him. He and I would start a new school for proletariat children in Pest; or did I think I might one day travel with him to the socialist paradise of Catalonia? I remember once, in a moment that felt like a great intimacy, he told me that his sister Erzsébet had always longed for a sister, and that he hoped she and I could form such a bond. This conjuring of a shared future was our agreement, our understanding.
This, and also the uncontested assumptions made by our friends and families. My mother took to calling him Tiborcsillag, a nonsense endearment that clearly assumed maternal status. Early on Levi casually referred to me as Tibor’s girlfriend, and I remember turning my eyes obliquely, anxiously, to Tibor, to see how he would react, and feeling a sense of relief – of accomplishment almost – when he did not blanch at the conferring of this title. Apparently this, then, was what we were to each other: people who assumed some common, if distant, future together.
As for the practicalities of how this future would be attained, these were never spoken of. There was no talk of our wedding, of when and where we might live together. This kind of obscuring of the future is quite the norm here: it is the same with Ildiko and Levi, with almost all the couples we know, unless both families are very rich. There is no point planning for a future we cannot afford or envision, with no practical means of establishing ourselves and starting independent lives. We all exist in a kind of perpetual present or suspended adolescence.
Of course this is not the whole story of how Tibor and I were immobilised. The other part of it cannot be easily explained in relation to the state of affairs in our country. Sitting on the wall overlooking Pest, considering the side of Tibor’s impassive face, I thought in a hypothetical way about reaching out to touch him. The thought seemed somehow implausible. Comical even. I did not think about it very much: the fact that we rarely touched. It wasn’t the same sort of physi
cal distance as that tantalising, teeming space between me and Pali in the train carriage. It did not bother my skin. I only knew, theoretically, that he should be the one trying to breach it; that men – even sombre young men from respectable families – were supposed to want this. Levi, for instance, could barely keep his hands away from Ildiko. I knew girls who had needed to make rushed marriages, surrounded by whispering. And yet I had never been required to consider those boundaries, let alone defend them.
‘Tibor,’ I said, ‘I don’t want to go with that man.’ My voice, to my shame, was quavering. ‘I don’t want to leave you and Ildiko and the others.’
He was silent and still, his jaw set, his colour perhaps deepening a shade. I knew not to bring Tibor feminine emotion and neediness, but I couldn’t help myself.
‘Tibor, do you even … do you like me?’ I said it in a small voice, terribly embarrassed as soon as the infantile question was out of my mouth.
His spine seemed to straighten slightly. ‘Of course I like you, Eszter.’ Gruff and dismissive.
‘No, but what I mean is …’
I could not go any further, I was suddenly overcome by my own absurdity. To be trying to hector some sign of affection from this man whom I had spent the last many weeks thinking of betraying, plotting to extricate myself from. The full perversity of it, of me, reared up in my mind, and I thought, Why not just marry that professor and get away from it all? Everything in my life seemed as flimsy, as ludicrous, as a series of waking dreams. I was so far from achieving or even wanting anything rational.
‘I’m sorry,’ I said to Tibor, looking away, looking out over the city. ‘I didn’t mean to … I don’t know what came over me.’
We were silent for a minute and I thought perhaps the conversation had spent itself, but to my great surprise Tibor reached out and took my hand. ‘Eszti,’ he said, turning to face me, ‘I have not been honest with you. I am not an honest person, except perhaps with Ildiko.’ His hand felt damp and his grip very firm. ‘When we were at school she used to speak of you with such fondness and respect. And when I finally met you I saw why. And then when she and Levi … the four of us – Ildiko and Levi, you and I – we seemed such a good combination. It was wrong of me. I have a high respect for you and I thought perhaps if there was anyone with whom I could overcome my nature it would be you, but it was very wrong of me.’
I tried to pull away but he didn’t let me at first. A kind of horror was coming over me, feeling the determined grip of his hand. I wished I could undo the whole conversation that I had so heedlessly started. I suppose I must have known, on some level, what he was trying to tell me. Ildiko had told me about a group at Cambridge: Hardy was a member, they called themselves the Apostles and they espoused ‘Greek’ views on love. But at the time I could not think it aloud to myself, I was all physical reaction: the blood rushed to my face and I felt slightly ill, I itched to be away from there, to prevent Tibor from disclosing any more. I think somehow, obscurely, I was offended.
I wish my reaction had been more reasoned and kind. In hindsight, with Tibor trying to open up to me about himself it would have been the perfect opportunity to tell him about my Pali problem. Perhaps we could have discussed the situation as adults and decided between ourselves what to do. But that is not what happened. Instead I managed to pull my hand away from Tibor’s, folded the letter and shoved it into my bag, and muttered something about needing to get home to help my mother with dinner. I had to turn and clamber over the wall we had been sitting on to get to the road, which caused a little kerfuffle, Tibor trying to assist and me ignoring his outstretched hand. It pains me to think of him standing there and watching me bustle. His shoulders were bent; he seemed to have lost all his upright self-containment. I wanted only to get away from him.
I clambered without looking back to the place where the road met the path and I began the descent to Pest, thinking fleetingly that I had broken my promise to Erzsébet about returning to the house to gossip with her. My mind skittered from one thing to another as I walked, from the professor to Pali to Tibor, unable to think clearly or for long about anything, walking quickly and trying to find release in the simple act of movement. Just walk, I thought. Don’t try and think. But I couldn’t help it.
Once I had descended the hill I joined a small crowd of people crossing the Chain Bridge, which was comforting somehow, to be in a flurry of movement. I let myself drift into the city, the warren of little streets that locals there call Chicago, which I had always found a rather exciting neighbourhood since my parents forbade me to enter it when I was small: hawkers calling out with trinkets and little stalls selling food along the roadside. I bought some peaches at one of the stalls, with vague thoughts about explaining my long absence when I got home, and then immediately felt hungry and stopped at a bench to eat one. I took the letter out and looked at it as I ate. The professor wrote his name, I noticed, with a little flourish above Voigt, the V reaching heavenwards. I tried to recall what he looked like: my memory of him was somehow overshadowed by his large, neat hands and the little spectacles he wore. His hair, I remembered, had sat in a wave across his forehead and his skin was slightly red, a burnished brick colour. If I accepted his offer, married him and emigrated, all the other confusion – Tibor and Pali and even Ildiko – would fall away. I would have a course in life, rather than this series of fumbling dead ends. I put the envelope back in my bag, careful not to get it sticky from the juice of the peach. The sun was starting to go down and there was a chill in the air. I headed towards home.
When I finally got there I found Ildiko. She was sitting outside the apartment block on the steps leading to the door.
After a day so full of shocks I found I had little capacity to be surprised or to return to the state of stilted strangeness in which we had left each other last week. Instead I flopped down beside her, took the envelope out of my bag and thrust it at her.
‘I know about it,’ she said. ‘Tibor came to see me. We should talk.’
And I could have wept with relief to have her there.
Sydney, 2007
After her initial, frenzied burst of reading, Illy returns to the notebook the next day with more circumspection, reading slowly, giving herself time to fill in the blanks about her parents. She has a hungry sense of searching for some clue, some answer to a question about her family that she can’t quite articulate. She steels herself to accept hints and glimpses as pieces of a puzzle that might never be finished, might only ever make up a blurry outline of her mother.
And she braces herself to accept what she knows must be coming for the group of young people (amazing to think they were no older than Josh) for whom she has quickly come to feel a kind of protectiveness.
Illy has travelled to Hungary twice: the first time a defiant backpacking trip when she was just old enough to escape her parents’ grasp but not yet out of the long spiral of teenage rebellion, and she knew that the worst thing she could do to Eszter was flirt openly with the country that had betrayed her so badly. That time Illy swept through the city – the baths and the opera house and the beautiful bridges – in an emotionally taut and mostly drunken blur that she now thinks was related to guilt: not knowing much of her mother’s past but knowing enough, knowing how Eszter felt about this country and going there anyway. Many years later she and Russell had taken the kids, wanting to give them a sense of their European heritage, and that time grown-up Illy had been careful and deliberate, telling her mother about the trip months before it happened, trying to reconcile Eszter to her grandchildren making this connection with Hungary, wanting if possible to get her blessing. During both trips Illy had visited the City Park and taken photos of the castle at its edge – grand but weird, architecturally chaotic – and she’d done a guided tour on the second trip. She can remember the statue in the castle’s courtyard, although she hadn’t paid much attention to it at the time: she remembers thinking it was a bit hammy, all omino
us robes and shadows, reclining with a large notebook like a literary grim reaper.
Knowing what is about to happen after 1938, how is it possible that she can suspend her disbelief? She can think that it might somehow sweep over them, Eszter’s friends, leaving them dazed but unharmed, blinking in the new world like the lucky farmer after a cyclone who is always photographed standing in front of the only unscathed house in town.
Illy knows it is not rational, but what she wants more than anything is for the young people not to go to Vienna. András Voigt. Her mother needs to meet him, to make the connection that will lead to her marriage and her migration to America, the charmed conditions of Illy’s own birth in a safe country. But sitting with the notebook and a cup of tea at the kitchen table, Illy has to put the book down and do some breathing exercises when she starts reading about the train journey to Vienna, painfully aware as she breathes in for six and out for six that the constricting dread in her chest is related as much to her father as to the spectre of Nazi-occupied Austria.
The professor. She tries to put one thing together with the other, to step back from the close view and squint so that she might see this professor and her father as the same person, the András Voigt she knew. She hasn’t adapted to thinking of him in the past tense. In fact, she coached herself long ago not to think about him very much at all, or only in the most opaque terms: as the exterior of a person, not someone with any depth of feeling that might be reflected back when you looked into it. So it is galling to find a new source of pain in this projection of András in his past life. Of course he never told her about it: she knows nothing about his time in Vienna before the war and has never felt any connection to Austria.
She forces herself to pick up the notebook again, to read on into the meeting, looking for the shadow of both her parents in their initial encounter.
At first it is not as strange or traumatic as she expected. The version of András her mother writes about is one she recognises and can reconcile with her own experience. It is the father who used to emerge like a magic trick when he was speaking to people outside the family; the further outside the better: the more civil, even gallant, he was capable of being – although sometimes with lapses into a kind of blankness, as though his programming for this socially acceptable frequency was patchy and prone to dropouts. He was also capable of vast pools of silence. At home he could make himself an impassive landmark for hours or even days. He would watch television, or read the newspaper, or just sit at the table with a beer in front of him, staring ahead into vacant space. The periods of inertia increased as he got older, but they were already a feature of home when Illy was a child, and they could be surprisingly comfortable while they lasted; her father’s physical presence, when he wasn’t on the attack, was an anchoring weight around which she and Eszter carried on with their lives. Sometimes Illy could almost forget the nature of her living, animate father and would lean on him, or read the newspaper over his shoulder. She remembers once she climbed onto his lap – she doesn’t know how old she was; were they still in America? She was small enough to find a viable crawl space between his legs and the table. She remembers the heat of him, the solidity of his legs and the scratchy fabric of the jumper he was wearing. There are other memories of András resisting and deflecting childish attempts at closeness, his responses on a spectrum of brutality, but this time for some reason he let her onto his lap. Illy remembers the feeling of it: a fluttering of hope, a blooming entitlement to that physical comfort.
