Blooms of Darkness

by Aharon Appelfeld

  “Don’t worry. Mariana will take care of everything. I spoke with her. She liked you,” his mother says with a trembling voice.

  “And where will you go, Mama?”

  “I’ll look for a hiding place in the nearby village.”

  His mother has stopped reading the Bible to him, but after Hugo puts out the lantern, he hears her calling to him. Her voice is soft, melodious, and penetrating.

  “You must behave like a grown-up,” his mother says, not sounding like herself. Hugo wants to reply, I’ll do everything that Mariana tells me to do, but he stops himself.

  At night sounds come from outside and shock the cellar. They are mainly the sobbing of women whose children were snatched away from them. The women were daring and ran after the gendarmes, pleading with them to return their children. The pleas drove the gendarmes mad, and they beat the women furiously.

  After the kidnappings, silence reigns. Only here and there a suppressed sob is heard.

  Hugo lies awake. Everything that happens in the house and in the street affects him. An expression that he heard by chance returns to him at night with intensified clarity. It is hard for him to read and hard for him to play chess. Images and sounds fill him.

  “Where is Otto?” he keeps asking his mother.

  “In a cellar.”

  Hugo is sure that Otto, too, has been snatched, thrown into a truck, and is now on his way to the Ukraine.

  His mother sits with her legs crossed and describes the place where Mariana lives. “She has a big room and within it is a big closet. In the daytime, you’ll be in the big room, and at night you’ll sleep in the closet.”

  “At Mariana’s, are they also liable to seize me?” Hugo asks cautiously.

  “Mariana will watch over you like a hawk.”

  “Why will I have to sleep in the closet?”

  “For safety’s sake.”

  “Will she read out of the Bible for me?”

  “If you ask her.”

  “Does she know how to play chess?”

  “I imagine not.”

  The short questions and answers sound to Hugo like final preparations for a secret journey. Sitting in the cellar oppresses him, and he is eagerly looking forward to the day when he’ll put the knapsack on his back and go down into the sewer with his mother.

  “Is there a school there?” he suddenly asks.

  “My dear, you aren’t going to go to school. You have to be in hiding,” his mother says in a different tone of voice.

  That sounds like a punishment to him, and he asks, “Will I be in hiding all the time?”

  “Until the end of the war.”

  He is relieved. The war, he has heard, will not be long.

  Hugo’s questions, asked as he gropes blindly, pain his mother. Usually she answers with a complete sentence or gives half an answer, but she doesn’t deceive him. She has a rule: never deceive. But there were times, to admit the truth, when she blurred things, distracted him, and concealed facts from him. For that reason, her conscience bothers her. To overcome her twinges of conscience, she says, “You must be aware, listen to everything that’s said, and understand that we’re living in strange times. Nothing is the way it was.”

  Hugo feels that his mother is distressed, and he says, “I’m listening, Mama. I listen all the time.”

  “Thanks, dear,” his mother answers. She has been feeling recently that she has lost control over her words. They slip out of her mouth and don’t touch on the main point. For example, she wants to tell Hugo about Mariana and her profession, so that he will know and be careful, but all the words she tries to mobilize don’t help her.

  “Excuse me,” she says suddenly.

  “What for, Mama?”

  “Nothing. My mistake,” she says, and she covers her mouth with a handkerchief.

  Again Hugo is ill at ease. It seems to him that his mother wants to tell him a big secret, but that for some reason she is hesitating. That hesitation makes him talk too much and repeat things he’s already told her.

  “Does Mariana have children?” Hugo tries a different approach.

  “She isn’t married.”

  “What does she do?”

  “She works.”

  To conclude the interrogation, she says, “There’s no reason to ask so many questions. I repeat, Mariana is a good woman. She’ll watch over you like a hawk. I trust her.”

  This time Hugo is insulted, and he says, “I won’t ask.”

  “You’re allowed to ask, but you have to realize that there isn’t an answer to every question. There are things that it’s impossible to explain, and there are things that a boy of your age can’t understand.” To console him a bit, she adds, “Believe me, everything will be clear to you. In a short while you’ll understand a lot of things. You’re a smart boy, and even without answers, you’ll understand.” His mother opens her eyes wide, and they both smile.

  4

  The night finally came. It was preceded by a day of house-to-house searches, kidnappings, and cries of dread. The noose was getting tighter, and his mother decided that after midnight they would set out. All the days in the cellar, Hugo didn’t feel afraid. Now, as he is on his knees and stuffing the books back into the knapsack, his hands tremble.

  “Did we forget anything?” asks his mother, the way she used to ask before they went on vacation.

  It’s one in the morning, and they walk up the steps in the dark house. Through the darkness Hugo can see his room—the desk, the dresser, and the bookcase. His schoolbag lies at the foot of the desk. I won’t be going to school anymore—the thought passes through his head.

  Hugo’s mother hastily puts a few small things in a handbag, and they go out the back door into the street. The street is dark and silent, and they cling to the walls as they walk, to avoid discovery. Near what was once the bakery is the manhole. Hugo’s mother pulls up the cover and goes down. Hugo throws her the suitcase and the knapsack. He immediately dangles his legs down, and his mother takes him in her arms. Luckily for them, the sewage isn’t deep at that hour, but the stench and the stifling air slow them down. Hugo knows that quite a few people have been caught coming out of the sewers. His mother assumed that on a Sunday night the guards would be drunk, and they wouldn’t leave the ghetto to lie in wait for people running away. From time to time the level of the sewage rises, and the air grows more stifling. While they are trudging along, Hugo collapses. His mother doesn’t lose her wits. She drags him, and in the end she pulls him out. When he opens his eyes, he is lying on grass.

  “What happened, Mama?” he asks.

  “It was suffocating, and you felt ill.”

  “I don’t remember anything.”

  “There’s nothing to remember.” His mother tries to distract him.

  Hugo will think a great deal about that dark night, trying to tie the details together, and he will wonder again and again how his mother had managed to pull him out of the sewer and restore him to life.

  But meanwhile, it’s dangerous to linger in the open field. They make their way, hunched over, to a nearby grove of trees. Every few minutes they stop, kneel, and listen.

  “Mariana works at night, and you have to get used to being alone.” His mother reveals another detail to him.

  “I’ll read, and I’ll do arithmetic problems.”

  “I hope that Mariana has a light in the closet,” she says in a trembling voice.

  “When will you come and see me?”

  “That doesn’t depend on me,” she says without emphasizing any word in the sentence.

  Then they take a break and sit without talking, and it seems to Hugo as if many hours have passed since they left the cellar, were in the sewer, and clambered out of it.

  “Will Papa also come and visit me?” he asks, hurting his mother without knowing it.

  “It’s very dangerous to wander around outdoors, don’t you see?”

  “And after the war, will you come and visit me?”

  “We’ll
come right away. We won’t delay even a minute,” she says, and she’s glad that this time she’s found the correct words.

  Then she tells him that she doesn’t intend to go back home. She will go to the nearby village. She has a friend there, someone with whom she’d gone to school, and maybe this friend will agree to hide her until the troubles are over. If that friend doesn’t agree, she will go to the village of Khlinitsia, where a woman who was a servant in Hugo’s grandparents’ house lives, an old woman with a good temperament.

  “Why can’t you stay with me?”

  “There isn’t room for me.”

  Then she speaks in a torrent, as though she were reading out loud or reciting. Hugo doesn’t understand anything she is talking about. He only senses that she wants to tell him something that’s hard to reveal. It’s her voice, but not her usual voice.

  “Mama.”

  “What?”

  “And you’ll come to visit me?” The words burst from his mouth.

  “Certainly I’ll come. Do you have any doubt?”

  The silence mingles with the darkness, and the smell of the damp grass rises from the soft ground. “Autumn,” says his mother, and her voice wipes away the memory of the stifling sewer and the fears of the night. Other sights, silent and enchanting, rise from oblivion.

  In the autumn they used to go for a week in the Carpathians, to see the fallen leaves. The autumn lay on the earth in a myriad of hues, and they would step slowly, so as not to destroy the big leaves that floated in bright colors, detached from the trees. Hugo’s father would bend over, pick up a leaf, and say, “A waste.”

  “A waste of what?” His mother’s question came promptly. “Of this beauty.”

  Other marvelous things were said then, but Hugo didn’t take them in, or maybe he didn’t retain them. His contacts with his parents at those times were delicate and soft, and what was said sank into him.

  For a moment it seems to Hugo that his mother is about to say, It’s late, let’s go home. We were wrong, but we can correct the error. His mother sometimes used sentences like that, expressions of her optimism. His father liked that sentence and would try to adopt it in his own way.

  “How do you feel?” she asks, looking at Hugo with her eyes wide open.

  “Excellent.”

  “Thank God. In half an hour we’ll be at Mariana’s.” Hugo, flooded by memories of the Carpathians, tries to delay the parting and says, “Why rush?”

  “Mariana is waiting for us. I wouldn’t want to delay her. It’s late.”

  “Just a little.”

  “We can’t, dear. The way was long, beyond what I had thought.” Hugo knows that phrase, “beyond what I had thought,” but this time it seems as if it has been plucked out of another place and another time.

  “What time is it?” Hugo asks.

  “It’s two-thirty, after midnight.”

  Strange, the thought flits through his mind, why did his mother say “after midnight”? There was no light in the whole area. Everything was night. Why say “after midnight”? Wasn’t that self-evident?

  “It’s very late. I wouldn’t want to bother Mariana too much. But if we make an effort, we’ll be there in half an hour,” his mother says softly.

  5

  Hugo’s mother was right. Before long, they are standing by a narrow wooden door. His mother knocks, and to the question in a woman’s voice, she answers, “Julia.”

  The door opens, and a tall woman, dressed in a long nightgown, stands at the entrance.

  “We got here,” says his mother.

  “Come in.”

  “I won’t disturb you. Hugo’s clothes are in the suitcase, and there are books and games in the knapsack. We came through the sewer pipes. I hope the clothes didn’t get dirty. You know Hugo?”

  “He’s grown since I last saw him,” she says, and looks at him.

  “He’s a good boy.”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Mariana will watch over you. She remembers you from when you were very little.”

  “Mama,” Hugo says, as though his lips have stopped him from saying more.

  “I have to leave immediately and get to the village before dawn.” She speaks with strange haste and takes something shiny out of her handbag and hands it to Mariana.

  “What’s this?” says Mariana, without looking at the jewelry.

  “It’s for you.”

  “Good God. And you?”

  “I’m going away from here to Sarina, and I hope to get there before sunrise.”

  “Be careful,” says Mariana, and she hugs Hugo’s mother.

  “Hugo, dear,” she says, “always be quiet and polite. Don’t bother with questions and don’t ask for anything. Always say please and always say thank you.” The words are choked in her throat.

  “Mama.” He tries to keep her for another minute.

  “I have to go. Take care of yourself, dear,” she says, kisses his forehead, and separates herself from him.

  Mama, he is about to call out again, but the word is blocked in his mouth.

  Hugo manages to see her go away. She walks stooped over, making a way for herself through the bushes. When she is swallowed up in the thick darkness, Mariana closes the door.

  That is the break, but Hugo doesn’t feel it. Perhaps because of the night chill that his body had soaked up, or because of his fatigue. He is very confused and says, “Mama left.”

  “She’ll come back,” says Mariana, not meaning it.

  “Is it far to the village?” he asks, breaking the first rule that his mother drilled into him.

  “Don’t worry about your mother. She’s experienced. She’ll find a way.”

  “Sorry.” He tries to fix things.

  “You’re surely tired,” Mariana says, letting him into the closet, a long, narrow space without windows. At first sight it looks like the roomy pantry in Hugo’s house. But the strong smell of sheepskins immediately reminds him of the shoemaker’s cellar, where his mother brought shoes to be repaired every few months.

  “This will be your bedroom. Can I bring you something to drink?”

  “Thanks, there’s no need.”

  “I’ll bring you some soup.”

  Hugo surveys the closet, and on his second look he discovers colorful nightgowns suspended from hangers, a few pairs of shoes, and, on a surface like a bench, scattered silk stockings, a corset, and a brassiere. Those women’s things amuse his eyes for a moment.

  Mariana brings him the soup and says, “Eat, dear. You’ve had a hard day.”

  Hugo eats the soup. Mariana looks at him and says, “You’re a big kid. How old are you?”

  “Eleven.”

  “You look older. Take off your shoes and go to sleep. Tomorrow we’ll sit together and talk about how to make your days with me pleasant,” she says, and closes the closet door.

  It’s still dark outside, and through the cracks in the closet wall the shrieks of birds of prey filter in, as does the clear cry of a rooster that has woken up. For a moment it seems to Hugo that the door will open soon and his mother will come in, stooped over, the way she was in the habit of walking during the past weeks. She will tell him that she has found a marvelous hiding place and that they will go there together now. Her voice and expression are clear, and he awaits her arrival intently. But in the end fatigue overcomes him, and he falls asleep.

  It is an uncomfortable sleep that presses on his chest and binds his feet. Several times he tries to slip out of the oppression. In the end he wakes up and feels better.

  Now he can see the closet. It’s narrower than he imagined. Through the cracks between the boards light filters in and brightens the back. The front remains dipped in thin darkness.

  Sleep, it seems, has wiped the expectation away from his heart. He sees his mother standing at the counter in the pharmacy with his father at her side, as though time had frozen them in their places. The panic of the last few months is not visible on them. They look quiet and settled, and if they wer
en’t frozen into mummies, there would have been no change in them.

  While he is still wondering about their frozenness, the door opens, and Mariana stands in the doorway, dressed in a colorful nightgown, with a cup of milk in her hand.

  “How did you sleep?”

  “Well.”

  “Drink, and I’ll show you my room.”

  Hugo takes the cup and drinks. It is sweet, fresh milk that seeps into him and warms him up.

  “Where’s Mama?” He can’t control himself.

  “She went to the village to find refuge.”

  “When will she come to me?” Again he makes a mistake and asks.

  “It will take a little time. Come, I’ll show you my room.”

  Hugo didn’t expect such a surprise. It is a broad room, well lit and wrapped in curtains. All the slipcovers in the room are pink, as are the chairs. Colorful jars and flasks are scattered on the dressers.

  “Do you like the room?”

  Hugo doesn’t know what to say, so he answers, “It’s very beautiful.”

  Mariana chuckles, a kind of suppressed laugh that is hard to figure out.

  “The room is very beautiful.” He tries to correct himself. “In the daytime you can play here. Sometimes I sleep in the daytime, and you can watch over my sleep.”

  “I’ll play chess,” it occurs to him to tell her.

  “Sometimes I’ll have to hide you, but don’t worry, it will be for a short time, and then you’ll come back here. You can sit in the armchair or on the floor. Do you like to read?”

  “A lot.”

  “You won’t be bored with me,” Mariana says, and she winks.

  6

  Mariana goes out and leaves Hugo by himself. The room isn’t like a room where a person lives. The pink slipcovers, the fragrance of perfume, give it the look of a beauty parlor. Not far from their house was a beauty parlor. There, too, the furniture was pink. In the corners they shampooed the hair of full-figured women and did their finger-and toenails. Everything was done there with a lazy ease, with laughter and open enjoyment. Hugo liked to stand and look at the scene, but his mother’s feet never crossed the threshold of the beauty parlor. Every time they went by it, her lips would curl into a smile whose meaning he couldn’t fathom.