The County of Birches

by Judith Kalman

  “Always clever,” said Gábor, “my brother Bandi piped up. ‘I know. It’s your horse, isn’t it, Szedrás-bácsi? Your new horse that you bought for the cavalry. Will they bring it today?’ My uncle snorted because Bandi had guessed well. The pinch he gave Bandi’s cheek was appreciative but, I knew from experience, painful. ‘Not my horse, not yet. But something on four legs—no, eight—should be pulling up here soon.’

  “Szedrás-bácsi’s anticipation was infectious. He made broad hints and pulled at our ears. My uncle was high-strung as a thoroughbred. When he was in the room, he was the centre of attention. A fine manly figure, he looked taller than his real stature because he held himself ramrod straight. He didn’t walk; he strode. He didn’t converse; he declared. Out in the fields the peasants bent into their work when they heard him coming. My poor grandfather more than once had to listen to a farmer complain that Master Szedrás had expressed himself with force. They knew Grandfather was pious and good-hearted and would reach into his pocket.

  “‘But Szedrás, what’s this!’ Anyuka cried, rushing to the window after Bandi and Miki spied the ponies and raced out. Well, of course I couldn’t run in that confining corset. So, trailing behind my brothers, I heard what sounded like dismay in her voice.

  “‘Why the war, darling sister, the war! What better occasion could there be? The glorious war, and your brother’s remarkable opportunity to serve the emperor! I want my nephews to remember!’”

  “Who knows from where my Uncle Szedrás got his military vocation?” Gábor mused. “Grandfather Aron said it sprang from an ancient gene that went as far back as the defenders of Jericho. Certainly no other family member in recent memory was like him. An ancient gene had randomly surfaced, defining my Uncle Szedrás. Grandfather Aron moved heaven and earth to indulge his son’s longing to serve with Hungary’s best. Not because he was weak and Szedrás-bácsi too willful. Grandfather Aron was quick and shrewd, but tender-hearted. He loved his children too much. They were all of them spoiled, even my saintly mother whose passion for religion was as deep as her brother’s military ambition. Grandfather Aron could deny his children—all twelve of them—nothing. My mother’s obsession for the dietary laws he catered to with separate kitchens no less—one for milchig, the other for fleischig. A rebetzin could not have observed more fastidiously. Although he bought Szedrás a handsome charger to ride in the cavalry, not a day of the war would pass without Grandfather praying with tears pouring down his face for his eldest son’s safety. For Uncle Lajos he bought a motor car to ferry the bigwigs between Budapest and Vienna and so stay out of active combat. Uncle Duri’s exemption from the military he purchased with bribes. They had only to ask and gold poured from Grandfather Aron’s pockets.”

  * * *

  The Rákóczi Tanya as Gábor remembered it was the lap of familial love. It engendered affection that spilled like change into the grasping hands of all the children, young and old alike. Gábor felt he had been born between the cornucopious thighs of Mother Earth, between the Tigris and Euphrates as he loved to say, the very source of life.

  When pressed for accuracy, though, he allowed that Grandfather Aron had entered adulthood without financial backing, and naught but a parochial education and a family legend to get him started. Grószmann lore had it that when Itzig the Jew arrived in the Nyirség he brought with him not even a surname. He dusted off a spot by the side of the road, erected a rough table, and placed on it a heel of bread. From this crust, travel-weary strangers were invited to sup and restore themselves. Then they went on their way leaving, in exchange, blessings.

  According to family myth, these blessings manifested themselves tangibly in wealth. Word of Itzig’s bounty by the side of the road spread to parts north and east. Aptly dubbed Grószmann by grateful guests, Itzig’s descendants continued to live up to their moniker, big-spirited, bountiful, burgeoning. The legendary table continued to be set for strangers, even after walls and roof were built around it. The legacy of hospitality, a sweet, soul-pleasing principle, Grandfather Aron adopted as his maxim. Grandfather Aron’s “nothing,” Gábor permitted, consisted of a name, a legend and a reputation. Like a calling card, the name Grószmann had preceded him through parts north and east, an ambassador of trade. Synonymous with largesse, it opened the doors of homes and inns, and it unlocked the coffers of investors. It was the legacy upon which Aron built his fortune, and he never forgot the origin of its meaning. “Like Itzig our Ancestor,” said Gábor, “the more Grandfather Aron gave away, the more the Lord saw fit to bless him.” Aron’s fortune appeared to Gábor to have been based on an open purse. He’d felt this kindness extended towards him and his brothers in small gifts of bonbons and tender excuses for their childish transgressions. Naturally, he added as an aside, there was Grandfather Aron’s business acumen.

  “The courtyard where the little team had drawn up causing such a stir and commotion among us children was the heart of the Rákóczi Tanya,” Gábor recounted. “An estate of almost a thousand holds, the Tanya ran more like an industry than a farm, and nowhere was this more evident than in the courtyard that was its hub. Here stood not only the big house, but also the distillery, the stables, barns, outbuildings and servant quarters. So when the miniature carriage drawn by two matched ponies pulled up in front of the house, the eyes of all—bailiffs, foremen, farmhands, servants—were on the exquisite toy equipage.

  “We children were excited and eager to try it out, but we couldn’t help but be aware that all the eyes of our world were upon us.”

  * * *

  The coach and pair that had drawn up in front of the big house was no mere pony cart, but a miniature replica of a carriage that might roll down the Maria Theresa Strasse in Vienna. Wincing at the aristocratic, ergo gentile, look of the rig, Liliana watched her boys pore over its perfect details: the silver-cropped whip, the shiny brass grip on the door, the polished wood running board, and the coat of arms emblazoned on the coachman’s tower. The carriage was a burnished black, encasing a too-red interior that made Liliana think of a sliced-open heart. But neither silver nor red leather could outshine the two ponies. The boys stroked and patted their soft sides, exclaiming that one was as white as goose down while the other looked like night.

  The shaved mane on the black pony was like the fresh military look the two older boys had sported on their return from town, shorn of their long locks a few weeks earlier. In comparison, the white pony’s mane was long and luxurious. It was cunning how the ponies were a perfect contrast to one another. The brothers rubbed the bristling thatch on the black, remarking how the cropped mane made it look like the older of the two.

  Their father, Wilmos, had insisted on the haircuts. “Eight years old and with his condition especially, Gabi needs to feel some respect.”

  Liliana’s eyes had filled. “Dearest, have I been too selfish? Lord forgive me if I’ve contributed to our child’s pain.”

  Miki had made no objection when his older brothers were taken to town. He spent the day with édes Anyuka learning his letters. Since then she ran her hands more freely through the silky strands on his head.

  At the window, Liliana worried about Gabi. Would her boy muster enough strength to hold back his hardy brother without collapsing in exhaustion? She hadn’t the heart to bring him in before he had driven the carriage, but it would hurt his brave spirit if he crumpled out there in front of everyone. Knowing Gabi, he was probably trying to find a way to assert his right as eldest without offending Bandi. Taking his time to think required endurance, however, and time was what Gabi lacked. The traitorous thought startled her with a stab. It was as near as she had ever come to acknowledging her son’s disease. “Condition” they called it amongst themselves; “weakness” was how they referred to it publicly. Only once had Wilmos mentioned to her the name that hung like a sword over their heads since his consultation with the famous Budapest specialist. “Weakness, dear sir!” The Budapest doctor had thrust the diagnosis at him. “Sir, your son suffers from
tuberculosis—tuberculosis of the spine.” It had come as a shock. Not only was the disease deadly; it was the affliction of the peasants and the poor. How could such an ailment have found purchase within their enlightened household?

  The little ponies dipped their heads as though politely urging the two boys to finish their business. Gabi felt the familiar softness in his legs. It was as if his back was an anvil crushing their strength. His family called his back weak, but to him it felt more like an iron-cast weight that bore him down. On bad days as he lay on the special mold attached to his bed to keep him from shifting position, his back pinned him in place, a boulder far stronger than his childish limbs could budge.

  He pressed his argument with Bandi, but the words came out panting. “The coachman doesn’t mount until all the passengers are settled. Only then,” he managed to stress meaningfully, “can he safely loosen the reins.”

  Noticing his brother flag, Bandi instantly gave Gabi his point. He climbed into the carriage without another word. Anyuka would be distraught if Gabi collapsed out here in plain sight of everyone.

  “Stay on your side,” he warned Miki roughly, concerned he might have pushed Gabi too far. “And don’t go leaning way out. After all, it’s not Csapati up there in the box.”

  Miki giggled. He pointed at Gabi and rolled the corner of his mouth like a camel’s, imitating the way Csapati sucked his long moustache. Bandi gave him a cuff, but laughed.

  Csapati the coachman looked on from the stable, absentmindedly chewing his moustache in just the way Miki mimicked. The workings of his jaw conveyed the extent of his disapproval. That Master Szedrás had so little sense as to spend a fortune on this toy was typical, but that the rest of them would stand by and let the crippled boy endanger his healthy brothers was less than he expected from them. The trap was a plaything perhaps, but it was hitched to two creatures that however well trained were live and unpredictable. Look at that, the young master could hardly haul himself up into the coachman’s tower even though it was barely three feet from the ground.

  Liliana noticed too, but she refused to credit what she saw. Why, just last week Gabi was able to stand through most of the Shabbat prayers, davening like a little man. They adhered strictly to the regime set out by the doctor in nearby Debrecen, from whom they had sought a second opinion. He had assured them that with the support of the corset and the plaster cast on his bed, Gabi’s back would straighten. She would not believe what her eyes told her. Surely Gabi’s condition could not have so deteriorated in a few short weeks that he could barely manage two steps up into the box on the carriage. The Lord who had spared Abraham his Isaac would not take from her her firstborn child.

  Szedrás stewed. The scene was not playing as he’d imagined. He had pictured his nephews in the beautifully appointed replica, but with handsome Bandi up in the box and Gabi’s disability disguised inside the carriage. The striking equipage would first, at a princely pace, circle the great courtyard, then Bandi would urge the ponies into a canter and weave them masterfully between the buildings, demonstrating to all who looked on what this family had become. But there was Gabi weak as a worm, teetering over the reins. It was an unbearable mockery. “He’s going to make a laughingstock of us!” Szedrás exploded.

  Gabi sat on the box precariously, almost swaying from the effort it had taken to get up there. His hand clasped the reins like a life line. He had not realized how tightly he held on until his hand throbbed inside the leather casing. When the ponies tugged, the leather bit his skin. Poor creatures, Csapati thought, it was a wonder the boy didn’t cut their mouths, he leaned on the reins so heavily.

  “Let go,” Bandi prompted from inside the carriage. Gabi knew he should unwrap his hand from the leather bandage, but even this seemed an effort.

  * * *

  Gábor’s voice dropped somewhat, as though he were about to say something off the record. “I had for a while felt my strength fading, but a child does not understand. I obediently surrendered myself to the regime of the corset and the cast that the Debrecen doctor said would heal my condition. Naturally I believed in what my parents thought best.

  “The surgeon in Budapest whom my dear father had first consulted was a specialist in pediatric orthopedics, but what he had prescribed was so risky and impractical my parents recoiled from the procedure. I was to be brought to him every few months and he would drain the pus from the abscess in my spine. ‘And how exactly, Honourable Doctor, do you propose to drain the abscess?’ my father had asked, blanching before he even heard the response. But the famous doctor guaranteed nothing. Not how many times it would be necessary to pierce my spinal column, nor a complete recovery. He made no assurances.

  “My beloved parents chose the less radical treatment recommended by the second doctor in nearby Debrecen. It was wartime, no simple journey to Budapest. There were long delays and disruptions along the rails, with military transports taking precedence over civilian travel. My parents made the reasonable decision.

  “I felt my strength wane, but a boy entrusts himself to his elders. My mother believed fervently in the usefulness of the corset. At that time any form of surgery was feared like the plague and to be avoided at any cost; yes, any. My grandmother, Grandfather Aron’s beloved wife, had left him a widower with twelve motherless children because she refused to let an aggravated hernia be operated on. And Grandfather Aron himself would in due course succumb to diabetes he treated with no more than the mineral waters at the Carlsbad spa. Before their eyes I withered until finally, in desperation, my beloved father wrapped me in blankets and almost carried me, alternating between horse and buggy, and rail, and lastly from the outskirts of Budapest by motor car, to the great surgeon in the capital who brutally accused him: ‘You call yourself a father, Mr. Weisz. In my eyes you are a murderer.’”

  “But as you can see,” Gábor resumed a heavier tone, “my dear father did not kill me with a tenderness that had only tried to spare me pain. For from then on we travelled regularly to Budapest, wartime notwithstanding, both of us imagining all the way the dreadful needle. He did not kill me after all, for the famous Budapest surgeon was not famous for nothing. In Budapest today the clinic is called the National Children’s Institute, but people still refer to it as the Berek Klinika. They no longer care who Károly Berek was, but here, a continent, an ocean and a lifetime away, an indebted former patient remembers.”

  * * *

  “Gee-yup!”

  “Fool!” Csapati spat into his moustache. Szedrás had sprung from the house, spurring the carriage to a start with a smart smack to the hindquarters of the white pony. The eager heads of the animals arched forward as they broke suddenly into step, jerking Gabi from the seat he had just laboriously gained. From the house it looked to Liliana that her child dangled from the reins like an entangled marionette. Her heart leapt into her mouth, displacing words of prayer. Realizing his error in judgement, Szedrás tried to intercept the animals, but they were strong and quick and relieved to get going.

  “Stay down! Down!” Csapati shouted at Bandi, who tried from inside the carriage to grab hold of his older brother. “Down!” Csapati yelled, running from the stable towards the bolting ponies. He knew the carriage must be too light for the combined strength of the animals, and would tip like a rowboat if rocked from within.

  But Bandi heard nothing over the whir of the wheels. He stretched out for Gabi, then pitched sideways when, headed off by Csapati, the animals slowed and veered into a turn. Liliana watched helplessly as the carriage tipped over, spilling her children. Szedrás caught Bandi as he hurtled out and hit the ground running. Little Miki rolled into the dust. But Gabi and the ponies were still bound together. Liliana didn’t remember leaving the house, but she was standing over Gabi, whose little hands were tangled in the reins. Her own hands fluttered. She couldn’t bring herself to look at her son, only his trapped hands. If she looked at him he might be broken, his delicate limbs twisted unnaturally. He might be bleeding. As long as she didn’t look
at him, she could still think of him as whole. She concentrated on his hands. She had to do something about his hands. Someone was screaming but she refused to hear. Trembling, the maternal fingers unwound her child’s from their noose. Then, stopping her ears with silence, she followed on rubber legs while Csapati carried the sobbing boy back to the house.

  * * *

  That was the first of the tumbles taken by all the children in the család. The pony carriage became a popular attraction to visiting cousins. It balanced well enough when hitched to just one of the ponies, but the children couldn’t resist their beautiful pairing, nor the added thrill of going as fast as possible without tipping over. Home on leave from the emperor’s Hussars, Uncle Szedrás was often rewarded with the sight of a pretty, ringletted cousin, the ribbons of her straw hat flying behind her as with one hand she clasped her hat, and with the other steadied herself on the rattling door of the racing carriage. Little Miki’s ringlets, too, whipped behind him as he flicked the reins or snapped the silver-handled lash above his head.

  Gábor drew meaning from his accident, as he was inclined to do from all his experiences. “I look back on my carriage accident as the first intimation of my family’s slide from grace, but it was, for me personally, a blessing. As she followed the coachman who carried me in his arms, my dear mother had to admit in her heart the seriousness of my disease. Bruised and terrified, from that point on, I stopped hiding my discomfort. It seemed to the family that my condition had worsened with alarming speed. The uncles and aunts openly referred to me as ‘poor darling.’

  “During my early years a polite but recurring debate had waged between my parents over how we boys should be educated. It came swiftly to an end. There was no question now of sending me, the cripple, away to school. And because the natural inclination within the család was to do things ‘en bloc,’ so to speak, my brothers too stayed on the Tanya.