At eight o’clock they went to the docks to say goodbye to Paul and Elisabet. The ship would sail at noon; the passengers were to board by nine. They had bought Elisabet a bouquet of violets to take on board with her, and a dozen fancy pastries, and a cylinder of yellow streamers for her to set free when the ship pulled away. She wore a straw hat with a red ribbon, and her blue eyes were feverish with the prospect of the voyage.
Paul was anxious to get on board, anxious to show Elisabet what he’d planned for her. But he insisted on having the ship’s photographer take a picture of the four of them together on the dock, the Île de France looming in the background. Then there was a flurry about the trunks, some article of clothing that had to be removed at the last moment. Finally, at the appointed hour, a volcanic horn-blast sounded from somewhere near the summit of the ship, and the passengers who had not yet embarked began to crowd toward the gangway.
The moment had come. Klara drew Paul aside to speak a few final words to him, and Andras and Elisabet were left looking at each other on the dock. He hadn’t considered what he might say to her at this moment. He was surprised to feel as sorry as he did that she was leaving; at dinner the night before, he’d begun to see what she might be like as an adult, and he’d found her to have more of her mother in her than he had imagined.
“I don’t suppose you’re sad to see me go,” she said. But she was looking at him with a hint of humor at the corners of her eyes, and she’d spoken in Hungarian.
“Yes,” Andras said, and took her hand. “Get lost already, will you?”
She smiled. “Make my mother visit us, all right?”
“I will,” Andras said. “I want to see New York.”
“I’ll send you a postcard.”
“Good.”
“I haven’t gotten used to the idea that you’re marrying her,” Elisabet said. “That’ll make you my-”
“Please don’t say it.”
“All right. But listen: If I ever hear you’ve hurt her, I’ll come kill you myself.”
“And if I hear that you’ve hurt that strapping husband of yours,” Andras began, but Elisabet cuffed him on the shoulder, and then it was time for her to say goodbye to Klara. They stood close together, Elisabet bending her head to touch her mother’s. Andras turned away and shook Paul’s hand.
“See you in the funny papers,” Paul said in English. “That’s what they say in the States.” He translated for Andras: “Je te verrai dans les bandes dessinées.”
“Sounds better in French,” Andras said, and Paul had to agree.
The ship’s horn blasted again. Klara kissed Elisabet one last time, and Paul and Elisabet climbed the gangway and disappeared into the crowd of passengers. Klara held Andras’s arm, silent and dry-eyed, until Elisabet appeared at the rail of the ship. Already, hours before the ship would leave the dock, Elisabet was so far away that she was recognizable only by the red ribbon fluttering from the brim of her hat, and by the pinprick of deep purple that was the cone of violets in her hand. The navy blur beside her was Paul in his nautical-looking jacket. Klara took Andras’s hand and gripped it. Her slender face was pale beneath the dark sweep of her hair; in her haste to get to Le Havre she’d neglected to bring a hat. She waved her handkerchief at Elisabet, who waved hers in return.
Three hours later they watched the Île de France slip out toward the flat blue distance of the open sea and sky. How astounding, Andras thought, that a ship that size could shrink to the size of a house, and then to the size of a car; the size of a desk, a book, a shoe, a walnut, a grain of rice, a grain of sand. How astounding that the largest thing he’d ever seen was still no match for the diminishing effect of distance. It made him aware of his own smallness in the world, his insignificance in the face of what might come, and for a moment his chest felt light with panic.
“Are you ill?” Klara said, putting a hand to his cheek. “What’s wrong?”
But he found it impossible to put the feeling into words. In a moment it had passed, and then it was time for them to go to the car and start for home.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE. The Hungarian Consulate
ALL THE TIME Andras and Klara had been at Le Havre, Tibor and Ilana had been together at the apartment on the rue de Sévigné. Tibor related the story the following day as he and Andras walked along the bank of the Seine, watching the long flat barges pass beneath the bridges. Now and then they would catch a strain of Gypsy music that made Andras feel as if they were back in Budapest, as if he might look up and see the gold-traced dome of the Parliament on the right bank, Castle Hill on the left. The afternoon was humid and smelled of damp pavement and river water; in the oblique light Tibor looked haggard with joy. He told Andras that Ilana had known on the train that she was making a mistake, but had felt powerless to stop what had already been set in motion. There was guilt all around, an endless carousel of guilt: her own, Ben Yakov’s, Tibor’s. Each had wronged the others, each had been wronged by the others. It was a miracle that any of them had emerged from the harrowing whirl of it with faculties intact. But Tibor had been protected by his physical distance from Paris, and Ilana had been tended by Klara as if she were her own daughter, and Ben Yakov had talked to Andras in his room at night.
“She’ll come back to Italy with me,” Tibor said. “I’ll take her home to Florence and spend the rest of the summer there. I’d ask her to marry me today if I could, but I’d rather not have her parents consider me the enemy. I’d like to have their permission.”
“That’s brave of you. And what if they refuse?”
“I’ll take my chances. You never know, after all. Maybe they’ll like me.”
They’d crossed the Île de la Cité and the Petit Pont into the Quartier Latin, where they found themselves walking down the rue Saint-Jacques. József’s building lay just ahead; the last time Andras had been there was the night after the Yom Kippur fast. He had seen József a few times since then in passing, but hadn’t crossed the threshhold of his building for months. The time was fast approaching when he and Klara would have to revisit the idea of taking him into their confidence. Now, as he reached the building, he saw that the street door had been propped open with two polished and bestickered leather traveling cases, József’s name and address clearly marked on their sides. A moment later József himself appeared in a summer traveling suit.
“Lévi!” he said. He let his gaze rove over Andras, who felt himself appraised in a bemused, brotherly fashion. “I must say, old boy, you’re looking well. And here’s the other Lévi, the future doctor, if I’m not mistaken. What a shame you’ve caught me just as I’m rushing off. We could have all had a drink. On the other hand, how convenient for me. You can help me get a cab.”
“Off on holiday?” Tibor asked.
“I was supposed to be,” József said, and an unaccustomed expression passed across his features-a look Andras could only have described as chagrin. “I was supposed to meet some friends at Saint-Tropez. Instead I’m off to lovely Budapest.”
“Why?” Andras said. “What’s happened?”
József raised an arm at a passing taxi. It pulled to the curb and the driver climbed out to get József’s bags. “Listen,” József said. “Why don’t the two of you ride to the station with me? I’m going all the way to the Gare du Nord, and it’ll take half an hour in this traffic. Unless you’ve got something better to do.”
“Better than a long hot ride in traffic?” Andras said. “I can’t imagine.”
They climbed into the cab and set off down the rue Saint-Jacques in the direction from which they’d come. József settled a long arm across the back of the seat and turned toward Andras.
“Well, Lévi,” he said. “It’s the damnedest thing, but I think I ought to tell you.”
“What is it?” Andras asked.
“Have you gotten your student visa renewed?”
“Not yet. Why?”
“Don’t be surprised if you run into trouble at the Hungarian Consulate.”
And
ras squinted at József; the slanting five o’clock light poured through the windows of the cab and illuminated what he hadn’t seen before: the shadow of worry beneath József’s eyes, the aftertraces of lost sleep. “What kind of trouble?” he said.
“I went to get my visa renewed. I thought I still had a few weeks left. I didn’t think there’d be any difficulty. But then they said they couldn’t do it, not here in France.”
“But that doesn’t make sense,” Tibor said. “That’s what the consulate does.”
“Not anymore, apparently.”
“If they won’t renew your visa in France, where are they supposed to do it?”
“Back home,” József said. “That’s why I’m going.”
“Couldn’t you get your father to work it out for you?” Andras said. “Couldn’t he use his influence to make someone do something? Or else, if you’ll excuse the vulgarity, couldn’t he just bribe someone?”
“One would think,” József said. “But apparently not. My father’s influence isn’t what it once was. He’s not the president of the bank anymore. He goes to the same office, but he’s got a different title now. Advisory secretary, or some such nonsense.”
“Is it to do with his being Jewish?”
“Of course. What else would it be?”
“And I suppose it’s only Jews who have to go back to Hungary to renew their visas.”
“Does that surprise you, old man?”
Andras pulled his papers from his jacket pocket. “My visa’s still good for another three weeks.”
“That’s what I thought, too. But it’s no good unless you’re taking summer classes. Next term doesn’t count anymore, apparently. You’d better go to the consulate before someone asks for your papers. As far as the authorities are concerned, you’re here illegally now.”
“But that’s impossible. It doesn’t make sense.”
József shrugged. “I wish I could tell you otherwise.”
“I can’t go to Budapest now,” Andras said.
“Truth to tell, I’m almost looking forward to it,” József said. “I’ll have a soak at the Szécsenyi baths, take a coffee at the Gerbeaud, see a few of the boys from gimnázium. Maybe go to the house at Lake Balaton for a while. Then I’ll do what I have to do at the passport office, and I’ll be back by the start of fall term-if there is a fall term, of course, which depends in part on the whims of Herr Hitler.”
Andras collapsed against the cab seat, trying to take in what he’d just heard. Ordinarily he might have welcomed the excuse to go home for a few weeks; after all, he hadn’t seen his parents or Mátyás in two years. But he was supposed to get married; it was supposed to happen while Tibor was still in Paris. He was supposed to move his things to the rue de Sévigné. And then there was the problem of Hitler and Danzig. This was no time to get on a train to Budapest, no time to cross the continent, no time for his visa to be in question. In any case, how could he afford to travel? The cost of a two-way ticket would consume what he’d managed to set aside for Klara’s ring and for tuition in the fall. He didn’t have the savings Tibor had; he hadn’t worked for six years before going to school. He felt suddenly ill, and had to roll down the cab window and turn his face toward the breeze.
“I should have spoken to you sooner,” József said. “We might have traveled together.”
“It’s my fault,” Andras said. “I haven’t been eager to see you since I got blind drunk in your bedroom.”
“Never feel ashamed,” József said. “Not with me. Not for that reason.” And then he turned to Tibor. “What about you?” he said. “How’s medical school? Was it Switzerland?”
“Italy.”
“Of course. So you’re nearly a doctor now.”
“Not quite nearly.”
“And what brings you to town?”
“That’s a long story,” Tibor said. “The short version is something like this: I’m courting someone who was recently married to a friend of Andras’s. I’m glad you’re leaving town before you can make me say more about it.”
József laughed. “That’s grand,” he said. “I wish I had time for the long version.”
They had reached the station, and the driver got out to untie the bags from the roof. József opened his wallet and counted out money. Andras and Tibor slid out after him and helped him carry the bags inside.
“I suppose you’d better go,” Andras said, once they’d consigned the luggage to a porter. “You’ll miss your train.”
“Listen,” József said. “If you do make it to Budapest, look me up. We’ll have a drink. I’ll introduce you to some girls I know.”
“Monsieur Hász, the playboy,” Tibor said.
“Don’t forget it,” József said, and winked. Then he slung his chestnut-colored satchel over his shoulder and loped off into the crowded station.
Before a week had passed, Andras would be obliged to return to the Gare du Nord with his own suitcases, his own satchel. But all he knew, as he and Tibor began the long walk to the rue de Sévigné that evening, was that he had to go to the consulate and explain that he must be granted legal visitor status. Only until the end of the month-only as long as it would take to get a marriage license and wed his bride. Once they were married, wouldn’t he have a claim to French citizenship? Couldn’t he come and go, then, as he wished?
At Klara’s, all the lights were burning and the women were cloistered in the bedroom. Ilana came out to tell Andras he was not to go in; the dressmaker was there, and behind Klara’s door there were secret preparations regarding her wedding gown.
Andras made a noise of dismay. He and Tibor went to the front room and sat down on either side of the sofa, where Tibor pulled his own papers from his trouser pocket and scrutinized the visa.
“Mine’s good until next January,” he said. “And I’ve been enrolled in summer study, though I’m afraid I won’t pass the course I’ve just abandoned.”
“But you’re enrolled. You ought to be all right.”
“But what about you? What will you do?”
“I’ll go to the consulate,” Andras said. “Then I’ll go to the Mairie. I’ll do whatever I have to do. I’ve got to have valid papers before we can get a marriage license.”
From the bedroom came a trio of exclamations, a crescendo of laughter. Tibor folded his papers again and set them on the table. “What’ll you tell her?”
“Nothing yet,” he said. “I don’t want her to worry.”
“We’ll go to the consulate tomorrow,” Tibor said. “If you explain the problem, maybe they’ll grant you an extension. And if they give you trouble, watch out.” He held up his fists in a threatening manner. But his hands were as elegant as a pianist’s, long and lean; his knuckles had the polished look of river stones, and his tendons fanned like the delicate bones of a bird’s wing.
“God help us all,” Andras said, and managed a smile.
The Hungarian Consulate was located not far from the German Embassy, where Ernst vom Rath had met his assassin. At first glance the building might have made an expatriate long for home; its façade was inlaid with mosaics depicting scenes from Budapest and the countryside. But the artist had an uncanny knack for ugliness: his humans seemed to suffer from anemia and bloating, his landscapes from a failure of perspective just noticeable enough to evoke vague nausea in the viewer. Andras had had no appetite for breakfast, in any case; he’d hardly slept the night before. Somehow he’d made it through the previous evening without mentioning the situation to Klara, but she suspected something was wrong. After dinner, as Andras and Tibor were preparing to leave for the Latin Quarter, she’d stopped him in the passageway and asked if he were having misgivings about the wedding.
“Not at all,” he said. “Just the opposite. I’m anxious for it to happen.”
“So am I,” she said, and put her arms around him in the shadowy hall. He’d kissed her, but his mind hadn’t been present. He was thinking about what had troubled him most since the cab ride that afternoon: not t
he prospect of resistance at the consulate, nor the problem of how he might afford a ticket home, but the fact that the young man rushing to the station had been József Hász, who had always seemed miraculously exempt from the difficulties of ordinary life-József Hász, packed off to Budapest for the sake of a stamp on a document.
The next day at the consulate, a red-haired matron with a Hajdú accent told Andras that his visa had expired when his classes had ended at the beginning of the summer, and that he’d been staying in France illegally for a month and a half; he must leave the country at once if he didn’t want to be arrested. He was given a copy of a form letter stating that he would be permitted to reenter Hungary. That seemed like an unnecessary measure; he was a Hungarian citizen, after all. But he was too upset to consider it for long. He needed to know what to do once he got to Budapest, how to return to Paris as soon as possible. Tibor, who had come along as promised, kept his hands in his pockets and asked polite questions when Andras might have demanded and shouted and raised arguments. Through Tibor’s gentle inquiries, they learned that if Andras carried a letter from the school stating that he was a registered student, and that his scholarship would be renewed in the fall, he ought to be able to get another two-year visa once he was back in Budapest. Any faculty member at the school could write the letter; it was valid as long as it appeared on the school’s letterhead and carried the school’s official seal. Tibor was effusive in his thanks, and the red-haired woman went so far as to say she regretted the inconvenience. But her small watery eyes were impassive as she stamped a red ÉRVÉNYTELEN across Andras’s visa. Expired. Invalid. He had to leave at once. There was no use going to the Mairie to apply for a marriage license; he could be arrested if he showed his expired documents there. The train ticket would exhaust his savings, but he had no choice. He could begin to save again when he returned.
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