By the next week, almost unnoticeably, the 79/6th had begun to drag its feet as it loaded goods onto the boxcars. The change happened slowly enough and subtly enough that the foremen failed to notice a general trend. But Andras and Mendel could see it. They watched with a kind of quiet triumph, and compared their impressions in whispered conferences on the bus. All indications suggested that the small shift they’d hoped for had come to pass. Their conversations with the other men confirmed it. There was no way to know, of course, whether the change would make a difference to the men at the front, but it was something, at least: a tiny act of protest, a sole unit of drag inside the vast machine that was the Labor Service. The following week, when they brought the news to Frigyes Eppler at the Journal, he clapped them on the shoulders, offered them shots of rye from the bottle in his office, and took credit for the whole thing.
On Sundays, when Andras was free from Szentendre Yard, he and Klara went to lunch at the house on Benczúr utca, which had been stripped by now of all but its most essential furnishings. As they dined in the garden at a long table spread with white linen, Andras had the sense that he had fallen into a different life altogether. He didn’t understand how it was possible that he could have spent Saturday loading sacks of flour and crates of weapons into boxcars, and was now spending Sunday drinking sweet Tokaji wine and eating filets of Balatoni fogas in lemon sauce. József Hász would sometimes show up at these Sunday family dinners, often with his girlfriend, the lank-limbed daughter of a real-estate magnate. Zsófia was her name. They had been childhood friends, playmates at Lake Balaton, where their families had owned neighboring summer houses. The two of them would sit on a bench in a corner of the garden and smoke thin dark cigarettes, their heads bent close together as they talked. György Hász detested smoking. He would have sent József to smoke in the street if the girl hadn’t been with him. As it was, he pretended not to see them with their cigarettes. It was one of many pretenses that complicated the afternoons they spent at Benczúr utca. Sometimes it was difficult to keep track, so numerous were they. There was the pretense that Andras hadn’t spent the rest of the week loading freight cars at Szentendre while József painted at his atelier in Buda; the pretense that Klara’s long exile in France had never occurred; the pretense that she was safe now, and that the purpose of the gradual but steady disappearance of the family’s paintings and rugs and ornaments, of the younger Mrs. Hász’s jewelry and all but the most necessary servants, of the car and its driver, the piano and its gilded stool, the priceless old books and the inlaid furniture, was not to keep Klara out of the hands of the authorities but to keep József out of the Munkaszolgálat.
It was a testament to József’s egotism that he considered himself worth his family’s sacrifices. His own luxuries were undiminished. In his large bright flat in Buda, he lived among gleanings from the family home: antique rugs and furniture and crystal he’d removed before the slow, steady drain had begun. Andras had seen the flat once, a few months after the baby had been born, when they’d gone for an evening visit. József had provided them with a dinner ordered from Gundel, the famous old restaurant in the city park; he’d held the baby on his knee while Andras and Klara ate roasted game hens and white asparagus salad and a mushroom galette. He praised the shape of his baby cousin’s head and hands and declared that he looked exactly like his mother. József’s manner toward Andras was breezy and careless, though it had never quite lost the edge of resentment it had acquired when Andras had delivered the news of his relationship with Klara. It was József’s habit to mask any social discomfort with humor; Andras was Uncle Andras now, as often as József could find occasion to say his name. After dinner he took Andras and Klara into the north-facing room he used as his studio, where large canvases were propped against the walls. Four of his previous works had been sold recently, he said; through a family connection he’d begun working with Móric Papp, the Váci utca dealer who supplied Hungary’s elite with contemporary art. Andras noted with chagrin that József’s work had improved considerably since his student days in Paris. His collage paintings-nets of dark color thrown against backgrounds of fine-ground black gravel and scraps of old road signs and pieces of railroad track-might be called good, might even be seen as evocative of the uncertainty and terror into which Europe had plunged. When Andras praised the work, József responded as though accepting what was due to him. It had taken all of Andras’s effort to remain civil through the evening.
On Sunday afternoons at Benczúr utca, when József and his Zsófia joined the group at the table, what he generally had to talk about was how dull it was in Budapest during the warmer months-how much nicer it would have been at Lake Balaton, and what they’d be doing that very moment if they were there. He and Zsófia would start in on some memory from when they were children-how her brother had sailed them far out into the lake in a leaking boat, how they’d gotten sick from eating unripe melons, how József had tried to ride Zsófia’s pony and had been thrown off into a blackberry bramble-and Zsófia would laugh, and the elder Mrs. Hász would smile and nod, remembering it all, and György and his wife would exchange a look, because it was the summer house that had kept József out of the labor service, after all.
One Sunday in early June, they arrived to find József’s usual bench unoccupied. For Andras, the prospect of an afternoon without him was a relief. Tibor and Ilana had arrived some time earlier, and Ilana played in the grass with young Ádám while Tibor sat beside them on a wicker chaise longue, fixing the bent brim of Ilana’s sun hat. Andras fell into a chair beside his brother. It was a hot and cloudless day, one of a series; the new grass had gone limp for want of rain. The week at Szentendre had been an unusually grueling one, bearable only because Andras knew that on Sunday he’d be sitting in this shady garden, drinking cold soda water flavored with raspberry syrup. Klara sat down on the grass with Ilana, holding Tamás on her lap. The babies stared at each other in their usual manner, as if astonished at the revelation that another baby existed in the world. The younger Mrs. Hász emerged from the house with a bottle of seltzer, a miniature pitcher of ruby-colored syrup, and half a dozen glasses. Andras sighed and closed his eyes, waiting for a glass of raspberry soda to materialize on the low table beside him.
“Where’s your son today?” Tibor asked Elza Hász.
“In the study with his father.”
Andras caught a note of tension in her voice, and he emerged from his torpor to watch her closely as she handed the glasses of soda around. The past five years had aged her. Her dark hair, still cut fashionably short, was shot with silver now; the faint lines beside her eyes had grown deeper. She had lost weight since he’d last seen her-whether from worry or from undereating, he didn’t know. He wondered with some anxiety what György and József might be discussing in the study. He could hear their voices coming through the open windows-György’s low, grave tones, József’s higher notes of indignation. A few minutes later József burst through the French doors and crossed the terra-cotta paving stones of the patio, then strode over the lawn toward his mother, who had seated herself in a low garden chair. When he reached her, he gave her a look so charged with fury that she got to her feet.
“Say you haven’t agreed to this,” he demanded.
“We’re not going to discuss this now,” Elza Hász said, laying a hand on his arm.
“Why not? We’re all here.”
Elza sent a panicked glance in the direction of her husband, who had come out onto the patio and was hurrying toward the lawn. “György!” she said. “Tell him he’s not to discuss it.”
“József, you will drop this subject at once,” his father said as he reached them.
“I won’t have you sell this house. This is my house. It’s meant to be part of my property. I mean to bring my wife to live here someday.”
“Sell the house?” Klara said. “What do you mean?”
“Tell her about it, Father,” József said.
György Hász fixed his son in his cool,
stern gaze. “Come inside,” he said.
“No.” It was the elder Mrs. Hász who had spoken, her hands firm on the armrests of her wicker chair. “Klara deserves to know what’s happening. It’s time we told her.”
Klara looked from József to her mother to György, trying to understand what this meant. “The house belongs to you, György,” Klara said. “If you’re thinking of selling it, I’m certain you must have a good reason. But is it true? Are you really?”
“You mustn’t worry, Klara,” György said. “Nothing’s certain yet. We can discuss the matter after dinner, if you’d like.”
“No,” said the elder Mrs. Hász again. “We ought to discuss it now. Klara should be part of the decision.”
“But there is no decision,” the younger Mrs. Hász said. “We have no choice. There’s nothing to discuss.”
“It’s Lévi’s fault,” József said, turning to Andras. “If it hadn’t been for him, this wouldn’t have happened. He’s the one who convinced her to come back to Hungary.”
Andras met Klara’s questioning glance, and then József’s angry one, his heart galloping in his chest. He got to his feet and stood before József. “Listen to your father,” he said. “Take it back inside.”
József’s mouth curled with spite. “Don’t tell me what to do, Uncle.”
Now Tibor was standing beside Andras, glaring at József. “Watch your tone,” he said.
“Why not call him Uncle? That’s what he is. He married my aunt.” He spat at Andras’s feet.
If Klara hadn’t taken Andras’s arm at that moment, he might have hit József. He hovered on the balls of his feet, his hands clenched. He hated József Hász. He had never known it before that moment. He hated everything he was, everything he represented. He could feel the fragile twig-structure of his own life losing its center, beginning to slip. It was József who had done this. Andras wanted to tear the man’s hair out, tear the fine cotton shirt from his back.
“Sit down, both of you,” the elder Mrs. Hász said. “It’s too hot. You’re overexcited.”
“Who’s overexcited?” József shouted. “It’s the loss of my family home, that’s all. Mother’s right: There’s no decision. It’s finished already, and no one consulted me. You all kept me in the dark. Even worse, you made me feel like it was for my sake that we had to give up the furniture, the paintings, the car, and God knows how much money! And all this time we were paying for her mistakes, and her husband’s.”
“What are you talking about?” Klara said. “How does this concern Andras and me?”
“He brought you back here. You came back. The authorities have known about it for nearly three years. Did you think you could hide behind your French name and your married name forever? Didn’t you know you’d be endangering the family?”
“Tell me what he means, György,” Klara said, turning to her brother. She held the baby on her hip and moved closer to Andras.
There was no way to avoid a disclosure now. As briefly and clearly as he could, György laid out the situation: how Madame Novak had brought Klara’s identity to light; how György had been approached, and when; how he’d arranged a solution; how he’d hoped that the authorities would have satisfied their greed, or grown tired of the whole affair, before he was forced to give up the house; and how they’d persisted, bringing the family to its current pass.
Klara grew pale as her brother spoke. She covered her mouth with her hand, looking from György to her husband. “Andras,” she said, when György had finished. “How long have you known?”
“Since last fall,” he said, forcing himself to look at her.
She took a step back and sat down in one of the wicker chairs. “Oh, God,” she said. “You knew, and you didn’t tell me. All this time.”
“Andras wanted to tell you,” György said. “I made him promise not to. I didn’t think it would be wise to worry you, in your condition.”
“And you agreed?” she asked Andras. “You thought it wouldn’t be wise to worry me, in my condition?”
“We argued about it,” György said. “He thought you would rather know. Mother, too, has always believed you should know. But Elza and I disagreed.”
Klara was crying with frustration now. She got to her feet and began to walk up and down the lawn with the baby in her arms. “This is a disaster,” she said. “I might have done something. We might have come to some solution. But no one said a word to me! Not a word! Not my husband. Not even my own mother!” She turned and went into the house, and Andras went after her; before he could catch her, she’d grabbed her cotton jacket and gone out through the heavy front door, carrying Tamás with her. Andras opened the door and followed her out onto the sidewalk. She half ran down Benczúr in the direction of Bajza utca, her melon-colored jacket fluttering behind her like a flag. The baby’s dark hair shone in the afternoon sunlight, his hand on her back just the shape and size of the starfish pin she’d worn in the south of France. Andras chased her now as he’d chased her then. He would have chased her all the way across the continent if he’d had to. But the traffic at the corner of Bajza utca and the Városliget fasor brought her to a stop, and she stood looking at the passing cars, refusing to acknowledge him. He caught up to her and took up her jacket, which had slipped from her shoulders to trail a sleeve on the sidewalk. As he draped it around her again he could feel her trembling with anger.
“Can’t you understand?” he said. “György was right. You would have risked yourself and the baby.”
The light changed, and she crossed the street toward Nefelejcs utca at the same brisk pace. He followed close behind.
“I was afraid you’d try to leave,” he said. “I had to go back to the work service. I couldn’t have gone with you.”
“Leave me alone,” she said. “I don’t want to speak to you.”
He matched her pace as she sped on toward home. “I respect György,” he said. “He took me into his confidence. I couldn’t betray him.”
“I don’t want to hear about it.”
“You’ve got to listen, Klara. You can’t just run away.”
She turned to face him now. The baby whimpered against her shoulder. “You let me beggar my family,” she said. “You made the decision for me.”
“György made the decision,” Andras said. “And be careful how you choose your words. Your brother’s not a beggar. If he has to move to an eight-room parlor-level flat in the Erzsébetváros, he’ll survive.”
“It’s my home,” she said, starting to cry again. “It’s my childhood home.”
“I lost mine, too, if you’ll recall,” Andras said.
She turned again and walked toward their building. At the entryway she fumbled in her pocketbook for the key. He extracted it for her and opened the outer door. From inside came the splash of the fountain and the sound of children playing hopscotch. She crossed the courtyard at a run and began to climb the staircase; the children stopped their game, holding their broken pot shards in their hands. Her quick steps rang on the stairs above, sounding in a spiral as she climbed. She had disappeared into the apartment by the time he reached the top. The front door stood open; the air of the hallway vibrated with silence. She had locked herself in the bedroom. The baby had begun to cry, and Andras could hear her trying to soothe him, their Tamás-talking to him, wondering aloud if he was hungry or wet, walking him up and down the room. Andras went into the kitchen and put his head against the cool flank of the icebox. His instinct had told him to tell her the truth at once. Why hadn’t he done it?
He sat in the kitchen and waited for her to come out. He waited as the shadows of the furniture lengthened across the kitchen floor and climbed the eastern wall. He made coffee and drank it. He tried to look at a newspaper but couldn’t concentrate. He waited, his hands folded in his lap, and when he got tired of waiting he went down the hallway and stood outside the door. He put a hand on the doorknob. It turned in his fingers, and there was Klara on the other side. The baby was asleep on the bed,
his arms flung over his head as if in surrender. Klara’s eyes were pink, her hair loose around her shoulders. She looked exactly as Elisabet had looked when Andras had gone to see if he could coax her from her room on the rue de Sévigné. She held one arm across her chest, cupping her shoulder as if it were sore. Her footsteps had sounded on the bedroom floor for hours; all that time she must have been pacing with the baby.
“Come sit with me,” Andras said, taking her hand. He led her to the front room and brought her to the sofa, then sat down with her, keeping her hand in his own.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I should have told you.”
She looked down at his hand, closed around her own, and pushed the back of her other hand across her eyes. “I let myself think it was over,” she said. “We came back here and made a different life. I wasn’t afraid anymore. Or at least I didn’t fear the things I’d feared when I left here the first time.”
“That was what I wanted,” Andras said. “I didn’t want you to be afraid.”
“You should have trusted me to do what was right,” she said. “I wouldn’t have endangered our child. I wouldn’t have tried to leave the country while you were away in the Munkaszolgálat.”
“But what would you have done? What are we going to do now?”
“We’re going to go,” she said. “We’re all going to go, before György loses what’s left. Even if he can’t keep the house, he’s not destitute yet. There’s a great deal that might still be saved. We’re going to go talk to that Klein, you and I, and we’re going to ask him to arrange the trip. We have to try to get to Palestine. From there it might be easier to get to the United States.”
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