The Door (16 page)

Since I still had plenty of time I did have a look at the (very tasteful) obelisk. It was made of granite. Above the names it depicted, appropriately, the waters of Babylon, and weeping willows with violins hung from their branches. The cousin even made me a gift of two photographs. She took ages to find them, before they finally turned up in a drawer. Emerence's mother had indeed been a beautiful bride, but what upset me most was an ancient snapshot, its edges cut in wavy lines, of Emerence with a little girl in her arms. The lighting was poor and only the child was in focus. Emerence, even then, was wearing her headscarf, but her dress was rather more colourful, clearly a hand-me-down from one of her employers that didn't much suit her. Her face was essentially unchanged, but there was an attractive cheerfulness, rather than malice, in her eyes.

In the end, all the Divéks and Koprós came to my lecture. None had intended to do so, but it seemed appropriate since I had paid them a visit. The audience was unusually small. Those who did come listened without any sign of interest. Everyone was feeling the heat. As I delivered my text for the hundredth time, I kept wondering what had become of the child in Emerence's arms.

As we started back, I asked the librarian if we could make a little detour to the station. If he was at all surprised, he didn't show it. I walked all the way to the end of the goods platform, just as Emerence had asked. It was like any other, a series of raised concrete blocks, and completely deserted. On the way back to Nádori, the driver stopped at Emerence's old home. It was still apparently referred to as the Szeredás house. It stood out clearly in the gathering dusk of one of those improbable summer evenings when the sun doesn't linger but withdraws its rays suddenly, leaving variegated streaks of orange, blue and violet glowing behind the grey. We took a good look at this scene from the past. It was as Emerence had described it — the painted façade, the trees round the side, the general line and height of the building. She had neither embellished nor understated. What was most surprising was her perfect recall of the proportions. She hadn't dreamed up a fairy-tale castle in place of her charming old home. It was quite beautiful enough the way József Szeredás had built it, a house designed not just with affection but with love. It had all the force of a timeless statement. There was still a workshop where the old one had stood, but this one had a power saw standing inside, and chained dogs that barked a warning. The little garden was still there. The roses had aged into trees, someone had planted a pair of maples near the sycamore and the walnut had filled out and shot up. A swing hung from one of its branches and there were children playing beneath it.

I didn't find the farmyard. A field of maize grew in its place, promising a fine crop. I stood gazing at the trees lined up in rows like soldiers, contemplating the memories the land must hold, with so much blood, so many dead, and all their dreams, all that failure and defeat. How could it bear to go on producing, with a burden like that? The works manager, a young man, had seen me stop the car and get out, and he imagined I'd come about one of his Komondor puppies, currently for sale. I told him I already had a dog and was looking over the building because someone in my street used to live there. As soon as he realised I didn't want a Komondor he lost interest. I thought about asking him for a rose from the ancient tree, but in the end I didn't. How could I know how far back her memories went, when to that day she had never mentioned that she had a child — or rather had had one? Standing in this place, in the unquestionable theatre of her early life, I tried to draw together the true co-ordinates of her being. But even here I couldn't do it. She was no more at home here than where she now lived, and even if that were where she belonged, it was in circumstances that had made her shut her home off from the world. In the fading light, with streaks of colour glowing between the blue of dusk, only one thing was clear: for her, the village had disappeared. She had arrived in the city and the city had taken her in. But she hadn't allowed it into her life either, so the only real elements of her existence that one might come to understand lay behind that locked door, and she had no intention of ever revealing them. I got back into the car, without plucking a single leaf for a memento, and we set off home.

I knew she wouldn't be waiting for me at our apartment — she was too proud for that. She would sooner not hear what fragments of her former life remained, than show interest. I greeted my husband, who told me that he and Viola had polished off a lavish holiday lunch. Then I went across to the old woman. The dog ran down from the porch to greet me at the garden gate. Emerence didn't even stand up, but remained airing herself on the laundry basket which served as a bench. I thought, just you wait. The atom bomb is about to fall. Still, you could have guessed that one or two details you had forgotten to tell me about your early life might have cropped up in conversation. First I gave an account of the watchmaker's, then I pushed a bit deeper. I described her cousin's agreeable circumstances; then added that her grandfather must have been a hard man, to punish the dead — who'd suffered enough. It was difficult to understand why a man would let graves to fall into ruin. Such behaviour wasn't very pleasant.

Emerence stared into the distance, as if she saw something in the darkness that had nothing whatever to do with me. A wave of shame engulfed me. Why was I thrusting myself into her private affairs? What did I expect from her — a confession? During all those years she hadn't allowed me to get one centimetre closer to her. Did I really want her to tell me about the child born out of wedlock, who had brought her only trouble and shame, and inescapable worry? Was I perverted? A sadist? Had I hoped she would boast about something she had until now felt she must conceal? She turned her back to the garden, and from then on looked only at me, holding Viola's head against her knee. It seems laughable to write this down, but I had the feeling that Viola had known all along about Emerence's daughter, because the old woman told him everything that I was curious to know.

"I've already told you," she began, in a conversational tone, "I've had the money for quite some time, but I decided to wait until my own death; then Józsi's boy can arrange for the crypt. I don't hate my grandfather. He was what he was, jealous and cold. He never forgave my father for taking my mother from him. He didn't like me either, but I don't hold that against him. But you have to honour the dead. I'll bring every one of them in. You'll see, it'll be a crypt like no-one ever built in Budapest. One of your painter or sculptor friends will draw up the plans, as I dictate them. The situation wouldn't have got as bad as it did, because my grandfather would have been afraid people in Csabadul would talk about him behind his back, but then I brought the child down on their heads. The old man was as clever as Satan, and he knew how deep the shame was, and that he could hit at me even harder by neglecting the graves; so he let the wooden crosses rot away. I was living in Pest, so I couldn't get to the cemetery."

Well thank God, she had brought the matter up, so I could then hand her the pictures. She studied them both at length. There was no emotion visible in her face. I had imagined that she might be moved, or even blush, though I don't know why I thought that. So far as I was concerned, she might have had a whole album of pictures of the child. What did I know about the contents of Emerence's Forbidden City? But she wasn't looking at the picture as a mother might, even less like a distressed mother whose past was at that very moment coming to light; it was more like a soldier who always won his battles.

"This is little Eva," she explained. "The person I was expecting that day. She lives in America, and sends me money. She also sends me parcels, and I give most of it away. You get the useless things, like make-up and creams. This is how she was when I brought her back from Csabadul to Budapest. Now I don't even want to see her face, since she didn't come when I sent for her. If I invite her — as I did — then she should come, even if the whole world is blowing apart. If it hadn't been for me, they would have smashed her head against a wall or sent her to the gas chambers."

She pushed the photograph towards me, as if it was nothing to do with her.

"Did you think it was all so simple?" (She still clearly found it difficult to speak about.) "Up until then, everyone thought highly of me. I was everyone's ideal, Emerence Szeredás — a clean, respectable girl living a sober life, who had learned to her cost what men were like. When that man left her, and then the barber ran off with all the money and the few valuables she had saved up over the years, she didn't swallow caustic soda. She shook herself down as if nothing had happened and announced that never again would she be anyone's property, or let a man get near her — they could make fools of others and fleece them instead. No-one had ever laid a hand on me, so how pleasant do you think it was for me to pitch up at my grandfather's with a child in my arms and tell them, 'This is mine. You'd better feed it until the war is over, because I can't look after it in Pest and I haven't got time to sit around cuddling it. It can tear around here instead. I can't help it if some nasty little crook put one over me, so here she is.' I couldn't keep her in Pest, it was too dangerous. I couldn't just lock her up. A child needs to run around and breathe fresh air."

There was a deep sighing in the bushes. Viola was asleep, with his head on Emerence's shoes.

"You remember the Jewish laws, don't you? The old people drank cyanide, and the young paid to get out. But they couldn't make their way through the mountains on foot, practically on all fours, with a tiny baby, so they gave it to me. Mrs Grossman knew what my little Évike was to me, and what I was to Évike. The child cried if anyone else came near her. Even when she was in her mother's arms, she wanted to be back in mine. But not all the Germans were gangsters. This villa belonged to a German factory owner. He paid for the Grossmans to be smuggled out. He installed me as caretaker here and entrusted everything to me before he went back home. There was a plan. I settled in here, the young Grossmans set off for the border, and then I took the child to the village. It was better for people to think she had disappeared with her parents. Don't ask what sort of treatment I got when I arrived. It wasn't an ordinary beating — I thought I'd never walk again. You can punch me and kick me, I told my grandfather, and tell everybody what I've done, only leave the child alone. I gave him the money and jewellery I had from the Grossmans for the child's upkeep. There was so much he thought I'd looted it in the confusion of the war, that I'd stolen it from them. But don't worry, he took it. They used it well, looking after the little girl for a good year or so, until the Grossmans came back and I was able to go for her. The poor things wanted to start life here afresh, but in the end they went away again. Out of gratitude they gave me everything they had left, including the living-room furniture I'd brought here for safe keeping. And then they disappeared. They were afraid to stay because Rákosi was beginning to start the circus up all over again. Did you walk along the goods platform?"

"Yes," I said.

"I wanted you to see it, because I often see it in my dreams, just as it was when a pet of mine jumped off the train after me. We had a heifer. It was sandy-brown. I had raised it from a calf. After the two little ones it was for me the third child. Its coat was every bit as silky as the twins' hair, its nose was pink and soft, and it smelled of milk, just like them. People laughed because it followed me everywhere. But then we had to sell it. They locked me in the attic so I couldn't run after them. In those days hysterics weren't tolerated in the village. Children were given a good smack and told what to do, and if you still didn't understand, they hit you on the head. Maybe things are different now, and they are more tolerant down there, I don't know. Anyway they beat me round the head and shut the door on me, but I managed to get out. I knew that if they sold the heifer they'd take it to the station, so I ran to the platform, but by the time I got there they'd already bundled it into the wagon with all the animals the other farmers had sold. It was mooing away pitifully, up there in the van, and I screamed out its name. They hadn't yet closed the door, and when it heard me it jumped down from that great height. Children are stupid; I didn't know what I was doing when I called out to it. It landed on its front legs and broke them both.

"They sent for the gypsy to hit it over the head. My grandfather was cursing and swearing. It would have been better if I had died, rather than valuable livestock — I was such a useless good-for-nothing.

"They butchered it and weighed it. I had to stand there watching while they killed it and cut it up into pieces. Don't ask what I was feeling, but let this teach you not to love anyone to death because you'll suffer for it, if not sooner then later. It is better not to love anyone, because then no-one you care about will get butchered, and you won't end up jumping out of wagons. Now you must go. We've both said quite enough and the dog's exhausted. Take him home. Come on, Viola! Oh yes, the heifer was also called Viola. My mother called it that. Off you go, now. This dog's half asleep."

The dog, not I who'd been working all day; not Emerence, who'd been rushing around cleaning and sweeping. The pressing image of Viola. Viola on the goods platform, Viola running down our street, in the shape of a dog.

I went home, as she wished. I sensed that she wanted to be alone with the memories I had stirred. At that moment, I could see, it was all around her — the Grossmans and the factory owner who wasn't an evil man; the empty villa where at first she lived entirely alone, before witnessing an ever-changing series of tenants; first a flood of Germans; then Hungarian soldiers, who disappeared and were replaced by the Arrow Cross; and then when the Arrow Cross left the Russians moved in. Emerence had cooked for them, and washed for them, before the villa fell under state ownership and became an apartment block, as I knew it. And at the heart of all these events, beneath and behind them, lay the primal wounds — the baker torn apart by the mob, the barber who robbed her, little Eva Grossman who brought shame on her in Csabadul, the heifer, the cat strung up on the door handle, and the one great love of her life.