The Invisible Bridge (73 page)

"No," said the elder Mrs. Hasz again. "We ought to discuss it now. Klara should be part of the decision."

"But

there

is
no decision," the younger Mrs. Hasz said. "We have no choice.

There's nothing to discuss."

"It's Levi's fault," Jozsef 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 Jozsef's angry one, his heart galloping in his chest. He got to his feet and stood before Jozsef. "Listen to your father,"

he said. "Take it back inside."

Jozsef's mouth curled with spite. "Don't tell me what to do, Uncle."

Now Tibor was standing beside Andras, glaring at Jozsef. "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 Jozsef. He hovered on the balls of his feet, his hands clenched. He hated Jozsef Hasz. 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 Jozsef 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. Hasz said. "It's too hot. You're overexcited."

"Who's overexcited?" Jozsef 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, Gyorgy," 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, Gyorgy laid out the situation: how Madame Novak had brought Klara's identity to light; how Gyorgy 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 Gyorgy to her husband. "Andras," she said, when Gyorgy 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," Gyorgy 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," Gyorgy 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 Tamas with her. Andras opened the door and followed her out onto the sidewalk. She half ran down Benczur 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 Varosliget 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. "Gyorgy 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 Gyorgy," 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."

"Gyorgy 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 Erzsebetvaros, 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 Tamas--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 Sevigne. 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 Munkaszolgalat."

"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 Gyorgy 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."

"You're going to give up the building in Paris."

"Of course," she said. "Think of how much my brother's already lost."

"But how will we get them to stop dunning him? If you flee, won't they go after him to tell them where you are?"

"He's got to come too. He's got to sell whatever's left and get out as soon as he can."

"And your mother? And my parents? And Matyas? We can't leave without knowing what's happened to him. We've talked about this, Klara. We can't do it."

"We'll take our parents. We'll arrange for Matyas to have passage too, if he returns in time."

"And if he doesn't?"

"Then we'll speak to Klein and arrange for him to join us when he does return."

"Listen to me. Hundreds of people have died trying to get to Palestine."

"I understand. But we have to try. If we stay, they'll bleed the family of everything. And in the end they might not be satisfied with the money."

Andras sat silent for a long moment. "You know how Tibor feels about this," he said. "He wanted us to go a long time ago."

"And what do you think?"

"I don't know. I don't know."

Her chest rose and fell beneath the drape of her blouse. "You have to understand,"

she said. "I can't stay here and allow us, or my family, to be
done to
this way. I didn't then. And I won't now."

He did understand. Of course he'd known this about her: It was her nature. This was why Gyorgy hadn't told her. They were going to have to leave Hungary. They would sell the property in Paris; they would go to Klein and beg him to arrange one last trip.

That night they would begin to plan how it might be done. But for the moment there was nothing more to say. He took her hand again and she held his gaze, and he knew, too, that she understood why he'd kept the truth from her for so many months.

IN THE WEEKS that followed, he tried not to think about the
Struma
. He tried not to think about the deceived passengers who found themselves aboard a wreck of a ship, ill-provisioned and ill-equipped for the journey. He tried not to think about the prospect of their own passage down the Danube, the constant fear of discovery, his wife and son suffering for lack of food and water; he tried not to think about leaving his brother and his parents behind in Europe. He tried to think only of the necessity of getting out, and the means for arranging the trip. He wired Rosen to tell him of the change in their situation, the new urgency that had come upon them. Two weeks later, a reply came via air mail with the news that Shalhevet had secured six emergency visas--six!--enough for Andras and Klara, Tibor and Ilana, and the children. Once they arrived in Palestine, he wrote, it would be easier to arrange visas for the others--for Mendel Horovitz, who would be so valuable to the Yishuv; and for Gyorgy and Elza and Andras's parents and the rest of the family. There was no time to celebrate the news; there was too much to be done. Klara had to write to her solicitor in Paris to hasten the sale of the property. Andras had to write to his parents to explain what was happening, and why. And they had to see Klein.

It was Klara's idea that they should go together, all six of them. She believed he might be more inclined to help if he met the people he'd be saving. They arranged to go on a Sunday afternoon; they dressed in visiting clothes and pushed the babies in their perambulators. Klara and Ilana walked ahead, their summer hats dipping toward each other like two bellflowers. Andras and Tibor followed. They might have been any Hungarian family out for a Sunday stroll. No one would have guessed that they were missing a seventh, a brother who was lost in Ukraine. No one would have guessed that they were trying to arrange an illegal flight from Europe. In her pocketbook Klara carried a telegram from her solicitor, stating that her property on the rue de Sevigne would be listed for ninety thousand francs, and that the transfer of the money from the sale, though difficult, might be accomplished through his contacts in Vienna, who had contacts in Budapest. Nothing would be done in Klara's name; ownership of the building had already been officially transferred to the non-Jewish solicitor himself, because it had become illegal for Jews to own real estate in occupied France. Everyone would have to be paid along the way, of course, but if the sale went well, there would still be some seventy thousand francs left over. No one would have known, looking at Klara as she walked along Vaci ut that Sunday afternoon--her fine-boned back held straight, her features composed under the pale blue shadow of her hat--how unhappy she'd been two nights earlier as she'd drafted a telegram to her solicitor, instructing him to make the sale. It had been a long time since she and Andras had imagined they might go back someday to reclaim their Paris lives. But the apartment and the studio were real things that still belonged to her, things that marked out a territory for her in the city that had been her home for seventeen years. The property had made the impossible seem possible; it made them believe that everything might change, that they might return someday. The decision to sell the building carried a sense of finality. They were giving up that source of hope in order to fund a desperate journey that might fail, to a place that was utterly foreign to them--an embattled desert territory ruled by the British. But they had made their decision.