Blooms of Darkness (16 page)

37

The summer is dying. The fields that just yesterday were golden are now harvested, barren, and gloomy. The nights are cold, and Hugo covers himself under the sheepskins. Once a week Mariana washes him. That time is very pleasant, and it fills him with a secret feeling that stays within him all week long.

At night, when Mariana has no guests, she invites Hugo into her bed, hugs him, and says, “You’re Mariana’s. You’re her man. All men are bastards. Only you truly love her.”

When fortune favors him, he sleeps in her embrace the whole night. But on some nights an unexpected guest knocks on her door, and he must crouch down and creep into the closet. All the warm pleasure evaporates, as though it had never existed. Searing humiliation remains.

Between morning and evening light, Mariana is tormented. She lists her torments one by one. “The soldiers treat me like a mattress and make me do disgusting things. When I drank brandy, I could stand that humiliation, but without brandy, every limb of my body is despised and painful.” Hugo can’t grasp all of her feelings, but he sees the trembling of her hands. More than anything else, that tremor says,
It’s impossible
for me to bear all the men who follow one after the other. The time has come to flee, and it doesn’t matter where
.

Hugo feels that he must save her. “I’ll run away with you,” he says. “We’ll live in the country, just you and I.”

“People will recognize me and beat me.” Mariana reverts to her old fears.

“We’ll run away to places where they won’t recognize us.”

“Are you sure?” she asks, as if he has the answer.

“My heart tells me that you need brandy. In the mountains, by ourselves and without threats, you’ll be able to drink as much as you want.”

“You understand Mariana, and you love her,” she says, and gives him a quick hug.

Every time Mariana decides to leave The Residence, something happens that holds her back. A few days ago Paula fainted and was sent to the hospital. Her situation got worse, and Madam refused to pay the hospital bills. For its part, the hospital threatened to transfer Paula to the poorhouse, where abandoned people quickly died. There was a general mobilization. Everybody talked about saving Paula as a holy deed. They collected money and jewelry, and there was a great moment of reconciliation. A specialist was called in, and he brought Paula back to life. Everybody celebrated her recovery with drinking and song. Madam threatened to fire all the revelers. Everybody was drunk and merry and had sealed their ears to her threats, but when Madam announced that she was going to police headquarters, they sobered up and stopped.

That very day Paula’s condition worsened, and she died that night. Gloom and helplessness fell upon The Residence, but there were no recriminations or calls for rebellion.

“Paula departed because we ignored her pain, and when we were roused, it was too late. People are no different from animals.
They live only for themselves.” Mariana spoke with a cold objectivity that terrified Hugo.

Hugo notices that when Mariana speaks about God and about His Messiah, she forms her sentences in the negative: “God doesn’t love Mariana. If He loved her, He wouldn’t torture her. He would show her the true path.” Another frequent comment is: “Mariana deserves it. In all of her ways she is rebellious, as the priest says.” And another: “I didn’t know how to love my parents, as God commanded, and I became addicted to dubious pleasures. God sees everything and hears everything, and He punishes people for their actions. I bear a burden of shame. I haven’t yet gotten a tenth of what I deserve.”

Once he heard her say, “Jesus, take me to you. I’m fed up with this life.” But when a guest was good to her, when he gave her extra banknotes or a box of candy, she forgot her trials. She washed, made herself up, put on a colorful dress and high-heeled shoes, and stood up straight in the center of the room. “How do I look?” she would ask.

“You’re marvelous,” Hugo would say, to flatter her.

“It’s wrong to complain too much. Not everything is black,” she would say in moderate tones. When Mariana is content, Hugo also comes out of his shell, and his world expands.

When the last of the guests have left the room, Mariana stays in bed and sinks into a deep sleep. Sometimes she sleeps until twilight. Hugo is tortured by hunger, but he’s careful not to disturb her. When she wakes up, she hurries to bring him a hot meal, apologizing and scolding herself. “I neglected my heart’s beloved. I deserve a whipping.”

One day she told him, “It will be different when we’re together in a secluded place. I have to gather strength. I need a little push, and we’ll take off. Don’t despair, Hugo, we’ll do it, and in the nicest way. Nature is the most suitable place for
Mariana. People drive her out of her mind. It’s hard for me to bear their hypocrisy and cruelty. I love birds. I’m willing to give my life for them. A little bird that pecks at bread crumbs in your hand is part of God above. For a moment you become weightless, and you can fly away with it.” She then fell silent. It was clear to Hugo that those words weren’t hers, but that someone else had put them in her mouth.

38

Thus the days pass. Hugo celebrates his twelfth birthday with Mariana. She takes a few swallows from the bottle and announces, “Today you’ve finally reached maturity. Today you’re a man. But not like all other men. You, unlike them, will be a gentleman—generous and loyal to all those who love you. Remember, nature gave you the right height, a charming appearance, and a sensitive heart. Life, I feel, won’t be hard on you anymore. You like to observe, to think, to imagine. Without a doubt you’ll be an artist. It’s right for an artist to be handsome. One day Mariana will appear in your imagination, and you’ll want to paint her. You know her body and her soul. Don’t paint her as a miserable woman. I don’t want to be fixed in your memory in the image of a wretched woman. Remember, Mariana struggles like a lioness every night with wild men. Engrave Mariana in your memory as a fighting woman. Do you promise me?”

In recent days Hugo has felt an agitation in his body, and when Mariana hugs him, the pleasure grows stronger. It seems to Hugo that this is a feeling it’s forbidden to express openly, but
when he is lying in Mariana’s embrace in bed, he allows himself to kiss her neck.

“What’s happening to me?” The words slip out of his mouth.

“You’ve matured, and you’re a man. In a little while you’ll understand some of the secrets of life.”

Hugo has noticed that Mariana looks at him now with a certain smile, and every time he draws near her, she opens her arms and encircles him.

The days of mourning for Paula do not pass easily. In the corridor and in their rooms they speak about Paula’s mother, who wanted to have Paula buried next to her daughter, and about Paula’s former husband, who got so drunk that he scratched his face and shouted, “I’m a scoundrel. I’m worthless. I’m the worst of the worst. I had a gift from heaven and I didn’t know how to keep it. In hell they’ll roast me. I deserve it, and you shouldn’t feel sorry for me.”

But more than anything, they speak about Paula’s funeral. Observing her friends who came to see her off to the world of truth, the priest raised his voice and called out, “Wanton women, return to your Father who is in heaven. God knows man’s soul and his frivolous mind. God, unlike human beings, forgives. Return to Him this very day.”

Paula’s death leaves an impression that doesn’t fade. The women mention things in her name, speak about her devotion to her mother, and constantly talk about her mortal illness. Hugo hears it all, and the cemetery appears before his eyes with its many crosses, the shouts of grief ringing in his ears.

One night Hugo dreams about his last birthday party at home. He sees Anna and Otto, his mother, who with the last remnant of her strength had tried to make the guests happy, and the guest with the accordion who had worn a heavy coat
and had tried to coax music out of the reluctant instrument. The guests hadn’t sat down, as was customary, but stood, with cups of tea in their hands. His mother went from person to person and apologized. At that moment it hadn’t seemed like a birthday party, but like a silent assembly where everyone expected everyone else to open his mouth with ancient words of prayer. No one came forward, and no one prayed. The guests looked at one another, wondering whether they would see each other again.

The cold rouses Hugo from his dream. It’s quiet. From Mariana’s room friendly murmurs are heard. This time he isn’t envious or angry. His sorrow at having been taken away from his home and his parents is stronger than envy and rasps him inside. Only after he rises to his feet and stands next to the cracks in the wall do the tears flood his eyes.

Mariana doesn’t like it when he cries. She once criticized him about it. “A man doesn’t cry,” she said. “Only children and women cry.” Since then he has stopped crying, but sometimes the tears overwhelm him.

Toward morning Hugo hears one of the women tell the guard, “Last night they caught a lot of Jews. They found them in a cellar and ordered them to crawl on the road. Anyone who didn’t crawl right was shot.”

“We thought there were no more Jews left,” says the guard noncommitally.

“There are a lot. They’re hiding.”

“Nothing can help them.”

“People fight for their lives as long as their soul is in them.”

“The Jews love life too much,” the guard says in a flat, metallic voice.

39

The closet door opens, and Kitty stands in the doorway with a small package in her hands. “I brought you a chocolate bar,” she says, and hands him the gift.

“Thank you,” says Hugo, rising to his feet.

It’s afternoon, and the autumn light falls on her small figure. It brings out her pleasant features, and now Hugo notices again that she is his height.

“What do you do?” she asks, as she has already.

“Nothing special.”

“Don’t you miss your friends?”

Hugo shrugs his shoulders as if to say,
What can I do?

“When I miss my friends, I take a little vacation and go to visit them,” Kitty says, revealing the extent of her innocence.

“Is it far?” Hugo asks, wanting to give her a chance to talk.

“About an hour by train, perhaps a little less.”

“I’m not allowed to leave here.”

Hearing his answer, Kitty smiles, as though she has finally understood something complicated.

The other women speak about Kitty as a girl who hasn’t matured or developed. The child within her dug itself in and refuses to leave. Most of the women like her and treat her like a young relative who must be protected, but there are a few women
who can’t stand her. She arouses uncontrollable anger in them, and every time they run into her, they curse her and call her strange names. Once Hugo saw one of the women attack her in the courtyard. Kitty was standing near the fence, bent over, and her expression said simply,
Why are you angry at me? What did I do?

“You’re still asking why? Get out of here. We don’t want to see you.”

Mariana also thinks that Kitty is out of place in The Residence. “She’s innocent, and even her curiosity doesn’t suit the place. She annoys the women with her questions. The Residence isn’t a place for women like her. She should learn a profession, work, or get married. Her place is not here.”

It’s hard for Hugo to understand that tangle, but he has learned to understand Mariana a bit better. Most of the day she restrains herself and suffers, and when Hugo hands her the bottle, she drinks and says, “How good it is that I have you. You’re my heaven.” The praise embarrasses him, and he wants to say a few consoling words to her, but he can’t find them.

During the past weeks Hugo has felt very close to Mariana. “You’re maturing,” she kept saying. “In a little while you’ll be a sturdy, loving man.” Nighttime in Mariana’s bed was a giddiness of pleasures that stayed with him all day long.

While Hugo is deep in his imagination, the closet door opens and Victoria stands in the doorway. She is stunned and says, “Are you still here?”

“Mariana watches over me,” the fear within him replies.

“You’re endangering us all,” Victoria says, the anger visible in her brow.

“I’ll go soon.”

“You already promised and didn’t keep it.”

“This time I will,” he says, trying to evade her furious eyes.

“We’ll see,” Victoria says, and closes the door.

That’s a threat, and Hugo knows it. The thought that Victoria will inform on him and that soldiers will come and surround
the house becomes more palpable with every passing moment. Hugo is so frightened that he checks the escape hatch twice and sips a few drops from Mariana’s bottle. He feels dizzy and immediately falls asleep. Toward evening Mariana comes to the doorway with a bowl of soup in her hand. Hugo tells her that Victoria has come to the closet, and that her words were harsh and evil.

“Don’t worry. We’re going to leave this place soon.”

“Where will we go?”

“Anywhere, just not here.”

Life here is tense and constricted, and Hugo wants very much to write the details down in his notebook. But the words, for some reason, aren’t within his reach. It’s now clear to him, though not with a clarity that can be garbed in words, that everything that has happened around him will be brought to light one day. And he is gathering it all up. Or, rather, things are being gathered up within him by themselves. Mariana apparently senses this, and she keeps saying, “Don’t remember me as an unfortunate woman. Mariana has been battling on this front since the age of fourteen. It’s a merciless front. I refused to be a servant in rich people’s houses, and for that I was punished. If you ever remember this woman who was called Mariana, write that she fought to the end of her strength, and that in the end her heart’s beloved freed her from prison.”

“Who is that?”

“You, and none other.”

Meanwhile, Mariana has another hard night. One of the guests shouts at her, calls her names, and keeps asking her to do things that apparently disgust her. He complains, and Madam scolds her and writes a warning in her account book. Hugo hears everything, and his heart tightens.