Last Train to Paris (29 page)

All I could do was nod yes and put my hands over my stomach and press tighter.

“He's still alive, Miss Manon, and—”

“Oh, thank you. Thank you,” I said, and surrendered to tears. Gerard handed me his clean folded handkerchief.

I was stunned. I realized I had felt certain that he was dead. This news was so unexpected that it took my breath away.

“Where is he? May I see him?”

“No, you may not know where he is, and you certainly can't see him. He's lucky to be alive. He was badly hurt when he fell down the stairs; it was a serious concussion. It was only because of his remarkable artistic skills that I was able to get him the proper medical treatment.”

“Is there any way,” I asked, “that I could use my newspaper or diplomatic resources to release him from wherever he is? People must escape all the time.”

“No, Miss Manon, people don't escape. People are murdered without a second thought. There are piles of dead bodies all over Europe. And it's going to get worse. But back to Leon. He's in a concentration camp where he works with other people who have his same talents, and—”

“You mean,” I interrupted, “forging documents?”

“Yes, forging documents. Also engraving whatever he's ordered to engrave. Basically, he must do whatever he's ordered, or he'll be eliminated.”

“Is the new definition for the word ‘eliminated,' death?” I asked.

Gerard let a moment of silence pass.

“The only advice I can give you, Miss Manon, is to hope for the best. In the meanwhile, I'll try to get a message to him that I've seen you.”

“Oh, yes, please do that! I would so appreciate it. Tell him that I'll wait for him. Tell him that I love him. Tell him—”

“Miss Manon!” Gerard said. “I'll be lucky to get any word to him, but I will try.”

“May I come back to see you again?” I asked. “Would you be able to tell me if he got the message?”

“Absolutely not,” he said. “You'll put me and my family in an untenable position. I beg you, please don't. If I can find a way to get you a message, I promise I will. But don't count on it.”

 

I never did see Gerard again—nor did I get a message from him. The United States declared war on Germany and I was forced to leave Berlin.

 

I barely got out of Germany alive. There were four of us: another American journalist, who worked for United Press International; a mystery writer, who I think was spying for the British; a German who had voiced the wrong opinion and had been seriously threatened, and me. For more than six weeks we suffered a series of harsh and terrifying events. We ended up on the rocky shores of Sweden—and two weeks later we arrived in London. What I remember most is my determination to reach the U.K. I convinced myself that if I survived, so would Leon. The articles I wrote about this two-month journey of escape became my first book.

 

* * *

 

And then there was my mother. Once I was settled in London, I knew I had to look for her. It wasn't hard. When I walked into our embassy, I saw one of her drawings hanging behind the front desk.

“Oh, my dear Miss Manon,” the receptionist said, “I'm relieved you're here. Your mother's ill. She's in a nursing home in the south end of London.”

I had no choice. I went to her. She looked terrible. Pale. Deep crevices etched her face and neck. Sprouting from her chin were thick black hairs and the hair on her head had turned white and had been cut short. It looked as if someone had chopped it with a rough-bladed scissors, paying no heed to style—just the simplicity of easy care.

When she saw me, she smiled. Hmm, I thought, what a nice welcome, for a change.

 

When my mother arrived in London, she had immediately settled herself in a flat. For the first few months, everything in her life was moving along at its normal energetic pace.

“One day I was walking in Regent's Park,” she told me. “I felt a terrible pain in my stomach. It sent me to my knees and I've never gotten up. Someone called an ambulance and I was taken to the hospital. It was only because of the pain that they operated on me quickly; they're so short-staffed because of the war. It's a cancer in the stomach, they said. But they assured me that they got it all and that I will be fine. I know I look like death, but I think we'll be pleasantly surprised.”

 

Oh, my mother! What an enigma she was, still is—although she's been dead nearly forty years.

After a few days, I helped her home and stayed to nurse her. I kept an emotional distance—reluctant to open myself to her anger—unwilling to show her my old dislike. I tried to be nice to her, all the while hiding my loss of Leon—the loss that she had caused. Complicated it was, but I kept myself busy. I would take long, brisk walks when she was napping during the day. In the evenings I worked on my book. My last days in Berlin. My escape from Germany. I was in a hurry, afraid I would forget the nuances.

Of course, just as she said, my mother recovered and returned to her old self. That first smile she had bestowed upon me quickly faded as she healed and gained strength. As far as I could tell, her illness didn't teach her anything. Her recovery was remarkable, given the extent of the surgery. I'm convinced that it was the adrenalin produced by her untethered anger, and her fierceness about living, that helped her heal. And within a week of feeling better, she dyed her hair black.

 

I was kept busy covering the war for the
New York Courier
. Wherever I could, I would silently slip over the lines of a country's frontier to discover and report on something new.

“Why don't you live with me?” my mother asked. “After all, you're hardly here and it's silly for you to waste money on hotel rooms.”

‘Thanks, Ma, but that won't work. When I'm back in London, I'll try to stay in a hotel close to where you live.' There was nothing under the sun that could convince me that I should live with my mother.

At that time, in 1942, I couldn't believe her offer. Today I can. Because of her illness, she had crossed over into the specific world of the elderly. She was still angry. It was obvious that I continued to make her uneasy. Yet surviving her illness with such vigor offered her new hope. She grabbed onto life with all her might—setting up her studio—drawing English gardens as if there were no war. She also threw herself into the world of air raids and fires and bombs and human suffering. Sharing the job of block warden with an elderly gentleman, she reached out of herself into a besieged community. There was something about her—something that I had never been able to fully admit to. She liked people and they liked her. And although she had this true talent for relating to people, she was dismal in her ability to relate either to me or to our family in New York.

I had an unspoken peace treaty with her. Through the war, and seeing her so often in London, I treaded delicately—stepping over cracks that could bring back angry memories. Those horrible war years became far more important than our personal war. A perspective was found. We got used to each other.

 

I realize now that I'm feeling a bit helpless in my old age. But I've always been helpless. We all are. I first glimpsed that concept in my mother. As she grew older and became infirm, she became vulnerable and dependent. This made her furious. As a result of observing her, I'm trying to be the opposite—trying to see age in all its beauty and wisdom. After all, I am sitting on this lovely patch of land, my land, holding a glass of cool delicious white wine that I poured for myself—having made my own decision to sit and look out at the world from my own porch. What could be better?

I'm fortunate. I don't feel empty in my isolation. I don't have to be in a herd of people to find satisfaction. But my mother did. She could never find humility in her situation—she was too angry. But she continued to have a sparkle of cynical, even sardonic, humor that people enjoyed and appreciated. I never became accustomed to her kind of humor, though. I always felt that she was showing off.

 

“When the war's over,” she told me, “I'm going back to the United States.”

“To Nevada?” I said.

“I don't know. Maybe. I still own the house—I hope it hasn't burned down or been completely vandalized. Or maybe to New York. But I don't know if I have the bravery for that big a change anymore.”

“Ma, in three years' time, you came to Paris, were chased out of Berlin, escaped to Lisbon, found your way to London, recovered from a serious illness—and you say that you're not brave!”

We were huddled in a bomb shelter. The all-clear siren had gone off. The noise of bombs and the shooting of heavy artillery had ceased. It was so very quiet. No one spoke aloud. We all whispered.

“I think,” she said, “that we're all being pounded to a pulp by this anxiety, this horrific noise. If I were to draw a self-portrait, I'd be covered with highways of nerves that ended at exploding brick walls; you know, Rose, the kind you see in comic books with big yellow flames and black typography screaming,” and she raised her voice, “
Boom! Wham!
I feel as if I'm living under a constant barrage of fear. Even though it's monotonous, cowboy Nevada appeals to me now.”

 

But after the war, she didn't go home to Nevada. She moved close to me in New York City, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it. At first, I rarely saw her. Between my traveling and writing, and her busy life, we had little time to get into trouble with each other.

Then my Aunt Clara died. Over the years she had descended further and further into depression. I still can't understand why the intensity of Stella's death had not been at least a little healed, a little faded with time. But Clara appeared to grip her feelings of guilt with extravagant honor. Now, I suspect that Clara was being heroic in her determination to live at all. But I was hoping over time that her innate heroism would give her the will to continue on in her natural, positive way. After all, she used to declare: “My dear Rosie, we are a family of survivors. We always puzzle things out.”

Together, my mother and I went to Leah's home in Brooklyn. Clara had left instructions. No service. No religion. No graveyard. No mention of God. Our time of saying good-bye was no more than a moment's sigh.

 

I still cherish the pin that Clara gave me with the painting of the young lovers. No matter how hard I try to imagine, I can't see those two lovely people being transformed into Leon and me. First of all, we're too dark. That couple is ivory white with yellow ringlets and soft pink patches on their full cheeks. We are dark people, sallow complexioned, dark rings under our even darker eyes. I have a very old sepia photograph of fourteen members of my family in Russia. In the photo they look like a band of tiny monkeys. They are all sitting or leaning on one another. It is a striking group, to be sure. Not quite real. Every one of them is painfully thin, and has black hair and large black eyes bridged by black eyebrows. They look as if they know what is going to happen to them.

They are all dead. During World War II, they were taken en masse from their village to a hand-shoveled pit on the plains. Forced to form a circle at the rim of the tomb, like perching blackbirds, they were murdered in cold blood.

Now my mother was left with one sister, Leah, her least favorite. Just deserts, I mused. And it got even more complex: When my mother was seventy-three, she was struck with another bout of cancer. I was living in Paris for the year, writing another book. Leah sent a telegram in her inimitably negative style:
COME HOME STOP MIRIAM DYING
.

 

I was with my mother for the last two weeks of her life. The first week, she was angry and uncomfortable. No matter what I did for her, it wasn't right. Sometimes she would scream at me to let her alone and just let her die, right then and there. “My life,” she said to me one night, “my life, what a joke.”

“But, Ma,” I protested, “you've had an amazing life. You've been lauded for your work, you had a wonderful husband, you've traveled—you have many friends. What more would you want?”

She flicked my words back into my face. “
Gornisht
,”
nothing, she said in Yiddish. “My life has been nothing.”

And from that moment, she spoke only in Yiddish. When I would respond in English, she said, “
Red tsu mir yidish
!” Speak Yiddish with me! So I spoke everyday German, which satisfied her.

Thanks to the morphine, the second week was calmer. We chatted, she in Yiddish, I in German. We listened to Beethoven. She requested that I read her Mark Twain's essay “English as She Is Taught.” “
Leyn es for af yidish
!” “Read it in Yiddish!” she commanded. I translated it into German and she didn't seem to mind.

I waited. Never was there a word of apology. And I waited. Never was there a word of love.

A few times I tried to talk to her about my feelings. I thought we could have our final round. I suppose I was hoping for redemption, for forgiveness. “
Gey redn tsu der vant
,” she said. Go talk to the wall. My mother appeared to be satisfied with the status quo.

Time moved slowly.

One tempestuous rainy afternoon, she died with a smile on her face.

I still dream about that smile.

Was it for me?

 

Night's arriving and I'm still sitting on the porch. Not hungry. It's been an overwhelming day of memories. I'm exhausted. But I know that I must push on and finish what I started this morning.

It's time to remember Leon.

Losing him was a laceration that has never healed. But I'll try to remember all that I can. Then, I promise myself, the self-pity, the lingering anger, must finally cease. I'm too old to be mooning over love. I need to accept and celebrate my life as it is. I don't want to die like my mother, miserable with her time on earth. I must accept that I will dream alone.