Blanca didn’t imagine how close at hand the solution was.
Before she left the hospital, Dr. Nussbaum told her, “Otto has recovered, but he needs to be watched over. Don’t put him in the care of that peasant woman. If there’s any need for my intervention, notify me right away.”
“I don’t know how to thank you.”
“You have to be a brave woman.”
“I promise,” Blanca said, and she was glad that those words had emerged clearly from her mouth.
When Blanca returned home she found Kirtzl sitting in the armchair, dressed in a housecoat. Her full face had gotten even fuller. Your job is over, she wanted to say. You have to go back to your village, and I’ll stay with Otto. Otto is recovering, and I have to watch over his recovery.
Kirtzl seemed to guess her thoughts. She rose to her feet, and with a peasant’s cunning she said, “Welcome. Otto, why don’t you say hello to me?”
“Hello.”
“Is that all?”
Blanca didn’t know what to say and sat down. The confidence she had felt earlier evaporated. Once again iron walls surrounded her, stifling her into muteness. Dear God, she said to herself, I went to grade school and after that to the municipal high school. Why can’t I say a single sentence?
“Are you going back to work?” Kirtzl asked after a silent pause.
“No. They fired me.”
“And what do you plan to do?”
“I don’t know.”
“Are you looking for another job?”
“I’m not looking. I don’t have to look,” said Blanca, and her fingers trembled. Kirtzl apparently sensed her anger. She turned around, went into the bedroom to get dressed, and when she came back out she said, “I’m going home. The food for Adolf is ready in the pantry. I’ll come back next Monday.”
The heavy smell of butter stood in the air. Blanca remembered that when she was in elementary school, the country girls used to spread butter on their hair. She had suffered from the smell but never complained about it.
When Adolf came home, he said, “You have to find work right away.”
“I’ll go and look,” she replied, to avoid contradicting him.
“On Monday, first thing.”
I have to suffer a little more, she said to herself, without knowing what she was saying. Only at night, in her sleep, did the meaning become a bit clearer. In her dream she saw Grandma Carole brandishing a long knife like a sword and calling out loud, “Arise, sleeping fathers, from your slumber, arise and save me from the apostates. I declare war and await you. Only with you can I defeat that great camp. Come, together let us break through the locked doors of the synagogue, so that the God of Israel will be revealed in all His splendor.”
49
ON MONDAY BLANCA left the house. As she got ready to go, Otto wrapped himself around her legs, encircling her with his arms and not letting her move. Blanca promised him that this time she’d come back soon. At that, he let her go and said, “You promise, but you don’t keep your promises.”
“This time I’ll keep it.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I swear.”
Blanca was so moved by Otto’s words that she made her way to My Corner at a quick pace. Upon entering My Corner, she stopped and looked around. This was her town, the streets where she had spent her childhood and youth. Now everything was wrapped in an alien mist. She felt like a prisoner who had received a short leave and didn’t know what to do with it.
In My Corner she was greeted with pleasure, and they rushed to serve her a cup of coffee and a piece of cake. She had planned to ask whether anyone knew of a goldsmith or a jewelry store where she could sell a jewel, but she checked herself.
While Blanca was busy with her thoughts, a short young man approached her. He stood next to her table, his head bent, and for a moment she didn’t recognize him. But as soon as she did, she cried out, “Ernst!”
Ernst Schimmer was her great competitor in elementary school and later in high school. He, too, excelled in mathematics and Latin, but he had some sort of inhibition that blocked him and overshadowed his obvious talent. All of his excellent grades always had an annoying “minus” attached to them. The mathematics and Latin teachers liked him and encouraged him, and there were days when he displayed wonders at the blackboard, but then that hidden flaw would appear and spoil the effect. Blanca didn’t like Ernst and ignored him. From an early age a bitterness showed itself on his lips, the sign of a person dissatisfied with himself. He suffered in class, especially from Adolf. Adolf used to call him a Jewish slug.
Blanca overcame her muteness. “How are you, Ernst?”
“I came to visit my hometown.”
“And where do you live now?”
“In Salzburg.”
Fortune had not smiled upon Ernst, either, it seemed. He had studied at the university for a year, but his parents couldn’t afford to support him, and he was forced to go out and work. He worked in a children’s clothing store in Heimland for a year, but then both of his parents died and he moved to Salzburg. There he was a cashier in a department store. Blanca looked at him and said, “You haven’t changed.”
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I live and breathe.” The voice of past days returned to her.
“May I join you for a cup of coffee?” Ernst said, sitting down beside her.
No, Ernst hadn’t changed. The wrinkles of bitterness had indeed become somewhat deeper, but there was no alteration in his appearance. He spoke as he used to, emphasizing, for some reason, the word “future,” a word his parents had apparently used frequently. His parents had been known in the town as hardworking people whom fortune had not favored.
“You haven’t converted, have you?” Blanca asked.
“No.”
“Like everybody else, I did.”
“My parents didn’t push me into that, and I myself never felt the need to do it.”
“You did right. A person should be loyal to his sentiments,” Blanca said, feeling that those words hadn’t come out of her own mouth.
“Who knows?” he replied, like someone who has already been burned.
After a pause he added, “When we were children, we competed with each other. People used to say, two competitive Jews. You were better, I must admit.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You were more open. Your response to a math problem was spontaneous. You immediately saw the possibilities, and sometimes all the possibilities.”
“But you were more thorough.”
“Maybe. But I was immersed in unnecessary details.”
“Strange, we never talked about it then.” For a moment she wanted to stop the stream of words.
“You were brilliant, and I was sure that I couldn’t catch up with you. Your quickness, your agility, proved to me every day that I was on a lower level.”
It was the same Ernst, with the same inhibitions coming out of hiding. Blanca wanted to contradict him but didn’t know how. Once again muteness seized her.
“I have to go back,” Ernst said, rising to his feet. She even remembered his way of standing up now. The journey from his seat to the blackboard was an obstacle course for him. On the way his momentum would dwindle, and he would reach the blackboard without any strength, immediately declaring, “I was mistaken. I had an idea, but it turned out to be useless. Excuse me.” Because of those apologies, he aroused mockery. In her heart, even Blanca was contemptuous of that weakness of his.
“How long were you here for?” Once again she overcame her muteness.
“Just a few hours. I felt a kind of urge to come, so I did. I took a walk around all the familiar places, but I didn’t meet anyone I knew. You’re the only one. I didn’t want to go inside the high school. That wasn’t a place that was pleasant for me.”