Aharon Appelfeld - Until the Dawn's Light

Blanca sat at some distance from him and observed him — the way he cut the steak, then sliced the bread and broke it into cubes. He dipped the cubes in the gravy and put them in his mouth. That was how his father ate, and so did he. But this time, for some reason, it seemed to her that with those movements he was imitating an unusually large dog that she had seen the night before in a dream and that she had been frightened of.

“How was it?” she asked after a prolonged silence.

“I worked.” He dismissed her with brevity.

“And how was Kirtzl?” she had an urge to ask.

“Fine.”

Blanca knew every detail of that abrupt way of speaking. Adolf had never had a real vocabulary, but the little that did emerge from his mouth was sufficient for him to express himself. Among his friends in the church and the tavern he spoke a lot, but in fact he used the same words over and over.

When Adolf finished the meal, he asked, “How much did they pay you?”

Blanca rose to her feet, picked up her purse, and took out the banknotes. With the same hand she took out the coins as well and laid them on the table.

“Not much,” he said, not touching the money.

“That’s what I received.”

“They have to pay you more.”

“That’s the salary.”

“The Jews are always exploiters.”

It seemed to her that he was going to fold the banknotes, gather the coins up in his hand, and slip them into his pocket.

“I’ll need money for fare on Monday,” she dared to say.

“Very well,” he said, and left a banknote on the table.

Blanca took the bill and put it into her purse.

“I’m going out,” he said.

In the first weeks after their marriage, Blanca used to implore Adolf to stay. Don’t go out, don’t leave me alone, she would say. Just for an hour or an hour and a half, he would reply, and I won’t drink a lot . She would sit at home and cry, and when he came back, she would pretend to be happy. Eventually she stopped asking. She understood that his cronies and the drinks were more important than she was. As long as he enjoyed her body, he didn’t despise her, but after she became pregnant and started vomiting, his attitude changed: he stopped talking to her and his sentences shrank to just a word or two, as though she were no longer his wife but a beast of burden that had fallen ill and was no longer useful.

Now she stood to the side and observed the way he put on his coat, tightened his belt, opened the door, and, without saying another word, went on his way. Over the next hour he would sit with his buddies, drink, brag, and tell a coarse joke about his Jewish employer. Then he would pull the bills she had given him out of his pocket and pay for them all, proudly proclaiming, “Tonight the drinks are on me!” the way she’d heard him announce more than once. The thought pierced her for a moment. She planted her feet on the floor and didn’t move. But the joy of having Otto in her arms, of being able to look into his eyes and talk with him, was so overwhelming that the way Adolf had robbed her a moment ago was erased from her mind.

That evening she had a few drinks and told Otto about her father and mother. She recalled the high school and the mathematics and Latin teachers, she spoke at length about Grandma Carole, and she said, “The work in the old age home in Blumenthal is exhausting and humiliating, but after darkness the light will come, and we will never be separated again.” She spoke in a torrent, mixing past and present, and she was so tired that she sank down on the floor next to Otto’s cradle and fell asleep.

Adolf apparently came back very late. He shouted and cursed, but Blanca didn’t hear him. Still, something apparently filtered into her sleep, because she was frightened and got up. When she opened her eyes, Adolf was already lying on the bed with his legs stretched out like the drunks who used to sprawl in the square not far from the high school.

The next morning, Blanca rose early, dressed Otto in clean clothes, and immediately left for church. She didn’t wake Adolf because he had once said to her, “Don’t you ever dare wake me!”

In church she met her father-in-law and mother-in-law and Adolf’s sisters. They all asked how Otto was and made a fuss about his hair; it went without saying that they didn’t ask how his working mother was. They were concerned only about the crown prince.

After mass the family and some guests came to the house. Adolf was merry and greeted them with hugs. Blanca rushed to serve sandwiches and drinks. Every step was hard for her, but she made an effort and stayed on her feet.

“Blanca, let me tell you something: you shouldn’t serve sandwiches without pickles,” her mother-in-law commented.

“I didn’t manage to pickle any cucumbers this week.”

“I prepare them in the summer, so that I’ll have a supply in the winter.”

“In the future I’ll see to that,” she said, to avoid quarreling, but her mother-in-law wasn’t content with that apology and went on to say, “You have a big garden, and you can grow all your vegetables in it.”

“I was working in the old age home in Blumenthal this week,” she said, trying to defend herself.

“I also worked away from home when I was young, but I never neglected the house. The house comes before everything else. That’s our temple, and we must watch over it like hawks.”

Now Blanca felt the anger that had been repressed within her since her return. It flowed through her arms and extended to her fingertips. She was alarmed. She hugged Otto and said in a quavering voice, “I understand.” Her mother-in-law apparently sensed the repressed anger and fixed her with a venomous look.

THUS THE WEEKS sped by, and the seasons changed. Every Sunday Otto would break Blanca’s heart with his weeping. In the first weeks, he seemed to be getting used to her absence, but that was only how it appeared. His cries for help grew steadily stronger, and she could hear them in distant Blumenthal.

One Monday, while Blanca was running to the station, Brandstock, the storekeeper, stopped her and told her that Grandma Carole had died the previous night. The funeral party was leaving from her house at noon. Then he turned and walked away.

“What?” Blanca gasped.

Brandstock was one of the few people in town, perhaps the only one, who was still an observant Jew. He was a short man with an unpleasant look. He would sometimes appear in her father’s store, buy something, and then announce out loud that the merchandise there was more expensive than in another store, but that he, Brandstock, was committed to buying from Jews and would always do so. Her father, of course, would get angry at that remark and retort, “You aren’t obliged to.” To which Brandstock would respond, “I’ll never change. This is how I’ve always acted, and this is how I always will in the future.”

Blanca, plagued with guilt feelings because she had left Otto behind, didn’t absorb Brandstock’s bitter message at first, but when it did register she started running toward the granaries that stood along the Schenau River to catch up with him and get more details. But, as though in spite, Brandstock had disappeared, as if the earth had swallowed him.

“I have to go right away,” she said, and turned toward the railway station. After she had gone some distance, she realized that she was walking in the wrong direction and turned around. It was eight thirty, and thick, foggy clouds crept over the houses. Only the tower of the municipal building and the trapezoidal roof of the school stood out.

Grandma Carole’s house was not far away from there, but ever since her marriage Blanca had avoided the house, and it had faded from her memory. It was a house of the kind that was no longer built, made of wooden beams. In the past people used to daub special oil on the walls, making them shine and last a long time, but in recent years they had stopped oiling the walls, and they were turning gray.