Julie Orringer - The InvisibleBridge

But he had to share the preliminary good news with someone, so he told Polaner and Rosen and Ben Yakov that night at their student dining club on the rue des Écoles. It was the same club József had recommended when Andras had arrived. For 125 francs a week they received daily dinners that relied heavily upon potatoes and beans and cabbage; they ate in an echoing underground cavern at long tables inscribed with thousands of students’ names. Andras delivered the news about Tibor in his Hungarian-accented French, struggling to be heard above the din. The others raised their glasses and wished Tibor luck.

“What a delicious irony,” Rosen said, once they’d drained their glasses. “Because he’s a Jew, he has to leave a constitutional monarchy to study medicine in a fascist dictatorship. At least he doesn’t have to join us in this fine democracy, where intelligent young men practice the right of free speech with such abandon.” He cut his eyes at Polaner, who looked down at his neat white hands.

“What’s that about?” Ben Yakov said.

“Nothing,” Polaner said.

“What happened?” asked Ben Yakov, who could not stand to be left out of gossip.

“I’ll tell you what happened,” Rosen said. “On the way to school yesterday, Polaner’s portfolio handle broke. We had to stop and fix it with a bit of twine. We were late to morning lecture, as you’ll recall-that was us, coming in at half past ten. We had to sit in the back, next to that second-year, Lemarque-that blond bastard, the snide one from studio. Tell them, Polaner, what he said when we slid into the row.”

Polaner laid his spoon beside the soup bowl. “What you thought he said.”

“He said filthy Jews. I heard it, plain as day.”

Ben Yakov looked at Polaner. “Is that true?”

“I don’t know,” Polaner said. “He said something, but I didn’t hear what.”

“We both heard it. Everyone around us did.”

“You’re paranoid,” Polaner said, the delicate skin around his eyes flushing red. “People turned around because we were late, not because he’d called us filthy Jews.”

“Maybe it’s all right where you come from, but it’s not all right here,” Rosen said.

“I’m not going to talk about it.”

“Anyway, what can you do?” said Ben Yakov. “Certain people will always be idiots.”

“Teach him a lesson,” Rosen said. “That’s what.”

“No,” Polaner said. “I don’t want trouble over something that may or may not have happened. I just want to keep my head down. I want to study and get my degree. Do you understand?”

Andras did. He remembered that feeling from primary school in Konyár, the desire to become invisible. But he hadn’t anticipated that he or any of his Jewish classmates would feel it in Paris. “I understand,” he said. “Still, Lemarque shouldn’t feel”-he struggled to find the French words-“like he can get away with saying a thing like that. If he did say it, that is.”

“Lévi knows what I mean,” Rosen said. But then he lowered his chin onto his hand and stared into his soup bowl. “On the other hand, I’m not at all sure what we’re supposed to do about it. If we told someone, it would be our word against Lemarque’s. And he’s got a lot of friends among the fourth- and fifth-years.”

Polaner pushed his bowl away. “I have to get back to the studio. I’ve got a whole night’s worth of work to do.”

“Come on, Eli,” Rosen said. “Don’t be angry.”

“I’m not angry. I just don’t want trouble, that’s all.” Polaner put on his hat and slung his scarf around his neck, and they watched him make his way through the maze of tables, his shoulders curled beneath the worn velvet of his jacket.

“You believe me, don’t you?” Rosen said to Andras. “I know what I heard.”

“I believe you. But I agree there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Weren’t we talking about your brother a moment ago?” Ben Yakov said. “I liked that line of conversation better.”

“That’s right,” Rosen said. “I changed the subject, and look what happened.”

Andras shrugged. “According to Vago, it’s too early to celebrate anyway. It may not happen after all.”

“But it may,” Rosen said.

“Yes. And then, as you pointed out, he’ll go live in a fascist dictatorship. So it’s hard to know what to hope for. Every scenario is complicated.”

“ Palestine,” Rosen said. “A Jewish state. That’s what we can hope for. I hope your brother does get to study in Italy under Mussolini. Let him take his medical degree under Il Duce’s nose. Meanwhile you and Polaner and Ben Yakov and I will get ours in architecture here in Paris. And then we’ll all emigrate. Agreed?”

“I’m not a Zionist,” Andras said. “ Hungary ’s my home.”

“Not at the moment, though, is it?” Rosen said. And Andras found it impossible to argue with that.

For the next two weeks he waited for news from Modena. In statics he calculated the distribution of weight along the curved underside of the Pont au Double, hoping to find some distraction in the symmetry of equations; in drawing class he made a scaled rendering of the façade of the Gare d’Orsay, gratefully losing himself in measurements of its intricate clock faces and its line of arched doorways. In studio he kept an eye on Lemarque, who could often be seen casting inscrutable looks at Polaner, but who said nothing that could have been construed as a slur. Every morning in Vago’s office he eyed the letters on the desk, looking for one that bore an Italian postmark; day after day the letter failed to arrive.

Then one afternoon as Andras was sitting in studio, erasing feathery pencil marks from his drawing of the d’Orsay, beautiful Lucia from the front office came to the classroom with a folded note in her hand. She gave the note to the fifth-year monitor who was overseeing that session, and left without a look at any of the other students.

“Lévi,” said the monitor, a stern-eyed man with hair like an explosion of blond chaff. “You’re wanted at the private office of Le Colonel.”

All talk in the room ceased. Pencils hung midair in students’ hands. Le Colonel was the school’s nickname for Auguste Perret. All eyes turned toward Andras; Lemarque shot him a thin half smile. Andras swept his pencils into his bag, wondering what Perret could want with him. It occurred to him that Perret might be involved with Tibor’s chances in Italy; perhaps Vago had enlisted his help. Maybe he’d exerted some kind of influence with friends abroad, and now he was going to be the one to deliver the news.

Andras ran up the two flights of stairs to the corridor that housed the professors’ private offices, and paused outside Perret’s closed door. From inside he could hear Perret and Vago speaking in lowered voices. He knocked. Vago called for him to enter, and he opened the door. Inside, standing in a shaft of light near one of the long windows that overlooked the boulevard Raspail, was Professor Perret in his shirtsleeves. Vago leaned against Perret’s desk, a telegram in his hand.

“Good afternoon, Andras,” Perret said, turning from the window. He motioned for Andras to sit in a low leather chair beside the desk. Andras sat, letting his schoolbag slide to the floor. The air in Perret’s office was close and still. Unlike Vago’s office, with its profusion of drawings on the walls and its junk sculptures and its worktable overflowing with projects, Perret’s was all order and austerity. Three pencils lay parallel on the Morocco-topped desk; wooden shelves held neatly rolled plans; a crisp white model of the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées stood in a glass box on a console table.

Perret cleared his throat and began. “We’ve had some disturbing news from Hungary. Rather disturbing indeed. It may be easier if Professor Vago explains it to you in Hungarian. Though I hear your French has advanced considerably.” The martial tone had dropped from his voice, and he gave Andras such a kind and regretful look that Andras’s hands went cold.