My Canary Yellow Star (13 page)

The seconds seemed to crawl by, but it couldn’t have been more than another ten minutes before Ervin and the two men returned. The younger policeman was just finishing off his second helping of cake. Ervin rolled his eyes heavenward behind the policeman’s back. Szilard, the janitor, had a sheepish expression on his face.

“Well, it seems that the girl was right this time,” the older policeman said. “Whenever the clouds moved away from the moon, we could see the silver on the cabinet reflecting the light.” He shook his forefinger at us threateningly. “Watch your step! You were lucky this time, but we’ll be keeping an eye on you.”

And with that, the policemen and the janitor were gone as abruptly as they had come. I rushed to the wardrobe and helped Peter climb out.

“I’m sorry for the noise,” he said, “but my legs were cramping so badly I had to move them.”

I was so overwhelmed by joy and relief that I couldn’t even answer him. I just laid my head on his shoulder and laughed and cried at the same time.

Before he left for home, Peter offered to take the boys’ tallisim with him.

“I’ll keep them safe for you until the end of the war,” he said. “It was a lucky thing you had the presence of mind to
shove them out of sight under the sofa cushions or the policemen would have taken them.”

Ervin and Gabor gratefully accepted Peter’s offer. They lovingly folded Papa and Uncle Laci’s prayer shawls and wrapped them up in a large sheet of newspaper. Nobody would have guessed what the square package in Peter’s hand contained when he took it out of our apartment.

O
n the last day of August, Mama left for work as usual. She was back an hour later.

“I’ve been fired,” she announced. She sat rigid on a kitchen chair.

“What will we do?” asked Grandmama.

“Don’t worry, dear. We have some jewelry to sell.”

Grandmama went back to bed, so she did not hear Mama’s weeping.

September came. As Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, approached, the days became cooler and the leaves yellowed on the trees. But there would be no prayers in the synagogues – they were all closed, and many had been defaced or burned to the ground. Nor was there food for a holiday meal – life was desperate in every Jewish family, not just ours.

To survive, we had traded away Mama’s pearl necklace and Aunt Miriam’s dainty bracelet with its Eiffel Tower charm and tiny bells – the pearl necklace brought us two dozen eggs and a bag of flour; the gold bracelet gave us two loaves of bread and a block of cheese.

I was in the kitchen helping Grandmama prepare something out of nothing for dinner. She was at the table transferring flour from a canister into a large bowl. She worked slowly, careful not to spill any. I sat at the table, kicking the leg.

“Don’t shake the table, Marta,” she said.

“What’s for dinner?”

“We’re eating your mama’s pearl necklace today,” she said wryly. She poured water from a pitcher into the flour and mixed the moist dough with a wooden spoon. “I am making
nokedli,”
she said. “Come, watch me do it. Unfortunately, I already used up our eggs, so I can’t put any into it.”

She transferred the dough to a wooden bread board and cut it into water boiling in a cast-iron pot on the old-fashioned wood-burning stove. We had broken up our dining-room chairs for fuel. The dumplings quickly rose to the surface of the water.

“Who bought Mama’s pearls?” I asked.

“Marika Marton, who else? How badly she wanted them! Even so, she took terrible advantage of your mother.”

The door opened and Mama came into the kitchen,
catching the tail end of our conversation. “Who took advantage of me?” she asked.

“We’re talking about Marika. Marta wanted to know who had bought your pearls.”

“I wish you hadn’t had to sell them, Mama.” I always liked the way the pearls glistened against her throat; they made her neck seem so long and elegant.

“Papa will buy me another strand after the war,” Mama said. “Nowadays, a loaf of bread is more precious than the rarest pearl.” She walked over to the icebox and took out a small block of cheese. “Well, this is the end of Miriam’s charm bracelet,” she said, laughing. “I’ll ask Marika if she has any friends who want to buy a ring.” She held up her hand and examined the large gold signet ring on her middle finger. It was a gift from my father for their first wedding anniversary. The ring bore both their initials intertwined. “This should be good for a few loaves of bread.”

“I won’t hear of it, Nelly,” Grandmama said. “You’ve sacrificed enough. I’ll sell my necklace.” Her fingers fondled the gold Star of David under her collar.

“I can’t let you do that, Grandmama. Besides, I’m afraid there isn’t much of a market for such things these days. It would be melted down for the gold. Aron can always buy me another ring, but your necklace is irreplaceable.”

Grandmama nodded. “I’ll wait, but only because Aron would want me to. You do realize, my dear, that we’re only
postponing the inevitable.” She turned to me and looked me over, head to toe. “The child is skin and bones. She must eat. So must the others.”

Mama did not reply. She grated the cheese into a small bowl. Grandmama drained the
nokedli
and melted the cheese in a frying pan on the stove.

“Marta,” she said, “call the others, please. Dinner is ready.”

Judit and I were lounging on my mattress. For once, we had some privacy. The adults were in the kitchen, and the boys were so noisy in the parlor that we could hear them through the closed doors.

“Do you realize that Rosh Hashanah is only three days away?” I asked my friend.

“Of course,” she said. “I wish everything could be the way it was before the war. I used to love getting ready: my new shoes, a new dress. We used to go to my uncle Natan’s for dinner.”

“Well, things
aren’t
the same. But I’ve been thinking: we can’t go to synagogue, but we can still organize a holiday meal.”

“How? We don’t have money, and the grocer’s shelves are always bare.” Her stomach grumbled so loudly that I could hear it. “I’m so hungry,” she said, embarrassed.

“Me too. I remember I used to eat so much on holidays that I felt I’d burst if I took another bite.”

“Wouldn’t it be wonderful to feel like that again?” Judit said. Her stomach growled even louder.

“What did you eat today?”

“Bean soup,” Judit said. “Bean soup every day this week. Yuk! It gives me gas.”

I held my nose. Judit stuck out her tongue.

“We’ve been eating
nokedli,”
I told her. “Mama was able to buy flour and cheese. I love Grandmama’s dumplings, but I don’t want to eat them ever again.”

Judit nodded. “I know how you feel. After the war ends, I’ll never have beans. Not even once,” she vowed.

“It doesn’t seem right not to have a holiday meal to welcome in the New Year. Let’s plan a special dinner like we used to have before the war. We’ll get the groceries we need for it somehow.”

“You’re dreaming, Marta,” Judit said. “There’s nothing we can do. We were able to buy only a handful of beans, and you have only a little bit of flour.”

“That’s it! We have only one kind of food and you have only one kind of food. If we pool them, we can make something special. Let’s speak to Mrs. Krausz on the fourth floor, the Kaufmanns on the fifth, and the Lazars next door to you. They might be interested in sharing as well.”

“You’re a genius, Marta. We won’t have meat, but it will sure be better than plain old beans.”

“Or plain old dumplings. Let’s go to the grocer’s tomorrow to see what else we can get,” I suggested.

We went to the kitchen to talk to my family.

“I don’t know … Cooking for four or five families – that’s a lot of work, even if we are making only one dish,” Mama said.

“Neither your mother nor I is a good cook,” Aunt Miriam added.

“But I am! I think the girls’ idea is absolutely wonderful!” Grandmama exclaimed. “It will actually be less work than usual. Each family can cook one dish and share it.”

“Well, Grandmama, if you’re quite sure that you’re up to it. Promise you’ll stop if it tires you. Remember your heart.” Mama was worried.

Grandmama laughed. “Nothing is wrong with me. I’m fine. Why, I’m doing well even without my medication!” My grandmother’s heart pills were no longer available at the pharmacy. “Come on, girls! We don’t have much time to organize such a special meal.”

The next morning, Judit and I visited neighbors in our apartment block to arrange for food and supplies. Mrs. Krausz volunteered to fry potato pancakes for all of us. She also sent two potatoes home to Grandmama. Mrs. Kaufmann on the fifth floor offered to make enough of her famous cucumber salad for everybody. The grocer had promised her fresh cucumbers, and she even gave us a package of yeast and butter so that Grandmama could bake
a chala. The last family we spoke to, the Lazars, not only offered to cook rice, but were also able to spare a few spoonfuls of precious sugar.

“Aren’t you girls clever!” Grandmama said when we showed off our booty.

First we wrote down what each family had promised to cook for our Rosh Hashanah menu, then we set out for the grocer’s. We wanted to see what he had before we decided what we’d make for the meal.

“Good day, Mr. Kertesz,” I said to the grocer behind the counter. I braced myself for his usual gruff “What do you want?” but it didn’t come.

Instead, we got: “What can I do for you, my dears?”

“We have an important holiday coming up. We’d like to buy some food for it,” Judit said.

My heart fell as I looked around the store. The shelves were almost completely bare. “I guess we came too late.”

“No, no, my dear,” the grocer said. He leaned forward and rubbed his palms together. The skin of his hands was ingrained with dirt. “I’ve been saving something for special customers. Two pretty girls like you certainly qualify.” He reached under the counter and pulled out a burlap bag. “I have some lovely peas for you. How much do you need?”

“At least three kilograms,” Judit said.

“How much will that cost?” I held my breath. Judit and I had only two hundred pengos between us. I was certain he would want at least six hundred.

“How much money do you have?” Kertesz asked.

“Only two hundred pengos,” I told him.

“How fortunate!” he cried. “Three kilograms of peas will cost you exactly two hundred pengos.” He measured the peas into the shopping bag I had brought with me from home.

“The peas look a little dry,” Judit said.

“It’s a little late in the season, but they’re very fresh,” the grocer answered.

“What luck,” Judit whispered to me. “We’ll have enough peas for everybody.”

“Thank you, Mr. Kertesz, for letting us have the peas. You’re a kind man.”

An odd expression flickered across his face. It was gone so quickly, however, that I thought I must have imagined it.

“I’m glad to help. I know these are hard times for you,” he said.

Judit and I had the kitchen to ourselves when we returned home. Grandmama was resting in her room and the boys were out. We took out two large metal bowls, one for the peas and one for the shells. I picked up a pod and squeezed it hard to open it. A few dry peas and two tiny bugs popped out and fell into the empty bowl with a hard ring. The bugs started climbing up the sides.

“Ugh!” Judit recoiled. My stomach lurched. I emptied the bowl into the kitchen sink and washed the bugs down
the drain. Then I picked up another pod and squeezed it open. Once again, dry peas and black bugs in the bowl. The same thing happened over and over again with all the peas we shelled. It didn’t matter whether the pod came from the top of the pile, the middle, or the bottom. All were infested with tiny black bugs.

“What are we going to do?” Judit wailed. “We spent all of our money on these disgusting peas. Do you think old Kertesz will give our money back?”

“There is no chance of that.” I remembered the expression on the grocer’s face when we thanked him for his kindness.

“What are we going to do?” Judit repeated. She sounded desperate.

I knew what we had to do, but the words did not come easily. “Kill the bugs and eat the peas.”

Judit looked sick, and I felt the same.

“We have no choice,” I continued. “If we don’t cook these peas, none of us will have enough to eat. Everybody is counting on us for at least one good dish.”

Judit nodded reluctantly. “If you’re sure there’s no other way.”

“There isn’t. Don’t tell anybody about the bugs. It’s bad enough that we know.”

For the next hour, Judit and I took turns squeezing open pea pods. Using a wooden spoon, we fished out the tiny black bugs crawling around in the bowl. By the time
Grandmama returned to the kitchen, the bowl was filled with slightly dry but edible peas.

I was in the women’s balcony in the synagogue on Dohany Street on the morning of Rosh Hashanah. I leaned over the railing and peered down at the men’s section. Papa and Ervin, Uncle Laci and Gabor were standing side by side, their tallisim draped over their shoulders. They bent and bowed in prayer. Ervin looked up and nodded to me. I nodded back.

The cantor chanted: “Remember us unto life, O King Who desires life, and inscribe us in the Book of Life – for Your sake, O Living God.”