Blooms of Darkness

63

When Hugo wakes, the sun has already set. The old soldier is still at his post. His unassuming presence encourages Hugo to ask, “Is the interrogation finished by now?”

“Apparently not.” The guard is stingy with his words.

“How long do you estimate it will continue?” Hugo speaks like an adult.

“I’ve stopped asking myself questions like that,” the guard replies, without bothering to look at Hugo.

Hugo returns to the square. Two young soldiers are filling the pot with fresh soup. The refugees observe them tensely. Hugo, too, stands and observes: the refugees are speaking German, using all the words he heard in his home, but they are not like his parents. Their way of standing shows that they have been in hiding places, and they move with caution. Before taking a step, they carefully look all around, like hunted animals.

“How long shall we stay here?” he hears one of the refugees ask another.

“I, at any rate, don’t intend to stay here long,” the man replies.

“And where will you go?”

“Anywhere, just not here.”

“I’ll wait,” says the first man cautiously. “They say that not everyone has returned.”

“Whoever hasn’t come back so far isn’t going to,” the other replies. His words cut like a knife.

Hugo partly grasps the meaning of their conversation. He is torn by his desire to wait for Mariana and his desire to leave this place. To separate himself from the refugees who surround him, Hugo gives himself over entirely to his imagination. He pictures Mariana and himself together in uninhabited green places similar to those where they had been before they were caught.

Suddenly a woman bursts into bitter tears. Everyone gathers around her, but it’s impossible to understand what she is saying. She mutters broken words and half-sentences that are incomprehensible. Finally she spits out, “I’m all alone. I have no one left in the world.”

“All of us are alone. Stop wailing.”

That reproach only increases her weeping.

Eventually they walk away from her. For a long time she cries bitterly, speaks about her parents and her sisters, and announces that there’s no reason to live without them. Her crying finally subsides, and gray perplexity freezes on her face. For a moment Hugo thinks of leaving the suitcase and the knapsack with the guard and returning home. His house isn’t far away — ten minutes at a run, and he’ll be there. He’ll go in, see if everything is in its place, and immediately return. The thought excites him, but then he remembers that all of Mariana’s worldly goods are packed in the suitcase. If it were lost or stolen, Mariana would never forgive him. While he is given over to his thoughts, a truck arrives and aims its rear at the gate. People immediately gather in the street. A priest, wearing a gilded hat and with a gleaming cross hanging from his chest, heads the group.

It is clear that something dreadful and momentous is about to happen. The people surrounding the truck watch the gate, but it doesn’t open. The priest begins a prayer, and those assembled join him. The prayer resounds and shakes the earth. More people gather and join in the prayer. Hugo gets the impression that they will stand there until the gate is opened and the imprisoned are freed.

As the praying continues, soldiers suddenly appear. They open the gate, storm the onlookers, and fire their guns in the air. There is a commotion, and Hugo grips the suitcase and the knapsack and pulls them to the side. The street empties out, and only the elderly priest remains on the sidewalk, praying determinedly.

Then the gate opens again, and women prisoners, wearing brown sackcloth dresses, emerge and are ordered to climb onto the truck. This isn’t easy for them to do, but they help one another. Some of them trip and fall, but in the end they all get on.

Hugo immediately recognizes Mariana and calls out loud, “Mariana.” People gather again and desperately call the names of the women who are standing in the truck, holding on to its bars. The priest waves his cross and raises his voice. “Jesus, save them,” he prays, “they have no help or savior beside you.” Hearing his supplication, everyone begins to pray again. The young soldiers are ill at ease for a moment, but then the order comes to shoot into the crowd. Now the prayers are mingled with sobs of pain. The women grabbing the bars of the truck look stunned by the sobbing and the shooting. Then they raise their arms and shout, “Jesus, we love you, you are the beloved of our heart forever and ever.” The driver starts the truck, and it leaves without delay.

“They were forced. They’re not guilty,” people shout. A few of the wounded lie on the ground, and others kneel and tear up their shirts to bandage them. Because of the wounded, the women prisoners are forgotten for a moment. Then Hugo hears someone say to his friend, “My poor sister, my good sister, she gave everything she had to her family. Now she’s on her way to death.”

“How do you know?”

“Don’t you know? The tribunal sentenced them to death by firing squad.”