Until the Dawn's Light

26

LATER BLANCA’S PAIN grew more intense, and Dr. Nussbaum gave her something for it. The pain did indeed die down a little, but the medicine made her woozy. Then Christina sat by her side and said something. Blanca didn’t absorb what she said, but it seemed to her that Christina’s lips were moving in prayer. For a moment she wondered about that prayer, and this made her faintly recall small scraps of her childhood. When she was sick, her mother used to sit next to her bed and observe her. Blanca would feel her hovering gaze, and she would sigh in relief. Then, surprisingly, a marvelous sort of contact would take place between her mother and her. Blanca’s hidden fears would fade all at once, and she knew that her mother would always be with her. But the full joy would come afterward, when she was recovering, a time that lasted many days and was full of glowing little things, like games of dominoes or cards, or books by Jules Verne. Her mother would read a chapter and say, “Now we’ll take a little break and nibble something. What shall it be? Maybe we’ll peel a pear.”

The weakness would pass, and Blanca’s appetite would return. She even found a slice of bread and butter tasty. Later the quiet hours would come, when nothing happened, just a feeling of pleasure and the happiness of light. While she was recovering, her father would try to entertain her with mathematical puzzles. She couldn’t solve them, but her father would do so effortlessly, like a magician. During those marvelous, brightly lit days, sharp, sudden fears would sometimes strike her, and she knew that her pleasure would not last long, that parting was inevitable. She would cry bitterly, and her mother would try in vain to console her.

These bright scraps of memory, which had been hidden within Blanca for many years, now appeared before her with new clarity. She opened her eyes, and Christina was sitting next to her. For some reason she thought Christina was Celia, and she said, “Celia?”

“How are you, Blanca? How do you feel?” Christina asked.

“I dreamed about my mother,” said Blanca.

Blanca felt better, but Dr. Nussbaum didn’t release her. Adolf came and stood at the door. In his work clothes, alongside the white iron bedsteads, he looked like one of the sturdy maintenance men who carried beds and chests of drawers to the upper floor.

“When are you coming back home?” He spoke in his mother’s voice.

She had noticed: Adolf resembled his mother and was full of superstitions. Once she had been sure that only weak people were subject to moods, daydreams, and superstitions. Later she learned that Adolf was careful to avoid the number thirteen. He had nailed a horseshoe above the door of their house, and sometimes he would say, “My mother says that a gate that doesn’t have a cross on it doesn’t protect the house.” At first she didn’t believe her ears, but in time she conceded to herself that superstitions were held by strong people, too, and in fact they enhanced their strength.

Without a doubt, Adolf was his mother’s son. His mother always protected him and spoke about his work in the dairy with admiration. His father loved him less, but through him Adolf belonged to the Hammer clan, which was known for its industry, religiosity, and devotion to family. All of these were, of course, merely fictions and wishful thinking. The family was full of drunkards, adulterers, cheaters, and idiots. But she had to learn all this painfully, over the years. Now she knew nothing but aches. Don’t release me, she was about to say to Dr. Nussbaum, I’m afraid to go back home. But Dr. Nussbaum spoke first, telling Adolf, “Blanca will be with us until she regains her strength and her wounds are completely healed.”

“I don’t understand,” said Adolf.

“What don’t you understand?”

“My sisters gave birth at home, not in a hospital.”

“So you’re an expert in medicine, too, I see,” he said and dismissed him.