Until the Dawn's Light

8

EVEN BEFORE THE end of the school year, Adolf was told that he couldn’t stay in high school. Dr. Klein and Dr. Weiss demanded his expulsion. The pleas of the assistant principal and some of the other teachers were to no avail. The decision to expel Adolf passed by a single vote. The announcement was sent to him in writing, and Adolf, in his fury, burned all his mathematics and Latin books in the school yard, shouting out loud, “Death to Klein! Death to Weiss! Long live freedom!”

Blanca returned from school in tears. Her pupil, whom she had tried so hard to help, had failed. Her mother tried in vain to console her.

“Klein and Weiss were cruel to him,” Blanca said angrily, still weeping.

The next day Blanca met Adolf at school. His face was furious and closed. Students surrounded him and tried to cheer him up, but Adolf rejected their efforts.

“I’m not upset,” he said. “The ones who failed me will pay the price.”

“I’m sorry, Adolf,” Blanca said, trying to take some of the blame on herself.

“You’re not to blame. It’s Klein and Weiss,” he said drily.

Adolf’s face was frightening, but Blanca didn’t leave his side.

“I don’t like pity,” he said repeatedly. “I’ve declared war, and I won’t be deterred.” That was clear in his appearance. The skin of his face was taut, and his lips were set in a firm line — which was exactly what Blanca found so enchanting.

“Good God,” she said when she got home. “Why are good people hurt? Why are they made to fail? People ought to be judged favorably, to bring out the good in them. So what if someone has trouble with mathematics or Latin? Is that a reason to expel him from school? What harm did he do?”

The school year ended, and Adolf was not among those who received report cards. His absence was conspicuous, because no boy in the school was as tall or as broad as he was. The excellent grades that sparkled on Blanca’s report card didn’t make her as happy as they had in the past. It seemed to her that they had come at Adolf’s expense.

“In mathematics there are those who are good and those who are better,” said her father enigmatically.

“Is that why they don’t let students study and expel them from school?” Blanca asked.

“What can you do? That’s nature.”

“Isn’t our motto that everyone should work according to their ability and receive according to their needs?”

“That principle doesn’t apply to the study of mathematics.”

“If mathematics leads to discrimination, I don’t want anything more to do with it.”

“Dear, you’re going too far.”

“I’m completely serious.”

Blanca’s father was proud of her, and now, hearing her opinions, he was even prouder. Her mother didn’t enter the argument. In matters of logic, her husband and daughter were better than she. Every time they caught her in a contradiction, she would say, “I raise my hands in surrender.”

That summer they didn’t go to Winterweiss. The doctors ordered Blanca’s mother to rest at home.

“I’m sorry, Blanca,” her mother said.

“Why are you saying you’re sorry, Mama?”

“Because of me, we’re not going to Winterweiss.”

“What are you talking about, Mama? I love being at home.”

Meanwhile, Adolf surprised Blanca by inviting her out for a bowl of ice cream. They sat in the busy café, and Adolf told her about his plans. Next month he would start working at a dairy, and he would be making a living. He was tired of being dependent on his parents. A man should work and make money.

Blanca was embarrassed and didn’t say a word. Being close to Adolf’s strength dazzled her.

“And you’re going to go on studying?” he asked, like someone who had himself been liberated from such things.

“What can I do?” She wanted to draw near to him.

“Aren’t you tired of it?”

“In another year, I’ll finish, too.”

When they parted, she, too, felt disgust for the institution called high school, which tortured the weak and raised the talented up to the skies. Her fury burned against the teachers who were so good to her, Dr. Klein and Dr. Weiss; because of them, about twenty students were expelled from school every year. High school without Adolf would be barren. “By virtue of the weak, we are humane.” She had heard that once from her uncle Salo, her father’s brother, who was a communist, heart and soul, and had been imprisoned for a number of years. After his release, he died suddenly of a mysterious illness.