City of the Sun (12 page)

CHAPTER 10

“
Sambousseks, boyos
, and
pasteles
,” Joe Levi exclaimed as he proudly pointed out some of the appetizers, or
mezzes
, as Allegra called the huge assortment she’d placed on the living room coffee table. “This one has cheese, this one spinach, and this one ground beef.”

Maya wasn’t very hungry, and she knew that the lunch that awaited them was a bigger meal than dinner in this household, and it would be at least three courses. Why was Allegra always overdoing it? She knew that Maya was a light eater, and it was apparent that Erik, despite his attempts to hide it, despised Middle Eastern cuisine. Only Vati indulged himself at mealtimes, particularly since Joe had reassured him that the meat in their home was kosher.

Feeling obligated, Maya tendered her blue porcelain plate to Joe, who had just arrived and was still wearing his seersucker suit jacket and his tarbush. “Just one of each,” she requested.

A short man with a friendly face and twinkling, warm brown eyes, Joe had greeted them at the train station in Cairo when Maya and her family first arrived with a big “S’aalam alekoum,” his arms wide open. He had indicated that he was only peripherally involved with the people who were helping them obtain their papers, but he was honored to open his home to the family. She had liked and trusted him
immediately. He’d been nothing but generous and had even taken a day off from work to drive them past the pyramids.

“The children are washing their hands before sitting down,” Allegra announced as she joined them. She was a good six inches taller than her husband, which made for an endearing sight when he rose on the tips of his toes to greet his wife with a kiss on the cheek.

“I saw the news in the paper,” she said to no one in particular as she prepared a plate for herself and sat down next to her husband, who habitually brought the newspapers home at lunch for her to see. “Kiev has fallen. How terrible.”

“Kiev?” Vati repeated, swallowing hard.

“The Russians admitted taking a heavy blow, but there are no official details,” Joe said, removing his jacket and hat. “There are reports that the SS murdered twelve hundred Jewish women and children there.”

Vati’s face turned ashen.

“My father still has family in Kiev,” Erik explained.

“But I thought you were German,” Joe said.

“Vater was born in Russia. As a child he fled the pogroms with his family and took refuge in Germany,” Maya offered.

“Maya,” Vati said as he reached for her on the chair next to him, his hand shaking slightly. “We must go to the synagogue to light candles for the dead.”

Joe stood up and kneeled in front of her father, taking his hands in his own. “We Jews are safe here in Egypt, monsieur,” he said firmly, his eyes slowly sliding to Maya and Erik. He was addressing them, too.

Joe had made that point several times, and from the way he filled the house with Maurice Chevalier’s happy tunes, such as
Y’a d’la Joie
, (All Is Wonderful), he must truly believe it, Maya thought.

Vati nodded slowly like an obedient child, a meek smile on his lips.

“That’s better,” Joe exclaimed with enthusiasm. “Now, what about trying some of these mezzes?”

Allegra sprang to her feet and took Vati’s plate, filling it with a choice selection, while Joe returned to his seat.

Whether he’d suddenly forgotten about his cousins in Kiev or was just humoring his hosts, Vati took his plate and proclaimed, “This is the best food I’ve had in
months
.”

“Monsieur Blumenthal, I know you told me you didn’t like to talk about your days in Germany, and I don’t mean to press you,” Joe said, “but we can be better friends if we can understand a little more about you.”

Maya threw a disconcerted look at her father. She knew that sooner or later they would have to divulge some information about the family’s ordeal—that was the price to pay for receiving help—but she wished it wouldn’t be just yet. The memories were still too raw.

“It is painful,” she admitted. “But we can talk about it with you.”

“When did you leave Germany?” Allegra promptly inquired as she sat down.

“Our parents left too late,” Erik answered, almost by reflex, using his fork to poke at the slices of pickled lemons adorning the plate on his lap. “They waited until the fall of 1937.”

“They were well connected in the community and were confident they would be protected,” Maya added softly, trying to remain detached.

“I was sure it would all pass,” Vati said. “And I was able to get work at the Kubu in Frankfurt as a conductor after I was fired from the Düsseldorf Opera.”

“The
Kubu
?” Allegra asked, leaning forward to hear better.

“The
Kulturbund
,” Vati explained. “It was an organization of Jewish artists that was allowed by the Nazis to perform in public, but only in front of Jewish audiences.”

“This was to show the world that they were not completely intolerant of Jews,” Erik added.

“As if the world really cared,” Maya heard herself muttering.

“They began to put all kinds of silly restrictions on the Kubu as time went on,” Vati shrugged. “They policed our recitals and then ruled that only Jewish works could be performed. By the end we were not even allowed to utter the word ‘blond,’ because that was deemed an insult to the Aryan trait. Can you believe such nonsense?” He waved his hand dismissively, indicating that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore. “When they shut the Kubu down, I knew it was time to leave.”

Maya didn’t contradict her father, but she knew that this had not been the final straw. That had been the garbage truck humiliation.

“You went from there to Paris?” Allegra asked.

“Yes. Erik was already there,” Maya replied on behalf of her father, “and Paris was full of opportunities for musicians.”

“It was good for Maya, too,” Erik offered. “She had gone to a French boarding school in Geneva and speaks with a true French accent.”

“And then you had to flee again,” Allegra said sympathetically. “And your poor mother? That was her violin, wasn’t it?”

Maya looked down at her white socks. She was not going to describe how her mother had coughed up blood for the last time on the day the Germans had entered Paris, succumbing finally to her tuberculosis. They had fled the capital that very day, but missed the ship bound for England that the British Embassy had chartered to give scientists like Erik refuge there.

“It all fell apart when Paris was invaded,” Maya said. “You must have read about the chaos and hysteria that followed when people tried to leave the city.” That’s all she was willing to say.

“I think the radio said there were seven million people on the roads that day,” Joe recalled.

Maya couldn’t go down this path. Perhaps it was the hot bath that she’d taken earlier, but she felt too exhausted to withstand further questioning. She was about to excuse herself to go to the bathroom when the Levis’ four young boys ran into the room, showing their clean hands to their mother. Fresh faced and energetic, they were still dressed in their school uniforms—ties and jackets.

Maya saw Vati staring at the crests on their uniforms. He’d been shocked when he’d learned that these Jewish children were attending a French Jesuit school. He had not accepted Allegra’s claim that the school provided the most disciplined and best education in Cairo, nor Joe’s rationalization that religion was learned in the home, and that he, too, had attended a Catholic school as a child.

“We’ve set Loulou’s Bar Mitzvah for next May,” Joe said proudly of his oldest son. “He’s been studying for it all summer. Say something in Hebrew,” he urged the boy.

Loulou blushed and shyly recited the first few words of the Shabbat prayer, struggling with his pronunciation.

Vati corrected him until he repeated it to his satisfaction. “You must let me help him with his Hebrew,” he said to Joe. “And most importantly do not let him abandon his Jewish studies after his Bar Mitzvah as I did with my son.”

To Maya’s relief, Erik, who’d become an ardent atheist, did not rise to take the bait.

Lunch was served with the same panache as the appetizers, but now the endless array of dishes was brought, one at a time, by the family’s longtime Egyptian house servant, Sayeda, an older woman with a large mole under her nose that distracted only slightly from her sweet smile. The meal started with a hearty soup that Maya had never tasted before and that was impossible to pronounce.
Melokhia
was full of unfamiliar spices and made with dark green leaves, like gelatinous spinach, and chunks of beef. Erik wouldn’t go near it, nor did he touch the chicken and peas with turmeric that followed, or the meat and vegetable dish that came after that. As always, every dish was served with rice. Even dessert included a rice pudding. Maya dutifully tried to taste everything, but was beginning to suffer from all the obligations that came with being a guest, including having to make small talk.

After discussing the price of meat in Cairo, which had skyrocketed because it could no longer be imported, and the recipe used by Vati’s mother to make Erik’s favorite potato latkes, Joe started to quiz the children about their schoolwork.

An accountant at Cairo’s finest hotel, Joe placed a high value on education, and he insisted that his children would do even better than he had. Loulou would be a doctor, Mimi an architect, Zazi a businessman, and their six-year-old, Soussou, a lawyer. The little one, however, protested, saying that when he grew up he wanted to be a singer and play the violin like Father Thibault in their church choir. This brought a raised eyebrow from Vati. Careers for girls, on the other hand, were frowned upon, and Allegra quickly dismissed the boys’ suggestion that their sister, Lili, would make a great seamstress.

“Princess Lili has arrived,” Joe grumbled as the sound of keys fumbling rattled the door.

Looking voluptuous in her tennis whites, Lili sauntered into the dining room. Her hair was pulled back, accentuating her smoky eyes. She raised her racquet in triumph. “I won. Three to one. School let out early, so I stole a game at the club.”

“You just missed lunch, missy,” Joe reprimanded loudly.

Lili rushed to her father, smacked a loud kiss on top of his head, shutting him up, and went around the table kissing everybody on the cheek. She was a mountain of energy.

“Roommate!” Lili wrapped her arms around Maya and pulled a chair next to her. “I hope I didn’t snore last night.”

“No, but you walked in your sleep,” Maya said. “Just kidding!”

Lili laughed and turned to her mother with an urgent question. “Mamie, did my copy of
Marie Claire
arrive yet?”

Embarrassed, Maya hastened to answer first. “Yes, and I’ve been flipping through it. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Of course not.” Lili took Maya’s hand in hers. “Last month I saw the most beautiful wedding dress there. Did I tell you that’s where I want to get married—Paris?”

“Are you getting married?” Vati inquired, refilling his glass with the wine on the table.

“Heavens, no. I’m only eighteen, monsieur.”

“You’re
already
eighteen,” Allegra corrected. “At your age, I was married and big with you.” She gestured toward her belly.

But Lili chose not to dignify her mother’s comment with a response and turned back to Maya. She pushed a strand of hair away from Maya’s face. “You really should let me do your hair and makeup one day. Isn’t she so pretty?” Lili gushed.

“She’s beautiful,” Soussou, the little one, agreed.

“You have to watch out for the boys in this country,” Joe said.

“They stick like olive oil!” Allegra added.

Maya let her hair fall back over her face. She used to enjoy compliments, basking in that luscious tickle that made her feel like she owned the world. But now, they sounded patronizing to her. She knew she looked awful. It should be obvious to everyone that she was in mourning, that her fate had been sealed, and that she was destined to be the mother to both her brother and her father.

“Maya looks like our mother,” Erik said, shoving a piece of pita bread into his mouth, the only thing on the table he would eat.

“That’s not true,” Maya protested, though she wished it were. With her flaming red hair and almond-shaped green eyes, her
mother had been a legendary beauty in Düsseldorf. At least Maya had inherited her oval face and the cleft in her chin. She had to settle for much duller hair and ordinary green eyes.

“We used to say that Maya had the beauty of her mother and the charm of her father, but that was when father was more charming,” Erik remarked, winking at his sister, and drawing some laughter.

What was the matter with Erik? Couldn’t he see that she was squirming inside? Uncomfortable at being the center of attention, she changed the subject and said, “I see Yom Kippur will be arriving early this year.”

“Yom Kippur is my favorite holiday,” Lili said with conviction. “No breads, no sweets. Nothing to eat at all. The only day of the year that I’m sure to lose weight. I think God created it for us women.”