4

Kicsi did not go back to the forest right away. For her it was enough to know that Vörös would be there, that at any time she could go to visit him. She carried the knowledge with her like a secret, like the star she wore near her heart. Meanwhile she talked to no one about Vörös, and the villagers thought that he had gone.

When she did return, a few weeks later, she could not find him. The red and orange leaves had fallen, covering the ground with silent, unmoving fire. The forest was quieter now, whispering softly and slowly like old people remembering their youth. Branches had fallen across the paths or lay snagged in the trees like ancient spiderwebs. For a moment Kicsi feared that Vörös had gone deeper into the forest to where she could not follow him, or that he had left the village. Then from somewhere a dog howled.

Kicsi returned the way she had come, following the sound. The howl came again, closer this time. She saw Vörös and the black dog off in the distance, sitting on a small red hill overlooking the forest, and she ran toward them.

“Hello,” she said, sitting beside Vörös. Then, quickly, before he could ask her to leave: “What are you doing?”

“Looking at the earth,” said Vörös. “There’s fine clay here. Your village has good bones. What brings you out here?”

“I wanted to ask you a question.”

“Another question!” Vörös said, laughing.

“Yes,” she said. “I wanted to ask—There’s a hole in our roof. Did you—I mean, did the rabbi—Do you have anything to do with that?”

“A hole in your roof?”

“Yes. They’re fixing it today. That’s why I remembered it.”

“I had nothing to do with it. What would I want with a hole in your roof? Perhaps a tree—”

“There wasn’t any tree nearby,” said Kicsi. “I think the rabbi did it.”

“The rabbi?” said Vörös gravely. He picked up a stick and turned it over and over without seeing it. “It could be. It could be. But, Kicsi, that’s all over now. The curse is gone. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Nothing to worry about!” she said, suddenly angry. “He says he will kill you!”

“I told you,” said Vörös. “I don’t think that he can.”

“You don’t know him,” said Kicsi. “He’s—he’s—If he wants to kill you, he can do it.”

“Ah,” said Vörös. “But he does not know me either.”

Kicsi sighed. “You haven’t grown up here. You don’t know. Once, János, the old shoemaker—he disappeared for a while. And his wife went to the rabbi to get him back. And the next day—it was terrible. He came back, bleeding and limping. I heard someone tell my parents that a wolf had chased him back from the next town.” Vörös looked at her. He was smiling slightly. “All right, so you don’t believe me! You think you’ve seen wonderful things in your travels, but the rabbi—he really can work miracles. He really does. My father—once he needed an operation—”

“I believe you,” said Vörös.

“You—you do?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re not afraid? Why not?”

“I think I can protect myself. I will need time, though, and quiet.”

“What will you do?”

“For the moment, nothing. Hush.” He sat a while, studying the ground between his knees.

“Vörös?” said Kicsi a while later.

“Hmmm? Yes?”

“Why don’t you ever answer my questions?”

Vörös laughed. He turned her head so that she faced him and looked into her eyes. “A magician’s business is with words. He may use other things to help him along—amulets and so forth—but it is within words that the power lies. To choose the wrong words may mean death. And so magicians learn, from the first, to use as few words as possible, to answer as few questions as we can. And that,” he said, smiling softly, “may be the longest answer I’ve ever given you. Now let me be. I must study the land a while longer.”

After a long while he stood up. The dog looked up at him.

Vörös began to pace. Then, as though he had come to a decision, he walked a large circle around Kicsi and the spot where he had been sitting. “What do you think?” he said to the dog.

The dog nodded once.

“Good,” said Vörös. “Now, Kicsi, once I begin, you may not leave the circle. Do you understand?”

“Did you just talk to the dog? Can he understand you?”

Vörös sighed. “Yes, I did, and yes, he can. If you have to be home, if you have something to do or somewhere to go, you must leave now. If you stay, you cannot leave the circle once I’ve begun.”

“All—all right.” She meant to ask him what he planned to do, but something stopped her.

“Good. Now then.” He paced the circle again, speaking a few words. Kicsi could tell that they were Hebrew, but the accent was harsher, more angular, than the one she was used to. A thin white line, pale as a scar, sprang up along the ground where he had walked, fencing them in. He returned to the center. The dog continued to prowl the outer edge of the circle.

Vörös sat down. He placed his hands on the ground and began to sing softly, tunelessly. Nothing happened for a long time and Kicsi started to stand up. The air was hot and still. A few grains of sand blew noiselessly along the ground. More joined them, and still more, and suddenly Kicsi saw that they were all moving toward the center of the circle, toward Vörös. She sat back down and put her hand out. There was no breeze. Sand hit her hand sharply, biting like bitter cold, and she pulled her hand back. Vörös continued to sing.

The grains of sand flowed together, thickened, became clay. The clay grew under Vörös’s hands. As he sang he pulled it from the ground, forming it, shaping it, giving it texture, calling it to him. Red rivers grew at his feet, humping out of the ground, flowing into pools. He stood.

The pools grew slowly. Wet clay touched the hem of Kicsi’s dress and she moved away, toward the edge. Beyond the circle everything looked shapeless and pale. The forest, the paths, the sun wavered as though they were woven into a tapestry hanging in the wind. She walked closer to the white line, trying to see. The dog turned to her and growled low in its throat, rumbling like a distant train. Vörös looked at her and she sat down quickly.

Vörös raised his hands and began another song, this one fast and full of melody. Air brushed past Kicsi’s cheek, moving toward his hands. The wind grew stronger, quicker, spinning about Vörös, tossing his clothes, his hair. The wind howled like mourners. Vörös stood steadily, his mouth opening and closing in the words of the song, but he could not be heard.

The clay spun around the whirlwind. Higher and higher it rose, spinning itself out like rope, until it had grown past the tops of the trees. Vörös stopped the wind then, letting his hands fall to his sides, and the clay fell slowly to earth, folding back upon itself in layers. The clay stood still, an unformed shape in the middle of the circle.

Vörös sang softly, coaxingly, to the clay, like a mother singing to her child. The clay began to shape itself, to flow, to change its outlines. It formed for itself a head, an arm, a leg.

Suddenly Kicsi saw that all Vörös’s magic was based on illusion. With his song he sought to beguile the clay into thinking it was a man. He sang to it of man-things: of hard work and sleep, of sun and rain, snow and mist, of comfort and pain. Come away, he sang. Be clay no more. Be a man.

The clay took one slow step toward Vörös. Then it toppled forward slowly, falling with no sound. One of its legs lay twisted under it at an impossible angle.

Vörös bent over the clay form. He straightened the leg, smoothed out the damage it had suffered in the fall. Then he sat back, staring off at the forest. The protective white line had disappeared and everything outside the circle was as clear as before.

“What is it?” said Kicsi. “Is it a golem?”

Vörös looked at her sharply. He seemed surprised that she was still there. “Yes,” he said. His voice was hoarse.

“I’ve heard stories about golems,” Kicsi said, “Erzsébet’s father tells them. There was a rabbi somewhere in Prague—I forget his name—who made a golem to protect the people. He was alive, but he couldn’t talk. The golem, I mean. Is that what you were trying to do?” She paused, looked at the still clay form. “Why didn’t it work?”

“It needs more words,” said Vörös.

“What do you mean?”

“More words,” Vörös repeated, as if he thought that Kicsi had not heard him.

“I don’t—I don’t understand.” She looked at him. He was very white; against his pale skin his scar gleamed like a sword. His blue eyes were large and expressionless. “Oh. You’re tired. I’m sorry. I’ll go home now.”

“Yes,” said Vörös. “Please.”

“Can I—can I come back tomorrow?”

Vörös nodded.

“All right. Good-bye.” She walked away slowly, stopped, and turned around. Vörös had slumped against the golem, his eyes closed. “Good-bye,” she said softly.

It was late when she finally came home. The family had started supper. “Kicsi,” said Sarah. “There you are. You’ve gotten stains all over your dress. How on earth did you manage that? Where have you been? Erzsébet’s mother told me she’d seen you going to the forest.”

Kicsi said nothing. She slipped quietly into her place at the table.

“Maybe she’s got a boyfriend,” said Magda.

“Don’t be silly,” said Kicsi.

“Kicsi’s got a boyfriend,” said Ilona. “Kicsi’s got—”

“Be quiet!” said Kicsi.

“Yes, please,” said Imre. “Kicsi, have you been to the forest? I’m sure your mother needs you at home. And are you doing your schoolwork?”

“Of course,” said Kicsi, thinking about that day’s assignment that she had not done yet.

“I don’t want you out neglecting your studies,” said Sarah. “Your father practically risked his life—we all did—so that you children could go to that school.”

“I know,” said Kicsi.

“And I don’t like you going to that forest,” said Sarah. “There are—things—in that forest. It isn’t safe. Your great-uncle saw his dead wife’s ghost there once. And there are animals there, too. Wolves.”

“I’m very careful,” said Kicsi. “And I leave when it starts getting dark. You don’t have to worry.”

“All right,” said Sarah. “But I don’t like it. I wish you’d find someplace else to go. And tomorrow, I want you right here after school, so I can see you doing your schoolwork. Then you can go off to the forest.”

“But—but I can’t—”

“Why? What else do you have to do?”

I can’t tell you, Kicsi thought. I want to tell you about Vörös, and the clay, and the dog, but you won’t believe me. Or you’ll forbid me to go. And it might get back to the rabbi that Vörös hasn’t left yet, and he might be—might be—No, I can’t tell anyone.

“Nothing,” she said aloud. “I’ll be here. You’ll see.”

She hurried through her schoolwork the next day and ran straight to the forest after she was done, but still she was late getting there. Evening was near, and the day was growing cold. Vörös and the dog had already started marking out the circle. She sat a small distance away, behind a rock, out of sight of any prying eyes from the village.

Suddenly the dog stopped. He pointed his head toward the forest. His ears lay flat and he growled, showing his teeth. Vörös looked around and Kicsi, after a while, did the same. There, picking his way slowly through the trail that led from the forest, making no sound, was the rabbi.

He came to the hill and stopped, leaning on his cane. Then he began to walk again. He climbed the hill with difficulty and stopped every so often, but still he came on. He made no sound as he walked over the leaves and sand and rocks, and Kicsi shivered. Vörös did not move.

“Good day to you, traveler,” said the rabbi. He thrust his cane through the protective circle and the white line snapped apart with the sound of sparks crackling. The cane was still raised as he walked across the circle and sat down on a small rock. Then he balanced his cane against his knees, lifted his hat, and adjusted the skullcap beneath it, never once looking away from Vörös.

“Good day,” said Vörös calmly, still standing. He looked around at the dog, who stood motionless, and at Kicsi, still well hidden behind the rock.

“I suppose it can be argued,” said the rabbi, “whether this hill is indeed part of the town. During the Sabbath, when one is not supposed to travel farther than the limits of the town, it is true that no one comes here. And if this hill is not part of the town then I suppose you are safe, for I said that I would kill you if I ever saw you in the town again.”

“I suppose so,” said Vörös.

“Still,” said the rabbi, “it may be that you will go into the town again—to get food, supplies, whatever you need. And if you do—if you bother us again—I will be waiting.”

“Yes,” said Vörös.

“Don’t be so calm!” said the rabbi. “Do you suppose that I want to kill you? I wish I had never seen you. Every day I watch my daughter, to see if all is well with her, and every day I give thanks to God that she is healthy and happy. But if she dies, if she dies, you are responsible for her death just as surely as if you killed her, because yours were the words of evil omen spoken at the wedding. I don’t want to kill you. I just want you to leave us alone. I want you to go back to your home, if you have a home, or to wherever it is you came from. You have caused enough trouble in this town.”

“I have things that I must do here.”

“Well, then, you have been warned. I have warned you what will happen if you continue to meddle in the affairs of this town.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“No?” The rabbi’s bushy eyebrows moved closer together. “Well, then. We shall see. I suppose you think that your knowledge of sorcery is greater than mine. It is true that you removed the curse that I set on Imre’s household, but that was only a very minor piece of spell-work. I was not expecting someone like you to happen along.”

“I go where I must.”

“Hmmm?” said the rabbi. He raised his eyebrows and looked at Vörös with clear, expressionless gray eyes. “Perhaps there are other forces at work here. I was not expecting that. Perhaps you work for the devil? Hmmm?”

“You know that isn’t true.”

“No. Well. You’re just a troublemaker, as I first suspected. Perhaps you think you can win against me because you broke my spell of darkness at the wedding. Again, that was a very minor thing. I was testing your power.”

“I knew you were,” said Vörös. “Though you have never thanked me for making the cup whole again.”

“Did you do that? No. I know you didn’t do that. I don’t know why, but you want to destroy us—my family, my daughter. Someone got another cup for us.”

“Very well then. Think what you please about me. But you know that no one left the courtyard.”

“No,” said the rabbi. He was almost speaking to himself. “You want to destroy us. I don’t know why. I don’t know who sent you. But I must destroy you first.” He looked up at Vörös and spoke louder. “Ah, but you have one advantage. You know my name, traveler, and I do not know yours.”

“I am called Vörös.”

The rabbi laughed. “You know better than that! You have survived many years, sorcerer—and I sense that you are old, older than you look—and so you must at least know the importance of names. With the proper names one can control all the angels of heaven and the demons of hell. It is said that the prophet Elijah knew seventeen of the names of the demoness Lilith, the child-stealer, and so kept her away from houses with newborns.”

Vörös said nothing.

“So, then, what is your name?” the rabbi went on. “There should be some way to discover it. Let’s see. You say your name is Vörös, and Vörös means red. Red is adom in Hebrew. Our father Adam was so called because he was made from the red earth—earth much like this.” He spread his hand over the red clay. “So perhaps you are Adam? But no, it says in the first book of the Torah that Adam, though he lived a long life, finally died, like all men. So you cannot be Adam. But we shall see. I will discover your true name sooner or later. I do not like to be at a disadvantage.”

Vörös smiled. “Perhaps you will,” he said.

“Perhaps!” said the rabbi. “You underestimate me, traveler. You say you are not frightened of me. Then yield up your true name to me now. It should be nothing for one such as you, who has no fear.”

“I am not a fool,” said Vörös, still smiling.

“No,” said the rabbi. “I thought not. I do believe I could destroy you if I knew your true name.”

“I don’t want it to come to that between us,” said Vörös.

“No? Good. Then stay out of my village and away from my people. And one other thing. I hear from the villagers that you have been spending your time with Imre’s youngest daughter.”

The rabbi looked around the hill, taking in everything with his wide gray eyes. Kicsi hunched further behind the rock.

“Kicsi?” said Vörös.

“Yes, that’s the one. I don’t want you to see her again. You’re a bad influence on her. I don’t want her exposed to the black sorcery, especially at so young an age.”

Vörös smiled. “I am not a black sorcerer.”

“So you say. Keep away from her. I am not the only one concerned about her. Her father, too, is worried.”

“He has nothing to worry about.”

“I hope you are right,” said the rabbi. “I must go now. And again I warn you. If I find you in the village again, I will kill you.”

“Good day,” said Vörös.

The rabbi stood and walked slowly down the hillside. The dog, who had stood motionless during the exchange between Vörös and the rabbi, began to twitch as though released from a spell. He watched the rabbi as he faded into the evening. Then he whined, and looked at Vörös.

“It’s all right,” said Vörös. “He has not said anything I did not know.”

“Vörös!” said Kicsi. She ran out from behind the rock and hugged him, holding on to him tightly. “Vörös, he is going to kill you! And what will he do to me, if he finds me here with you? Is he going to kill me too? I’m frightened, Vörös, I’m so frightened.”

“Don’t worry,” said Vörös soothingly. “I’ve told you not to worry. He won’t harm you.”

“Why is he so angry with you? You didn’t—you didn’t do what he says, did you? Curse his daughter?”

“No. No, he is angry with me because I see something he does not see, or has seen and forgotten.”

Kicsi stepped away from him. “Can I come back tomorrow?”

Vörös laughed. “I thought you were frightened.”

“I—I am. But I want to see what will happen. Can I come back?”

“How do you know that anything will happen?”

“Oh.” She paused. “I don’t—I guess I don’t really know. Will the rabbi be back?”

“I think so.”

“Can I watch?”

“All right,” said Vörös. “But stay behind the rock again, exactly as you did today. That was a very wise thing you did, when you did not move from the rock.”

She smiled at his praise. “I was too frightened to move,” she said.

He laughed. “All right then. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Kicsi looked around her. In the twilight the golem was no more than another stone. “Why didn’t he see the golem?”

“The protection on the circle still extended that far,” said Vörös. “There was a spell on him so that he was unable to see it. But I think,” he said, looking toward the setting sun, “that I shall let him see it tomorrow. It will not hurt to let him know what I have in mind.”

“I’d better go now,” said Kicsi. “It’s very late.”

“Yes,” said Vörös. “Good-bye.” He called after her as she ran down the hillside. “And good luck!”

The rabbi arrived the next day, shortly after Kicsi had taken her place behind the rock. Vörös had not put up the protective circle, and so the rabbi found him bent over the still clay form.

“Ah,” said the rabbi, seating himself on a rock. “So you are making a golem.”

Vörös said nothing.

“It is interesting that you should attempt that,” said the rabbi. “It has not been done successfully since 1580, as far as I know. Yet you think you will succeed, of course, or you would not have gone to the trouble. May I ask what you are making him for?”

Vörös looked up. He was very pale; even his eyes seemed to have lost color. Kicsi thought, shocked, that he looked as though he had not slept all night. Perhaps he had given the golem more words, as he said he would. “To protect the village,” he said.

“I protect the village, not you,” the rabbi said emphatically. “Do you think the people here do not know that? I am their teacher, their adviser, their”—he looked to the golem again, and his voice, though lowered, carried to where Kicsi sat concealed by the rock—“magician. We do not need you here among us to create trouble. I am afraid you see monsters where none exist.”

“I see a man in my dreams,” said Vörös. “I see him often. A man with no teeth.”

The rabbi looked up, startled.

“Ah,” said Vörös, “you see him too.”

“So what if I do? They are dreams, nothing more.”

“No, rabbi,” Vörös said. “They are not just dreams. You know what they are. Please, tell the people they are not safe here. They listen to you, not to me.”

“They listen to me,” the rabbi said. “They listen because I have never advised them wrongly. What will they say if I suddenly tell them to leave their homes, their synagogue, their village—all on the strength of a dream?”

Vörös looked at him. Light broke against his eyes and he looked as though he were seeing some terror. “Rabbi,” he said levelly, “they will thank you.”

The rabbi shrugged. “I have lived here longer than you,” he said. “I know my people, and you do not.” He bent over and peered at the golem.

“I see you have nothing written on the golem’s forehead,” the rabbi said. “I know that you understand the importance of names. I am curious. Tell me. There are many schools of thought concerning the word that should be written on the forehead of a golem. Which word will you choose?”

“I do only as I have been taught,” said Vörös.

“Ah! And who taught you? That would be an interesting thing to learn. There are those who teach that the Holy Name of God should be written on the golem’s forehead to bring him to life and that to take away the gift of life one must erase the Name.” The rabbi paused. Vörös said nothing. “And then there are those who believe that the word emes, truth, should be the word written on the forehead, and that to take away life one must erase the first letter, the aleph, so that the word on his forehead is now the word for death.

“Ah, so you will not speak,” said the rabbi. “Very well then. I shall be back tomorrow to see the progress you have made. Sholom aleichem.”

The rabbi stood and began to walk down the hill. Vörös spoke softly to the golem, swaying back and forth, his words falling like rain falling on bare ground. The rabbi turned back, puzzled.

“You are a very rude man,” he said. “I trust we will be rid of you soon.”

Vörös stopped the flow of his words. He picked up a sharpened stick from the ground and wrote a word on the golem’s forehead. Then he moved back so that the rabbi could read the word he had written. It was Adam.

“That is blasphemy!” said the rabbi. “You are not God. You cannot play like this with creation!”

The rabbi stepped back. His eyes were bright with rage. He lifted his cane and pointed it at Vörös.

For a moment nothing happened. Then the world exploded. The forest tore free of the sky and the sun skittered away like a top. Kicsi held on tightly to the rock and closed her eyes. A noise filled the world, drowning it in thunder, and went on and on forever. She lived alone in an agony of darkness and sound. She opened her eyes.

Vörös lay on the ground, not moving. The golem got up, slowly, forcing itself to its knees, its feet. It walked unsteadily across the moving ground toward the rabbi.

The rabbi stepped back once more. A look of horror was on his face and he lost control of his spell. The world slowly fit itself together again. He took one step more, then drew himself up and faced the golem. He held up his cane, pointed it at the golem. Suddenly everything stood out sharply in a great flash of light. The earth tossed once more.

The golem’s hand rose slowly and covered his forehead and fell down, lifeless. The rabbi’s fire had erased the first letter of its name. The word on its forehead now spelled dam, blood.

Blood spilled slowly from its wound, blood that could barely be seen against the red of the clay. More blood came, and more, spilling over the golem’s arms and legs and on to the ground. The golem wavered. It fell.

Vörös stood. He held his left hand to his forehead, as though he had been hit in the same place as the golem. With his right hand he held tightly to the sharpened stick. He shouted and flung the stick at the rabbi. The ground burst into flames at the rabbi’s feet.

The rabbi stepped back. He passed his cane over the flames and they fell away. Then he moved forward, his face twisted into a smile.

“It may be that I will not need your name to defeat you, eh, traveler?”

“It may be,” said Vörös, breathing heavily. Blood dripped from his forehead into his eyes, and he wiped them with his sleeve.

“You put a lot of yourself into the golem, did you not, traveler?” said the rabbi.

“You know I did,” said Vörös.

The rabbi came on. “I am fond of my daughter, too, traveler.”

“Rabbi,” said Vörös. He swallowed. “Then we are even, you and I. More then even, for your daughter lives and my creation is dead.” He pointed to the golem. It could now barely be distinguished from the earth.

The rabbi laughed. “But I love my daughter. What do you know of love, traveler? Did you love your golem? I do not think so.”

The rabbi raised his cane again. Once again the earth was forced apart. Boulders ran down the hillside. Trees fell crashing to the forest floor.

Vörös raised his hands. With an obvious effort he calmed the trees, the hill.

The rabbi came forward. “You are weakening, are you not, sorcerer?”

Vörös moved back. He stumbled over a stone and was down so suddenly that Kicsi had not seen it happen. The rabbi stood over him.

“Is it true that you think that you are God?” said the rabbi.

“No,” said Vörös.

“Once you said you were not afraid,” said the rabbi. “What do you say now?”

“I am still not afraid,” said Vörös. He tried to stand, but could not. “Kill me now.”

The dog moved suddenly. He grew as hazy as fire smoke. In his place stood a tall man in a long robe and brightly colored cap.

“Who—who are you?” said the rabbi. His eyes moved from Vörös to the man.

“I am called Akan,” said the man. His voice was very deep. “You will not have heard my real name.”

“That does not matter to me,” said the rabbi. He raised his cane a third time. “Your friend lies bound and helpless. In a few minutes he will be dead.”

“No!” said Akan. He raised his hands. Flames leapt up in a circle around the rabbi, hemming him in. Closer and closer they came to him. Kicsi thought she saw his long coat catch fire.

The rabbi twisted like a bird caught in a cage. Through the red walls of fire Kicsi could see him raise and lower his cane. She could feel the heat of the fire.

He cried out one long, despairing word and turned and threw his cane through the fire at Akan. The other man screamed and clutched his head. Then he was gone. The flames went out.

The rabbi stood a while, trying to catch his breath. Then he said, “Ah, that was intended for your friend Vörös.” He turned back to where Vörös had fallen, but Vörös was not there. He laughed softly. “So, you have escaped me once again. No, I am not angry. I only hope that you do not come back. I hope that we have seen the last of you.” He bent down and picked up his cane. It was barely singed.

He walked with difficulty, leaning on his cane, to where Akan had last stood. “Your friend was better at withstanding me, I see. I did not mean for this to happen. Him I would have taken apart piece by piece and thrown to the winds, as I did you. But I did not bear a grudge against you. You I did not know.”

The rabbi stood straighter and held heavily to his cane. “But,” he said, “if you had any part in this blasphemy, if you sought in any way to take upon yourself the function of the Creator, then I have done well. Then I have made no mistake. And of course, if you were a friend of the traveler, then you had probably meddled too far in the black sorcery for the good of your soul.”

He poked with his cane at the remains of the golem. “Ah, that is something I would like to know.” Then he shivered, and wrapped his torn coat tighter around him. Twilight had come upon them during the battle. “But it is probably for the best that I never find out.”

He turned and walked down the hill, making no sound.

Kicsi came out from behind the rock. She could still hear faintly the terrible sound of the world being torn down the middle, sounding in her mind like a distant bell ringing forever. She began to shiver violently and sat down for a long time until she could walk. Far off, she heard howls and shrieks—animals crying in the forest—and she looked up. A few trees were on fire, and the blaze caught quickly.

She stood up, holding to the rock for support. It was as if nothing had happened. Vörös and the rabbi were gone, Akan was dead, and the golem was as if it had never been. She could not even see any footprints. She could see only the rocks, the red clay, and the paths leading to the forest.

She waited until she was sure the rabbi had left, then began to walk down the hillside. As she went, she tripped over something soft in the dark and she bent down to feel its outlines. It was Vörös’s knapsack.

She picked it up—it was surprisingly light—and carried it with her into the town. By the light of the first lamp post she knelt and opened it.

There was a peacock’s feather, a fox’s tail, pieces of amber, bits of jewelry. There were amulets of gold, of brass, of copper. There were keys attached to a necklace of silver. There were seashells, stones, dried flowers, cloth bags with various sweet-smelling herbs. There were shirts and pants and headgear, but none of a fashion she had ever seen. And finally, at the bottom, there was a small leather bag tied round with ribbons.

She lifted the bag out of the sack and held it in her hands. Then suddenly she was confused. What was she doing? The street seemed to tilt and the lights ran together. She placed the bag back where she had found it in the knapsack and shook her head. She took a deep breath, decided that she felt better, and set off down the street.

When she got home, she went around the side way, lifting the latch on the gate to get into the backyard. With some recently chopped wood she found in the woodpile she dug a hole and put in the sack. Then she covered the sack as neatly as she could and marked the spot with a small piece of wood. Later she would return and hide the sack away in one of the thick walls of the house.

It was only when she opened the front door that she realized it must be very late. The food set on the table had grown cold and everyone stood near the door, waiting. Ilona was crying. Sarah was sitting down and holding her head in her hands. She did not look up as the door opened.

“Kicsi!” said Imre. “Where have you been?” Without waiting for an answer he grasped the back of her neck and walked her forcefully to the window. She could see small flames in the distance, like demons dancing. “Do you see that? The forest is burning. Didn’t your mother and I warn you?”

Sarah looked up. “Your dress! Imre, look what she’s done to herself. Her dress is ruined! And what happened to your hair?”

Kicsi reached up and touched her short brown hair. It was woven with sand and clay and small rocks.

“Where have you been? Have you been to the forest?”

“Y—Yes.”

“What happened to you?”

“The fire—there was a terrible fire—”

“Did you see the fire?” asked Tibor. The others stared at her. “How did it start?”

“I don’t know—I don’t know.”

“All right,” said Imre. “That’s enough. Kicsi, I forbid you to go to the forest again. Do you hear me?”

She nodded.

“And you may not come and eat with us until you have washed yourself—and your hair—and put on clean clothes. And as for the rest of you, you are not to talk about this unless Kicsi shows that she is willing to listen.” He pulled her closer to him. “It’s all right, Kicsi, it’s all right. You can cry now if you want to.” But she could not cry.

Later, as she was taking her bath, she realized two things. The first was that Vörös had escaped the rabbi and was still alive. The second, following the first so closely that she did not have time to feel joy, was a certainty that went deeper than the need for proof. She knew that Vörös would never sit and eat with them again. And then she began to cry.