Catherine was reading the newspaper and saw a picture of Hungarian refugees. A young girl in the picture caught her eye. She saw this girl as someone with a great destiny living with her boy-heavy family. Underneath in the caption it said, "Please look after our young ones." Catherine decided that she was gunna call this small girl by the name Szaba. It was short for szabadsag, which meant freedom and that was written on their cards. At Catherine's school, they were establishing a fund for the refugees. She donated half of her allowance and packed food hampers that would have been sent to the refugee reception centre in London. The other half of her allowance was put into a jar that she marked "Szaba" with a picture of the little girl on it. She would soon have Szaba as her sister and she imagined how it would be. Catherine then asked her mom while knitting scarves for the refugees, but her mom said no because they had no room in their house. Catherine talked to her piano teacher, Mrs Berenyi and she decided to write to the Red Cross. She too was in this exact situation after the war in Switzerland, so she understood what those children were going to be put through. The Red Cross wrote back and could not identify the child Catherine spoke of. Then Catherine talked to her dad and he decided to write an article in the paper. After Christmas, three Hungarian girls were sent to Catherine's school. None of them looked like Szaba. She hung around the one girl named Marta, who was the closest to her age. Catherine showed Marta the photo of Szaba and then Marta started crying. She pointed to the picture and said Halott. Catherine never invited her over again, since she did not understand Marta. Then Catherine wrote a letter to a journalist about Szaba, and he said that he could not find her which meant Catherine would not be able to see her. Years later, she was introduced a colleague on another newspaper. This woman's family took in a Hungarian boy who wrote a book on his experiences. The woman gave it to her, but she never read it.
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In any part of the story, was the word "Halott" explained?
ReplyDeleteOddly enough, no. But i assumed that it meant that the girl was dead or that it was her actual name since Marta started crying and Catherine became very angry and upset.
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