She never meant the door to be a riddle
Emerence keeps the building, sweeps the street, and will not let the narrator into her apartment. The narrator is a writer who thinks that if she is patient and decent, the door will open and the two of them will have understood each other. I recognized that bargain. I have made it. The book is about how insulting it is.
Emerence is not a symbol of folk wisdom, and she is not a monster. She is a woman who survived things she does not owe to a younger writer's essay. She loves the dog. She shows up when people are dying. She also decides, alone, what anyone is allowed to see, and she is cruel when that decision is challenged. The narrator loves her and uses her and writes about her, and the writing does not cancel the using. Szabó lets both of those stay true. I kept wanting a scene where someone apologizes the right amount and the friendship is repaired. The book has no interest in that scene.
When the door finally opens, it is not because Emerence changed her mind. It is because she can no longer hold the house against the street. I will not describe what is inside. I will say I felt ashamed of how badly I had wanted to look. A locked room in a novel is usually a promise to the reader. This one was a promise Emerence made to herself, and I was not the person it was for.