The Lair (The Margellos World Republic of Letters) (22 page)

At last, the metallic door opens gently to the side. A thin, little man in a silken, striped prisoner’s uniform, striped cap over his shaved head, enters stealthily into the room. Heavy, thick, silk, elegant pajamas, with a skullcap, the beret of a wealthy retiree. On his feet, slippers made of felted fabric.

The general clicks his heels in a military salute, comes out from behind the armchair, moves respectfully to the side, making room for his superior.

The little man sits hastily in the general’s armchair, and the general moves to the chair to the left of the detainee. The chief pulls a golden pen from the shirt pocket of his pajamas, extends it to the
general, pushes a thick, black folder across the desk in the general’s direction.

He smiles at the detainee, who doesn’t raise her head. “We know each other, don’t we?”

She keeps her head down, her gaze on the metallic floor.

“I’d prefer it if you took off that stinking kerchief.”

Lu slowly pulls the kerchief off her shaved head and lets it fall at the foot of the chair. She stares, resigned, at David Ga
par, the cousin of her mother, comrade Serafim. Eva Kirschner’s husband. Peter’s father.

“I think you know what this is about.”

Having gotten no answer, the prosecutor makes a quick sign to the general, who pulls a pack of Kent cigarettes and a golden lighter out of his breast pocket. He sets them on the desk. David Ga
par pulls out a cigarette, the general lights it, David takes a deep drag, once, three times, with the thirst of someone who’s been kept far away from such pleasures for a long time. The general pushes the ashtray from the edge of the desk toward the center, to the right of the chief.

“You come from a trustworthy family. Your parents were on our Party’s side after, and maybe even before the war. In spite of their bourgeois origins and their wealth, comrades Serafim are people of confidence.”

The general makes notes, conscientiously.

“They’re not the ones in question. Nor their daughter. We’re talking about the fugitive Augustin Gora. The son of former exploiters, owners of vast forests in Bukovina. Your husband.”

Lu looks at him, unmoved, shivering in the too short fur.

The general unbuttons his jacket once again, as well as the buttons to the neck of his shirt.

“Have you divorced this man?”

“No.”

A prompt, whispered answer.

“Hm, that surprises me. I don’t think your parents were too happy with this marriage. Not that . . . no, I’m not referring to
ethnicity. The Party doesn’t discriminate among people; your family rid itself of the horrors of the ghettos and the arrogance of the chosen people, but I don’t think they approved of the choice. And I doubt they’re happy to have a son-in-law who ran away to the capitalists.

Lu looks at her relative, silently, trembling.

“Maybe Professor Gora thought that he’d received a passport on the merit of his intellect; maybe he hasn’t understood that we gave him the passport. Not because he deserved it, but because that was what we wanted.”

The prosecutor Ga
par emphasized the word
we,
gazing at the general. The general was writing, concentrating on the paper.

“I hope you’re not intending to follow him.”

“No.”

“Very good. This doesn’t, however, excuse you from your duty to us. You’ve refused to answer the questions. You could be accused as an accomplice. Have you decided to answer?”

“No,” whispered Lu, clutching her fur.

Cousin David had filled half the ashtray.

“While he was here, Augustin Gora participated in clandestine meetings. In those meetings, books by Nazis, Legionnaires, Trotsky-ists, Liberals, and Masons were discussed. Even books by Quakers. Decadent and religious literature was read. We know exactly who participated and when …”

Lu was silent; the general was filling his pen with ink.

“Is your eminent husband a mystic? Or is Mr. Gora a liberal propagandist?”

“He isn’t,” whispered Mrs. Gora.

“Yes, he is! He is all of those things. He read the Bible. He commented on the Scriptures. Even in high school. He would perorate in favor of Saint Peter. ‘Peter’s sect,’ he would say. He debated
The Rights of Man.
He commented on Confucius. We have proof. Old and new. Not just from one, or a few of his former colleagues, but from many.”

The prosecutor Ga
par makes a short signal; the general rises,
pours something from the carafe on the desk into the interrogator’s glass; David sips the water of life, staring at the bareheaded detainee. Lu wets her burned lips with her tongue, clutching the short and expensive fur.

“And there’s another thing … He wrote a letter for a student, a letter to American senators. Regarding an American scholarship. We didn’t approve the passport. The student had dubious, idealist leanings. He talked too much, much too much. Conceited, arrogant, a know-it-all, he thought himself untouchable. We didn’t give him a passport. And we’re never going to. Your husband wrote the letter and gave him the addresses of the senators. And the address of a fugitive Legionnaire, who is now a celebrated professor of mystic studies. Moreover, Mr. Augustin Gora brought with him provocative, antisocialist, antihumanist documents, which were then played on Radio
opirli{a.
*
You know what I’m talking about.”

“I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do. The capitalist gossip station, Radio Free Europe. You know it, Ludmila Serafim, you know it! Or is it Ludmila Gora? Or maybe Ga
par? I’ve heard you like your men a little wet behind the ears.”

The prosecutor slams his small fists on the metal table, once and again, and again, unable to hold back his anger.

“You know and you’re going to admit it! You’re going to admit it, Ludmila, I assure you.”

He leans toward the ashtray, the cigarette is out, he takes it, he throws it, hysterically, onto the metal floor.

He gets up. The general follows, officiously, a step away. The felted boots of the superior are silent while the general’s boots carry a deafening tread.

Lu takes her head in her hands, stiff, straight, in the metal chair, her shaved head, her narrow, pale face serried in between her green hands. She doesn’t move. An effigy. Her face hollow, head shaved, her gloves covering her ears. Petrified.

Gora shakes a fist in the air, the pillow falls over the lamp on the nightstand; the lamp falls with a crash to the floor; the somnambulist twists, dizzily, wet with transpiration, awake.

“Green gloves,” he murmurs. He sits, overwhelmed, he sits, worn out, on the edge of the bed, gazing down at the lustrous, wooden floor.

No, Lu had never worn green gloves!

He makes his way toward the bathroom, puts his head under the faucet. Wet, awake, he doesn’t reach for the towel.

Peter Ga
par isn’t the only one having nightmares. The obituarist is also going through nocturnal trials.

Green gloves? Never… he pulls out the first-aid kit from under his bed, opens it, rummages around in it, pulls out Ludmila’s old, black gloves, brought over from the Homeland of his youth.

Tara calls Peter Ga
par on the phone, to remind him about the postcard. Wednesday afternoon, Peter has a meeting with the dean. The tall, blond sailor with curly hair and large, stained, freckled hands, smiles. Protectively, encouragingly. Ga
par produces the card. He retells the story about his compatriot’s assassination, about Professor Palade. Afterward, the biography of the mentor Dima, the author of an encyclopedic work. He summarizes the review that he wrote about the old man’s memoirs, the scandal provoked by the revelation of the scholar’s old political sympathies.