Darkness at Noon (24 page)

Though only blinkingly, he could now look Gletkin in the face. He saw again the broad red scar on the clean-shaven skull.

“... excepting only one point which I consider essential,” said Rubashov.

“Namely?” asked Gletkin, again become stiff and correct.

Now, of course, he thinks I mean the
tête-à-tête
with the boy, which never took place, thought Rubashov. That is what matters to
him
: to put the dots on the i’s—even if the dots look more like smudges. But, from his point of view, he may be right. ...

“The point which matters to me,” he said aloud, “is this. It is true that according to the convictions I held at the time, I spoke of the necessity of acting by violence. But by this I meant political action, and not individual terrorism.”

“So you preferred civil war?” said Gletkin.

“No. Mass action,” said Rubashov.

“Which, as you know yourself, would inevitably have led to civil war. Is that the distinction on which you place so much value?”

Rubashov did not answer. That was indeed the point which, a moment ago, had seemed so important—now it also had become indifferent to him. In fact, if the opposition could attain victory against the Party bureaucracy and its immense apparatus only by means of a civil war—why was this alternative better than to smuggle poison into the cold snack of No. 1, whose disappearance would perhaps cause the régime to collapse quicker and less bloodily? In what way was political murder less honourable than political mass killing? That unfortunate boy had evidently mistaken his meaning—but was there not more consistency in the boy’s mistake than in his own behaviour during the last few years?

He who opposes a dictatorship must accept civil war as a means. He who recoils from civil war must give up opposition and accept the dictatorship.

These simple sentences, which he had written nearly a lifetime ago, in a polemic against the “moderates”, contained his own condemnation. He felt in no state to continue the argument with Gletkin. The consciousness of his complete defeat filled him with a kind of relief; the obligation to continue the fight, the burden of responsibility were taken from him; the drowsiness of before returned. He felt the hammering in his head only as a faint echo, and for a few seconds it seemed to him that behind the desk sat, not Gletkin, but No. 1, with that look of strangely understanding irony he had given Rubashov as they shook hands at their last leave-taking. An inscription came into his mind which he had read on the gateway of the cemetery at Errancis where Saint-Just, Robespierre and their sixteen beheaded comrades lay buried It consisted of one word;

Dormir
—to sleep.

From that moment onwards, Rubashov’s recollection again became hazy. He had probably fallen asleep for the second time—for a few minutes or seconds; but this time he did not remember having dreamed. He must have been woken by Gletkin to sign the statement. Gletkin passed him his fountain pen which, Rubashov noticed with slight disgust, was still warm from his pocket. The stenographer had ceased writing; there was complete silence in the room. The lamp had also stopped humming and spread a normal, rather faded light, for dawn appeared already at the window.

Rubashov signed.

The feeling of relief and irresponsibility remained, though he had forgotten the reason for it; then, drunk with sleep, he read through the statement in which he confessed to having incited young Kieffer to murder the leader of the Party. For a few seconds he had the feeling that it was all a grotesque misunderstanding; he had an impulse to cross out his signature and to tear up the document; then everything came back to him again, he rubbed his pince-nez on his sleeve and handed the paper over the desk to Gletkin.

The next thing he could remember was, that he was walking through the corridor again, escorted by the uniformed giant who had conducted him to Gletkin’s room an immeasurable time ago. Half asleep, he passed the barber’s room and the cellar steps; his fears on the way there occurred to him; he wondered a little at himself and smiled vaguely into the distance. Then he heard the cell door bang behind him and sank down on his bunk with a feeling of physical bliss; he saw the grey morning light on the window-panes with the familiar piece of newspaper stuck to the frame, and fell asleep at once.

When his cell door opened again, it was not yet quite daylight; he could hardly have slept an hour. He thought at first that the breakfast was being brought; but outside stood, instead of the old warder, again the giant in uniform. And Rubashov understood that he had to return to Gletkin and that the cross-examination would go on.

He rubbed cold water on forehead and neck at the washbasin, put on his pince-nez, and again started the march through the corridors, past barber’s room and cellar stairs, with steps which swayed slightly without his knowing it.

From then onwards the veil of mist over Rubashov’s memory became thicker. Later, he could only remember separate fragments of his dialogue with Gletkin, which extended over several days and nights, with short intervals of an hour or two. He could not even say exactly how many days and nights it had been; they must have spread over a week. Rubashov had heard of this method of complete physical crushing of the accused, in which usually two or three examining magistrates relieved each other in turn in a continuous cross-examination. But the difference with Gletkin’s method was that he never had himself relieved, and exacted as much from himself as from Rubashov. Thus he deprived Rubashov of his last psychological resort: the pathos of the maltreated, the moral superiority of the victim.

After forty-eight hours, Rubashov had lost the sense of day and night. When, after an hour’s sleep, the giant shook him awake, he was no longer able to decide whether the grey light at the window was that of dawn or of evening. The corridor, with the barber’s shop, cellar steps and barred door, was always lit by the same stale light of the electric bulbs. If, during the hearing, it gradually grew lighter at the window, until Gletkin finally turned out the lamp, it was morning. If it got darker, and Gletkin turned the lamp on, it was evening.

If Rubashov got hungry during the examination, Gletkin let tea and sandwiches be fetched for him. But he seldom had any appetite; that is to say, he had fits of ravenous hunger, but when the bread stood before him, he was overcome by nausea Gletkin never ate in his presence, and Rubashov for some inexplicable reason found it humiliating to ask for food. Anything which touched on physical functions was humiliating to Rubashov in the presence of Gletkin, who never showed signs of fatigue, never yawned, never smoked, seemed neither to eat nor to drink, and always sat behind his desk in the same correct position, in the same stiff uniform with creaking cuffs. The worst degradation for Rubashov was when he had to ask permission to relieve himself. Gletkin would let him be conducted to the lavatory by the warder on duty, usually the giant, who then waited for him outside. Once Rubashov fell asleep behind the closed door. From then onwards the door always remained ajar.

His condition during the hearing alternated between apathy and an unnatural, glassy wakefulness. Only once did he actually become unconscious; he often felt on the brink of it, but a feeling of pride always saved him at the last minute. He would light a cigarette, blink, and the hearing would go on.

At times he was surprised that he was able to stand it. But he knew that lay opinion set far too narrow limits to men’s capacity of physical resistance; that it had no idea of their astonishing elasticity. He had heard of cases of prisoners who had been kept from sleeping for fifteen to twenty days, and who had stood it.

At his first hearing by Gletkin, when he had signed his deposition, he had thought that the whole thing was over. At the second hearing it became clear to him, that it was only the beginning of it. The accusation consisted of seven points, and he had as yet confessed to only one. He had believed that he had drunk the cup of humiliation to the dregs. Now he was to find that powerlessness had as many grades as power; that defeat could become as vertiginous as victory, and that its depths were bottomless. And, step by step, Gletkin forced him down the ladder.

He could, of course, have made it simpler for himself. He had only to sign everything, lock, stock and barrel, or to deny everything in a lump—and he would have peace. A queer, complicated sense of duty prevented him giving in to this temptation. Rubashov’s life had been so filled by one absolute idea that he had known the phenomenon “temptation” only theoretically. Now temptation accompanied him through the indistinguishable days and nights, on his swaying walk through the corridor, in the white light of Gletkin’s lamp: the temptation, which consisted of the single word written on the cemetery of the defeated: Sleep.

It was difficult to withstand, for it was a quiet. and peaceful temptation; without gaudy paint, and not carnal. It was dumb; it did not use arguments. All the arguments were on Gletkin’s side; it merely repeated the words which had been written on the barber’s message: “Die in silence.”

Occasionally, in the moments of apathy which alternated with transparent wakefulness, Rubashov’s lips moved, but Gletkin could not hear the words. Then Gletkin would clear his voice and shove his cuffs into place; and Rubashov would rub his pince-nez on his sleeve and nod bewilderedly and drowsily; for he had identified the tempter with that dumb partner whom he had believed already forgotten, and who had no business in this room, of all places: the grammatical fiction. ...

“So you deny having negotiated with representatives of a foreign Power on behalf of the opposition, in order to overthrow the present regime with their help? You contest the charge that you were ready to pay direct or indirect support of your plans with territorial concessions—that is, by the sacrifice of certain provinces of our country?”

Yes, Rubashov did contest this; and Gletkin repeated to him the day and occasion of his conversation with the foreign diplomat in question—and Rubashov again remembered that little, unimportant scene, which had bobbed up in his memory while Gletkin had been reading the accusation. Sleepy and confused, he looked at Gletkin and knew it was hopeless to try to explain that scene to him. It had taken place after a diplomatic lunch in the legation in B. Rubashov sat next to corpulent Herr von Z., Second Councillor to the Embassy of the very same State where, a few months ago, Rubashov had had his teeth knocked out—and pursued a most entertaining conversation with him about a certain rare variety of guinea-pig, which had been bred both on Herr von Z.’s estate and on that of Rubashov’s father; in all probability, Rubashov’s and von Z.’s respective fathers had even exchanged specimens with each other in their time.

“What has now become of your father’s guinea-pigs?” asked Herr von Z.

“They were slaughtered during the Revolution and eaten,” said Rubashov.

“Ours are now made into
ersatz
fat,” said Herr von Z. with melancholy. He made no effort to hide his contempt for the new régime in his country, which presumably had only by accident omitted to kick him out of his post so far.

“You and I are really in a similar situation,” he said comfortably and emptied his liqueur glass. “We both have outlived our time. Guinea-pig breeding is finished with; we live in the century of the Plebeian.”

“But don’t forget I am on the side of the Plebeian,” Rubashov said smilingly.

“That is not what I meant,” said Herr von Z. “If it comes to the point, I also agree with the programme of our manikin with the black mustache—if he only wouldn’t shriek so. After all, one can only be crucified in the name of one’s own faith.” They sat a while longer, drinking coffee, and at the second cup Herr von Z. said: “If you should once again make a revolution in your country, Mr. Rubashov, and depose your No. 1, then take better care of the guinea-pigs.”

“That is most unlikely to happen,” said Rubashov, and after a pause, added: “... although one seems to count with this possibility amongst your friends?”

“Most certainly,” Herr von Z. had replied in the same easy tone of voice. “After what your last trials gave us to hear, something rather funny must be going on in your country.”

“Then, amongst your friends, there must also be some idea of what steps would be taken on your part in this very unlikely eventuality?” Rubashov had asked.

Whereupon Herr von Z. answered very precisely, almost as though he had been expecting this question: “Lie low. But there is a price.”

They were standing beside the table, with their coffee cups in their hands. “And has the price, too, been decided upon already?” Rubashov asked, feeling himself that his light tone sounded rather artificial.

“Certainly,” answered Herr von Z.; and he named a certain wheat-growing province inhabited by a national minority. Then they had taken leave of each other. ...

Rubashov had not thought of this scene for years—or at least had not consciously recalled it. Idle chatter over black coffee and brandy—how could one explain to Gletkin its complete insignificance? Rubashov looked sleepily at Gletkin sitting opposite him, as stony and expressionless as ever. No, it was impossible to start talking to him about guinea-pigs. This Gletkin understood nothing of guinea-pigs. He had never drunk coffee with Herren von Z.’s. It occurred to Rubashov how haltingly Gletkin had read, how often with the wrong intonation. He was of proletarian origin, and had learnt to read and write when already grown-up. He would never understand that a conversation beginning with guinea-pigs could end God knew where.

“So you admit the conversation took place,” Gletkin said.

“It was completely harmless,” Rubashov said tiredly, and knew that Gletkin had pushed him a step further down the ladder.

“As harmless,” said Gletkin, “as your purely theoretic dissertations to young Kieffer on the necessity of the removal of the leader by violence?”

Rubashov rubbed his spectacles on his sleeve. Had the conversation been really so harmless as he tried to make himself believe? Certainly he had neither “negotiated” nor come to any agreement; and comfortable Herr von Z. had had no kind of official authority to do so. The whole thing could at most be considered as what was known in diplomatic language as “taking soundings”. But this kind of sounding had been a link in the logical chain of his ideas of that time; besides, it fitted in with certain Party traditions. Had not the old leader, shortly before the Revolution, used the services of the General Staff of that same country in order to be able to return from exile and lead the Revolution to victory? Had he not later, in the first peace treaty, abandoned certain territories as a price for being left in peace? “The old man sacrifices space to gain time,” a witty friend of Rubashov’s had remarked. The forgotten, “harmless” conversation fitted into the chain so well that it was now difficult for Rubashov to see it otherwise than through Gletkin’s eyes. This same Gletkin, who read clumsily, whose brain worked just as clumsily and arrived at simple, graspable results—perhaps precisely because he understood nothing of guinea-pigs. ... How, by the way, did Gletkin know of this conversation? Either it had been overheard, which in the circumstances was rather unlikely; or else the comfortable Herr von Z. had been acting as
agent provocateur
—God only knew for what complicated reasons. Such things had happened often enough before. A trap had been laid for Rubashov—a trap planned according to the primitive mentality of Gletkin and No. 1; and he, Rubashov, had promptly walked into it. ...