Flaw (17 page)

The general will not stop at anything, that much is sure. He seeks to carry out his duty conscientiously, then immediately to cast from his memory the details of what it fell to him to do. He would have found it especially intolerable to be called upon to explain his actions. But is he not afraid after all that at some point in the future some higher authority will take an interest in the matter of the shelter beneath the cinema? Perhaps someone will open it one day? Perhaps their spades will encounter
the remains of fabric and padding, eaten away by quicklime? But what higher authority, for goodness' sake, and what future? The true nature of the highest authority is permanent absence. Besides, where would they come from, when here even the director of the local government offices is missing, and a few yards from the square the space is blocked off by city landscapes painted on sheets of plywood?

Now things must move faster, as the general too is in a hurry. Having already been derailed from its course, the story has entered on a different track. The same one that every story ends up on unavoidably sooner or later, because it is the track of the world, always ready to give direction to whatever is moving without purpose or destination. In the quiet of early evening, the story is already heading straight towards violent and cruel events, as if there were no one to take care of it. If this story belongs to me, I am powerless to change its course or turn things back. But insofar as I have any influence at all, this is the last moment to consign to oblivion all that the refugees spoiled with their incursion; to forgive them their inconvenient existence and their resulting tendency to occupy space; to justify the persistent efforts of these characters to disappear somewhere, the beating of their hearts, and the spasms of their defenseless stomachs. Things have gone so far that I have no other way out than to admit I belong to this crowd, and to shoulder the troublesome burden of affiliation. There is no escaping it.

The glow of evening heralds an approaching finale. It pulses
beneath closed eyelids. The heavens will flame crimson until at some dark moment stars appear. It is only a certain quantity of silver nails, embedded in the fabric covering the vault and needed only to hold up the folds of satin, or rather of cheap, shiny sateen, the same material used in the linings of the overcoats. The nails have been hammered in firmly and permanently, yet all the same they can never be properly counted: they hide in the folds then wink mockingly from the edges first of one constellation, then another, proving that arbitrary boundaries mean nothing. The familiar names of groups of stars are nevertheless scrupulously listed on the invoices, without any reference to symbolic meanings: in the columns for amount and type of material, every metaphor is converted into small change. Does this mean that the stars are used only for successive, ever more artful abuses – that their very existence creates the groundwork for subterfuge? Are they otherwise unnecessary? Far from it. If the return of the silver nails were to be demanded in strict accordance with the invoice, there would be nothing to hold up the vast sheet of dark-colored fabric that is the lining of the sky. It would inevitably come fluttering down, revealing a structure of rough pinewood boards. But no one would even see it. The whole world would be thrashing about in the shiny folds, amid a fearful din of confused voices and scattered thoughts that would be lying everywhere like broken glass.

In the dingy warehouse the master craftsmen are calmly playing cards for a diamond necklace taken from the notary's
safe; it lies on the table in an open velvet-lined box. No one is going to claim it now. They have no worries about their own business. All the principle installations are in their hands and all will continue to turn a profit for them. Only their perpetually smoldering anger at being condemned to a life without women suddenly ignites within them as they fling down a king on top of the queen of hearts. The masters regard their clandestine exploitation of the back area as their one and only privilege, barely sufficient compensation for the incomprehensible restrictions placed upon them; they will not stop at anything to protect it. Anyone who sought to prevent them would have to be prepared for the worst – for a mad escalation of losses, and destruction that can scarcely be imagined before it happens. It makes no difference to them whether anything remains intact, and the only thing they will insist on is the principle of having their own way. Anyone who cares about more than profits and losses, in turn, has to bend beneath their steadfast indifference, since in indifference lies strength, while in attachment there is only weakness. If this is my story, I am forced to negotiate, to accede to humiliating compromises, to make concessions, without losing hope.

From a certain point of view there are no made-up stories. Towards the end, all appearances to the contrary, each one turns out to be true and inevitable. Each one is a matter of life and death. Anyone who spends time in its unseen back area has to accept all the shared and ownerless pain it contains, spilling this
way and that – because the channels through which it flows are all connected. It may be that every character curses the place that has fallen to his lot, certain of having been cheated. Events are followed with suspicion, like the questionable numbers popping out of lottery machines. But the more profound one's despair and doubt, the more powerful the belief that some almighty and impartial higher authority will render judgement, weighing wrongs and making amends for suffering. And if for some reason this is not possible? They would accept even bare-faced injustice and malicious disrespect more trustfully than helpless silence. If this is my story, they will forgive me all my transgressions. Helplessness alone will prove to be truly unforgivable, because it alone offends every one of the characters, upsetting their sense of purpose and wounding them by depriving them permanently of hope. As the ending approaches, there is no one left to take on the weight of all the failures and humiliations that were too much even for those most used to carrying them. If this tale belongs to me, at the present moment I merely squeeze my eyes shut so as not to see anything at all. Am I not the very last character of all here, the one who in the end must assume the entire pain alone?

As the conclusion of the tale draws near, the singing of guardsmen rises over the square. The singing calms anxiety and clouds thought. It brings a waking dream to the choir, and to the first floors and the balconies as well. While the guards keep singing, they dream of courage and of brotherhood unsullied
by the filth of personal calculations. The songs have no power of their own but draw strength from the stillness. They are able to ring out so resonantly because the other sounds of the world have suddenly fallen silent. A sentry watching the door to the shelter pokes the snow sleepily with one of the walking sticks confiscated from the refugees. Let's say he happens to have been issued the white cane. Yet this is of no significance – there will not be any further occasion for him to use it to impose compliance. At some point he is bound to be surprised by the oppressive quiet in the place where previously there had been a muffled hum of voices. He cautiously opens the sealed entrance and looks into the cellar that his commander ordered him to guard. It is empty, completely empty from one end to the other; no one is there, though the air is thick with the smell of mothballs and breathing. The sentry cannot believe his eyes. He calls his comrades and his superiors, he calls the policeman, he runs to the general himself. Those who were confined there have vanished without a trace, even the children from the orphanage, even the notary's maid – yet the padlock on the door was untouched. Encircled by his staff, the general examines the padlock closely as an incomprehensible curiosity. Each person separately has the fleeting impression they are dreaming, for there is no other way to explain what they are seeing with their own eyes. But common sense is unable to rebel in the face of the evident.

Nothing can be reversed; what is done cannot be undone.
A disturbing sense of unease sweeps over all those involved, as if they suddenly felt someone's eyes on their backs just when they were sure that what they were about to do was no one else's business. They are immediately struck by some unspecified fear, even though they had already gotten used to other people being afraid of them. After all, everyone knows that only the dead pass no judgment and acquiesce humbly to everything. So now it must be accepted that an action which would in no way have offended the dead might well be denounced by the survivors. They cannot be expected to forgive it all easily: the deliberately sealed vent, the spades, and the sacks of quicklime prepared ahead of time. Their outrage, it would seem, broke free at the same time they themselves did; it will take an unpredictable course, and each of the guardsmen wonders where else it will lead.

At the general's request, the residents were questioned with regard to the disappearance of the refugees. But here too the inquiry ground to a halt. No one had seen a thing, though as the general kept repeating, and after him the policeman and the guards, it wasn't possible that so very many witnesses should have failed to notice the departure of such a large crowd. Then someone was lying, the general was forced to conclude, and someone perhaps was guilty of treachery. What if the treachery were to go unpunished; what if the guilty party avoided being unmasked and, even worse, stood there saluting the general with a click of the heels as if nothing had happened? Yet the
details of this affair, the question of the unaccountable disappearance of so many people at once, baffled the minds of all those who attempted to fathom it. If this is my story, I will allow them to drop the matter, exhausted as they are by their futile inquiries, as a mystery that for them cannot be solved.

Evidence of the fleeting presence of the refugees has remained only in the pictures taken by the photographer. Here a little girl looks directly at the lens; only her eyes can be seen from behind the pillow she holds in her arms. Here people with empty jars form a line for water, snaking round the shut-off faucet; here the orphans in patched clothing reach for a basket of rolls, licking their lips in anticipation. In the background is the crowd, always the same, dragging their suitcases along and stooping under the weight, sitting on them, not allowing themselves easily to be separated from their belongings. If these people were asked their opinion now, they would surely agree that it would have been best not to take any luggage with them at all. But who could have known ahead of time, they would add with a shrug. They would not have liked the photographs taken on the square, where they had found themselves against their will and where their feelings had been trampled underfoot. For sure they would have wanted the photographer to destroy the pictures along with the negatives. If they had found out that, on the contrary, he intended to sell them for a handsome sum to certain astute press agencies, they would have been indignant. Seeking to prove that those pictures contained images taken out
of context, false and of no value, they could have shown numerous private photos from their wallets, on which, it had to be admitted, they came out incomparably better. And the earlier pictures, in which they appeared in the fullness of their good looks, good health, and prosperity, would be a proper memento of them. Their eyes gazed into the future without a trace of terror; their clothing was brand-new and not yet disheveled by fate. This is what ought to have remained as their visiting card in the present story when they themselves had already left it. But from the very beginning the refugees' opinions were not consulted in any matter, and now that they are gone, they count for even less.

Alas, if someone had hoped that after their disappearance the frost would ease up or the guards would turn back into schoolboys, subsequent developments were to disappoint them. It was the armbands on the school coats that created the guards, and they are easier to put on than to take off. Now the threads of local stories, which in the view of the residents ought to have been the most important, had suddenly been snapped off at a random moment as if in themselves they were of no significance. The notary had managed to drag himself out of bed in the morning, but he had not even made it to his office. The policeman had begun his rounds but hadn't finished them. The maid had prepared lunch, but the family had not gathered round the table. After disposing of the remnants of the foreign story that had encroached on the local tale, the latter ought to
have continued smoothly on. It would have been nice to believe that nothing had happened. Or that what had taken place was a transitory and inconsequential interruption in the course of more important concerns, such as family life, work, and secret passions. But the desired return to the point of departure ceased being possible when the story of the notary lost its original cohesiveness. After the obstacle that blocked its advance was removed, the story itself no longer had any meaning. This slackening off makes itself felt ever more acutely. The notary falls asleep in an armchair, and his desires yield to the forces of inertia, like the aforementioned soldiers wearied by a hopeless fight who finally leave their fortress under a white flag of surrender. The policeman, who from morning till evening has done everything he could, dozes off on a kitchen stool while the water cools in the basin in which he is soaking his corns. The singing stopped some time ago, but it still rings in the ears. The residents won't even notice when they drift into the sleep they emerged from in the morning. Bodies in one place, clothing in another – arranged tidily on hangers, and no longer needed here. An unbroken quiet will take over, like inside a glass ball in which, after a vigorous shaking, everything returns to its place.

In the meantime, however, the general is unable to regain his composure. What he ordered to be locked up should have remained so, period. The general is not fond of surprises, especially those that require additional explanations, because as a seasoned soldier he is well aware that additional explanations
never make sense and serve only to pull the wool over people's eyes. All he can do is blame the sentries. The absence of the crowd is nothing but a special form of presence, and what has changed is in essence of secondary importance. Since the refugees are no longer here, they must be somewhere else, that much is obvious. But if such is the case, where are all those people now? Where is the woman in the white fur coat, where is the pair of newlyweds, their wedding outfits sprinkled with confetti? That the general does not know. Nor does he know where the schoolgirl in pigtails is, along with her elderly grandmother, who wanted all along just to sit down comfortably somewhere, nothing more; or the blind man with the violin in a case. And above all the family that in the confusion had lost its newborn baby. If the general wanted an answer from me to the question that was tormenting him, he might receive one, but he would not believe it. I close my mouth and will not say a word to the general. For sure? What if I am pressured? What if a peremptory command is issued, backed up with the irrefutable argument of a cold gun barrel on the back of my neck? I admit this would come as a shock. But even then, no. For the privilege of not opening one's mouth it is worth paying any price. To the very end there is hope, however slim, that resistance will triumph. That by some miracle the mechanism, imperfect by its very nature, will once again jam before the fatal click of the firing pin. As the story comes to an end only one thing is worth counting on: the failure of the rules, and a beneficent confusion
that will blunt the inexorability with which effect follows on the heels of cause.