John Verdon: Shut Your Eyes Tight

It was a famous scene from a famous movie, but as Gurney scanned the faces in the room, he saw no sign that anyone recognized it. In the scene, an older man is interrogating a younger man.

The young man is eager to work for the Irgun, a radical organization fighting to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine at the end of World War II. He presents himself boastfully as a demolitions expert, seasoned in combat, who acquired his expertise with dynamite by fighting the Nazis in the Warsaw Ghetto. He claims that after killing many Nazis he was captured and imprisoned in the Auschwitz concentration camp, where he was assigned to a routine cleaning job.

The older man wants to know more. He asks him several specific questions about his story, the camp, his duties.

The young man’s version of events begins to fall apart when the interrogator reveals that there was no dynamite available in the Warsaw Ghetto. As his heroic narrative crumbles, he’s forced to admit that he learned what he knows about dynamite from his real job in the camp, which was blasting holes in the ground big enough to hold the thousands of bodies of his fellow prisoners, being killed each day in the gas chambers. Beyond that, the older man makes him admit, even more degradingly, that his other job was picking the gold fillings out of the mouths of the corpses. And finally, collapsing in tears of rage and shame, the young man admits that his captors repeatedly raped him.

The raw truth is exposed-along with his desperation to redeem himself. The scene concludes with his induction into the Irgun.

Gurney switched off the tape player.

“So,” he said, turning to the thirty-nine faces, “what was that all about?”

“Every interview should be that simple,” said Falcone dismissively.

“And that fast,” someone chimed in from the back row.

Gurney nodded. “Things in movies always seem simpler and faster than real life. But something happens in that scene that’s very interesting. When you remember it a week or a month from now, what aspect do you think will stick with you?”

“The kid getting raped,” said a broad-shouldered guy next to Falcone.

Murmurs of agreement spread around the room, encouraging other people to speak up.

“His breakdown in the interrogation.”

“Yeah, the whole macho thing evaporating.”

“It’s funny,” said the only black woman. “He starts out by telling lies about himself to get what he wants, but he ends up getting it-getting into the Irgun-by finally telling the truth. By the way, what the hell is the Irgun?”

That got the biggest laugh of the day.

“Okay,” said Gurney. “Let’s stop there and take a closer look. The naïve young guy wants to get into the organization. He tells a lot of lies to make himself look good. The smart old guy sees through it, calls him on his bullshit, drags the truth out of him. And it just so happens that the awfulness of the truth makes the kid an ideal psychological candidate for the fanatical Irgun. So they let him join. Is that a fair summary of what we just saw?”

There were various nods and grunts of agreement, some more cautious than others.

“Anyone think that’s not what we saw?”

Gurney’s Hispanic star looked troubled, which made him grin, which seemed to give her the nudge she needed. “I’m not saying that’s not what I saw. It’s a movie, I know, and in the movie what you said is probably true. But if that was real-you know, a real interview video-it might not be true.”

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” someone whispered, not quite softly enough.

“I’ll tell you what the fuck it’s supposed to mean,” she said, sparking to the challenge. “It means there’s no proof at all that the old guy actually got to the truth. So the young guy breaks down and cries and says he got fucked in the ass, excuse my language. ‘Boo-hoo, boo-hoo, I’m no big hero after all, just a pathetic little pussycat that gave the Nazis blow jobs.’ So how do we know that story isn’t just more bullshit? Maybe the pussycat is smarter than he looks.”

Christ , thought Gurney, she did it again . He decided to step into the speculative silence that followed her impressive exposition. “Which brings us to the question we started with,” he said. “ Why do we believe what we believe? As this perceptive officer here just pointed out, the interrogator in that scene may not have gotten to the truth at all. The question is, what made him think that he did?”

This new twist produced a number of reactions.

“Sometimes your gut tells you what’s what, you know?”

“Maybe the breakdown the kid had looked legit to him. Maybe you had to be there, catch the attitude.”

“Real world, the interrogator would know more stuff than he’s putting on the table. Could be the kid’s confession squares with some of that stuff, confirms it.”

Other officers offered variations on these themes. Others said nothing but listened intently to every word. A few, like Falcone, looked as if the question was making their heads hurt.

When the flow of replies seemed to be stopping, Gurney stepped in with another question. “Do you think a tough-minded interrogator could be misled once in a while by his own wishful thinking?”

A few nods, a few affirmative grunts, a few expressions of pained indecision or maybe plain indigestion.

A guy at the far end of the second row, with a fire-hydrant neck emerging from a black T-shirt, along with densely tattooed Popeye forearms, a shaved head, and tiny eyes-eyes that looked like they were being forced shut by the muscles in his cheeks-raised his hand. The fingers were curled almost into a fist. The voice was slow, deliberate, thoughtful. “You asking, do we sometimes believe what we want to believe?”

“That’s pretty much what I’m asking,” said Gurney. “What do you think?”

The squinty eyes opened a little. “I think that’s… right. That’s human nature.” He cleared his throat. “I’ll speak for myself. I’ve made mistakes because of that… factor. Not because I so much want to believe good things about people. I’ve been on the job awhile, don’t have a lot of illusions about people’s motives, what they’re willing to do.” He bared his teeth in apparent revulsion at some passing image. “I’ve seen my share of hideous shit. Lot of people in this room have seen the same shit. What I’m saying, though, is that sometimes I get an idea about the way something is, and I may not even know how much I want that idea to be right. Like, I know what went down , or I know exactly how some scumbag thinks. I know why he did what he did. Except sometimes-not often, but definitely sometimes-I don’t know shit, I just think I do. In fact, I’m positive I do. It’s like an occupational hazard.” He fell silent, gave the impression that he was considering the bleak implications of what he’d said.

Once again, for perhaps the thousandth time in his life, Gurney was reminded that his first impressions were not especially reliable.

“Thank you, Detective Beltzer,” he said to the big man, glancing at his ID tag. “That was very good.” He scanned the faces along the rows of tables and saw no signs of disagreement. Even Falcone seemed subdued.

Gurney took a minute to extract a mint from a little tin box and pop it into his mouth. Mostly he was stalling to let Beltzer’s comments resonate before going on.

“In the scene we watched,” said Gurney with new animation, “that interrogator might want to believe in the validity of the young man’s breakdown for a number of reasons. Name one.” He pointed randomly at an officer who hadn’t yet spoken.