Joseph Roth - Confession of a Murderer

“Good,” he said, and put the paper into his pocket. “Now, which do you choose?”

Would to God that I had then said what was on the tip of my tongue; namely the simple words: Home! To my mother! But at that moment the door opened and a police officer stepped in, a brilliant figure with a shining saber and a polished holster and a dazzling glance of fire and ice. And only because of him, and without looking at the other man, I said suddenly: “I want to join the police!”

Those thoughtless words, my friends, decided my fate. Only much later did I learn that words are mightier than deeds — and I often laugh when I hear the well-worn phrase: “Not words, but deeds!” How impotent deeds are! A word endures, a deed perishes! Even a dog can perform a deed, but only a man can speak a word. A deed, an action, is a phantom compared with the reality, even the abstract reality of a word. Action stands roughly in the same relation to words, as the two-dimensional shadow in the cinema to the three-dimensional living man, or, if you like it, as the photograph to the original. That, too, is the reason why I became a murderer. But that comes later.

Meanwhile, I signed another paper in the room of an official whom I had not seen before. I cannot remember exactly what was in that second paper. The official was an elderly man with a beard so imposing, so long and so silvery, that his face above it seemed tiny and unimportant, as though the face had grown up from the beard and not the beard down from the face. When I had signed, he gave me his soft, fat, flabby hand and said: “I hope you will soon feel at home with us and grow accustomed to our ways. You will proceed now to Niijn-Novgorod. Here is the address at which you are to report. Good-bye!”

And just as I reached the door, he called out: “Stop!” I walked back to his desk. “Pay attention to this, young man,” he said, now almost angrily “Keep silent! Listen! Keep silent! Listen!” He laid his finger against his bearded lips and waved with his hand.

Thenceforward I was a member of the police — a member of the Ochrana, my friends! I began to forge plans for my revenge. I had power. I had hate. I was a good agent. After Lakatos I no longer dared to enquire. He will often reappear in my story But spare me the details, which I ought now to tell you, of what I did during the next few years. There is enough that is horrible and repulsive in my life which must yet be related.

So, with your permission, I will omit any detailed account of the mean and loathsome things which I was forced to do during the years following my enlistment in the police. You all know what the Ochrana was. Some among you may even have suffered under it yourselves. In any case, there is no need for me to describe it to you. You know now what I became. And if that is too much for you to bear with, please say so, immediately, and I will go. Has anyone anything against me? Gentlemen, I beg of you to speak out. But quickly. And I will leave you.

But none of us spoke a word. Only our host said: “Semjon Semjonovitch, since you have already begun to tell your story, and since we all of us here have surely something on our consciences, I ask you, in the name of us all, to continue.” Golubchik took another gulp from his glass and then resumed:

I was no fool, in spite of my youth, and so I was very soon regarded favorably by my superiors. But first — I forgot to tell you — I wrote a letter to my mother. I told her that the Prince had received me kindly and that he sent his respects to her. He had obtained for me — so I went on to write — a wonderful position in the employ of the State, and from now on I would send her ten rubles a month. There was no need for her to thank the Prince for this money.

When I wrote this letter, my friends, I knew already that I would never see my mother again, and I was also, strange as it may seem, very sad at the thought. But something else, something stronger — so it seemed to me at the time — was calling to me, stronger even than the love for my mother, and that something was the hatred I felt for my false brother. My hatred was as loud as a trumpet, and my love for my mother was as tender and soft as a harp. You will understand, my friends.

So I became, young as I was, a first-class agent. I cannot tell you all the despicable things which I did during that time. But some among you may still perhaps remember the case of the young Jewish Socialist revolutionary, Salomon Komrover, better known as Komorov. Well, that was one of the foulest thing I ever did in my life.

This Salomon Abramovitch Komrover was a youth from Kharkov. Politics had never held the slightest interest for him. As is befitting for a Jew, he studied the Talmud and the Torah diligently, hoping one day to become a sort of Rabbi. His sister, however, was a student; she studied philosophy in Petersburg, she mixed with the Socialist revolutionaries, she wished, as was the fashion at that time, to free the people — and one day she was arrested. Whereupon Salomon Komrover, her brother, went immediately to the police and announced that he, and he alone, was responsible for the dangerous activities of his sister. Good! He, too, was arrested. And during the night I was put into his cell. It was in a prison in Kiev. I can even remember the exact time — a few minutes before midnight. When I entered — that is, when I was thrown in — Salomon Komrover was pacing up and down; he seemed not to have noticed me. “Good evening,” I said, and he did not answer me. I behaved, according to instructions, as though I were a hardened criminal and lay down with a sigh on my bed. After a time, Komrover, too, ceased to wander about and also went and sat on his bed. I was used to that. “Political?” I asked, as usual. “Yes!” he said. “How so?” I went on. Well, he was young and stupid, and he told me the whole story. But I, still thinking of my false brother, the young Prince Krapotkin, and of my revenge, wondered whether here, at last, was not the opportunity to cool my ever-burning hatred. And I began to persuade the unsuspecting young Komrover that I knew a way out for him and his sister. That was, that he should say that the young Prince was a friend of his sister’s, and then, so I told the terrified youth, once a name like Krapotkin’s had been brought into the case, there was nothing more to be feared.

Actually, I had no idea that the young Prince was really involved in revolutionary circles and that for a long time he had been kept under close observation by my colleagues. So my hatred and my desire for vengeance had one might say, met with a certain amount of luck. For hear what happened. A few days after the police had arrested Komrover, they brought into our cell a very handsome young man in the uniform of the Imperial Engineers. It was my false half-brother, the young Prince Krapotkin.

I greeted him, but of course he did not recognize me. With insidious persistence I began to worm my way into his confidence. Komrover, who lay on his bed in a corner, now held no more interest for me. And as Lakatos had once done with me, I began also to do with the Prince, luring information out of him, one thing after another, betrayal after betrayal; only with more success than Lakatos had had with me. Yes, I even asked the young Prince whether he still remembered the snuffboxes which his father used to give to his guests. That startled the young man; he reddened, I could see it even in the semi-darkness of the cell. That is just what happened: the man, who had perhaps plotted to overthrow the Czar, grew red when I reminded him of his boyhood escapades. From then on he willingly gave me all the information I asked. I learned that, as a direct result of that ridiculous affair with the snuffboxes, which had one day come to light, the youth had felt himself driven to adopt a hostile attitude towards law and order. Like so many young men of his time, he had used the fact that his vulgar little pilferings had been discovered as an excuse for becoming a so-called revolutionary and for attacking the existing organization of society. He was still handsome, and when he spoke, and even when he smiled with his white teeth, the gloomy cell in which we were imprisoned grew brighter. His uniform was faultless in cut. Faultless in shape, too, was his face, his mouth, his teeth, his eyes. I hated him.