David Bezmozgis - The Betrayers

Nina Semonovna ground her cigarette into the ashtray.

— So we have finally reached the point? You would like to be released from your obligations? On account of the terrible hardships imposed, yes?

— I would.

— And what about my part of our agreement? Am I then to be released from that?

Tankilevich eyed Nina Semonovna cautiously.

— You speak of the hardship our agreement imposed on you, but why not ask about the hardship it imposed on me? Do you think it was easy for me to engage in this subterfuge all these years? And to engage in it for the sake of a person like you?

Nina Semonovna leaned forward, her eyes lit with malice. But also with something else. A kind of gladness. He had been mistaken. The appetizer hadn’t robbed her of a stomach for the main course. Quite the contrary. It had whetted her appetite. The appetizer had made her ravenous, eager to devour something. It was likely that, even without the episode with the horrible woman, Nina Semonovna would have denied his request. But after the horrible woman, his fate was sealed. Such was his misfortune.

— You ask if I remember when you first came to this office. When I say I remember, not only do I mean that I remember it now because you have asked me to. When I say I remember, I mean that I have never forgotten. I mean that, from time to time, I still think about you, Mr. Tankilevich. I still think about you and whether I was right or wrong to enter into this arrangement with you. Because I did not like you from the first. I did not like you and I did not trust you. I thought you were an opportunist. That is still my opinion. Because of what you did for the KGB, because of how you conducted yourself in the decades after, because of the circumstances under which you came to my office, I thought you deserved nothing but scorn. Not my indulgence, not my protection, and not a kopek of the Hesed’s money.

— I see, Nina Semonovna, Tankilevich said. And ten years of my faithful attendance at the synagogue has not changed your opinion?

— Why should it? You attended only for the Hesed subsidy. What is there to admire, Mr. Tankilevich? It is batlanus, and you are a batlan. I am not happy that I had to resort to batlanus to help the synagogue, but that is our reality. Hilka complained to me that they did not have enough men and by chance you happened on my doorstep. So I extended my offer. More out of sentiment than sense. Always a mistake. As you have now proved.

— I’m sorry, but how exactly have I proved this? By making a difficult trip from Yalta to Simferopol for ten years, until my health no longer permits it? You think I did all that as part of some fraud? The fraud, Nina Semonovna, was my life until I came to you.

Nina Semonovna leaned back and emitted a throaty, contemptuous laugh. She laughed this way, deliberately, overlong, until the laugh drained to a dark smile.

— Quite a declaration, Mr. Tankilevich. You’ll forgive me if I don’t applaud. But since you put it like this, allow me to say you could have put an end to the so-called fraud of your life at any time simply by walking through this door and declaring: My name is Vladimir Tankilevich. I have reached my pensionable age. I am a Jew, descended from Jews. I was born on such and such a date, in such and such a place. Here are my supporting documents. This is what everybody else does. But this was not what you did. You came here under a shroud of secrecy and asked me to help you conceal your true identity. And in the moment I agreed to that, I became a party to this deception. I compromised myself for you. I could say for the synagogue, but this fine distinction would not count for much in the heat of a scandal. You have thought only about yourself and your situation, but allow me to enlighten you about mine. From the performance you witnessed a few minutes ago, you might have gathered that I am a person who is not without enemies. Can you imagine what that wonderful woman would do if she learned that for ten years I have been secretly helping a person like you? A notorious traitor to the Jewish people? You think she would keep quiet? You think she wouldn’t be writing to Odessa and Moscow and New York to denounce me? Here I am, denying her humble claim, while I am giving money to Vladimir Tankilevich, KGB informant, the man responsible for sending the great Baruch Kotler to the Gulag. How do you think this would be received by my superiors? And by their superiors? By the American Jews in New York whose job it is to raise the money for our sustenance? Do you know how they do this? By appealing to their wealthy brethren who still harbor quiverings for their shtetl roots. By telling them sad tales about our existence. By printing brochures with photographs and touching descriptions of poor, neglected Russian Jews. By staging lavish events for millionaires where famous Jews, like your Baruch Kotler, make speeches to get them to open their wallets. Now, can you imagine what happens if it is revealed that some Nina Semonovna Shreibman, director of the Simferopol Hesed, has, with full and deliberate knowledge, been aiding and abetting the traitor Tankilevich, this disgrace to the Jewish people? That for ten years she has been giving him money — and not only him but also his shiksa wife? That to this end, she has manipulated documents? Are you getting the picture, Mr. Tankilevich? Can you imagine what would happen if this information was to be publicized? Not only what would happen to me. That should be quite clear. But the harm it could do to the larger structure upon which we all rely? Can you imagine how such an embarrassment would look printed in the newspapers? You have no idea how sensitive these American Jewish organizations are. Or how territorial. I have seen them go into fits over far lesser things. There are many organizations and they are all competing for the same dollars. If one group stumbles, believe me, the others are quick to take advantage. And just like that, money that has been painstakingly solicited for the Jews of Ukraine is now diverted to some other, less controversial, cause, like teaching Ethiopian Jews to eat with forks or sending young American Jews to pick tomatoes in the Negev. And all this because I stuck my neck out for you. So while you have been riding the trolleybus, Mr. Tankilevich, this is what has been hanging over my head.

Tankilevich received the speech as if it were a clobbering, and he slumped down accordingly. And yet, he thought: Clobbered, yes, but not beaten! In his life he had known real terrors, real bloodlettings. So this was nothing new. Unpleasant, yes, but it would take more to make him fold. He found his voice.

— Nina Semonovna, I don’t dispute anything you say. But the fact remains: What choice did I have? As Vladimir Tarasov — with this false identity bestowed upon me by the KGB — I could rejoin the community of my people. As this aberration, Vladimir Tarasov, I could attend the synagogue. And as Vladimir Tankilevich, I could not.

— As Vladimir Tarasov, this aberration — as you call it — you could have rejoined your community and attended the synagogue a long time ago. Nothing was stopping you. But you came only when there was money for the taking. And now you wish to have everything: to retain the disguise of Vladimir Tarasov, keep the subsidy, and retreat from your obligations to the community and the synagogue. But, Mr. Tankilevich, hear me well: So long as I sit behind this desk, I will not allow this to happen. If you do not fulfill the terms of our agreement, I will cut you off. Doing so, as you should by now understand, would be a great relief for me. A great relief and no small satisfaction.

With this statement of finality, Nina Semonovna reached again for her pack of cigarettes and, in a flare of punctuation, struck a match.