David Bezmozgis - The Betrayers

In his pronunciation of the Hebrew word was a subtle mimicry of the way Svetlana had flourished it the previous day. She detected it.

— He would have gone willingly! Svetlana protested. When he was well, he went with pleasure. She’d only needed to ask. But to force someone to perform a religious duty is an insult. An insult twice over. To the person and to God.

— I see, Kotler said. So this must be why God sent us to you.

— I don’t presume to know God’s reasoning. But just when our life here was made impossible, He sent the only person who could save us.

— I still don’t understand how you believe I can save you.

— By letting us finally leave this place.

— For Israel.

— For Israel.

— Flights depart regularly from Kiev for Tel Aviv. I hope to catch one myself today. If your husband is well enough to travel, you could be on a plane tomorrow.

— Your girlfriend said the same thing. But both of you know it isn’t so. We cannot go as we are. Not with my husband’s past. He must first be absolved before the Jewish people.

— I see. And I’m to absolve him?

— Who else? Not me. If it were me, I would have done it long ago.

Tankilevich wouldn’t accept Kotler’s money — what of Kotler’s absolution, to which he had an even fainter claim? Kotler looked to see if he was rousing himself in protest. He was not; instead, he had composed himself in a yet more stately guise, the image not merely of a man deserving of absolution, but of a man to whom it had been too long and cruelly denied. And thus— tragically, tragically —he might meet his Maker! It was clear that Kotler was expected to grant this absolution even though Tankilevich offered no repentance. But why should he? Since Tankilevich was in need, since he was in the subordinate position, he must be the injured party. And since Kotler was in the dominant position, since the power now rested in his hands, it was mean and petty of him to demand repentance, an admission of guilt. After all, guilt and innocence were not fixed marks. There were extenuating circumstances. Wasn’t this the governing logic of the times? That cause and effect could not be easily disambiguated? That all was up for revision and nobody durst speak of an absolute truth? By this logic, in granting absolution, Kotler would be remediating a wrong. A wrong he had perpetuated by virtue of holding power. Saying I forgive you, he would actually be saying Please forgive me. Or, at least, Please forgive me for not forgiving you sooner.

There lay Tankilevich, presumably with one foot in the next world. Svetlana had asked Kotler to absolve her husband before the Jewish people. What would it cost him to say he would do it? A small lie. Just enough to calm her down and enable her to call the private ambulance. For Kotler wanted no hand in Tankilevich’s death. Especially since, once, he had truly wished him dead. And yet, being himself, he still could not form the words.

— So, will you do it? Svetlana asked.

— Call the ambulance, Svetlana. First he needs to live, then worry about absolution.

From Tankilevich came another objection but it lacked force, and this time Svetlana did not heed him. She went into the kitchen and returned paging through a phone book. She looked from Kotler to Leora and then dialed the number. Unlike the call to the public ambulance, this one was brief.

— Shall we wait with you until they come? Kotler asked.

— What for? Svetlana said. So you can feel magnanimous? You gave the money for the ambulance. Very well. The paramedics will come. They will help us. Today. But what about tomorrow? If this is all you intend to do, then go, and the devil take you.

Now Svetlana went and sat again at her husband’s side in a demonstration of fidelity. She placed a hand on his forehead, which caused Tankilevich to turn his face toward the back of the sofa.

The image of the two of them struck Kotler as pitiable and ludicrous. Upon these people he was to exercise his lofty principles? Still, Svetlana peered at him and awaited a reply.

— Svetlana, you may not believe it, but I harbor no ill will toward your husband. So it is not even a matter of forgiveness. I hold him blameless. I accept that he couldn’t have acted differently any more than I could have acted differently. This is the primary insight I have gleaned from life: The moral component is no different from the physical component — a man’s soul, a man’s conscience, is like his height or the shape of his nose. We are all born with inherent propensities and limits. You can no more be reviled for your character than for your height. No more reviled than revered.

— You say, came Svetlana’s answer. When you have been revered and my husband reviled.

— It’s true. But that doesn’t change the fact that it is so. You spoke before of fate, that you believe in a Divine Providence. You asked my opinion, and I said that I believed we walk hand in hand with fate. We choose to follow it or pull against it, depending on our characters. But it is character that decides, and the trouble is, we don’t decide our characters. We are born as we are. Last night I told Leora about my father, who, in his youth, was a gifted sportsman, a very fast runner. I was his only child. In many respects I resemble him, yet I didn’t inherit his athletic prowess. When I was a boy, he trained me, attempting to coax from me something that wasn’t there. I tried with all my strength, but I simply lacked the ability. This was my first encounter with this unpleasant reality. The first but hardly the last. For instance, I was a good pianist. But if I didn’t achieve greatness it was because, again, I lacked a certain quality that more gifted students possessed. I also had these small hands. I understood that both these things inhibited me equally and were equally beyond my control. It is the same with morality, as I was forced to discover. Just as there are people in this world who are imparted with physical or intellectual gifts, there are those who are imparted with moral gifts. People who are inherently moral. People who have a clear sense of justice and cannot, under any circumstances, subvert it.

— I see, so you were born a saint and my husband a villain?

— No, I do not consider your husband a villain. There are villains, but he is not one. This is why I said I don’t blame him. He is an ordinary man who was ensnared in a villainous system. As for what I am, I don’t have a word for it. A saint or a hero might be someone else’s word, but not mine. I behaved the only way I could. When I was in prison and I knew that it would take only a single word from me to put an end to my suffering, I still could not bring myself to speak the word. It was like I had a plug in my throat. A moral plug. Impossible to dislodge. As for where it came from, that is as much a question for physicians as metaphysicians. This is what I discovered during my imprisonment. I saw the human character in its naked form. I saw at one end a narrow rank of villainy, and at the other a narrow rank of virtue. In the middle was everyone else. And I understood that the state of the world is the result of the struggle between these two extremes.

— A very strange idea you have, Svetlana said. There is no fault; there is no blame and no praise either. Nobody is accountable for his actions.

— I agree it is strange. There is no fault, no blame or praise, but we are all held accountable.

— I don’t understand, Svetlana said. You say you do not fault my husband. You hold him blameless. You forgive him. But still you intend to punish him, even after all these years and him in his condition?

— I do not intend to punish him. But I cannot absolve him the way you ask. I cannot go in front of the news cameras and the journalists and declare to all the world that I forgive him and hold him blameless. That he was a victim of forces he could not resist. Even if this is what I sincerely feel in my heart.