David Peace - Occupied City

And in my cell, I now had visions.

Each night, at the window in my cell, a tall man in a black mask appeared, pointing a foreign gun at me through the iron bars, and the man would whisper, ‘Confess. Confess. Confess …’

And then the dead, one by one, night after night, the Teikoku Bank Dead came to me and said, ‘You are a bad man, you are a wicked man we know. You are our murderer, our killer …

‘You should be executed, executed by potassium cyanide, to taste the pain we tasted, to suffer as we still suffer …’

Then finally, one night in September, as the prison clock struck midnight, the Buddha himself came to my cell and he said, ‘Hirasawa, Hirasawa, listen to me carefully. I know you sincerely wish to be cleansed of all your sins and I know you are not the killer, but in order to be truly cleansed of your own sins, you must willingly accept the sins of others. So confess, confess …’

I now believed I had only two ways to escape. I could either kill myself or I could confess. So first of all, I tried to kill myself. And three times I tried. First, I cut my left radial artery. Then, I drove my head into a pillar in the interrogation room. Finally, I swallowed five suppositories. But each time I failed to die. And I shed tears –

For I then knew only the other way now remained.

Still, it is hard for me to remember now, and so hard for me to fully explain, what exactly led me to confess to crimes I had not committed. For though I felt hypnotized by the voices, and though I was plagued by the visions, I had not been threatened and I had not been tortured. Nor was I coerced, though I suppose I felt persuaded by the visions, by the voices, that it would be for the best to confess, the best for my wife and for my children, and for my father back in Otaru. And so, one day that September, I confessed –

And not only to the Teikoku Bank murders, but to every bad thing, to every crime I could think of, including to the assassinations of Prime Minister Inukai and Baron Takuma Dan, the president of Mitsui, and every coup d’état I could remember.

And for a time, following my false confessions, the voices ceased and the visions left, and there was a strange silence and benign warmth around me as I learned and repeated the statements they wanted from me, as I copied and re-enacted the crimes they said I had done, in the silence and in the warmth.

I had, in fact, confessed to things I had not done, things of which I was innocent, before. Some doctors and my supporters have stated that such false confessions are a symptom of K-disease, a side-effect of the rabies vaccination. And maybe it is true. But I really don’t know. I cannot say. For such behaviour on my part, along with my repeated denials of the things I had done, the things of which I was truly guilty, predates my wife’s bite and my rabies vaccination and has, in truth, been a trait of mine since an early age, for as long as I can recall. Now I can only surmise that it was as though my mind was a rope, a rope made from two threads; one thread my true-self, the other my hypnotized-self, until that thread snapped.

For then, one day in November, it was as if I suddenly woke up. I remember I had just been served hot miso soup for my breakfast and as I took a sip, I heard a loud pop , as though a balloon had burst close-by my brain. And I suddenly recognized what I had done, what I was doing, and I suddenly thought, ‘I am incriminating myself, and not only myself, but all the people who love me, my wife and my children, my family and my friends.’ And I also thought, ‘And I am shaming the victims of the crime. I am protecting the real killer. What if the killer were to strike again, to kill more people?’ And I suddenly realized, ‘I must recant and apologize to the nation.’

Another way to explain what happened to me that morning would be to describe a stage, a stage where the curtain rises and the stage is bare, but there on the stage is an actor and the actor is naked before his audience. That is what I felt had happened to me now; that the curtain had risen and there I was –

Naked before the world –

Innocent, yet guilty –

And so I remain.

For as everybody knows, despite retracting my confession, I was found guilty and sentenced to death. And so, knowing each day may well be my last, I now live each day in a state of readiness and repentance; readiness for death by hanging and what will follow, repentance for the things I have put my wife and my children through.

My wife has divorced me. My children have disowned me. Rightly, they are ashamed of me and they deny me, deny that I am now or ever was their father. They have changed their name, the name I gave them, my name. They have abandoned and disowned that name, my name. But the blame, the fault, is all mine.

I should not have married. I should not have had children. Not being the person I am. I did not deserve my wife’s love. I did not deserve my children’s love. Not being the person I am. Not with all the things I have done, not with all the lies I have told.

Now my ex-wife hates me. Now my children hate me. Being the person I am. My wife believes I am guilty. My children believe I am guilty. Being the person I am. And though I am innocent of the crimes my wife and my children believe I committed, I am still guilty. Being the person I am. Guilty of so many other crimes. Guilty of so many other lies. Being the person I am –

A bad and wicked person.

And though I know many kind people do believe I am innocent of the crimes of which I have been convicted, though I know many people work tirelessly to clear my name and to save me from this death sentence, and though I know these same people would be upset, even angry, to read these words, I must confess:

I am resigned to my fate.

For though I am innocent of the Teikoku Bank murders, I am guilty of so many other crimes. Crimes against my wife, crimes against my children, crimes against their hearts. And I truly believe I deserve to die for these bad things I have done, the terrible hurt I have caused them, the lies I have told them. In short, for the life I have led.

The sole reason, therefore, that I allow and I assist in the attempts and the appeals to clear my name and save me, is for the sake of my ex-wife and my children; that their reputations may be restored, and that they may once again live not in fear or in shame.

And that then is the only reason I have told this story, that I have said these words. But these words I have said are not for me. These words are only for those who once loved me, my ex-wife and my children. For I do not seek your pity. And I do not seek the truth. For I do not deserve your pity. I do not deserve the truth.

Beneath the Black Gate, in its upper chamber, between the three candles, the old man now bows his head,

and another candle gutters,

gutters and then

dies–

‘No!’ you are screaming. ‘No, no! Come back! Come back! There’s more to say. There must be more. That can’t be all. That can’t be it. Please, please! Come back! Come back!’

But the flame of the candle is out, its light is gone, and the old man is fading; fading, fading, fading –

’No!’ you shout again — ’

There’s so much more I want to know, much more I need to know. No! No! What about the trials, the appeals? The conspiracies, the experiments, the war? Help me! Please help me to help you!’

But in the dim-light of the last two candles, the old man is shaking his head; fading, fading –

‘Wait! Wait! I know you did not murder those people. I know you were never there. I know you were never at the bank. But help me, please! Please help me to help you. For I want to tell your story. I want to prove your innocence, to clear your name …’