Jaume Cabré - Confessions

The operation was repeated over the course of a few days. Prisoner 615428 had to get down on her knees, naked, and the Obersturmbannführer Höss penetrated her, and His Excellency Nicolau Eimeric reminded her, panting, that if you speak a word of this to that wretch, the Wall-eyed Man of Salt, it will be you sent to burn at the stake as a witch, you’ve got me under your spell, and 615428 couldn’t say yes or no because she could only weep in horror.

‘Have you seen the rosary I wear around my waist?’ said His Excellency. ‘If you’ve stolen it, you’ll pay.’

Until stupid Doctor Voigt took an interest in that violin and crossed the line that no Inquisitor General could ever allow anyone to cross. Despite that, Voigt won the match and Oberlagerführer Eimeric had to put the instrument down on the table with a thud.

‘All your talk about confessional secrets, you bastard.’

‘I’m no priest.’

Sturmbannführer Voigt picked up the violin with eager hands and Rudolf Höss slammed the door excessively hard on his way out and rushed towards the chapel of his inquisitorial headquarters and remained on his knees for two hours, crying at his weakness in the face of the temptations of the flesh, until the new chief secretary, worried because he hadn’t shown up for the first advance review, found him in that edifying state of holy devotion and piety. Friar Nicolau stood up, informed the secretary not to expect him until the following day and headed to the registry office.

‘Prisoner number 615428.’

‘One moment, Obersturmbannführer. Yes. Shipment A27 from Bulgaria on 13 January of this year.’

‘What is her name?’

‘Elisaveta Meireva. She’s one of the few that has a file.’

‘What does it say?’

Gefreiter Hänsch checked in the file cabinet and pulled it out and read Elisaveta Meireva, eighteen years old, daughter of Lazar Meirev and Sara Meireva of Varna. It doesn’t say anything more. Is there some problem, Obersturmbannführer?

Elisaveta, sweet, with fairy eyes, witch eyes, lips of fresh moss; it was a shame she was so skinny.

‘Any complaints, Obersturmbannführer?’

‘No, no … But begin urgent proceedings to have her sent back to the general population.’

‘She still has sixteen days in the Kommando of domestic service in

‘That’s an order, Gefreiter.’

‘I can’t …’

‘Do you know what an order from a superior is, Gefreiter? And stand up when I speak to you.’

‘Yes, Obersturmbannführer!’

‘Then, proceed!’

‘Ego te absolvo a peccatis tuis, in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti, Obersturmbannführer.’

‘Amen,’ replied Friar Nicolau as he humbly kissed the gold-filled cross on the venerable father confessor’s stole, with his soul blessedly relieved by the sacrament of confession.

‘You Catholics have it good, with confession,’ said Kornelia, in the middle of the cloister, with her arms outstretched, taking in the springtime sun.

‘I’m not Catholic. I’m not religious. Are you?’

Kornelia shrugged. When she didn’t have a proper answer, she shrugged and kept quiet. Adrià understood that the subject made her uncomfortable.

‘Seen from outside,’ I said, ‘I like Lutherans better: the Grace of God liberates us without intermediaries.’

‘I don’t like talking about that stuff,’ said Kornelia, very tense.

‘Why?’

‘Because it makes me think about death, I guess. What do I know!’ She grabbed him by the arm and they left the Bebenhausen monastery. ‘Come on, we’ll miss the bus.’

On the bus, Adrià, looking out at the landscape without seeing it, began to think about Sara, as he always did when he lowered his guard. He found it humiliating to realise that her facial features were beginning to fade in his memory. Her eyes were dark, but were they black or dark brown? Sara, what colour were your eyes? Sara, why did you leave? And Kornelia’s hand took his and Adrià smiled sadly. And that afternoon they wandered through the cafés of Tübingen, first to have some beers and then, when they’d had their fill, they ordered very hot tea, and then dinner at the Deutsches Haus because, apart from studying and going to concerts, Adrià didn’t know what else to do in Tübingen. Read Hölderlin. Listen to Coşeriu rant about what a blockhead Chomsky was, and against generativism and all that crap.

When they got off the bus in front of the Brechtbau, Kornelia whispered in his ear don’t come to the house this evening.

‘Why not?’

‘Because I’m busy.’

They parted without a kiss and Adrià felt something like vertigo in the very centre of his soul. And it was all your fault because you had left me without any reason to live, and we’d only been dating for a few months, Sara, but I lived in the clouds with you and you are the best thing that could ever happen to me, until you ran away, and Adrià, once he was in Tübingen, far from his painful memory, spent four months studying desperately, trying in vain to sign up for some course with Coşeriu but secretly auditing it, and going to all the conferences, seminars, talks and open meetings offered at the Brechtbau — which had just moved to a new building — and everywhere else but especially the Burse. And when winter came suddenly, the electric heater in his room wasn’t always enough, but he continued studying to keep from thinking about Sara, because you left without saying a word, and when the sadness was too strong, he went out to stroll along the banks of the Neckar, with his nose frozen, and he would reach the Hölderlin Tower and he would think that if he didn’t do something he would lose his mind over this love. And one day the snow began to melt, gradually, it was becoming green again, and he wished he weren’t so sad, so that he could appreciate the nuances of the shades of green. And since he had no intention of returning to his distant mother’s home that summer, he decided to change his life, laugh a little, drink beer with the others who lived with him in the pension, frequent the department’s Clubhaus, laugh for laughter’s sake, and go to the cinema to see boring and incredible stories, instead of dying over love. And with a hitherto unknown restlessness he started to look at the students with different eyes, now that they were beginning to remove their anoraks and hats, and he realised how pleasurable that was, and it helped to slightly fade the memory of runaway Sara’s face and yet it didn’t erase the questions I’ve asked myself throughout my entire life, like what did you mean when you told me I ran away crying, saying not again, it can’t be. But in History of Aesthetics I, Adrià sat behind a girl with wavy black hair, whose gaze made him a bit dizzy, a girl named Kornelia Brendel who was from Offenbach. He noticed her because she seemed unattainable. And he smiled at her and she smiled back, and soon they had a coffee at the department bar and she swore you don’t have the slightest accent, I thought you were German, really. And from coffee they moved to strolling together through that park bursting with spring, and Kornelia was the first woman I went to bed with, Sara, and I hugged her close pretending that … Mea culpa, Sara. And I started to love her even though sometimes she said things I didn’t completely understand. And I knew how to hold her gaze. I liked Kornelia. And we were together like that for a few months. I clung desperately to her. Which was why I became anxious when, as the second winter began, when we returned from our visit to the Bebenhausen monastery, she told me don’t come to my house this evening.

‘Why not?’

‘Because I’ll be busy.’

They parted without a kiss and Adrià felt something like vertigo in the very centre of his soul, because he didn’t know whether you could say to a woman hey, hey, what do you mean you’ll be busy? Or whether he had to be prudent and think she’s old enough not to have to explain herself to you. Or shouldn’t she, actually? Isn’t she your girlfriend? Kornelia Brendel, do you take Adrià Ardèvol i Bosch as your boyfriend? Can Kornelia Brendel have secrets?