Norman Manea - The Lair

“No,” whispered Lu, clutching her fur.

Cousin David had filled half the ashtray.

“While he was here, Augustin Gora participated in clandestine meetings. In those meetings, books by Nazis, Legionnaires, Trotsky-ists, Liberals, and Masons were discussed. Even books by Quakers. Decadent and religious literature was read. We know exactly who participated and when …”

Lu was silent; the general was filling his pen with ink.

“Is your eminent husband a mystic? Or is Mr. Gora a liberal propagandist?”

“He isn’t,” whispered Mrs. Gora.

“Yes, he is! He is all of those things. He read the Bible. He commented on the Scriptures. Even in high school. He would perorate in favor of Saint Peter. ‘Peter’s sect,’ he would say. He debated The Rights of Man. He commented on Confucius. We have proof. Old and new. Not just from one, or a few of his former colleagues, but from many.”

The prosecutor Ga par makes a short signal; the general rises, pours something from the carafe on the desk into the interrogator’s glass; David sips the water of life, staring at the bareheaded detainee. Lu wets her burned lips with her tongue, clutching the short and expensive fur.

“And there’s another thing … He wrote a letter for a student, a letter to American senators. Regarding an American scholarship. We didn’t approve the passport. The student had dubious, idealist leanings. He talked too much, much too much. Conceited, arrogant, a know-it-all, he thought himself untouchable. We didn’t give him a passport. And we’re never going to. Your husband wrote the letter and gave him the addresses of the senators. And the address of a fugitive Legionnaire, who is now a celebrated professor of mystic studies. Moreover, Mr. Augustin Gora brought with him provocative, antisocialist, antihumanist documents, which were then played on Radio opirli{a. * You know what I’m talking about.”

“I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do. The capitalist gossip station, Radio Free Europe. You know it, Ludmila Serafim, you know it! Or is it Ludmila Gora? Or maybe Ga par? I’ve heard you like your men a little wet behind the ears.”

The prosecutor slams his small fists on the metal table, once and again, and again, unable to hold back his anger.

“You know and you’re going to admit it! You’re going to admit it, Ludmila, I assure you.”

He leans toward the ashtray, the cigarette is out, he takes it, he throws it, hysterically, onto the metal floor.

He gets up. The general follows, officiously, a step away. The felted boots of the superior are silent while the general’s boots carry a deafening tread.

Lu takes her head in her hands, stiff, straight, in the metal chair, her shaved head, her narrow, pale face serried in between her green hands. She doesn’t move. An effigy. Her face hollow, head shaved, her gloves covering her ears. Petrified.

Gora shakes a fist in the air, the pillow falls over the lamp on the nightstand; the lamp falls with a crash to the floor; the somnambulist twists, dizzily, wet with transpiration, awake.

“Green gloves,” he murmurs. He sits, overwhelmed, he sits, worn out, on the edge of the bed, gazing down at the lustrous, wooden floor.

No, Lu had never worn green gloves!

He makes his way toward the bathroom, puts his head under the faucet. Wet, awake, he doesn’t reach for the towel.

Peter Ga par isn’t the only one having nightmares. The obituarist is also going through nocturnal trials.

Green gloves? Never… he pulls out the first-aid kit from under his bed, opens it, rummages around in it, pulls out Ludmila’s old, black gloves, brought over from the Homeland of his youth.

Tara calls Peter Ga par on the phone, to remind him about the postcard. Wednesday afternoon, Peter has a meeting with the dean. The tall, blond sailor with curly hair and large, stained, freckled hands, smiles. Protectively, encouragingly. Ga par produces the card. He retells the story about his compatriot’s assassination, about Professor Palade. Afterward, the biography of the mentor Dima, the author of an encyclopedic work. He summarizes the review that he wrote about the old man’s memoirs, the scandal provoked by the revelation of the scholar’s old political sympathies.

The sailor raises his blond eyebrows. He listens to the details of the scandal in the faraway country, the refugee’s suspicions, the biography of the deceased scholar, the assassination of his apprentice, twisted, Balkan tales … as if they were sailor stories from the time when he was setting a course toward Indonesia and Dahomey. He’s never reached the Black Sea (and that area’s history certainly wasn’t on the forefront of the planet’s psyche), though it would have been worthwhile.

He doesn’t have time for confusion. The decision is simple and prompt. Action! If one professor was assassinated without apparent motive, another could be assassinated for a minor motive. A mere review?! Just a review in a journal, and all this scandal on the other end of the world? It’s a bad joke, naturally. The threat might also be just a bad joke. Still, we must be careful. So, then: action.

Friday morning, the Eastern European professor presents himself to Ms. Tang, the college’s head of security. Small, amiable, elegant, precise, like a manager at a bank; laconic, determined, sparing in her gestures. Ga par can’t take his eyes off her sleek, golden hair, her black eyebrows, her black and sharp gaze. Her dress suit is white, her shoes, small and white, with heels, small, dainty hands, short nails without polish. The professor sums up the twisted details of the twisted story, expressing his skepticism about the threatening letter. Ms. Tang has two clear dispositions: prudence and action.

“This is a death threat, Professor! A joke? Even if mortals are jokesters, death doesn’t joke.”

Maybe a Vietnamese proverb, co-opted by the American police? Ga par wondered.

“A death threat!” Jennifer was satisfied by the European’s smile.

“We’re all threatened with death,” murmured Ga par.

Jennifer isn’t in the mood to philosophize. She’d already alerted the local police. She requests permission for a visit the following morning.

“Where do you live on campus?”

“A cottage lost in the woods. Hard to see from the street.” The silence of Ms. Tang signals that the Eastern European hasn’t answered the question clearly. So he describes the surroundings of the cottage.

“No one seems to know about it. Nonetheless, it’s on the campus map.”

Friday night. An agitated forest, neurotic animals, hysteric branches, whistles, rustling. The resident sleeps with interruptions.

At 11 in the morning, Jennifer Tang’s car stops in front of the cottage. J.T. is wearing a red tracksuit and red sneakers and is accompanied by a tall man in police uniform. Slow with questions, even slower in the transcription of the answers. He introduces him-self as Jim Smith, Trooper. J.S.T.? No, Trooper isn’t a name, but a title. State police.