Ivan Klíma - Judge On Trial

They convicted Father on the grounds that some enormous machine in Poland had not worked as it was supposed to, which could have been as experts testified, either a fault in the manufacture or the assembly; in addition, on the grounds that he habitually gave his instructions orally and not in writing, thereby making it impossible to check his work; and lastly, on the grounds that he had not paid sufficient attention to the training of younger engineers. They sentenced him to twenty-five months’ imprisonment. The judge read out the verdict as if it was a report about shoe production or the potato harvest, not once raising his eyes from the paper, never once looking in the direction of Father or the public benches. He didn’t raise his voice and made no pretence of feeling or thinking anything at all. Appeals could be lodged against the verdict within eight days of receipt of the verdict in writing.

They permitted me a visit that same afternoon.

I was let in through a gate which closed behind me, led across a yard and then along gloomy prison corridors. I held tightly to the bag with my brother’s statuette, the oranges, the strudel and cake (and I had been out to a buffet and bought a fresh schnitzel and a length of salami to add to them). I was shown into the visiting room, which made an ineffectual show of trying to look civilian. I sat down and took out the sculpture and the food. I felt a sense of total emptiness growing within me, an absence of everything — pain or tears or reactions of any kind. I put the statuette away again and stood up, but then I remembered it was against the rules and I sat back down. At last my father appeared.

They sat him down opposite me. Father gave a slightly bemused smile and said he was glad to see me. And then suddenly his voice quavered and I saw his Adam’s apple give a leap. He asked what was the matter with Mother, why hadn’t she come?

We had been expecting him to be released, we had not counted on those extra three months. And I started to give him the news, relating almost with relish how we lived on an abundance of student-canteen buns and soup and talking about my studies and how we would all be together for Christmas, and how Hanuš had built a new bookshelf above his desk, and Father was relieved. His gaunt face seemed to me youthful, almost boyish, a little boy scout erecting a tent in an old grey photograph in the family album unaware of what life held in store for him. The same eyes, the same person.

He asked me whether I had a girlfriend yet and how Hanuš was getting on with his studies. Our time was running out; the guard looked at his watch and announced five minutes more. Then he got up, took several paces away from us and started to look out of the window. It was almost blatant permission. Father leaned towards me and said rapidly: ‘Adam, it’s all lies and falsehoods. Lies and falsehoods.’ The guard at the window turned round.

This, then, was Father’s message, the most important thing he had to tell us, the essence of months and months of reflection: the whole of life in a single sentence, one little word, in fact –

Lies

That evening, as I took the train home, alone in the compartment, the landscape beyond the window swallowed up in a cascade of sparks, I realised that Father was just falling asleep in that alien town, inside a tomb-like building with barred windows; and I thought of a whole landscape that, like a tomb, was quietly devouring thousands of its children and waiting for more innocent bodies, a landscape full of tombs, full of malevolent witnesses, a landscape to which at any time I too could be taken, hands above my head, a pistol at the nape of my neck, a pistol aimed at my forehead, the shots were already ringing out, I could no longer hear them anyway, my blood was flowing, dogs were running up, the sound of shovels on stone, shots, funeral carts with cold outstretched arms and contorted heads protruding stiffly from them; the carts were wending their way in procession through the world, my realm of freedom, my slaughterhouse, my model state, my camp, my prison, my tomb, my dead landscape bathed in moonlight.

And when at last I started to fall asleep, lulled by the rasp of iron against iron, the conviction took hold of me that I would change it, I had to change it.

1

HE WAS ALONE at home with the children. Alena was out for the evening with some old school chums; she had decided at the last minute. It did not matter to him that his wife would be returning late. If anything, he was relieved, because at least she would not be there to remind him he had lied, and he would have no difficulty putting off the moment when he would tell her about the other one, and he could even retain the hope that he might postpone that moment indefinitely, that the other one would disappear from his life before having a chance to change it irreparably.

He peeled the hot potatoes, poured melted butter over them and added a piece of curd cheese. His daughter was washing lettuce in the sink. Martin was already at table and banging the plate with his fork.

‘When’s Mummy coming?’ Manda asked.

‘Late this evening, I expect.’

‘Mummy’s always out these days.’

‘Maybe she’s gone to see Honza,’ Martin interjected with his mouth full.

‘You’re stupid. What would she be doing there?’

‘She’s got to look after him, of course, because of his broken leg.’

‘Why should she? Daddy, she doesn’t have to, does she?’

‘No, of course she doesn’t.’ So far he had said nothing to his wife, but she must suspect something by now. She seemed to be wary with him; sometimes he had even had the impression she was about to ask him, but in the end she had said nothing, maybe suspecting the answer in advance. Whenever he tried to embrace her she had been bound to feel his coolness, which only masqueraded as affection, and she too had remained cool.

He had made an effort not to add further infidelities to the one he was already concealing and had deliberately avoided Alexandra — just once taking her out to lunch. Then she had left town for a fortnight, and it seemed she had retreated from his life and he would forget her, as one forgot a disturbing dream.

His daughter had got herself off to bed on her own, Martin he had to help wash. ‘Mummy always sings with us before we go to sleep,’ his son said in an effort to influence him.

‘Well there’s no chance of me singing with you; you’ll have to sing on your own.’

‘So tell us about something!’ Now Martin lay in the metal cot that was getting too small for him. He stuck his feet through the rungs at the bottom of the cot and waggled them. ‘Tell us what you did today, f’rinstance.’

‘Nothing special.’ She was supposed to be coming home by yesterday evening and he had spent the whole of today knowing that he had the chance to phone her. The obligation, even. ‘Mrs Richterová told me about some lads who had been stealing cars on a housing-estate,’ he recalled. ‘There were four of them, and they had a perfectly equipped workshop…’

‘Daddy, are you sad?’ his daughter interrupted him.

‘What makes you ask?’

‘I don’t know. You don’t have to tell us about it if you’ve got too much to do.’

‘Don’t you worry!’ He went on with the story about the car thieves and took care afterwards to concentrate on what he was saying.

‘Daddy, can I show you what I painted?’ She got out of bed and ran barefoot to the desk. She rummaged for a while in the drawer before pulling out a large sheet of paper with a painting on it: seven brightly coloured ponies dancing on a dark-blue field, their movement and bright colours imparting happiness, maybe tenderness as well.