Ivan Klíma - Judge On Trial

He arrived at his office an hour late, but nobody took any notice. Magdalena had written to him:

Dear Adam,

I must let you know how things turned out for Jaroslav. I’ve been putting it off because I find it hard to write a letter to you. I needed a drink to get in the mood. So here I am drinking wine (after all that expense, Gamza is the best I can treat myself to) and writing to let you know it all turned out well. They were as good as their word and didn’t cheat me. As a result I am happy, and grateful to you. I should leave it at that, but it occurs to me you might be offended if I were to fob you off with just a couple of lines.

So what should I tell you? That my daughter Tereza is very good on the piano? That I’ve been reading a Graham Greene novel? But what would be the point seeing that I’ve never written to you about any of the other things I’ve read over the last thirteen years? So instead I’ll say thank you once more. I know things like that are against your principles and someone in your profession is at greater risk than anyone else.

He screwed up the letter and threw it in the waste-paper basket unread. However could she really write such rubbish in a letter? — get drunk, spout all sorts of nonsense and get herself and others into trouble.

It was time he got on with something but work was the last thing on his mind. He picked up the telephone and checked whether the two lay judges for the Kozlík case had been asked to attend the next day. Thinking about the Kozlík case was definitely not the best way to improve his mood. (Happily there were still three weeks to go before the trial; he had been unable to book the courtroom for two consecutive days any earlier.)

On this occasion he had been very careful in his choice of lay judges; in a system in which the right to take decisions had, by and large, been superseded by the right to participate, and participation meant paying lip-service, one underestimated formalities at one’s peril.

As his two assistants he had chosen Mrs Pleskotová, the pharmacist, and Mr Kouba, the fitter. He had often shared the bench with Mrs Pleskotová, whom he considered a wise and sensitive person. And although he had never talked to her directly about the subject he assumed that she would find it very difficult to despatch someone to their death. Apart from that, she worked not far from where the murder was committed and he thought it a good idea to find out what the local people felt about the case.

Old Kouba was a manual worker turned official, and a reliable one at that. He had been sitting on committees recently, assisting with the purges. He had mercilessly handed down verdicts not against criminals but against upstanding and defenceless fellow-citizens. It would have been best to steer clear of such people, but if Adam remained a judge how could he avoid them? With someone like Kouba on the bench, at least their joint decision would have political authority. So long as Kouba didn’t realise that on this occasion the court did not represent the authority to which he was accustomed to paying lip-service. If he did, he would start to resist the proposed verdict and would make it difficult to reach a decision.

But it was a risk he had to take. It was necessary to include at least one of Them.

One got caught up with people one didn’t trust and whose views and attitudes one regarded as abhorrent. One argued with them but they were deaf to one’s words. The only possibility was to try to outwit them, to soften or defuse their belligerence; but they would have their own way in the end anyway, for theirs was the kingdom, the power and the law. The sovereign of a Commonwealth, be it an assembly or one man, is not subject to the civil laws. Thomas Hobbes.

He retrieved the crumpled letter from the waste-paper basket.

But maybe such things don’t offend you so much by now. You could well have changed. For the better I should say. You seemed to me more adult or manly than you were in The Hole. There were times there that you behaved like a little boy. Sorry! You wanted to be loved. And you wanted to make love too, but were unwilling to see that it implied any responsibility or duty as far as you were concerned. Above all you felt no duty, nor any need even, to be heedful of others and try to understand them. You did not notice that other people lived according to different values from yours, that they might have hated the thought that their very work assisted the ‘construction’ (as you people called it) of the society you believed in. You knew very well I was unhappy in The Hole. And you weren’t happy there either — you felt slighted and wasted. But you knew that it would soon come to an end — for you, it was just a brief passing phase, a heroic episode that you would quite enjoy looking back on one day. You didn’t notice that they were making me do something other than what I wanted, that they had taken away all my rights. You didn’t notice and you made not the slightest effort to save me from the place. Of course you didn’t have to marry me if you didn’t love me enough, but you could have helped me. Or tried to, at least. Why am I writing to you about it? After all, it makes no difference any more. But I’ll never tell you if I don’t tell you now. When you left I felt terribly lonely. I spent several days convincing myself you’d turn up again, that you wouldn’t just disappear for ever like that. You would be sure to come and take me away.

So now I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you after all, and if I do then stick the envelope down and send it to you you might even read it: I did travel to see you. About a month after you left, because I had to do something and had no one at all in the world. I took two days off work and caught the night express. I didn’t sleep a wink the entire journey, thinking about what I would say to you. I got off at the other end and checked the time of the next train back. I found my way to your square — it must have been about seven thirty in the morning. I gazed at the house you had never shown me, at your home that you had never invited me to, and I shivered at the thought you might suddenly come out or look out of the window and see me standing there. But you didn’t look out. On the journey back I met Jaroslav in the train. He was much older than you and I didn’t find him attractive but I was in such a mood I told him, a total stranger, about the way I was living and he, a total stranger, offered to help me in some way. And he did. He never told me how. He must have known somebody somewhere — he was in the same party as you. They transferred me to Moravia and let me teach singing, which was something.

Don’t go thinking I want to reproach you with anything. I realise it was against your nature and your convictions to help anybody. In your view, it wasn’t just. In your view justice decreed that everyone who wasn’t enthusiastically in favour should be repressed. Maybe I do you an injustice. You just didn’t fancy taking any action, you always disdained anything that distracted you from your work, from your private self…

He took the letter and started to tear it into little bits. There were still a few lines at the end which he hadn’t bothered to read; he’d have to live without the knowledge of what they contained.

He stared at the small pile of white scraps for a moment before sweeping them into the waste-paper basket. If only he could do the same with the day, with his previous life. Make a clean break. But making a clean break with life meant to die — was there any other way for one to escape from one’s own life?

He tried dialling the number, at least, and waited for the connection.

‘I thought you’d call me ages ago,’ she said.

‘I’m calling you now.’

‘I’ve got visitors coming tonight. Unless you’d like to come as a visitor.’