Alina Bronsky - Baba Dunja's Last Love

“This is for you,” he says.

“Thank you, but it’s really not necessary.”

“I’ve been racking my brain trying to think of a way I could make you happy.”

“I have everything and am content. Thank you for the kiwi the other day, I hadn’t had one in a long time.”

“Baba Dunja! I’m at my wit’s end.”

“What would happen if someone were to confess?” I ask. “Would all the rest be allowed to go home?”

“It would depend.”

“On what?”

“On who confessed.”

This is the way our talks always go. It’s exhausting.

“I’m going back to my cell, Arkadij.”

“Wait, please!”

The constant standing up and sitting back down gets to my knees.

“It’s impossible to answer your question about finding out what language something is in. There are too many languages on earth,” he says.

“And what if it is written on paper?”

He leans back and closes his eyes. For a few seconds he wobbles in his chair like a little boy who is bored in class.

“If the word the appears frequently, then it is English. If there is a lot of der, die , or das then it’s German. And if you see un or une then it’s French. And with il it could be Italian. Or it could also still be French.”

I look at him respectfully. “You are so young and already so knowledgeable,” I say. “Go home to your wife and get a good night’s rest.”

Petrow and the other men I see for the first time again on the first day of the court proceedings. We are taken one by one into the holding pen inside the courtroom and sit on a bench inside it. Sidorow’s knees are stiff, he remains standing and braces himself on Petrow’s shoulder. You didn’t have to be a former nurse’s assistant to see it: he wasn’t going to last long. Though actually I expected everyone to be in worse shape than they are.

I see my Arkadij Sergejewitsch with red spots on his chalk-white face. He is sitting opposite the holding pen. The courtroom is bursting with people, though I expected the room to be bigger. Photographers and camera teams are shuffled past us at short intervals. They call to us but we just stare blankly into their lenses.

We villagers of Tschernowo don’t greet each other, we don’t even look at each other. It could be construed as impoliteness. But in reality we are all bound to each other and have no need of formalities.

The judge is a sturdy woman with bleached blonde hair. She is wearing a black robe and there’s a white bib dangling from the collar. While she speaks I scan the faces in the room. Men and women in suits, in shirts, in jean jackets.

I turn toward Petrow. I have to look at him. I need to ask him my most important question. He stares back at me provocatively. I briefly shake my head. This is the wrong time to act like a defiant child.

I’m going to be dead soon anyway, I read in his eyes. Do you really want me to spend my final days in prison?

I stand up, step up to the lattice of metal bars and knock on it.

The judge pauses in the middle of her oration.

“One needn’t drag this out unnecessarily,” I say. My rusty old voice clangs through the courtroom.

Arkadij stands up frantically. I motion to him with my hand that he should sit back down.

The judge looks down at me. She has the face of a bank teller from the 1980s. She wears fat rings on her fingers. That comforts me. This woman is from a world I still understand. Perhaps she was one of the first babies I helped deliver. Perhaps I once splinted her leg. Perhaps I pronounced the death of her grandmother. There were so many who passed through during all those years.

“Baba Dunja?” she asks, and everyone laughs. She clears her throat and calls for order. “Pardon me… Evdokija Anatoljewna. Are you unwell?”

Evdokija Anatoljewna is the name in my passport. A murmur goes through the room.

“I’m doing fine,” I say. “But I need to say something. All of us here in this holding pen are either old or infirm or both. Nobody should be treated this way, it is dishonorable. Please, your majesty… unfortunately I don’t know your name or your father’s name. I don’t know the customs here, so I beg your pardon if I do something amiss.”

The judge looks at Arkadij. Arkadij looks at me. The uniformed personnel whisper to each other. What follows is a series of gestures and looks. Suddenly I feel weak and try to steady myself on the bars of the pen.

Everyone is looking at me and nobody knows what really happened on that day in Tschernowo. Aside from the dead man, a total of just two people in the world know. I am one of them.

“None of you know what really happened,” I say. “Please excuse me for disturbing this proceeding. But in this pen is a one-hundred-year-old man who cannot stand up much longer. I will tell you what this is all about. I’ll be brief. We are the last inhabitants of Tschernowo. The dead man, whom this case concerns, wanted to move in as well. He brought his little daughter.”

If I thought it was quiet in the court before, then I was wrong. Now it is really quiet.

“Tschernowo is a beautiful place,” I say. “A good place for us. We don’t chase anyone away. But I would, however, advise against it for someone young and healthy. It’s not for everyone. Anyone who takes a little child there in order to exact revenge is an evil person. A child needs a mother and clean air.”

I fix my gaze on the judge’s white bib. I have to concentrate. For a second the thought crosses my mind that she probably doesn’t speak English either.

“And now I ask that you take note of the following statement. Arkadij, let me be, I am an old woman and sound of mind. Listen, your majesty. I, Baba Dunja of Tschernowo, killed the evil man with an axe and forced the others under threat of violence to help me dig a grave for him in the garden. It was impossible for them to resist me. I wish to hereby petition your grace to release the others and punish me as the sole perpetrator.”

My dear granddaughter Laura,

I hope you and your mother and, naturally, your father, whom I hold in high esteem, are doing well.

I am using my fifteen-minute break from work to write you, as long as there is still light. You must have seen on television that your grandmother is now a felon. I was sentenced to three years’ imprisonment for voluntary manslaughter.

I’m a little bit ashamed to write you, because you are probably ashamed of me. But you needn’t be. First, because my conscience is clear. I only did what needed to be done. Second, because you would be a good girl even if you did have a crazy person for a grandmother.

I keep your photo with me, the one where you are wearing a red T-shirt. I don’t have many things here, just a few things for daily use. I often think about my beautiful house in Tschernowo. It looks now as if I won’t die there after all, as I wanted. I haven’t gotten used to this thought yet. Believe me, Laura, I have experienced a lot in my life. But my most peaceful years I spent there.

Now I am housed in a camp. But life is fine here. I get along with the other girls. We are awoken at six, and after washing up and eating breakfast (barley mush), we go to the sewing machines in the workshops. We sew pillowcases. I am permitted to receive six packages per year but I made sure not to write that to your mother because I don’t want her to start unnecessarily spending money on me again.