John Berger - Lilac and Flag

In the Interrogation Unit on the ninth floor, Sergeant Pasqua went to the sink and opened a can of beer. Naisi was seated on a bench against a wall, his arms behind his back, wrists handcuffed. He could feel the clots of blood with his tongue, like bleeding gooseberries. Yet he did not dare spit them out. If he spat, he’d be hit again.

Tell us, you fucker!

Tell you what?

You know, fucker.

Your football team won last week, didn’t they, Sarge?

Start telling.

What?

Who supplies?

I heard they played well.

Who gives you the news?

Hoo does.

Don’t get fresh with me, fucker.

Hoo pays too, and Hoo collects.

What’s his name?

Told you, Sergeant. Hoo. Chinese.

You got more? said the sergeant, throwing away the can of beer. Naisi knew that whatever he replied would not be heard. But he could not prevent one of the gooseberries dripping from the corner of his mouth.

Start telling.

When a man is handcuffed, he becomes like a bird who can’t fly. Crippled, he can only scurry like a mouse. Striking a prisoner who is handcuffed produces new words, new cries.

Ble!

Who do you get it from?

Ble!

I’ll make you nobody.

On my own.

Take that, bastard. Shit is. Shit is. Shit is what you deserve.

Pasqua knocked Naisi onto the floor and dragged him over to the toilet. I have known all kinds of violent men. There is no violence, however terrible, that I have not seen. Yet usually they were as helpless as their victims. Sergeant Pasqua was different. His violence was as routine as a dog scratching behind its ears.

Shit is. Shit is what you’re going to eat. Start telling.

Blu!

Who do you get it from?

Dug.

Dog what?

Dug.

Address?

Ble.

Pasqua kicked the prisoner in the stomach.

Start telling.

Morio.

Address?

Twenty-one twenty-five Tortoise Hill.

What’s Morio for a name?

It’s what he uses.

Where do you meet him?

City Aquarium, by the turtles.

Okay. If you’re lying, the next time you’re brought in here, you get them pulped, see? Pulped — no more fucky-fucky.

Hector arrived on the ninth floor by lift. He had put on his outdoor shoes and dark glasses. The shoes because he intended to go home afterwards without returning to his office, the glasses because he always wore them when he visited the Interrogation Unit. They prevented any appeal to the eyes.

The Superintendent opened the door and saw a man wearing calf-coloured boots with golden buckles smoking a cigarette. The man was no longer handcuffed. There was blood on his face but no signs of collapse. The Superintendent considered himself an expert in reading such signs, which often begin at the corner of the mouth or in the way fingers are held.

Where did it come from? he asked the prisoner.

Probably from Colombia, replied Naisi.

Everything comes from Colombia, doesn’t it?

Now you’re talking, Super.

Who handled it before you did?

One of your men here in the station.

At this point Sergeant Pasqua allowed each of his hundred kilos to give weight to the four words he now pronounced:

He has grassed, sir.

So, he’s grassed, has he? Like a heifer he’s grassed, you say, Sergeant!

Like a rhino, said Naisi, not a heifer.

What’s he given you, Sergeant?

The name of Morio.

Morio, Morio? Operating where?

Twenty-one twenty-five Tortoise Hill.

Brilliant, Sergeant. I think I should see to it that your rota gets changed.

Routine, sir.

Brilliant, Sergeant.

Thank you, sir.

Perhaps you’ve spent a little too much time up here. A few months at ground level might do you a world of good, Pasqua. Have you tried tracking down somebody on Tortoise Hill?

Never, sir. Tortoise Hill is recent, sir.

You can find nothing and nobody there. It’s worse than Rat. It’s worse than Tepito. They’ve got Uzis there. He’s made you a present of nothing.

He won’t do it a second time. Give me half an hour.

Like a rhino, Superintendent. I told you I grassed like a rhino, said Naisi.

Was the stuff planted on him? demanded Hector.

He’s had his hands on plenty, trust my nose, Superintendent.

Was it planted?

Let’s say it was found, Superintendent, a few minutes after they frisked me, said Naisi.

Turn him out.

Give me—

I’ve told you, Sergeant. Turn him out.

As the Superintendent passed through Reception, the two police officers on duty wished him good-night. Under his breath one of them muttered: Geriatric Ward! Then the two of them went on looking at the comic they had hidden under the counter.

In the story they were reading, a chauffeur was driving a large limousine. In the back of the car were David and George and a woman called Antoinette. She had her legs apart. Antoinette, you’re still full of spunk, said David. Of course, she replied, you came everywhere! Ah, Antoinette, said George. Why don’t you begin again? she suggested. You’ve knocked us both out, said David. Then I’ll have to find out what the chauffeur is made of, said the insatiable Antoinette. She leant forward and put her tongue in the chauffeur’s ear … The two police officers turned the page and read on, both imagining they were the chauffeur.

When he first left the village, age fourteen, Hector wept. I saw him wiping his eyes with his sleeve outside the door of the Republican Lyre. Then he ran down the steps to get into the bus and he shouted to his friends: You’d better lock up all your chicks and chickens when I get back!

He only came back twice.

Peasants make solid policemen, for they have the necessary energy, obstinacy, and toughness. But power isn’t the same thing as earth, and, as policemen, they seldom become wise.

After a number of years in the city, Hector married Susanna, the daughter of a disgraced army officer. She had auburn hair, a milky, delicate skin, and a profile like they engrave on coins. The first time he saw her she was wearing golden sandals. It was Hector’s assurance that attracted Susanna. He was capable and daring. He was not, like her father, ridden with doubt. Even his bragging she considered as a kind of froth bubbling around his capabilities. She told her friends there was nothing Hector couldn’t handle, and she nicknamed him Ram, the bélier . With her help he would become Chief Constable. And one day he would take her away, she dreamed, from sprawling Troy to a nobler city such as Tenochtitlán, where nobody would have to handle anything except chalices and anointing oils and flowers, flowers …

You’re home later than ever, she said to him.

Policemen aren’t librarians.

That’s new. Usually you say policemen aren’t train drivers.

Same thing.

And in a few months’ time, Hector, you won’t be a policeman.

Like you say, my dear, I won’t be a policeman.

It was suffocating this afternoon, I felt so weak I didn’t go to my gym class.

Why didn’t you put the fan on?

Fan! All our friends have air conditioning, they’ve had air conditioning for years, but not us, not poor us, because Hector couldn’t make it higher than a Superintendent, his resources were exhausted. He’s spent himself. He’s reached his limit, hasn’t he?

I’d say you’ve been drinking again, Susanna.

I most certainly have not—

The evidence suggests—

The evidence suggests … You’re not in the station any more. You’re at home. You’ve come home. And the one person in the world you can’t question, Hector, is me. And you can’t question me because I’m your own failure.

Pour me a coffee.

Then take off your gun.

With ice.

And your sunglasses. It was a great mistake, Hector, when you stopped drinking, you never relax now.