Miljenko Jergovic - The Walnut Mansion

“What kind of pistol? I don’t get it,” Gabriel said, confused.

“I don’t understand. That’s how you say it: I don’t understand. You work in the theater, but you talk like a bum. Don’t let Comrade Barilla hear you. Or is he a gentleman? Huh, tell me — is Barilla a comrade or a gentleman? So I can know what to call him when he comes over for coffee. We know that he took you on as an actor. The second herald, hah! And he took you of all people! ‘You know, he’s a joiner, but he’s got talent!’ Oh yeah, those guys in acting schools don’t know what they’re doing, but the famed director does, ain’t that so?”

Gabriel thought that they had summoned him there to find out why Barilla had taken him for the performance and that made him angry: “I didn’t ask them to give me a part. He did that because none of the actors would take such a small role. .”

“That’s right; that’s what I’m saying! And then he gave it to you. He knows what he’s doing,” Jere said, continuing the same tone.

“Why didn’t you call him in and ask him?”

“So you’d like to tell me how to do my job? You know, that wouldn’t help you because as soon as someone starts poking their nose into my job, I get this stabbing pain in this side of my head. You know, it was right here that I took an Ustasha bullet in ’49, when I was chasing holdouts in Herzegovina. I haven’t had any serious consequences from it, except that I fucking lose it when someone tells me how to do my job or when, God forbid, someone in this chair starts bullshitting me. Then, my dear, good, and honest Gabriel, I get really fucked up. And when I’m fucked up, then I take this hand here, grab the guy’s head with it, and slam it into that safe over there a little. Just to calm down. Turn around and look at it; it’s behind you. Hey, turn around when I tell you to and look at the safe! Oh, and then I smash your head into the safe until my head clears and my sequela subsides. Only that tends to take a while, and then fuck it; you just hope your head is hard. If it’s hard, you live, but you walk around like an idiot without knowing what you used to have inside it. If it’s soft, well then you can kiss your ass good-bye along with the state, the party, and Inspector Jere Vidošević! Your head, Gabriel, as far as we know, isn’t Bosnian. Gabriel Ekert — I can tell you right away — that means a soft head, so it’s better for us not to try it out. Right? Ekert’s not a Bosnian surname. It’s a Kraut one. Beg pardon — German! I hope you’re not offended. You aren’t, are you? We know your father, Mijo, a cheerful little man, right, but dammit, you tell me: did your old man have a brother?”

Faced with this question, Gabriel broke and started stuttering, and in a second the innocent man who had ended up there by mistake became a wrong-doer who was covering up his crime. It didn’t matter what he’d done or whether he’d done anything that might give him reason to be afraid of the police. Guilt is proven not about the innocent but the guilty, that is to say, those who are pronounced guilty and start feeling guilty. As soon as you feel guilty, you also start acting guilty. This is why there’s no police force better than a communist one because it never happens that they let an innocent man through the exit door. All are guilty; it’s just that some are punished and others forgiven. From that place it was easy to send someone to do hard labor because there was no one who hadn’t at least once said something that was punishable with five years of prison. And if such a just man ever turned up, he’d heard someone say something and didn’t report him.

“What’s wrong? Is your tongue tied? Oh, what I don’t see in this job! A man comes into my office healthy, whole, and sane, and an actor too. He says hello and asks how I’m doing properly. Look at him — he’s full of himself. He has things to be full of. It’s not a joke that the last row in the theater hears you when you whisper. And then all of a sudden, it’s like he’s thunderstruck. Maybe he’s sick? Want me to bring you some sugar and water? No? Then what, so to speak, the fuck is your problem?”

Gabriel sighed heavily, and then started talking before Jere managed to comment on that sigh:

“Yes, I had an uncle. He died in prison. I never saw him. .”

“What a shame! You never went to visit him! If he was guilty before the state and the people, if he stole and killed, it’s still not proper for his kin to renounce him,” the inspector continued.

“He didn’t kill!” Gabriel objected. Jere suddenly grew serious and frowned, and on the left side of his brow a hole suddenly opened up; a piece of bone was missing under his skin and one could see his brain pulsating. He leaned over the table, almost right up to Gabriel, as if he were going to pounce on him or hit him in the face: “And how do you know, effendi, that Bruno Ekert didn’t kill? Now you’ll tell me who told you that so we can ask him about his health a little. .”

“No one told me,” Gabriel whispered.

His knees shook and every muscle on his face was twitching. He expected to get hit and wanted it to happen as soon as possible, for Jere Vidošević to take him down and for what had to happen to happen. Just so it would all be over as soon as possible.

“Aha! So tell me like that so I understand you! So I won’t wonder to myself, what’s this guy talking about, have magpies swallowed my brains, or is he a total asshole? You should’ve told me up front that the Ustashas didn’t slaughter and kill, that there wasn’t any Jasenovac, that they didn’t leave a million some-odd dead people behind. People or Serbs and Jews. Oh, beg pardon, if you please! You all say Yids, right? Yids! No entry for Yids and dogs! Is that what they say, you dog’s führer, or did we make that up too? Talk, you son of a bitch; isn’t that what they say?!” Jere Vidošević howled, and Gabriel kept himself together as best he could, his gaze fixed on the sharp edge of the black office desk.

He was feverishly wondering what he was supposed to do now. Keep quiet or say something? If he kept quiet, this man would beat him on the spot because he was provoking him, but if he said he always said Jews and not Yids, what the hell did that have to do with anything? And he would look like he was talking shit.

But at that moment an elderly little fat man in a gray suit ran into the office: “What’s going on, Jere, what happened? Come here, c’mon, relax a little; Fazila’s brought kebabs. .”

And before Gabriel raised his head, the little fat guy was already sitting in Vidošević’s seat, and Jere had vanished from the room.

“Forget him, man; he’s crazy. Someday he’ll kill someone. I tell him, ‘Jere, poor Jere, retire, relax, take care of your apiaries; this isn’t for you. The fool; he’s got more years of service than years of being alive, when you count his time as a partisan and his ten years of chasing Ustashas around Herzegovina. But he won’t retire! Be that as it may, tell me, boy, did you see anything yesterday outside the theater? We can be done in ten minutes. Ugh, damn it, how uncultured of me; I didn’t introduce myself, and that’s proper according to the rules of the service and ordinary customs. Martin Barnjak,” the inspector said and extended his hand. That hand was small, like a child’s, and somehow all round, with a wedding band that had been put on long, long ago, when the finger was thinner. Gabriel accepted that hand like the greatest gift he could have been given.

“I didn’t see anything. I was setting up the stage scenery. I went into the theater at four in the afternoon, and at that time there was no one outside. .”

“Great. We knew that already, but we’re just following procedure. You have to get a statement, regardless of the fact that it’s clearly stupid, both to you and to the person you’re asking. But what the hell, those are the rules of the service. Now did anyone tell you later what those guys were singing in front of the theater? I’m just asking; I’d like to know. .”