‘Of course not,’ he replies. ‘You will go straight to the next life. You will be a bright new person there. It will be exciting. It will be an adventure, just as this life has been an adventure.’
‘But if I don’t go to the next life, will I go blue?’
‘Trust me, my boy, there will always be a next life. Death is nothing to be afraid of. It is over in a flash, then the next life begins.’
‘I don’t want to go to the next life. I want to go to the stars.’
CHAPTER 13
THE COURTS of justice in Estrella have as their mandate the recovery, rehabilitation and salvation (recuperación, rehabilitación y salvación) of offenders: so much he has learned from his fellow bicycle messengers. From this it follows that there are two kinds of trial at law: the long kind, in which the accused contests the charge and the court must determine his guilt or innocence; and the short kind, in which the accused admits his guilt and the task of the court is to prescribe the appropriate remedial penalty.
Dmitri has, from the first, admitted his guilt. He has signed his name to not one but three confessions, each more copious than the previous, relating in detail how he violated and then strangled Ana Magdalena Arroyo. He has been given every opportunity to minimize his transgression (Had he been drinking on the fatal night? Had the victim died by misadventure in the course of erotic play?) but has refused them all. What he did was inexcusable, he says, unforgivable. Whether what he did is forgivable or unforgivable is not for him to decide, reply his interrogators; what he must say is why he did what he did. This is the point at which the third confession comes to an abrupt stop. ‘The accused refused to cooperate further,’ report his interrogators. ‘The accused became foulmouthed and violent.’
Proceedings are set for the last day of the month, when Dmitri will appear before a judge and two assessors for sentencing.
Two days before the trial a pair of uniformed officers knock at the door of his, Simón’s, rented room and deliver a message: Dmitri has requested to see him.
‘Me?’ he says. ‘Why should he want to see me? He barely knows me.’
‘No idea,’ say the officers. ‘Please come with us.’
They drive him to the police cells. It is six in the evening; a change of shift is taking place, prisoners in the cells are about to receive their supper; he has to kick his heels for quite a while before he is led into an airless room with a vacuum cleaner in one corner and two mismatched chairs, where Dmitri—his hair neatly cut, wearing sharply ironed khaki trousers and a khaki shirt and sandals, looking considerably smarter than in his old days as a museum attendant—awaits him.
‘How are you, Simón?’ Dmitri greets him. ‘How is the fair Inés, and how is that youngster of yours? I think of him often. I loved him, you know. I loved them all, the little dancers from the Academy. And they loved me. But it is gone now, all gone.’
He, Simón, is irritated enough at being called out to visit the man; being treated to this sentimental patter brings him to a boil. ‘You bought their affection with sweets,’ he says. ‘What do you want from me?’
‘You are cross, and I can see why. I have done a terrible thing. I have brought grief to many hearts. My behaviour has been inexcusable, inexcusable. You are right to turn your back on me.’
‘What do you want, Dmitri? Why am I here?’
‘You are here, Simón, because I trust you. I have cast my mind over all my acquaintance, and you are the one I trust most. Why do I trust you? Not because I know you well—I don’t know you well, just as you don’t know me well. But I trust you. You are a trustworthy man, a man worthy of trust. Anyone can see that. And you are discreet. I myself am not discreet but I admire discretion in others. If I had another life I would choose to be a discreet, trustworthy man. But this is the life I have, the life allotted to me. I am, alas, what I am.’
‘Get to the point, Dmitri. Why am I here?’
‘If you go down to the storage area of the museum, if you stand at the bottom of the stairs and look to your right, you will see three grey filing cabinets against the wall. The filing cabinets are locked. I used to have a key, but the people here took it away from me. However, the cabinets are easy enough to break into. Push a screwdriver into the crack above the lock and give it a smart blow. The metal strip that holds the drawers shut will buckle. You will see for yourself once you try. It is easy.
‘In the bottom drawer of the middle cabinet—the bottom drawer of the middle cabinet—you will find a small case of the kind that schoolchildren use. It contains papers. I want you to burn them. Burn the whole lot, without looking at them. Can I trust you to do that?’
‘You want me to go to the museum and break open a filing cabinet and steal papers and destroy them. What other criminal acts do you want me to commit on your behalf because you cannot commit them yourself because you are behind bars?’
‘Trust me, Simón. I trust you, you must trust me. That little case has nothing to do with the museum. It belongs to me. It contains private possessions. In a few days I am going to be sentenced, and who knows what the sentence will be? Never again, in all likelihood, will I see Estrella, never again pass through the doors of the museum. In the city I used to call my own I will be forgotten, consigned to oblivion. And that will be right, right and just and good. I don’t want to be remembered. I don’t want to linger on in the popular memory just because the newspapers happened to get their hands on my most private possessions. Do you understand?’
‘I understand but I do not approve. I will not do as you request. Instead I will do the following. I will go to the director of the museum and I will say, “Dmitri, who used to work here, tells me there are private possessions of his on the premises, papers and so forth. He has asked me to recover them and restore them to him in jail. Do I have your permission to do so?” If the director agrees, I will bring the papers to you. Then you can dispose of them as you wish. So much I will do for you, but nothing illegal.’
‘No, Simón, no, no, no! You can’t bring them here, it is too risky! No one must see those papers, not even you!’
‘The last thing in the world I want is to see these so-called private papers of yours. I am sure they consist of nothing but filth.’
‘Yes! Exactly! Filth! Which is why they must be destroyed! So that there shall be less filth in the world!’
‘No. I refuse to do it. Find someone else.’
‘There is no one else, Simón, no one I trust. If you do not help me, no one will. It will be only a matter of time before someone finds them and sells them to the newspapers. Then scandal will erupt again, and all the old wounds will be reopened. You can’t allow that to happen, Simón. Think of the children who befriended me and brightened my days. Think of your youngster.’
‘Scandal indeed. The truth is, you don’t want your collection of filthy pictures to be made public because you want people to think well of you. You want them to think of you as a man of passion, not as a criminal with an appetite for pornography. I am leaving now.’ He raps on the door, which is opened at once. ‘Goodnight, Dmitri.’
‘Goodnight, Simón. No hard feelings, I hope.’
The day of the trial arrives. The crime passionnel at the museum is a talking point all over Estrella, as he has learned during his bicycle rounds. Though he makes sure he is at the courthouse well ahead of time, there is already a press of people at the doors. He pushes his way into the foyer, where he is confronted with a large printed notice: Change of venue. The sitting of the court scheduled for 8.30 a.m. has been rescheduled. It will be held at 9.30 a.m. in the Teatro Solar.
The Teatro Solar is the largest theatre in Estrella. On the way there he falls into conversation with a man who has with him a child, a little girl not much older than David.
‘Going to the trial?’ says the man.
He nods in reply.
‘A big day,’ says the man. The child, dressed all in white with a red ribbon in her hair, flashes him a smile.
‘Your dau
ghter?’ he says.
‘My eldest,’ replies the man.
He glances around and notices several other children in the crowd pressing toward the theatre.
‘Do you think it is a good idea to bring her along?’ he asks. ‘Isn’t she a bit young for this kind of thing?’
‘A good idea? It depends,’ says the man. ‘If there is a lot of legal palaver and she gets bored I may have to take her home. But I am hoping it will be short and to the point.’
‘I have a son of about the same age,’ he says. ‘I must say I would never think of bringing him along.’
‘Well,’ says the man, ‘I suppose there are different points of view. As I see it, a big event like this can be educative—bring it home to youngsters how dangerous it can be to get involved with their teachers.’
‘The man on trial was never, as far as I know, a teacher,’ he replies tartly. Then they are at the entrance to the theatre, and father and daughter are swallowed up in the crowd.
The stalls have already filled up, but he finds a place on the balcony in sight of the stage, where a long bench covered in green baize has been set up, presumably for the judges.
Nine-thirty arrives and passes. The auditorium is becoming hot and stuffy. New arrivals press in behind till he is jammed tight against the rail. Below, people are sitting in the passages. An enterprising young man is going up and down selling bottled water.
Then there is movement. The lights over the stage come on. Led by a uniformed officer, Dmitri emerges, shackled at the ankles. Blinded, he stops and stares out over the audience. His escort seats him in a small roped-off space.
All is still. From the wings emerge the three judges, or rather the presiding judge and his two assessors, wearing red robes. With a great heave the crowd comes to its feet. The theatre has a capacity for, he would guess, two hundred; but there are at least twice as many present.
The crowd settles. The judge-in-chief says something inaudible. The officer guarding Dmitri leaps forward and adjusts the microphone.
‘You are the prisoner known as Dmitri?’ says the judge. He nods to the officer, who sets before Dmitri a microphone of his own.
‘Yes, Your Honour.’
‘And you are accused of violating and killing one Ana Magdalena Arroyo on the fifth day of March this year.’
It is not a question but a statement. Nonetheless Dmitri replies: ‘The violation and the murder took place on the night of the fourth of March, Your Honour. This error in the record I have pointed out before. The fourth of March was Ana Magdalena’s last day on earth. It was a terrible day, terrible for me but even more terrible for her.’
‘And you have confessed your guilt on both charges.’
‘Three times. I have confessed three times. I am guilty, Your Honour. Sentence me.’
‘Patience. Before you are sentenced you will have the right to address the court, a right which I hope you will make use of. First you will have an opportunity to exculpate yourself, then later you will have an opportunity to plead in mitigation. Do you understand what those terms mean: exculpation, mitigation?’
‘I understand the terms perfectly, Your Honour, but they have no relevance to my case. I do not exculpate myself. I am guilty. Judge me. Sentence me. Come down on me with the full weight of the law. I will not murmur, I promise.’
There is a rustle among the crowd below. ‘Judge him!’ comes a cry. ‘Be quiet!’ comes an answering cry. There are murmurs, low hisses.
The judge glances questioningly at his colleagues, first at the one, then at the other. He raises his gavel and brings it down once, twice, thrice. The rustling ceases, silence falls.
‘I address myself to all of you who have taken the trouble to come here today to see justice done,’ he says. ‘I remind you most earnestly that justice is not done in haste, nor by acclamation, and certainly not by setting aside the protocols of the law.’ He turns to Dmitri. ‘Exculpation. You say that you cannot or will not exculpate yourself. Why not? Because, you say, your guilt is undeniable. I ask: Who are you to pre-empt these proceedings and decide the question before this court, which is precisely the question of your guilt?
‘Your guilt: let us take a moment to ponder that phrase. What does it mean, what does it ever mean, to speak of my guilt or your guilt or our guilt in respect of some action or other? What if we were not ourselves, or not fully ourselves, when the action in question was performed? Was the action then ours? Why, when people have performed heinous deeds, do they commonly say afterwards, I cannot explain why I did what I did, I was beside myself, I was not myself? You stand before us today and assert your guilt. You claim your guilt is undeniable. But what if, at the moment when you make that claim, you are not yourself or fully yourself? These are only some of the issues which the court has a duty to raise and then settle. It is not up to you, the accused, the man in the very eye of the storm, to seal them off.
‘You say further that you do not want to save yourself. But your salvation is not a matter that rests in your hands. If we, your judges, do not do our best to save you, following scrupulously the letter of the law, then we will have failed to save the law. Of course we have a responsibility to society, a grave and onerous responsibility, to shield it from rapists and murderers. But we have an equal responsibility to save you the accused from yourself, in the event that you are or were not yourself, as the law understands being oneself to be. Am I clear?’
Dmitri is silent.
‘So much for the matter of exculpation, where you refuse to plead. I move on to the matter of mitigation, where again you say you will refuse to offer a plea. Let me tell you, as one man speaking to another, Dmitri: I can understand that you may wish to act honourably and accept without murmur the sentence pronounced on you. I can understand that you should not wish to shame yourself in public by seeming to crawl before the law. But that is the very reason why we have lawyers. When you instruct a lawyer to plead on your behalf you allow him to take on himself whatever shame the plea brings with it. As your representative he crawls on your behalf, so to speak, leaving your precious dignity intact. So let me ask you: why have you refused to have a lawyer?’
Dmitri clears his throat. ‘I spit on lawyers,’ he says, and spits on the floor.
The first assessor intervenes. ‘Our presiding judge has raised the possibility that you may not be yourself, as being oneself is understood by the law. To what he has said let me add that spitting in a court of law is not something one does when one is oneself.’
Dmitri stares at him fixedly, baring his teeth like an animal at bay.
‘The court can appoint a lawyer for you,’ continues the assessor. ‘It is not too late for that. It is within the court’s powers to do so. We can appoint a lawyer and postpone this sitting to give that officer time to acquaint himself fully with the case and decide on your best course of action.’
There is a low murmur of disappointment from the crowd.
‘Judge me now!’ cries Dmitri. ‘If you don’t, I will cut my throat. I will hang myself. I will beat my brains out. You won’t be able to stop me.’
‘Be careful,’ says the assessor. ‘My colleague has already recognized your wish to be seen to behave honourably. But you do not behave honourably when you threaten the court. On the contrary, you behave like a madman.’
Dmitri is about to reply, but the judge-in-chief raises a hand. ‘Be silent, Dmitri. We will all join you in silence. We will be silent together and allow our passions to cool. After which we will deliberate in a calm and reasoned way the question of how to proceed.’
The judge folds his hands and closes his eyes. His colleagues do likewise. People all around begin folding their hands and closing their eyes. Reluctantly he, Simón, follows their example. The seconds tick by. Somewhere behind him a baby whimpers. Allow our passions to cool, he thinks: what passion do I feel except a passion of irritation?
The judge-in-chief opens his eyes. ‘So,’ he says. ‘It is not contested that the deceased Ana Magdal
ena met her end as a result of the actions of the accused Dmitri. The court now calls upon Dmitri to tell his story, the story of the fourth of March as seen through his eyes; and for the purposes of the record let it be known that Dmitri’s narrative will be designated a plea in exculpation. Speak, Dmitri.’
‘When the fox has the goose by the throat,’ says Dmitri, ‘he does not say, “Dear goose, as a sign of my grace I am going to give you a chance to persuade me you are not a goose after all.” No, he bites off her head and tears open her breast and eats her heart. You have me by the throat. Go on. Bite off my head.’
‘You are not a beast, Dmitri, nor are we beasts. You are a man and we are men, entrusted with the task of achieving justice or at least an approximation to justice. Join us in that task. Put your trust in the law, in the tried and tested protocols of the law. Tell us your story, beginning with the deceased Ana Magdalena. Who was Ana Magdalena to you?’
‘Ana Magdalena was a teacher of dance and the wife of the principal of the Academy of Dance. The Academy of Dance occupied the floor above the museum, where I worked. I saw her every day.’
‘Go on.’
‘I loved Ana Magdalena. I loved her from the very first moment I saw her. I venerated her. I worshipped her. I kissed the ground she trod on. But she would have nothing to do with me. She found me uncouth. She laughed at me. So I killed her. I violated her and then afterwards strangled her. That is all.’
‘That is not all, Dmitri. You venerated Ana Magdalena, you worshipped her, yet you raped her and strangled her. We find that hard to comprehend. Help us. When the woman one loves spurns one, one’s feelings are hurt, but surely one does not react by turning upon her and killing her. There must have been some added cause, something that happened on the day in question that drove you to action. Tell us more fully what happened that day.’
Even from where he stands he, Simón, can see the flush of rage that creeps over Dmitri’s face, the intensity with which he grips the microphone. ‘Sentence me!’ he bellows. ‘Be over with it!’