For ten or fifteen minutes the three of them looked around in the teacher’s house and came to the conclusion that a minute forensic investigation was unnecessary. Plutonier Cartarescu merely impounded the empty schnapps bottle and the glass. These objects were regarded as evidence that, once again, alcohol had driven a person to commit a desperate act.
On the village square the elderly policeman explained that just in the district of Kronauburg, four hundred people were reported missing each year. Half of them showed up again in a week, and a good portion of those had taken off in the first place to escape familial or conjugal duties or had disappeared with a lover or mistress, while two or three dozen of the disappearances were alcohol related.
“Those drunks are awful, just awful,” Cartarescu corroborated his superior’s words, “and we have to identify the bodies, mostly in the spring when they emerge after the snow melt. First the suicides fill up on booze, then they freeze to death in their sleep. Remember last summer, that case with the false teeth?”
“Don’t remind me,” groaned the fat guy and he stuck another Carpati in his mouth. “Three gold teeth. Who’s got that many? We found the skull first—up in the Fagaras Mountains, below the Ortuella Chasm. Just the naked noggin with a couple tufts of hair still on it. And the bones, all mixed up: arms, ribs, thighbones. No surprise: the wolves and bears make a mess of everything, like a Gypsy camp. We knew where the scene of the crime was once we found the bottle. The cork was still in it. Drink yourself silly and then neatly cork up the bottle, your male suicides never do that. And the bottle was only half empty. You want to know why? It was a woman! We were thinking we’d have to go knock on every dentist’s door in the whole district, but we found the right one pretty quick. He said right away, ‘I know her. Three gold teeth, two in the upper-right quadrant, one in the lower left.’ The wife of Dascalescu, second in command at Kronauburg Electric. A randy old goat, let me tell you, after anything with skirts. Must have gotten to be too much for her, being the wife and always last in line. Killed herself instead of her old man. She was missing without a trace for two whole years. Scratch that: nobody disappears without a trace. It’s just a question of when we find the remains.”
Plutonier Cartarescu added that for now we shouldn’t worry too much about Miss Barbulescu. “She’ll turn up again for sure. Unless she’s holed up somewhere with a secret lover.” Cartarescu snorted a laugh, glanced over at the silent Lupu Raducanu in embarrassment, and then offered the opinion that a person’s love life was fundamentally a private matter and therefore not the object of official scrutiny. But since in Miss Barbulescu’s case it was a civil servant who was involved, her absence from the school would be punished as a serious dereliction of duty, although at the present time no search would be initiated.
The fat policeman nodded and ground out his cigarette with his shoe. “There’s no point searching now when it’s already snowing in the mountains.”
Cartarescu enjoined us to keep our eyes and ears open and report anything whatsoever unusual to the police station in Apoldasch. Then he tugged at his cap, saluted, and opened the driver’s door of the jeep.
“Just a moment! We’re not in such a hurry.”
The whole time I’d been getting the feeling that Lupu Raducanu had just as little interest in the fate of missing drunks as in the disappearance of a village schoolteacher. Now he turned to the men of Baia Luna.
“Just a few more questions,” said the security agent. Then he looked around and walked up to the Saxon Hermann Schuster. Everyone could see the goose egg on his forehead. It had turned dark violet since the party member Roman Brancusi had shattered a bottle on his head on Grandfather’s birthday.
“You should have that examined in the hospital,” said Raducanu. “An undiagnosed concussion can cause permanent damage.”
“It’s nothing worth mentioning,” the Saxon replied.
“Doesn’t look good, though.”
“Like I said, not worth mentioning.”
Raducanu dug a white pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket. Kents: a brand unknown in Baia Luna. The major flipped open a silver lighter, took his own sweet time lighting his cigarette, and then inhaled the smoke.
“I hear you had a little disagreement a few days ago?”
“Me? No. I can only repeat, it wasn’t worth mentioning.” Schuster seemed ill at ease.
“That’s right. Just a little misunderstanding.” Liviu Brancusi and his brothers Roman and Nico emerged from the crowd of men and came over to Raducanu and Schuster.
“J-j-just a mi-mi-misunderstanding between two m-m-men,” Roman repeated. “A m-m-minor mi-mi-misunderstanding between two m-m-men who had ma-ma-maybe a little too m-much to drink. You can see, M-m-major, the argument’s been se-se-settled already.”
Roman Brancusi ostentatiously extended his hand to Hermann Schuster. The Saxon shook it.
“Well, well. The argument is settled. How nice. Very pleasant to hear. So now you’re in agreement?”
Schuster and the three Brancusi brothers nodded cautiously.
“Very good. I hear tell that the argument was about the implementation of the government’s five-year plan and the upcoming collectivization of agriculture.”
“Who told you that?” asked Schuster.
“It doesn’t matter, does it? Now that you, a Saxon, an ethnic German, and the comrades Brancusi are in agreement.”
Hermann Schuster didn’t reply.
Major Raducanu turned to Roman. “Comrade, I understood you to say that this difference of opinion is really over and done with?”
“Ye-yes indeed, Co-co-comrade Major.”
“Very good. That means we can proceed immediately to transfer private landholdings in Baia Luna to the possession of the Commonwealth?”
Liviu Brancusi piped up, “It’s possible there’s a little more persuading that needs to be done. But our side has the best arguments. Baia Luna needs progress.”
“So, Comrade Brancusi, that means the work of persuasion has yet to be completed?”
“But soon will be, Comrade Major! Very soon.”
“I don’t understand. You were just talking about being in agreement. But now? Do people have a problem seeing the necessity for progress? Is there stubbornness? Protests? Resistance?”
The onlookers saw party member Liviu getting red in the face. “Protests? Resistance? Here in the village? No, no, one wouldn’t put it that way.”
“One damn well would put it that way!” Karl Koch pushed his way to the front. “And I will put it that way. Loud and clear.”
Koch looked Major Raducanu straight in the eye.
“After the war your father Aurel sent us off to the Russian mines even though you people cheered for the Führer just as much as we did. We Saxons did the dirty work for you. When we came home you’d taken our land, our houses, even the right to vote, a right every citizen has. We had a long struggle to get everything back that belonged to us. And now you want to dispossess us again. Let me tell you something, you little snot! I’m not giving up anything. Nothing! You Bolsheviks aren’t getting anything out of me. Over my dead body!”
Lupu Raducanu kept calm, even nodded. “You’re an upstanding fellow, an honest soul, Herr . . . Herr . . . ?”
“Koch,” said the Saxon, “Karl Koch.”
Raducanu lit up another Kent. “Our country needs people like you, honest men, Herr Koch. People who say what they think.”
The Saxon was completely nonplussed.
I was standing off to one side and got a fright as Lupu Raducanu suddenly stretched out his arm and pointed at our shop. “Herr Koch, there must be paper and pencils in that store?”
“Of course,” answered the confused Saxon. “Why do you ask?”
To Karl Koch’s surprise Raducanu took his wallet out of his coat and fished out a bill. Before Koch knew what was happening, the major had stuck the money into his jacket pocket.
“Herr Koch, you
will go into that store and buy paper and a pencil. Then you will sit down in your parlor and write down everybody’s name. Just the men in the village, in two columns. To the left the names of the ones who want a kolkhoz and to the right the names of the men who refuse to accept progress. I know you’re an honest man. You won’t forget anyone. You have three days. Then I want to see the list. I think we understand each other. Three days.”
Raducanu flipped his cigarette onto the ground.
“I’ll do shit-all, pretty boy.”
Koch spat onto Raducanu’s shiny shoes and tore the bill into little pieces. The major grinned, turned on his heel, and got into the car.
The fat policeman gave a brief shrug, which I interpreted as a gesture of regret, then Cartarescu started the car. The motor revved to a shriek, and the tires spun. As the cloud of diesel exhaust dissipated, I corrected an erroneous impression. I always thought a Securitate interrogator made people sweat, but Lupu Raducanu gave me a chill.
Chapter Five
A PRIEST’S LAST DAY, SILENCE, AND A MISSING COFFIN
I saw Karl Koch through the eyes of a boy, but everything I had seen convinced me the courageous Saxon would never draw up that damn list. It was November 8, a Friday. On Monday the Securitate major would show up in Baia Luna again and demand the list. On the left the names of those who wanted the kolkhoz, on the right the names of those opposed to the nationalization of their land.
As the gray jeep sped off in the direction of Kronauburg, some of the men clapped their German neighbor on the shoulder and expressed their admiration for his blunt words and the guts it took to say them.
“‘Pretty boy’! Not bad!” said Istvan. “‘Fatface’ would’ve been even better.”
If I had to guess, I’d say the Hungarian would be on the right side of the list that Karl Koch would definitely not be turning over. Same for the Petrovs and the Deslius. And of course the Scherban brothers and Grandfather Ilja. On the left the three Brancusis, all of them stout comrades. Certainly their father Bogdan as well, who didn’t till his land anyway, just let it go to seed. Simenov the blacksmith would also be on the left. I wasn’t sure about the Konstantins and the sacristan Julius Knaup, nor about Alexandru Kiselev. As a future employee of the state tractor factory, would he dare to have his name on the right side? There was no question where the Saxons stood, except for the photographer Heinrich Hofmann. The Gypsies didn’t even enter into the picture, since they had nothing to collectivize.
“Man, Karl, have you gone crazy?”
Hermann Schuster shoved the shoulder clappers aside and started rebuking his fellow Saxon. “Did you have to call Raducanu a pretty boy? The man is dangerous!”
“I’ll say whatever I want to. A pretty boy is a pretty boy.”
“Of course,” replied Schuster, “but it was a mistake to call Raducanu that to his face, a really dumb mistake.”
Hans Schneider put in his two cents: “Not here in the street. Let’s go to Ilja’s where we can talk it over in private.” Some agreed and started off toward the tavern—but only those whose names would have been on the right side.
I was still preoccupied with my fears about the extinguished Eternal Flame and the mysterious disappearance of Angela Barbulescu and so only grudgingly followed Grandfather’s summons to help him out in the tavern. As I was about to open a bottle of zuika, the men signaled me not to. Those who had just been congratulating Karl Koch for his resistance to Lupu Raducanu now admitted ruefully that Koch’s public protest against the Security Service had been extremely unwise and could have unforeseeable consequences.
Hermann Schuster’s reproach couldn’t be ignored: “If you hadn’t provoked Raducanu, the idea with the list of names would never have occurred to him.”
“You shouldn’t ever tangle with the Securitate, especially not that Lupu. He’s nothing but trouble,” remarked Alexandru Kiselev, whose only dream was to install transmissions in Stalinstadt.
“Do you realize what you’ve done, Karl?” Hermann Schuster asked his friend with growing urgency. “You know what it means to have the Securitate as an enemy? It means paragraph one hundred sixty-six: resisting state authority, threatening national security. For that you get two years, five years, maybe even seven years. Off to Aiud or Pitesti. They mess you up. Is spitting on an asshole’s shoes worth that? If you make this list, we’ll all be in trouble. If you don’t, they’ll just come and get you.”
“Fuck the list,” replied young Petre. “With it or without it, either way they’re going to force us into the kolkhoz. If not today, then tomorrow. And if Karl doesn’t make the list, somebody else will. The Brancusis or Simenov or whoever. The main thing is they want to divide the village. If we’re fighting each other, it’s easier to dispossess us.”
“They’re not going to collectivize me!” Karl Koch banged his fist on the table. “You can quote me. I’ve been on the wrong side once already. Never again! I must have been crazy to run and join that fucking war. I cheered along with everybody else for that strutting rooster and his Third Reich. And I did things I should never have done. Never, never again! I’m not going to let these crooks turn me into their stooge. Black, brown, or red, I don’t care. Over my dead body.”
“Okay, okay, Karl. We were all stupid.” Hermann Schuster put his arm around his friend’s shoulders. “But man, it’s not just about you. It’s about all of us, all of us who want to live here together in peace. It’s about your wife and children, too, Karl. Think about Klara, think about Franz and Theresa.”
Karl Koch was silent.
“But it’s true. Petre is right,” Hermann Schuster continued. “Raducanu wants to drive a wedge between us. We can’t let him do it. We need unity.”
The men sat together awhile longer but didn’t make much progress toward deciding what to do about the disunity threatening the village. The only sure thing was that Karl Koch was not going to make a list of names. No one, however, had a useful suggestion for how the Saxon should behave when Lupu Raducanu showed up again on Monday. More stymied than purposeful, they all agreed to wait and see what Pater Johannes would say in his sermon on Sunday. But then because of the urgency of the situation, they decided to seek the priest’s advice the next morning. With the authority of the clergy behind them, they hoped it would be easier to resist the power of the Securitate.
I was shocked when Karl Koch got up to go home. He looked tired and gray, older by several years and smaller than usual. Suddenly I understood what fear is. Without being afraid myself, I saw what fear can do to someone. Hermann Schuster’s appeal to think of his wife and two little children had awakened it in him. He was disabled by a power that snuck up on him with the question, What will happen if . . . ?
I tried to imagine what Karl Koch must be thinking. What would happen if he didn’t write down the names? What if on Monday he just went and hid out in the woods for a few days? Raducanu would leave, empty-handed. But the major would be back again sometime with ten or twenty of his people. They would come looking for him but wouldn’t be able to find him. But what then? What would happen to his wife and his children? Who would look after them? What about the others in the village? Would the Security Service interrogate Karl Koch’s friends as accessories to an enemy of the state? And what if Koch stayed in the village and confronted Raducanu with the words: Fuck your list, Fatface, write it yourself! That would mean Aiud or Pitesti. I didn’t even know where those two towns were, but I knew there were big prisons there. People said that anyone who made it out of them was never the same again. After two or three years in the clink, the wives no longer recognized their husbands nor children their fathers.
That Konstantin woman is nuts,” said my mother Kathalina at the supper table. “She really believes the devil himself’s been running around the village at night. Sometimes I have to wonder what kind of place this is, anyway.”
“Whoever pays attention to anything Kora says is beyond help. Best thing is just to let it go in
one ear and out the other,” Grandfather replied. “But it is a funny thing about that blood. Everyone in the village is scratching their heads about the trail of blood from the altar to the horse trough. I’d sure like to know what went on that night.”
I was relieved. No one seemed to have the least inkling that Fritz and I had anything to do with what happened. Strangely enough, no one said anything about the Eternal Flame being out. Could it be burning again? Had Johannes Baptiste or the sacristan Knaup relit it? I’d have to take a look. Next morning, when the delegation of men paid the priest a visit to confer about Karl Koch’s list and how to get out of it, I’d go into the church.
Even though the modest flicker of the red lamp was hardly noticeable in the daylight, I saw immediately that it wasn’t burning. But nobody else had noticed. With the little box of matches still in my pocket I could reestablish order.
But I didn’t. It was Fritz Hofmann who had blown out the light, not me. And it was up to him to straighten things out insofar as that was possible. Surely the Christian God was merciful and forgave every sinner: every liar, every thief, perhaps even every murderer, as long as he truly repented. But there probably wasn’t much that could be done about someone who blew out the Eternal Flame. Fritz would be punished. Maybe not today or tomorrow, but sometime or other he would pay for his sacrilege. On the other hand, what if God was in fact dead, as that Nietzsche guy claimed? Then Fritz Hofmann had nothing to fear, for a dead God cannot punish. But could God be dead? Could he die at all? If he’s dead, I reasoned, then he must have been alive at some point. But if he was once alive, then he had to be both almighty and immortal, because a god who wasn’t almighty and immortal was no kind of god. The true God, however, could obviously not be dead because of his immortality. Accordingly, Nietzsche was wrong. But was that thinker really so limited that I, a simple barroom gofer, could overturn his declaration that God was dead with a few logical arguments? I had to discover what Nietzsche really meant and, while I was at it, find out something about Heinrich Hofmann—what he believed, what he thought.
The Madonna on the Moon Page 11
