In the First Circle

by Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn

“And she’s still . . . really . . . devoting her life to me. How many people could do that? Are you sure you could?”

  The tears remained undried on her numbed cheeks.

  “Didn’t she want a divorce?” Simochka asked softly, deliberately.

  How quickly she had gotten to the heart of the matter. But he was reluctant to admit that something new had happened yesterday. It was much too complicated.

  “No.”

  Too pointed a question. If it were not so pointed, not so peremptory, not so sharp-edged, if we could stop calling things by their names and just look and look and look, then maybe you could get up, maybe you could walk to the light switch. . . . But pointed questions demand logical answers.

  “Is she . . . beautiful?”

  “Yes. To me she is,” Gleb said cautiously.

  Simochka sighed loudly. She nodded to herself, to the broken reflection in the mirror-smooth radio valves.

  “She won’t wait for you, then.”

  Simochka could not allow this invisible woman any of the advantages of a lawful wife. So she had once lived for a while with Gleb, but that was eight years ago. Since then, Gleb had fought in the war and done time in jail, while she, if she was really beautiful and young and childless, . . . had surely not lived like a nun. Gleb could never—not at yesterday’s meeting, not in a year’s time, not in two years, belong to her—but to Simochka he could. Simochka could become his wife that very day. That woman—no longer a phantom, no longer merely an empty name—why had she taken the trouble to get a visitor’s permit? What insatiable greed made her clutch at this man who would never belong to her?

  “She won’t wait for you!” Simochka repeated mechanically.

  It hurt more every time she touched that tender spot.

  “She’s waited eight whole years already!” Gleb said indignantly. But added, with his usual realism, that it would get harder before it was over.

  “She won’t wait for you!” Simochka said yet again, in a whisper.

  She wiped her drying tears away with the back of her hand.

  Nerzhin shrugged. If he was honest, Simochka was right, of course. They would grow apart—their characters would change; they would experience life differently. He had himself urged his wife over and over again to divorce him. But what gave Simochka the right to keep pressing on that sore spot?

  “Anyway, suppose she doesn’t wait. Just as long as she has nothing to reproach me with.” This seemed to be the moment for a little philosophy.

  “Simochka, I don’t consider myself a good man. In fact, I’m a very bad man. When I remember all the things I did at the front, in Germany, the things we all did. And now this, with you. . . . But believe me, I got that way in the free world, the thoughtless, comfortable, free world. I let myself be deluded into thinking that . . . bad things are permissible. But the lower I sank the . . . it’s strange. . . . She won’t wait, you say? Well, she needn’t wait. Just so long as I have nothing on my conscience. . . .”

  He had hit on a favorite theme. He could have talked about it at length, especially as there was nothing else he could say.

  Simochka had heard very little of this homily. He seemed unable to talk of anything but himself. But what was to become of her? She shuddered to think of herself going home, mumbling something to her tiresome mother, flopping onto her bed. The bed in which she had lain thinking of him for months past. How shameful, how humiliating! How eagerly she had prepared for this evening! All those lotions, all that perfume!

  But if a one-hour prison visit with no privacy meant more to him than all the months they had spent side by side, what could she do about it?

  There was no need to go on. They had said all they had to say, without stopping to think or to spare each other’s feelings. She ought to walk away, shut herself in the soundproof booth, weep a little longer, and pull herself together. But she could not bring herself to dismiss him or to walk away. For the last time, some tenuous thread still held them together.

  Gleb saw that she was not listening, that all his fine arguments were wasted on her, and said no more.

  He lit a cigarette, relaxed a little, and looked through the window again at the scattered yellowish lights.

  They sat there saying nothing.

  He was beginning to feel less sorry for her. It wasn’t as if her whole life depended on it. This was just a passing fancy. She would get over it . . . find somebody.

  With his wife it was different.

  The silence was becoming oppressive. Gleb’s only companions for many years had been other men, and he had never needed to explain himself at length. There was no more to be said. The subject was exhausted. So why were they still sitting there like dummies? Women never knew when to let go.

  He squinted at the electric wall clock without moving his head—he didn’t want Simochka to notice. Roll call in twenty minutes. Twenty minutes of the evening recreation period left. But he couldn’t just get up and leave. He didn’t want to hurt her feelings. He would have to sit it out.

  Who’ll be on duty this evening? Shusterman, probably. And the junior lieutenant tomorrow morning.

  Simochka sat huddled over her amplifier, idly wobbling the valves out of their sockets and putting them back in again.

  She had never understood the first thing about that amplifier. And she understood even less now.

  But Nerzhin’s active mind needed something to occupy it. He had made a note of the day’s radio programs, as he did every morning, and slipped it under his inkstand.

  “20:30—Rs. s. & rm (Obkh),” he read, meaning “Russian songs and romances performed by Obukhova.”

  A rare treat! And in the quiet leisure hour. The concert had started already. But wouldn’t it be a bit tactless to switch it on?

  A receiver permanently tuned to the three Moscow stations stood within easy reach on the windowsill. A present from Valentulya. Nerzhin glanced at the motionless Simochka and furtively switched it on at the lowest possible volume.

  The valves lit up, and suddenly the sound of accompanying strings, followed by Obukhova’s low, hoarsely passionate, incomparable voice broke the silence in the room.

  Simochka started. She looked at the receiver. Then at Gleb.

  Obukhova was singing something painfully relevant: “No, you are not the one I burn for. . . .”

  The last thing they needed! Gleb fumbled for the switch and could not find it.

  Simochka sat slumped over her amplifier, head in hands, and wept uncontrollably.

  He had not been satisfied with his own hurtful words in their last few minutes together.

  Gleb was touched to the quick.

  “Forgive me!” he cried. “Forgive me!”

  He gave up feeling for the switch.

  Impulsively he dashed across the room, around both desks, and with no further thought for the sentry took her head in his hands and kissed her hair near her forehead.

  Simochka wept copiously, easily, no longer convulsively sobbing.

  These were tears of relief.

  Chapter 90

  On the Back Stairway

  WORRIED TO DISTRACTION and still reeling from the shock of Ruska’s arrest (the buzz had gone around two hours ago, after Shikin had broken into Ruska’s desk, and was confirmed at evening roll call when the orderly officer pretended not to notice Ruska’s absence), Nerzhin almost forgot about his rendezvous with Gerasimovich.

  Routine had inexorably brought him back fifteen minutes after roll call to the same two desks, the same open journals, and the upended amplifier still spotted with Simochka’s tears. And now Gleb and Simochka were condemned to sit facing each other for another two hours (and tomorrow, the next day, and every day, all day long), staring at their papers so that their eyes would not meet.

  But the minute hand of the electric clock jumped toward 9:15, and Nerzhin suddenly remembered. He was not really in the mood just at present to talk about the rational society, but maybe this was as good a time as any. He locked the left-hand s
ide of his desk, where his more important records were kept, and, without tidying up his papers or turning off the desk lamp, went out into the hallway, cigarette in mouth. He sauntered over to the glass door that opened onto the back stairs and gave it a push. As expected, it was unlocked.

  Nerzhin took a casual look behind him. No one to be seen along the hallway. He stepped briskly across the threshold, from wooden floor to concrete floor, keeping his hand on the door so that he could close it noiselessly, and set off up the stairs, into the gathering gloom, drawing on his cigarette occasionally to help him see his way.

  The Iron Mask’s window was unlit. A band of fading light filtered through one of the outer windows onto the upper landing.

  After twice tangling with junk dumped on the staircase, Nerzhin called out from the top step in a subdued voice, “Is anyone there?”

  A voice, which might or might not belong to Gerasimovich, called out, “Who’s that?”

  “It’s . . . only me.” Nerzhin pronounced the words slowly, in order to help the other man recognize him, and pulled on his cigarette so that the glow would light up his face.

  A narrow beam from Gerasimovich’s pocket flashlight indicated the block of wood on which Nerzhin had sat the day before, after the visit. Gerasimovich perched on one just like it.

  A throng of invisible witnesses—the serf artist’s paintings—lurked on the walls around them.

  “There you are, you see, after all our years in jail, we’re greenhorns when it comes to conspiracy,” Gerasimovich said. “We omitted to take the simplest precaution. The newcomer hasn’t given himself away, but the person waiting in the dark must not call out. We should have thought of some sort of password for you to use on the stairs.”

  “Ye-e-es,” Nerzhin drawled, taking his seat. “We certainly have our work cut out. We’re busy enough earning our bread and trying to save our souls, but we also have to learn to hold our own against the overfed apparatchiks of the KGB. How many of them are there? A couple of million? We have to live so many lives in one lifetime. No wonder we can’t keep up! How do we know Mamurin isn’t lying on his bed in the dark? If he is, we might as well be having this conversation in Shikin’s office.”

  “I made sure before coming here; he’s in Number Seven. If he comes back, we will be aware of him first. So let’s get on with it.”

  His words were businesslike, but he sounded tired and distracted.

  “Actually, I was going to ask you to postpone our talk. But the fact is that I’ll be leaving this place any day now.”

  “Is that definite?”

  “Yes.”

  “As a matter of fact, I will be leaving, too, though not quite so soon. I haven’t given satisfaction.”

  “If only we knew that you and I will find ourselves in the same transit prison, we could have our talk then—plenty of time for it there. But prison history teaches us never to put off a conversation.”

  “Yes. I’ve learned that lesson myself.”

  “All right, then. You doubt whether it’s possible to construct a rational society.”

  “I doubt it very much. To the point of total disbelief.”

  “And yet it’s not at all complicated. But constructing it is a job for the elite, not the asinine hoi polloi. And the society to be constructed is not a ‘democratic’ one or a ‘socialist’ one; these are secondary characteristics. The society to be constructed is an intellectual one. It will of necessity also be rational.”

  “So that’s it,” Nerzhin drawled, disappointed. “You’ve outlined your plan in three sentences. But it would take more than three evenings to make sense of them. To begin with, how do you distinguish between ‘intellectual’ and ‘rational’? We know all about the rational society. French rationalists have already made one great Revolution. Spare us any more of that!”

  “They weren’t rationalists, just windbags. The intellectuals haven’t carried out their Revolution yet.”

  “And they never will. They’re like tadpoles—big heads and nothing else. An intellectual society . . . how do you visualize it? It would obviously have nothing to do with ethics and religion?”

  “Not necessarily. We can make provision for them.”

  “Make provision! But that’s just what you’re not doing. An intellectual society—what do we imagine it would be like? Engineers without priests. Everything functioning beautifully, a perfectly rational economy, everybody in the right job—and a rapid accumulation of all good things. But that’s not enough, take it from me! Society’s aims must not be purely material!”

  “Adjustments can be made later on. But for the time being, most of the countries in the world. . . .”

  “I don’t want to talk about the time being! And later on will be too late! You talk about a rational social structure. Then you tell me it will be nonsocialist. Well, I don’t give a damn about that; the form of property ownership is of minimal importance, and who knows which is best. But when you say ‘not democratic,’ that frightens me. What does that mean? Why?”

  Out of the pitch darkness, Gerasimovich answered precisely, choosing his words as carefully as a fastidious writer.

  “We have been starved of freedom, so we think that freedom should have no limits. But unless limits are set to freedom, there can be no well-adjusted society. The restrictions, however, must not be of the kind that shackle us now. And people must be kept honestly informed, not deluded. We think of democracy as a sun that never sets. But what does democracy really mean? Truckling to the uncouth majority. And that means accepting mediocrity as the norm, pruning the highest and most delicate growths. The votes of a hundred or a thousand blockheads set the course for the enlightened.”

  “Hm-m.” Nerzhin seemed to be at a loss. “This is all new to me. . . . I don’t understand . . . don’t know . . . must think about it. . . . I’m used to the idea of democracy. What would we have in place of democracy?”

  “Equitable inequality. Inequality based on talent, natural or cultivated. You can please yourself whether you call it ‘the authoritarian state’ or ‘the rule of the intellectual elite.’ It will be rule by selfless, completely disinterested, luminous people.”

  “Heavens above! As an ideal, that’s just fine. But how is your elite to be selected? And, above all, how do you persuade the rest that this is the true elite? After all, a man’s intellectual capacity isn’t stamped on his brow, and honesty doesn’t give off a glow. We were promised that it would be just like that under socialism; our rulers would be clad in light, like angels—and look at the ugly customers who crawled out of the woodwork. All sorts of questions arise. What about political parties? Or rather, how do we dispense with political parties, the old type and—heaven forfend—the new type? Mankind awaits the prophet who can tell us how to do without political parties altogether. Party membership always means leveling down to the majority, accepting discipline, saying things you don’t mean. Every party warps the individual and perverts justice. The leader of the opposition criticizes the government not because it has really made a mistake but because—well, what else is the opposition for?”

  “There you are—you yourself are moving away from democracy and toward my system.”

  “Not really! Just a tiny bit closer, perhaps. Authoritarianism, now. What are we to say about it? The state must exercise authority, of course. But what sort of authority? Moral authority! Power relying not on bayonets but on love and respect. Able to say, ‘Fellow countrymen! You must not do this! It is wrong!’ so that they are all conscience-stricken and know in their hearts ‘This is bad! We will eschew it! We will do it no more!’ What other way is there? What is called ‘authoritarianism’ is totalitarianism in embryo. I’d sooner have something on the Swiss model. Remember what Herzen says? The lower the authority, the more powerful it is: The most powerful is the village assembly, the most impotent man in the state is the president. . . . All right, I’m not really serious. Perhaps you and I are being a bit premature? Rational structure! It would be more rationa
l to discuss how to escape from the irrational. We can’t even do that, although it’s a more immediate concern.”

  The voice from the darkness was unperturbed.

  “That is, in fact, the main subject of our discussion.”

  And, as calmly as if they were talking about changing a fused valve in a circuit: “I think the time has come for us, the Russian technical intelligentsia, to change the form of government in Russia.”

  Nerzhin was taken aback. Not that he did not trust Gerasimovich; the very look of the man had inspired a feeling of kinship, although they had, as it happened, never talked until now.

  But the quiet voice from the darkness, composed and somewhat solemn, sent a little shiver along Nerzhin’s spine.

  “Alas, spontaneous revolution is impossible in our country. Even in Old Russia, where those intent on subversion enjoyed almost unrestricted freedom, it took three years of war—and what a war—to stir up the people. While nowadays a joke at the tea table can cost you your head—what hope is there of revolution?”

  “No need for the ‘Alas,’ ” Nerzhin replied. “To hell with revolution: Your elite would be the first to be massacred. Culture and beauty would be eliminated; everything good would be destroyed.”

  “All right, forget the ‘Alas.’ But that’s why many among us have begun to set their hopes on help from outside. That seems to me a profound and damaging mistake. What the ‘Internationale’ says isn’t all that stupid. We look nowhere else for deliverance; let us win freedom with our own hands! You have to understand that the more prosperous, the more free and easy life becomes in the West, the less ready Western man is to fight for fools who have allowed themselves to be oppressed. And they are right; they haven’t opened their own gates to the robber band. We have deserved our regime and leaders; we got ourselves into this mess, and we must get ourselves out of it.”

  “Their turn will come.”

  “Of course their turn will come. There is a destructive force in prosperity. To prolong it for a year, a day, a man will sacrifice not only all that belongs to others but all that is sacred. He will defy the dictates of common prudence. They fattened Hitler, they fattened Stalin, gave them half of Europe each; now it’s China’s turn. They’ll gladly surrender Turkey, if that will allow them to postpone general mobilization by as much as a week. They will perish; of course they will. But we may perish first.”