The Buddha's Return

by Gaito Gazdanov

  “Nonetheless, his notary has provided us with a copy of the will: Shcherbakov has left his entire fortune to you.”

  “To me?” I said in astonishment. A chill ran down my spine. “That is indeed a terrible coincidence.”

  “The body of evidence stacked against you is almost too incredible to be believed,” he said. “On the evening of the murder you went to Shcherbakov’s. You are the last man to have seen him alive. No fingerprints other than yours have been found. Let us suppose that it’s all a coincidence—an extremely unlucky one, but a coincidence nevertheless. The only argument to speak in your favour was that, as far as you were concerned, the murder would have been utterly pointless. Yet now we learn that there was a will, and this will leaves the deceased’s entire fortune to you. The logical missing link—how you stand to benefit from Shcherbakov’s death—has been found. You must admit that the evidence is overwhelming. And the answer to the question that arose at the very beginning—‘Why did you kill him?’—is now obvious. You claim you knew nothing of the will, but that’s a verbal assertion opposed by a host of weighty and incontrovertible evidence gathered during the course of this investigation.”

  I couldn’t recollect myself for the shock of it: how and why had Pavel Alexandrovich made out a will in my favour? I focused on this question for a few moments and was suddenly struck by a possible explanation for it all. However, I did not mention this to the investigator.

  “I should like to know,” he continued, “what you have to say to this.”

  “First of all, that it would be odd, to say the least, if it were true that I had acted as the investigation, not without a certain logic, seeks to establish. What could be more foolish and naive than the behaviour of such a murderer? He knows he cannot conceal the fact of his visit to Shcherbakov, that what he stands to benefit from the death of this man is indisputable and all too apparent, and that suspicion in the first instance will fall on him. Yet there he goes one evening to Shcherbakov’s, not by chance, but by invitation, kills him, returns home and fancies that if anyone were to ask him about it he’d simply say he didn’t kill anyone and that he would naturally be believed. You must admit that only a man whose mental faculties ought to be the subject of clinical study could act in such a way.”

  Everything the investigator said to me and everything I said in response was marked by a peculiar clarity and precision—to which I was now quite unaccustomed, having lost it long ago.

  “There’s almost always a clinical element,” said the investigator, “in the logic of every murderer; criminal reports continue to substantiate this. Herein lies the difference between their logic and that of normal people, and this is the Achilles’ heel, so to speak, of any murderer.”

  “Yes, yes, I understand. There’s always a certain pathological moment,” I said. “It usually manifests itself as some minor miscalculation. But such sheer stupidity in the behaviour of a would-be murderer—doesn’t that seem even more unlikely to you than this whole series of coincidences? For me this is a matter of life and death, and I intend to defend myself to the last. But I give you my word only to speak the truth.”

  His distant eyes looked at me as though he were thinking something I could never know. Then he said:

  “I’m going to do something that is perhaps a little unorthodox. Let us suppose that you aren’t the murderer, although, I repeat, the evidence is stacked against you. I admit, the arguments you have just presented had already occurred to me: it’s much too obvious, and it’s truly rather strange. Were it not for the fact that I’ve met and spoken to you, and had I just been told about this, I would have said that an investigation would be a waste of time. But I will try to help you. Do you remember what you and Shcherbakov were talking about on the night of his murder?”

  Silence filled the large office. I was sitting in a chair, smoking a cigarette; to anyone else it might have looked as if two friends were having a quiet conversation about some abstract matter.

  “Yes, yes,” I replied. “I remember everything now. It all began when I mentioned how much I enjoyed watching the fire, finding something atavistic in this love for flames. My friend agreed with me; then we began to talk about death. He said that he often thought about it and found a certain comfort in these thoughts. He quoted from the Orthodox funeral rites and an obituary that might have appeared in the papers. I told him that death lacked any allure for me whatsoever. I recall it now as clear as day: I said to him that he had no heirs, no one to make a will for. Then came a few personal recollections that had no particular significance. One of the last things we discussed was Buddhism.”

  “If I understand correctly, then, the conversation meandered without any logical sequence to it,” he said. “We would call it une conversation à bâtons rompus. But perhaps you’re able to recall the link, the association that led you from personal anecdotes to a discussion of religious doctrine?”

  “That’s very simple,” I replied. “Above Pavel Alexandrovich’s head…”

  “You mean to say, above the divan where he was sitting?”

  “He was sitting on the armchair, not on the divan,” I said. “The divan was to the right of the armchair, a little off to the side.”

  “You’re quite right; my mistake. Please, do go on.”

  “Above his head was a bookshelf, and on this shelf stood a golden statuette of the Buddha.”

  “Can you describe it to me?”

  “I’d recognize it among a thousand others.”

  “What was so unusual about it?”

  I described the golden Buddha in detail and said that I was struck by its ecstatic face and the similarity of its expression to that of St Jerome.

  The investigator’s face suddenly tensed.

  “That’s odd,” he said under his breath, more to himself than to me. “That’s very odd. Did you imagine this statuette to be particularly valuable?”

  “I’m no expert in such objects. For me its value was primarily aesthetic. However, I believe it must have been worth a great deal; it was made of solid gold, and there was a ruby set in it, albeit a very small one. In any case it was a remarkable statuette.”

  “Very well,” he said. “So, you see the gold Buddha, and this naturally made you think of…”

  “…of Buddhism and nirvana. Pavel Alexandrovich handed me the statuette so that I could examine it properly. While it was on the shelf, I hadn’t been able to see it in all its glory: a lamp was shining on the table and the books were in the shadows.”

  “What did you do with the statuette next?”

  “I handed it back to Pavel Alexandrovich, who placed it back on the shelf.”

  “You’re sure of this?”

  “Of what in particular?”

  “That he put it back on the shelf.”

  “I’m certain.”

  “Very well,” he said. “I’ll have more questions for you later.”

  Back in my cell, I set my mind to work on the murder of Pavel Alexandrovich. Unlike my interrogators, I knew one vital detail—that I was not the murderer. The first hypothesis to enter my head was that Amar was the murderer. But I failed to see why he would do this. There could be no question of jealousy. Nor of any immediate advantage: Pavel Alexandrovich was supporting Lida, and Amar was living off the money she received. Moreover, the apartment had been left perfectly in order, there were no signs of any struggle, no attempt at theft, and everything was in its rightful place. Could it have been a man from the street, some random criminal? That seemed equally improbable—mainly because nothing had been stolen.

  There was one other thing that seemed strange—the murder weapon. Pavel Alexandrovich had been killed with a knife to the back of the head, causing death instantaneously. At least, that is what I had managed to glean from the investigator. This, too, was a mystery. What type of knife could it have been? The instrument of death could not have been any ordinary broad-bladed knife. In any case, whatever the type of knife, the blow must have been delivered with ex
ceptional strength and precision. It was unlikely that the ailing, consumptive Amar would have possessed such an unerring eye or the requisite physical strength. Moreover, for the hundredth time, why on earth would he have done it? The most likely remaining hypothesis—absurd as it was, it could not entirely be discounted—was that Pavel Alexandrovich had been the victim of some maniac.

  When I was next brought in for questioning, I waited impatiently to hear what the investigator had to say. He sat down, laid a piece of paper in front of him and asked me in exactly the same tone, as if he were continuing an interrogation that had been interrupted only a few minutes ago:

  “You say you remember the gold statuette of the Buddha in minute detail?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was it standing on? Did it have a base of any sort?”

  “No,” I replied. “There was no base. The underside of the statuette was a perfect square, the one difference being that the corners were slightly rounded.”

  He handed me the sheet of white paper and asked:

  “Is this the approximate shape of the underside?”

  On the paper there was a faint line drawing of a perfect square with rounded corners.

  “That’s it exactly.”

  The investigator nodded. Then he looked me in the eyes and said:

  “Whoever killed Shcherbakov must have taken the gold Buddha. There was a square imprint left on a shelf that was covered by a thin layer of dust. You’re holding a tracing of it in your hands right now. If we can find the statuette, you’ll be free to return home and continue your research on the Thirty Years War, the notes on which we found in your room. I must say, however, that I completely disagree with your conclusions, and in particular your appraisal of Richelieu.”

  He then handed me a cigarette—this silent gesture immediately said more than any alteration in the tone of his voice could have done. He did it almost automatically, as one might offer a cigarette to a friend. I felt a strange sense of relief, and my breathing quickened.

  “Let’s move on to another matter,” he said. “What do you know about the deceased’s mistress, her parents and her protector? I’d find it difficult to imagine that you haven’t given any thought to the possibility of their having some part in the murder.”

  “I’ve given it a lot of thought,” I said. “I’ve got a fair idea of the people we’re dealing with, but least of all I know Amar, Lida’s ‘protector’, as you call him. Not one of them is a respectable sort. Although I have to say, I fail to see how Lida or Amar could stand to profit by this murder.”

  “One could be forgiven for thinking that you’re completely indifferent to the outcome of this investigation.”

  “My line of reasoning may differ somewhat from yours,” I said, “but this is because I’m in possession of first-hand information that for you isn’t proven a priori: I know I didn’t kill Shcherbakov.”

  “At first glance, Lida and Amar appear to have a watertight alibi,” he said. “They both spent the night at L’Étoile d’Or, a dance hall. The waiters on both the first and second shifts remember Amar ordering champagne for them.”

  “It happened on a Saturday night, when there will have been a crowd. An hour’s absence could easily go unnoticed.”

  “Yes, and what’s more, we have reason enough to doubt any testimony from that lot. However, until we have proof to the contrary, we’re obliged to go along with it.”

  “Still, I can’t see what Amar could have been trying to achieve by killing Shcherbakov.”

  “Nor can we, and this stands in his favour. We searched their residence and questioned them, but to no avail. Lida’s parents spent the night at home, and in any case I see no reason to suspect them. What are you able to tell me about them?”

  I told him what I knew. He said:

  “Of course, that speaks volumes for their character, but frankly it doesn’t prove that either of them committed this murder, which has only left them out of pocket. We have to find this statuette; it’s the key to everything. I shan’t pretend that finding it will be an easy task. I see no reason to question you any further. Now you must wait; time is on your side.”

  Before sending me away, he added:

  “If the murderer hadn’t been tempted by the golden Buddha, you’d be facing the guillotine or a lifetime’s hard labour. I doubt whether the knowledge that the annals of justice would have been enriched by yet another case of a man being convicted for a crime he didn’t commit would have been any consolation to you.”

  I couldn’t even begin to imagine how long I would have to wait. But at least I was now certain that I was out of harm’s way. True, I had imagined that the investigator, now being convinced of my non-implication in Shcherbakov’s murder, might have restored me to freedom; however, placing myself in his shoes, I fancied that I should have acted in much the same way, if only so that Pavel Alexandrovich’s real murderer would continue believing himself to be out of danger. As I subsequently found out, this was indeed the case to a certain degree. It later occurred to me that in the realm of elementary logic every individual reasons in much the same way, and it is ultimately the arbitrary laws of this peculiar branch of mathematics that leads to the arrest of a killer or to a crime’s solution—especially as criminals are so often primitive people, incapable of any abstract thought, and in this sense are defenceless against the slightest intellectual advantage of even a middling investigator. This ought to be a case in point, I thought.

  I never gave any thought to the likely duration of my incarceration, nor did I keep track of the time I spent there; in spite of this, I was unconsciously prepared to believe that it might last for a couple of days. However, several weeks elapsed with no change in my circumstances. Sometimes it began to seem as if years could go by like this—not because I ought to have remained in custody, but because I was but one man among a crowd of millions in Paris and I had somehow found myself arrested, facing the prospect that I could simply vanish and be forgotten. This, however, was neither conjecture nor deduction, but a dark, vague presentiment; it was yet another obvious fault in my muscles, my vision, my hearing, my whole imperfect sensory apparatus. Days went by. At first I was unable to think about anything, but then I began to remember a whole array of things that were entirely unconnected with the murder. I always had to make such an effort to force myself to consider what it was that had played the chief part in my fate. It struck me that Pavel Alexandrovich’s tragic and untimely death had failed to stir in me any pity or sorrow, feelings that I should have been experiencing and that would have been only natural. A strange sensation suddenly took hold of me—I myself found it difficult to put my finger on—as if everything had essentially been set in motion the moment it was revealed that Pavel Alexandrovich was no longer of this world. He had unsuspectingly, and now as though for ever, acquired that haunting, picturesque quality that had so struck me on the day I first met him in the Jardin du Luxembourg. I remembered all our conversations, his peculiar geniality, but now they somehow failed to provoke in me any emotional—I could find no other word for it—response. It occurred to me that he had come into my life at a time when everything was illusory and hypothetical, when the trees in the Jardin du Luxembourg had been no more real to me than the imaginary scenery in that far-off country I had never known. And yet what had taken place corresponded exactly with what I had been thinking about as I stood on that bridge across the Seine, on my way home from his apartment on the night of his death. Perhaps the very thought had coincided with the precise moment he died in that armchair, robbed even of the time to realize, perceive or comprehend that this was the journey into the other world that he had described to me in such lyric tones. This was the real crime—as it is with almost every murder: he had been deprived of what he had only begun to anticipate, the purpose of his long journey, a slow and gradual withdrawal from everything, the approach of nirvana, as he might have said during one of our conversations that was never to take place. And so it now struck me that
I had been wrong in thinking it would have been better for him to die before he stopped appreciating his newfound happiness: I had arbitrarily dispossessed him of the single most important period in his life. I had stolen—and my only consolation was that it remained purely in the realm of theory—his right to a natural death, which had belonged to him, and to no one else. But time had not been on his side—and who could have known that there would be no journey, no approach of nirvana, but a quick gasp and instant darkness? Who could have known that there would be no obituary, no “bosom of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob”, but the rigid body of an old man lying in a dissecting room before an autopsy, the very same body that Lida had held in her limp embrace the previous evening, as she closed her eyes and thought of Amar?

  I noticed in my current condition a single attribute that could perhaps have been linked to the fact of my incarceration: whenever I began to think about something, I would find it more difficult than ever before to transfer my attention to something else. Normally I would have done this almost automatically: now, however, the images that used to fill my imagination seemed to have lost their former lightness and, more importantly, they had stopped submitting to my will, on which their appearance and disappearance no longer depended. Perhaps this was the effect of exhaustion. I tried to fight it as much as I could, but evidently I had little remaining strength. The moment finally came when I grasped the impossibility of distancing myself from what had long been approaching, from what I had tried to repress once and for all, because I knew nothing more painful or tragic. It began with three lines that haunted me:

  But come you back when all the flow’rs are dying,

  If I am dead—as dead I well may be—

  You’ll come and find the place where I am lying…

  Just then I heard the voice that had sung these words, a voice I had not heard for two years. Both the voice and these words emerged out of a sense of regret and loss, reminding me of my wilful and senseless rejection of the only chance I had to turn back the clock. How could I have thought then that I was unworthy of all this—the summer evenings, the intimacy with Catherine, her voice, her eyes and her diaphanous love? And how was it that these shadowy images, these descents into oblivion, my own shifting silhouette and the swaying instability of my life could seem so overwhelming that, fearing the inescapable illusoriness of existence, I would step into this abstract darkness, leaving that voice and these words behind, on the other side of this hateful expanse? Why did I do it? No one could have known for sure that I would have lost the battle. Had I really lacked the imagination to construct a seductive fictional reality? Would I really have been too weak to embody the image that Catherine had vaguely glimpsed, the one she had forgotten, the one she had invoked?