Z, 50th Anniversary Edition

by Vassilis Vassilikos

In spite of the ice bag, Nikitas could feel the blood rising to his head. He couldn’t believe that the General, the “immune leader,” had come expressly to bait him. Here he was, not knowing where, alone in a ward with forty beds, and to make matters worse, people came and made fun of him. No, that was too much. He stared at the General, who stared back with thorny eyes, trying to penetrate his soul. Neither spoke. Finally the General got up, went to the window and opened it, “to let in a little fresh air,” accompanying these words with a gesture suggesting that only thus could he clear the fog out of Nikitas’s brain.

  Then, approaching him with the elastic tread of an old fox, he tapped him condescendingly on the shoulder. “And to think you’re one of our boys. How could you do such a thing?”

  Nikitas understood. He had a koumbaros, an officer on the police force, and the General certainly knew it. But he couldn’t help it if all his kith and kin were on Yango’s side. He, Nikitas, knew the truth, and he also knew that unless he made it public, it would weigh on him like a stone the rest of his life.

  “Well,” the General said as he went out, “in good time you’ll go back to your work and your little shop. If I were you, I’d forget the whole business. We’re even going to find you a better house.”

  He closed the door, leaving behind a bunch of thistles and a frost of fear because nothing specific had been said. A nurse came in to change the ice, and then the medical examiner—the one who had maintained that Z. had not been wounded by a blow with a club but by his “fall on the pavement”—entered. After taking Nikitas’s temperature—100 degrees—he examined the wound on his head, concluding that it was nothing very serious, that in a day or two he’d be able to go back to work, provided, of course, he cooperated.

  “Which means?” asked Nikitas.

  “You know better than I.”

  “Which means they didn’t hit me?”

  “You slipped and fell.”

  “Then I’ll take off this ice bag.”

  “No, for God’s sake, don’t take it off!”

  “There are only two possibilities, sir. Either they hit me, in which case I need the ice bag, or they didn’t hit me, in which case I don’t need it.”

  The doctor too had managed to inject him with the anguish of doubt. “They can’t all take me for a lunatic,” thought Nikitas. He was just dozing off when a third visitor arrived. It was the Public Prosecutor, the one he was going to to testify when he had been struck down in the street.

  “How many years have you been in the party?” he asked abruptly.

  “What party?”

  “The left.”

  “I was never in the left party, or in any other party. If it’s absolutely necessary for me to belong to something, well then, it’s the PAOK soccer club.”

  In the newspapers the next day he read the account of his accident: “The theory of a criminal assault does not stand up. Despite the man’s assertions, he fell on the street; he was not attacked. The student who picked him up made a formal statement before the Public Prosecutor: ‘I was walking along when I heard a noise. Turning around, I saw a man stretched out on the street …’ The medical examiner later found him smoking and reading the newspapers. Moreover, his sister, Roxani Koryvopoulou, maintains: ‘My brother was not attacked. He must have stumbled, and fallen.’ And his mother: ‘Ever since he was a little boy, he’s been telling tall stories.’ ”

  He clutched his head; he was losing his mind. It was now that he was suffering from delusions. They were all conspiring against him, trying to show him up as a mythomaniac. So no one had struck him? He’d fallen down in a kind of epileptic fit? That was certainly what his sister had intimated. Of course, she hadn’t dared to assert it openly because it might have been damaging to herself as well. But Nikitas was sure that was what she meant. His head was whirling. He skimmed through the newspaper again, and among the miscellaneous items on the last page he read the following: “It is alleged that the two doctors who first examined him and reported lesions induced by a blow have been under extreme pressure since yesterday to retract their diagnosis. It should be stressed that certain eminent physicians at the university have cast doubt on the judgment of these doctors, describing them as ‘second-rate.’ ”

  Then he saw her. Yes, it was his mother. She’d come, bringing some fruit and other delicacies. She’d made him a spinach pie, his favorite dish.

  “Now then, what’s all this about, my boy? What a thing to happen! Everyone in the neighborhood sends you greetings. Our house is like a railroad station. Newspaper reporters, photographers, you can’t imagine … But tell me, my dear son, prop of my old age, what’s this they’re saying—that someone attacked you? You who wouldn’t even hurt a fly! Why did they have to come and tell me that? I told them it wasn’t possible, that no one could have anything against my Nikitas. Once, when you were a little boy, you slipped and fell—do you remember? You thought you’d been hit on the head. Remember? You thought the kids in the neighborhood had done it because you had a beautiful new ball. They ran after you and you fell down and hurt your head. You came home and cried in my arms. My poor Nikitas! The truth is that nobody hit you, either then or now. You don’t want to make us the laughing stock of the neighborhood, do you? Say you slipped! So we can have some peace. Since these are the people who have the power, why don’t you cooperate? Or are you maybe with the others—the dirty Reds, who butchered my father-in-law in ’45? No, it’s not possible; you never were. I told them you only cared about two things: your work and the soccer club. They keep coming and asking me about you. They want photographs of you when you were a little boy. And I tell them: ‘He didn’t have any appetite when he was little. I had to tell him fairy tales to make him eat.’ When I told you the story of the wolf and the sheep, your mouth would open wide, and I’d quickly put a mouthful of food in it. ‘Ah, so he likes fairy tales?’ they said. ‘He’s always liked them,’ I told them. You’re all I have, my boy. Think of my rheumatism. And just when I was getting ready to go to Eleftheres with Mrs. Koula for the sand baths! If I don’t get there this summer, I’ll suffer all winter long. Do you want me to be ill when the rainy season starts? You know it rains all the time in Salonika. Why can’t you just say you slipped and fell so we can all have some peace.”

  “Who sent you here, Mama? My sister?”

  “I came of my own accord, my son. I don’t want you to go to prison.”

  “Prison? That’s where I’m going to send those culprits. Please, Mama, I beg you, stop talking, I’m dizzy.”

  “Come, eat a little fruit.”

  “I don’t want any.”

  “Try to think of me—your poor mother.”

  “I’ve had enough. You’re all trying to make it look as if I were a nut. I’ve not had a second’s peace since I got here. And now …”

  The mother went out; the sister came in.

  “So we make statements to the press, do we?” he shouted. “We do everything to protect our own little interests.”

  “What do you want to do? Break up my home?”

  She was dressed in a pink printed cotton dress and was carrying a smart handbag. Everything about her bearing and dress made it clear that she was utterly unlike her brother.

  “You’ve always been cheeky,” she said to him. “And you’ve always despised me.”

  “No, it’s you who despise me! You’re two years older than I am, and you’ve always treated me like a kid.”

  “Tell me, did you ever take me anywhere? You chased after girls, while I stayed home embroidering. And whenever one of your friends asked about me, you’d lose your temper. You were so afraid one of them might get a crush on me. How I used to long for our father! How much more understanding he would have been. He would have allowed me to go to the movies. But you! Well, I got married, I made a home, I’m very happy, and I won’t let anyone wreck my life. I’ll say again what I’ve said a thousand times before. You’re nothing but a liar. You’ve let yourself be taken in by those bums!”
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  “Tell me, Roxani … But first calm down. Sit down.”

  “Why haven’t you shaved today? Do you want to make it look like you’ve been mistreated, that they’ve tortured you?”

  “Sit down,” said Nikitas gently. “That’s right. And don’t, please don’t cry.”

  She took a handkerchief from her purse and wiped her eyes.

  “Now tell me: if someone came to you and announced that he was going to commit suicide that very evening, wouldn’t you do anything to save him? Wouldn’t you notify his family? Wouldn’t you notify the police? Well, that’s all I did. I told what I knew, to make their task easier for them.”

  “Whose task? The Reds’?”

  “Can’t you understand? I mean the police! So they could do their duty. And the judges. All of them.”

  “The only people you’ll help will be those bums, the Communists. Take Nikos the party organizer in our neighborhood. Did you ever see him do any good? He only causes people trouble. Those are the ones who have influenced you, I know. The moment you made your deposition, you fell into their trap. I hate them.”

  “Roxani, either you don’t know me at all or you’re raving!”

  “You’re the one who’s raving!”

  Just then someone burst into the ward and introduced himself as a newspaper reporter from Athens. He was young, blond, alert.

  “I will tell you what happened to my brother,” said Roxani, turning to him still upset and tearful. “You reporters put too much nonsense in your papers.”

  “Were you present at the accident?”

  “No, but that doesn’t matter. My brother was not the victim of any attack. Any one of three things might have happened: either he stumbled, or he felt dizzy and fell, or else he was attacked by some Reds to stir up trouble.”

  Nikitas winked at the reporter, to indicate that it was better to let his sister go on talking.

  “So that’s what you think happened?” the reporter commented.

  “I’m absolutely convinced of it,” Roxani went on. “The ERE has no criminals. Mr. Karamanlis wants peace, progress, stability. The troublemakers are somewhere else.”

  “Then, if I’m not mistaken, you’re supporting the contention of the police that your brother has gone mad. The police don’t have any evidence on which to base their charge. Do you?”

  “What kind of evidence?”

  “A few witnesses, for instance, who could certify that they saw your brother stumble and fall?”

  “No.”

  “Then how can you claim he’s crazy?”

  “I’m not claiming he’s crazy. On the contrary. I just think he’s wicked and wants to drive everybody else crazy with his obstinacy.”

  “Obstinacy about what?”

  “About insisting that someone hit him.”

  Nikitas, losing patience at this point, broke into the conversation. “Roxani, you haven’t told the reporter everything. You haven’t told him, for example, that you’re a member of the women’s branch of the ERE in Forty Churches, and that your husband is in the civil service.”

  “I certainly do belong to the ERE and I’m proud of it!” she exclaimed, turning beet-red and snatching up her handbag. Without saying another word, she stalked out of the ward, slamming the door.

  “I can’t take any more,” Nikitas said, leaning back against his pillow. “My nerves are going to crack. This has been going on for three days. When people think you’re crazy, you end up believing it yourself. But I think they’re crazy and I’m the only one who’s got any sense. They’re trying to convince people that I don’t know what I’m saying, that I keep changing my story to suit my interests. But I have no interests. They have. I don’t think they are crazy, I know they are. So I can be at peace. But since I’ve been cooped up in bed here without being able to stir, my nerves are finally giving out. And then I have these horrible headaches, right here; they come on me like an electric shock. I hate having to stay in bed. I’m pining away in here all by myself. I know the more determined I am, the more determined they’re going to be. Would you mind looking in the hall to see if the policeman is still there? The idea that he might leave his post and give the others a chance to come in and murder me gives me nightmares.”

  The reporter rose and opened the door. There was no one outside.

  “You see! He’s gone again! And I told them not to leave me alone! By the way, how did you get in?”

  “With the yoghurt.”

  “With the what?”

  “I arrived when the yoghurt man was making his delivery. The guard opened the gate for him, and I came in at the same time. ‘What do you want?’ he asked me. I showed him my press card. ‘It’s forbidden,’ he said sleepily. I pretended I didn’t hear him and followed the yoghurt man into the hospital. The guard was too lazy to run after me, and anyway it was dark. I stumbled on a police sergeant sitting in a chair without moving a muscle. When I asked him if I could get through, he didn’t answer me. For a minute I thought he’d had a heart attack. I went over to him and tapped him on the shoulder. He hardly moved his head. Here in Salonika I’ve noticed that people are slow and heavy and wary with their words. In the end, I got through. I wanted to see you; to get first-hand information. I’ll be sending a story to my paper this evening.”

  “Write the truth, please,” said Nikitas. “I can’t bear it any longer. The last thing I want, write this, is to harm my family—my mother and sister. I was a kid when my father died, and since then I’ve had full responsibility for the two women. But for the first time I’ve come to understand what ‘conscience’ means. It would have been immoral not to go to the Investigator, isn’t that so? I didn’t sleep the night I made the decision. But once I’d made up my mind, nothing could change it. I’m a mule in such matters. But I feel fear all around me. Especially in the night with the light on, I’m frightened. I’m suspicious of every murmur, every noise. I feel, write this, like a soldier abandoned in some huge barracks, with nobody but the barracks guard for company, while all the other soldiers have been killed in battle. And for their spilled blood I must stay alive, to justify them. The Public Prosecutor, who was here yesterday, sitting right there where you’re sitting now, asked me to describe Yango, because Yango had told him he didn’t know me, that he’d never seen me. I only said two words to him and he said: ‘To think that Yango went on for hours trying to convince me that he didn’t know you. In just two words you’ve persuaded me that you do know each other.’ You understand what I’m trying to say? Nothing can stop the truth, it will win out in the end. The General can’t stand me. What did I ever do to him? Why shouldn’t I reveal anything that might be of help in tracking down the guilty parties? Didn’t I do right? No. I’m neither a dope addict nor a drug fiend. Twice, as a boy, I was caught stealing. I was hungry. Since then my police record has been spotless. They’re trying to foul me up. Well, let them try! There is no retreat. Write that I’m not a Communist. I never was. Or anything else. I’ve never been mixed up in politics. The proof is that I’ve been on the voting lists for three months and—I’m ashamed to say—I still haven’t voted. That was my mistake—not knowing who governed us. Also, I shouldn’t have gone to the headquarters of the party Z. belonged to. That’s how they labeled me a Red. But where are we living—in Al Capone’s Chicago, as one local paper wrote? They grab you in the middle of the street, knock you out, and then spread the rumor that you did it yourself! I’m a Greek citizen, I have the right to expect police protection. I can’t trust the law till the guilty parties are found.… No, please don’t go. Don’t leave me alone. The night will stifle me. And the guard has gone. I’m lonely. Stay. I know you have work, but you did want me to talk. Well, I’m talking. I’ve grown old in the last few days! Don’t leave, I’m talking. Why were they following me? Is there some organized crime syndicate? If there is, I haven’t a chance. I knew from the start that I’d end up like Z. The minute I left the Investigator’s office, I went straight to the Public Prosecutor to ask for prote
ction. He wasn’t in his office, and I left a message with his secretary, who looked at me oddly. Everybody looks at me oddly lately. Except you. You’re the only one who seems to think I’m normal. As for the others, I might as well be a leper. Stay a little longer. We could have some coffee. There’s a bell for the nurse, but it’s out of order. I’m absolutely alone. Do you understand? I hope that tomorrow or the day after I’ll be able to get out and get back to my work. I should finish some coffins—how do you like that?—I’m already late on the delivery. How one’s life can change from one day to the next! It’s strange. The man I was yesterday hasn’t any connection with the man I am today. And tomorrow I know I’ll be another man still. And I forget. I forget all those stupid little things I used to care about. Well, that’s enough. I’ve worn you out. I understand. It’s only my mother I can’t understand. How could she? I love her, even though I don’t understand her any more. My sister and I never got along. I don’t mind. But my mother, how could she?”

  The reporter got up, put his pad in his pocket, and opened the door. There was a policeman in the corridor.

  “He’s back,” he told Nikitas. “You needn’t be afraid. I’ll be going now. Thanks for everything. Get the Athens Morning News tomorrow. You’re quite a guy.”

  “I’m so broke I can’t even buy a newspaper,” Nikitas said.

  “Take this.”

  And he left a bill on the nighttable. Nikitas wanted to protest, but he didn’t have the strength. His dizziness suddenly returned and he was sinking. He saw the reporter go off as in a dream.

  In two days he was permitted to leave the hospital. On his way out he got confused in the corridors. Opening a door at random, he stumbled on Vango, the pederast, lying in bed with his leg in a cast. He was reading a newspaper. Nikitas had never seen him before, and he did not recognize him from the photographs in the newspapers. He excused himself hastily and closed the door.

  But Vango recognized Nikitas. If it hadn’t been for his cast, he’d have run after him and eliminated, in some dark dead-end corridor, this second serpent of evil.