Darkness and Company

by Sigitas Parulskis

  ‘But what if there is?’

  ‘Then we’re really done for.’ Then she grinned. ‘If you were Jewish we could hide you in the ghetto.’

  Vincentas looked Judita in the eyes with hesitation. ‘Yes, they are my photographs.’

  THE LETTER

  It is cold and damp in the room. Yesterday a long, emaciated rat crawled out from under the floorboards. Do you remember how I kept asking you to close up that hole in the floor, but you never had time? She looked at me so pitifully that I soon began to wonder which of us was more human – the haggard rat or me.

  Do you remember how I once said that photo negatives are like unborn children? You asked if I wanted children. What did I reply? Well, something about how it’s a horrible time for having children, that only the mad could do that.

  I don’t know where to start … It was a warm day yesterday. I opened the window. A light wind was blowing and the frame creaked. I only had one cigarette left – maybe that was a good thing since I don’t want to smoke any more. When I found out … I suddenly felt very lonely. Even when we’re together I still feel lonely.

  I try to go out into the street as little as possible – people are being hunted in restaurants, movie theatres, cafés, work permits are being checked, those without them are rounded up on to trucks, they’re taken to collection points and the next day are transported to Germany to work in factories. I can’t take such risks any longer. Now that it’s no longer just me I don’t want to.

  Your mother once said – she was very drunk as usual – suddenly, out of the blue she said, ‘I like fish. I like fish. They’re the only ones with any decency. They don’t gossip for no reason. All the other animals make a noise – they growl, bark, roar, squeak and come out with all sorts of nonsense, but fish are quiet.’

  The funniest thing is that she herself never shuts up.

  It’s looking at me again, the rat. Maybe it can smell the remnants of food on my mouth. The smell. The smell of life. Or maybe something else.

  I remember the last time I was by the sea. The summer that we met. Aleksandras did not go, he never had time, he was always listening to music in his head, I would say to him that one day I would find a little knob on his head, would turn it and music would start blaring out of his ears.

  I was there with Nataša – we worked together at the translation bureau. I’m not a very good swimmer, and the waves were so big. Nataša shouted, ‘They’re as tall as horses,’ and they really were like great steeds with arched necks coming towards us, then they would rear up, their heads pouring cold water over us. The Baltic is cold even on a hot summer day. At first it was frightening, but then a strange elation came over me, and I felt like I was a huge, two-legged fish, but one that screams and shouts.

  Do you remember when you came to see us for the first time? I was sitting in the kitchen … That was the first time we saw each other. No, it wasn’t by chance. I had bared myself on purpose. I wanted to enjoy your confusion. And it really was fun. You blushed so deeply, you were so confused, you couldn’t get a single word out. I almost exploded with laughter, barely controlled myself. Your timidity was so childlike, like a little boy’s, so innocent … You said that you had been with a woman before, but I’m not sure … I’m not talking about sex, but about a woman, about love. You had never loved until you met me. And I had never loved until I lost you.

  I can hear her again. She’s playing the piano and singing. I’m sure she has already drunk half a bottle. Her voice is sober enough, but her fingers sometimes miss the keys. If circumstances were different I think we’d get on pretty well. Now, whenever I speak to her I feel indebted. I do not like to feel indebted. After all, it’s you I love, you I share everything with. I don’t want to share it with anyone else, I cannot, there would simply not be enough of me.

  I do not know what else to say. I had intended to say something important, but it seems as though everything that is important is unsayable. Because when you say it, it feels that maybe it’s not that important after all, that there are more important things. I’m not good at writing farewell letters. Does such a profession exist? Farewell-letter writer?

  I wanted to go back to Aleksandras. I’m his wife. To go back to certain death. But when I realized I was pregnant it changed everything. Aleksandras could not have children. An empty score, as he himself used to say. At first we thought that I was barren. We saw several doctors, but in the end a French professor, Julien Robbe-Grillet, confirmed that it was Aleksandras who was infertile.

  I wanted to curse you, to curse this greedy, bloodthirsty little nation that worships God and suffering, but I changed my mind. I don’t believe in curses; I believe in punishment and memory. You will never see your child. And if you survive you will always remember that. Always.

  You once said that there are similarities between Christ and photographers – you only observe people, but you cannot change them, you cannot help them. Rats also observe. They wait for a crumb to fall so they can grab it. But we are not rats, we are not idols decorating temple walls, we are people. We have to make choices; we have to answer for our actions. No one else, just us.

  How are you any better than a monster who rapes a woman while looking at a severed head? You watched as thousands of people died – not only watched, you recorded it; you did it to give someone pleasure. And you would return to rape a woman, still savouring the images of the dying in your head. Yes, it was rape, because a deceitful love is a greater violence than an open crime. It’s as though I had been making love with a rat that had temporarily taken the shape of a man. War tears off all masks.

  Don’t look for me. I never want to see you again, even if it breaks my heart. I can’t, not any more.’

  That’s all. Nothing more. Just a letter.

  CHRISTMAS

  Christmas was approaching. The first Christmas of the war, the feast of the baby Jesus. Only a madman like Christ could have chosen to be born at such an awful time.

  Vincentas was sitting in the studio. Beyond the window it was dark; he could see the occasional shadows of passers-by. Again that same feeling, that state he had sometimes been in last summer when walking along a country road by a pit full of the executed – as though he were stuck in a cave, as though he could see only shadows, as though he had become a shadow himself. Everything had changed so quickly after Judita left; life stopped. He read her letter a thousand times but found nothing, not the slightest hint that she might return. He tried unsuccessfully to find her. She was not in the ghetto. And Aleksandras was no longer in the ghetto either.

  Vincentas felt pain – the pain of loss, separation, even of betrayal. But at the same time this pain provided some relief. Scenes from that night would appear before him, and the feeling of hopelessness would leave him gasping for breath. But more and more he felt pain combined with relief: maybe it’s better that Judita is not here with him, maybe it’s better that he doesn’t have to look at her, doesn’t have to caress her, kiss her, maybe it’s better …

  He stood up, went to the gramophone and looked through the records. He felt like listening to some French music.

  Again someone appeared outside the window, but this time lingered. They stopped and looked inside. A ‘stone guest’, he thought, and a moment later he heard knocking at the door.

  ‘It’s open!’ Vincentas shouted and continued to sit facing the gramophone, his back to the door. Whoever it was, he was not expecting anyone except Judita. But she’ll never come back. He no longer entertained the slightest hope that she would.

  ‘So, you’re still taking pictures,’ he heard a familiar voice say. Vincentas turned around. It was Simonas, the same one that the men of the brigade had called Petras.

  ‘Yes,’ replied Vincentas, ‘I still am.’

  The time before they had sent Tadas; this time they sent Simonas Petras, thought Vincentas. I wonder if he’ll shoot me on the spot or perhaps take me behind the house first.

  Simonas, whom they called Petras, stuck h
is hand under his coat and searched for a long time. He was looking for a pistol, it couldn’t be a very big weapon. Finally he pulled out a sheet of paper. It looked like the sheet had been crumpled, then smoothed out and carefully folded.

  ‘You know German – translate it for me.’

  Vincentas took the sheet and quickly scanned it. ‘Do you want me to translate it and write it down?’

  ‘No, read it out right now. If you have time, of course,’ said Simonas, who was called Petras, glancing around the empty workshop.

  ‘Sure,’ said Vincentas and began reading aloud. ‘“To the General Commissar in Minsk. Regarding the Jewish operation. On 27 October, at approximately 8 a.m., a senior police battalion lieutenant arrived from Kaunas (Lithuania) and presented himself as the aide of the security police battalion commander. The first lieutenant stated that the police battalion had been issued the order to liquidate all the Jews here in the town of Slutsk within two days. He further explained that the battalion commander would be arriving with a battalion of four companies, two of them consisting of Lithuanian partisans, and that the operation must begin without delay. I replied to the first lieutenant that I ought first to discuss the operation with the commander. Approximately thirty minutes later the police battalion appeared in Slutsk. Further to my request, as soon as the commander arrived we exchanged opinions. First of all I explained to the battalion commander that it would not be possible to implement the operation without preparation, as our troops had all been sent out on work duty and it would cause serious disruption. It was his responsibility to give me one day’s notice. Therefore I requested that the operation be delayed for one day –”’

  ‘Christ, those Germans are so picky!’ said Simonas Petras, frowning.

  ‘Maybe that’s enough?’ asked Vincentas.

  ‘No, no, read.’

  Vincentas continued. ‘“Therefore I requested that the operation be delayed for one day. He rejected this, noting that he had to execute operations everywhere, in all towns, and that only two days had been designated for Slutsk. Over those two days the town of Slutsk had to be completely cleansed of Jews. I immediately protested, pointing out that the liquidation of Jews should not be executed in a random manner. A large number of the Jews remaining in the city consisted of craftsmen or craftsmen’s families. It would be impossible to manage without these Jewish craftsmen as they were essential to production. I went on to say that there were practically no Belarusian craftsmen, and that the liquidation of all Jews would force all essential factories to halt operations immediately. At the end of our conversation I also mentioned that all essential craftsmen and specialists have documents and cannot be removed from factories. And that, further, we had agreed that all the Jews in the city, and in particular craftsmen’s families, must first be moved to a ghetto for reallocation. This distribution was to have been carried out by two members of my staff. The commander did not in any way counter my opinion, therefore I was firmly convinced that the operation would be executed in this manner. But within hours of beginning the operation considerable difficulties arose. I was forced to conclude that the commander was not acting in accordance with our agreement. Despite our agreement, all the Jews were removed from the factories and workshops and were rounded up and driven away. In truth, some of the Jews were transported through the ghetto, where I was able to locate and distribute a considerable number of them, but the vast majority of them were put straight on to lorries and, without any delay, liquidated on the outskirts of the town. Immediately after midday complaints began to pour in because the removal of all the Jewish craftsmen meant the factories could no longer operate. Because the commander was not there but in Baranovich, after a lengthy search I contacted the captain under him and demanded that the operation be halted immediately because it was being executed without following my instructions, and the economic damage done up to that point was already irreversible. The captain was quite surprised to hear me express this opinion and said that he had received an order from the commander to cleanse the entire town of Jews without exception, as they had done in other towns. This cleansing had to be carried out for political reasons, and to date economic factors had not played any role anywhere else. Nevertheless, because of my insistent demands the operation was halted by evening.

  ‘“As for the way this operation was executed, I am sorry to say that it approached sadism. During the operation the town was a scene of horror. German police officers and, notably, the Lithuanian partisans, were extremely cruel in the ways they drove Jews as well as Belarusians from their homes and crowded them into one location. Shots rang out all over the town, and some streets were simply filled with piles of Jewish corpses –”’

  ‘Remember how I almost shot you at the beginning of the war?’ Simonas Petras asked, once again interrupting Vincentas.

  ‘Do I keep reading?’

  ‘I could have shot you, and that would have been that … And now you’re taking pictures of me …’ He smiled. ‘No, that’s enough. Jokūbas the Elder got so upset when he read that text. I don’t understand.’

  ‘Where did you get it?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘It’s stamped “Secret”.’

  ‘Well then, if it says that keep your trap shut,’ Simonas Petras replied sternly. ‘I don’t get the Germans – we do a good job for them, and they complain. The two-faced idiots.’

  Simonas Petras fell silent for a moment. ‘You wouldn’t believe what it was like, what some of our boys who escorted a group of Russian POWs described. A guard shoots a horse, and they all fall on it and eat it raw, innards and all. Some die and others survive, but later they all still die from the cold. You know, it was fifteen or seventeen below, they lead them along a road while waiting for the lorries to come. As they wait for the transportation to arrive many of the prisoners freeze to death, and the ones who are still alive strip the dead ones naked, but some are still dying, and they crawl towards the bonfires, fall into the flames and burn. Our boys then shoot all the ones who are dying or trying to escape, apparently about a hundred Russians in all.’

  Simonas, whom they called Petras, was in a good mood. He was treating Vincentas like a good friend even though they had only seen each other a few times, and not always under the most pleasant circumstances.

  ‘Remember Tadas?’

  ‘Yes.’ Vincentas nodded, and he felt an unpleasant chill in his breast.

  ‘There you go.’ Simonas Petras cleared his throat. ‘We were on our way to an operation to catch some partisans. There were German and Latvian squads with us. We surrounded two neighbouring villages; the officers ordered us to shoot anyone who showed the slightest resistance – they were all partisans, paratroopers from Moscow, and if not, they would be locals harbouring Soviet partisans.

  ‘The shooting started in the north. There was a really loud hammering from the Latvians’ MG 34s. Our guys were mostly armed with MP 40s. That’s a good thing. Better than a Mauser carbine. The partisans retreated in all directions, and we met them with a wall of fire. Because they were caught by surprise the resistance died down pretty fast and the armed partisans pretty much disappeared, all that was left were innocent, peaceful residents. Peaceful and innocent,’ repeated Simonas Petras and fell silent. ‘Are you going to photograph me or what?’ he asked after a pause.

  ‘I’m ready. Don’t move,’ said Vincentas, and he stuck his head under the cover, pressed. Click. A guillotine that chops a person in half, leaving one half in the light and the other in the darkness.

  ‘Once we’d taken the villages there wasn’t a moment’s rest – we got the order to round up all the men, though it became clear later that women and children were rounded up, too,’ Simonas, who was called Petras, continued. ‘We drove most of them into a bakery storehouse, the rest into a wooden barn. A Latvian officer ordered that the women and children be herded into the storehouse, and then that the soldiers pack all the windows with as thick a layer of dry straw as possible. A regular soldi
er, not one of us, was already holding a bundle of burning straw, but at the last second there was an order to let all the women and children go. The soldiers were cursing because they had done all that work for nothing. “Never mind, we’ll bake some bread out of even better dough,” Tadas joked. But no one had given the order to set fire to the bakery storehouse. A German staff sergeant ordered that a machine-gunner on a motorcycle be stationed a bit further off in case any of the prisoners tried to get away. They he ordered that the Bolsheviks be brought up from the basement four at a time, and the staff sergeant shot them himself by the bakery wall. We threw the dead bodies back into the basement. About fifty men. Which of them were partisans, which were villagers, nobody asked. “They’ll be classified up there,” said Jokūbas the Elder, pointing up to Heaven. You know how he likes to use heavy phrases.’

  Oh yes, thought Vincentas, his words were heavy, his work even heavier.

  ‘We were already thinking about taking a break, but then, suddenly, all the vehicles were started up and a non-stop honking started. “Let’s go and see what’s happening,” said Jokūbas the Elder. We took our weapons and went over to the barn. When we got there it was already in flames. You could hear the screams even through the honking. All the Germans standing around the barn lifted their weapons and started shooting in every direction. I didn’t know if I should stay and shoot or go to try to find a drink. And then, listen to what happened next.’ Simonas Petras became more serious, fell silent for a moment and cleared his throat. ‘What a viper! A real viper. This woman came out of the closest cottage, a bit of a looker, big chest – you know those Russian women – and she was carrying a basket of eggs. She walked up to a small group of soldiers and a couple of German officers, and our Tadas was standing the closest to her. And then suddenly – that bloody woman’s eggs exploded!’