Forgiving Ararat

by Gita Nazareth

  I find myself within the bedchamber of a great Roman palace, a chamber as immense and splendid as the Pantheon itself. White stone columns soar into the bowl of a fantastic marble dome overhead; beneath it sits a glittering golden bed surrounded by divans covered in plush crimson fabric. Standing in front of this bed, bloated and nude, is the Emperor Nero Claudius Caesar. At his feet, groaning and pleading for mercy, lies his wife, Poppaea, fully clothed and several months pregnant with his child. Her white gown is streaked red between her legs.

  “You ungrateful whore!” Nero bellows as he drives his foot deep into Poppaea’s abdomen. “I put Octavia’s head on a platter for your amusement and this is how you repay me, by ridiculing me!” He kicks her again, more savagely, and this time her ribs give way, cracking and breaking like twigs. Poppaea gasps for air, blood drools from her mouth.

  “Get out of my sight!”

  Poppaea does not rise. Nero strikes another blow to her stomach, then turns and walks from the bedchamber with his hands on his hips, soaked with sweat from the exertion, his penis flapping from side to side against his heavy thighs, like a wagging finger. He orders his servants to have her removed and bring him a meal before he takes his afternoon nap.

  The Roman palace vanishes just as suddenly as it had appeared. In its place emerges the outline of the Urartu Chamber with Luas standing at its center; the faceless creature from the monolith whispers something in his ear then returns to its home inside the monolith. I am sitting, now, on one of the observer chairs in the back of the Chamber. I have no idea how I’ve gotten from the cinderblock building, to Nero’s palace, to the Urartu Chamber. Luas walks over to speak to me.

  “Hello, Brek,” he says. “I’m sorry you had to see that. How was your visit back home?”

  “You just presented Nero?” I say, astonished by what I have just seen.

  The Urartu Chamber disappears, and now we’re standing in the corridor leading back to the train shed.

  “Yes, foul character, isn’t he?”

  “But he died two thousand years ago—”

  “And I’ve been representing him ever since,” Luas says. “The presentation usually ends here, or just after he has the boy Sporus castrated and takes him for his wife. When I return to the Chamber the next day, I’m informed a final decision on his fate still hasn’t been made and I must present his case again.” Luas sighs. “This is my job, it seems, to try Nero’s soul every day for eternity, even though a decision is never made. Seems God isn’t quite ready to make up his mind about this one.”

  “Didn’t you say we only present the close cases,” I ask.

  “Yes, well, there are two sides to every story, aren’t there? It may seem strange, but Nero did have some redeeming qualities, not unlike Toby Bowles. I never get to them during the presentation, of course, but he had them. Anyway, ours is not to wonder why. Nero is a postulant here and we treat him like all the rest. Just be happy he isn’t one of your clients.”

  We start walking toward the train shed, but Luas leads me around a corner and into another corridor I hadn’t seen before, so unfathomably long that I’m unable to see the end of it stretching beyond the horizon and out into space. It has the appearance of a vast courthouse annex, with thousands of identical offices lining both sides of the corridor, each with tall, slender wooden doors and transoms closed tight; florescent tubes bathe the walls in the uniform and compassionless light of bureaucracy.

  We continue walking. “So,” I say, still stunned by the trial, “Nero and Toby Bowles are treated the same way—nothing they did right their entire lives is heard in the Chamber. What’s the point of conducting a trial at all—if you can even call it that? Why not just send them straight to hell?”

  “Back to that again, are we?” Luas says. “There is no Bill of Rights in Shemaya. The procedural protections in which you placed such great faith as an attorney on earth are entirely unnecessary here. No lie can go unexposed in the Urartu Chamber, and no truth remains hidden. Justice is guaranteed as long as the presenters remain unbiased and do nothing to tip the scales.”

  “But how can there be justice if all sides of the case aren’t presented?”

  “Do I need to remind you,” Luas answers in a reprimanding way, “that the Judge himself was once tried, convicted, and punished unjustly? Surely He requires no lessons from us about fairness. Of course, justice has many dimensions, and we’ve been speaking only of fairness to the accused; you lost your arm when you were just a little girl, Nero Claudius turned Christians into tapers, and God once drowned every living creature. To know whether justice has been done, one must consider all of its aspects.”

  We somehow reach the end of the limitless corridor. Luas stops us at the last office on the right. A small plaque on the door reads, “High Jurisconsult of Shemaya.”

  “Ah, here we are,” Luas announces, opening the door. “The next phase of your training is about to begin.”

  13

  * * *

  There was a simple wooden desk in the office, two candles, two chairs behind the desk, and a single guest chair in front of it. No windows, papers, files, phones, pencils, or other office items. Luas closed the door and struck a match to light the candles.

  “Please have a seat here beside me,” he said. “We’re going to interview a new postulant together and then watch the presentation. I will be your proctor. After this, you will be assigned your first client and conduct a trial on your own.”

  “Am I being forced to represent them?” I asked. “I mean, what if I refuse?”

  “Forced?” Luas said. “Certainly not. The choice is yours, but it’s a choice you have already made. That’s why you’re here. You will represent them because, like all lawyers, justice is what you crave most and you won’t rest until you have it.”

  “There’s no justice here,” I said flatly. “At least not the kind I crave.”

  Luas smiled condescendingly. “Perhaps you will introduce it to us then,” he said.

  I thought about this for a moment and, for the first time, considered the possibility that I just might be able to help these poor souls, that this might be the reason why I was brought to Shemaya, to fix a broken judicial system. Lawyers had a long and proud tradition of bringing about reform and restoring justice to the world. I had always dreamed of doing something truly significant and grand, like Mahatma Gandhi or Martin Luther.

  “Perhaps I will,” I said. “Perhaps I will.” Then I looked down and realized I was still wearing my silk pajamas, from what I had thought would be a relaxing evening at home, watching a movie and eating popcorn.

  “Oh, you needn’t worry about your clothes,” Luas said, noticing my embarrassment. “The postulants can’t see us; but if you’d feel more comfortable, you may change into these.” From a desk drawer he produced the black suit, blouse, and shoes I’d been wearing since I arrived in Shemaya—the ones I’d discarded at the mall during my shopping spree.

  “How did you get these?” I asked, confused.

  “I didn’t get them,” he said. “You did. Go ahead, put them on, I’ll step outside.”

  By telling me I got the clothes, Luas meant to remind me that I was making all of this up—my appearance and his, that is, not Shemaya itself, which existed quite independently of me, and over which I exercised no control. Even so, I took the opportunity to dress, out of respect for my profession if nothing else; pajamas were not appropriate for meeting a client on earth or in heaven, particularly a client facing the Final Judgment.

  Luas returned to the office and seated himself beside me behind the desk, surrounded by darkness. The dim candles gave his face a dull orange color.

  “Before I invite the postulant in,” he said, “I must warn you that there is a grave danger in this meeting, one for which I have been trying to prepare you. More than Mr. Bowles, more than your parents, your husband, or even your own child, will you come to know the postulant we are about to meet; only slightly better will you know yourself. To avoid losin
g your identity forever, you must employ the tactics I showed you earlier. No matter how difficult, you must continue to remind yourself of the circumstances of your disfigurement. Try to recall the smallest details: the smell of the air above the manure, the sound of the flies buzzing over the heap; the puzzled look of the cows as they watched you and your grandfather spreading their excrement across the fields; the way the heavy, wet dung, produced by the first alfalfa of the season, clotted in the bin like plaster, jamming the tines.

  “Your parents had told you they were taking you to your grandparents’ farm to enjoy some time in the country, but you had heard the viciousness of their argument when your father revealed the arrangements, against your mother’s wishes, to admit her into a treatment center for alcoholics and your mother revealed her knowledge that he had been having an affair. All that had held them together was you, and you were convinced that only a crisis would hold you all together now. You considered running away, but this would only separate you from them; you had already tried modulating your grades, but the good marks only gave them confidence of your adjustment and the bad just another source for blame. Behaving and misbehaving had the same weak effect, and crying worked only temporarily and could not be sustained. You had even contrived illnesses, but doctors confirmed your health and the proper functioning of your organs.”

  I could no longer bear the pain of reliving those difficult days. “Enough!” I said. “Please, stop.”

  “You did not plan what to do next,” Luas continued, ignoring my discomfort. “Your grandfather had warned you to stand clear as he worked his pitchfork through the pile; he climbed down from the bin and up onto the tractor, but he left the guard off the conveyor chain. You watched the chain hesitate for a moment under the load and then break free with a bang, whirring through the gears and cogs as the tractor engine roared and the manure flew. The thought struck you in that very moment, before he could disengage the power and replace the guard. You ran up and thrust your hand into the gears. You thought you’d only cut your finger or perhaps break it; but feeling no more than the return of a firm handshake at first, you watched in astonishment and disbelief as your forearm ripped from your elbow and hurled along the conveyor like a toy on an assembly line. You stood frozen for a moment, the way one does upon first seeing one’s own reflection, watching yourself watch yourself, but not fully recognizing the image. In the moment before you lost consciousness, your body tingled—not with pain, but with the brief exaltation that you had finally succeeded in reuniting your parents and all would soon be well.”

  “No more, Luas,” I begged, sobbing. “Please, stop.”

  “But there is more,” Luas said callously. “So much more. This is the only way to separate yourself from the powerful memories of the postulants, and this is what must be done. Two years later, after your parents had divorced and the right sleeves of your clothes had been sewn shut, you took the witness stand in the Huntingdon County Courthouse, where you would one day practice law, and a young attorney named Bill Gwynne asked you to show the jury the mangled stump of your arm and tell them what happened. It was the most critical testimony in the case, to establish the liability of the manufacturer of the manure spreader for producing a defective product and bestow upon you and your family a small fortune in recompense. The courtroom was silent, every moist eye turned to you. You had practiced your testimony so often with Mr. Gwynne that you actually believed what you were about to say. He had promised you justice. You faced the jury and do you remember what you said?”

  “Yes, yes,” I cried, traumatized and ashamed. “I remember. There’s no need for you to repeat it.”

  “Oh, but I must,” Luas said. “‘I was standing on my toes,’ you told the jury, ‘trying to see what my grandfather was doing. I slipped on the wet grass and fell against the guard. I didn’t hit it very hard, but the guard gave way and my arm got caught in the gears—’ You became too emotional to go on; the memory of what happened next was too painful.”

  Luas’ relentless recounting of the story was having the desired effect; so immersed did he have me in my own memories that I couldn’t possibly confuse my life with that of the postulant I was about to meet. I saw myself there on the witness stand, a ten year old girl again: the judge, robed in black, glaring down at me from the bench, old and terrifying like God; the pinch-faced stenographer yawning as she taps her keys; my grandfather, pale with guilt and remorse, nervously fondling his pipe, aching for a smoke; my grandmother waving a roll of Lifesavers at me for encouragement; my mother sitting by herself on the other side of the courtroom with her “I told you so” face, snarling at my father and grandparents; my father sucking on a Lifesaver my grandmother insisted he take, checking his watch; the defense lawyer from Pittsburgh, too slick and condescending for Huntingdon County, whispering to the vice president of the equipment manufacturer, a Texan, who crosses his legs and strokes the brown suede of his cowboy boots. To my right sits the jury who will decide the case: three farmers, a hairdresser, a housewife, and a truck mechanic. The farmers tug uncomfortably at the collars of their white dress shirts; the hairdresser, wearing too much makeup, cracks her gum, drawing the glare of the overfed tipstave with stains on his necktie; the housewife, wearing too little makeup, fusses with her hair; the truck mechanic bites his dirty fingernails, stealing glances at the hairdresser.

  “It’s ok, honey,” Mr. Gwynne says. He’s here to protect me, my knight in shining armor, gallant and handsome; I have a secret crush on him. “Take a moment to blow your nose; I know it’s difficult with one hand. I’m sorry we have to do this, but the makers of the manure spreader here want their day in court, and they’re entitled to it. Just a few more questions, ok? We need you to be brave now and tell the truth. Are you certain the guard was in place? I’m talking about the metal shield over the chain.”

  “Oh, yes, Mr. Gwynne, I’m certain.”

  “And you slipped and bumped into it?”

  “Yes.”

  “And it gave way?”

  “Yes.”

  “And your arm got caught in the chain.”

  “Yes. Gee, I’m sorry, Mr. Gwynne; I’m awfully sorry for all this. I should have been more careful.”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for, Brek,” he reassures me. “We’re the ones who are sorry for what happened to you. You’ve been very brave for us today, and we appreciate it.”

  The jury returned a verdict against the manufacturer in less than an hour: four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. An expert hired by Mr. Gwynne testified that if the spreader had been designed properly, there would have been no need to remove the guard to fix the problem in the first place, meaning that my lie might not have made the difference after all. One-third of the money went to Mr. Gwynne; another third put me through an expensive Quaker boarding school, four years at a private liberal arts college, and three years at an Ivy League law school; the rest paid my medical bills with some left over for other expenses, including a semester abroad in Europe. Only my grandfather knew for certain I lied about the guard, but we never spoke about it to each other. He testified that he couldn’t remember whether he left it on or off, which made it seem like only half a lie.

  Luas wasn’t finished with me yet: “Nobody in the courtroom that day knew,” he said, “not your parents, not Bill Gwynne, not even your grandfather—that you deliberately put your hand into the machine. You told only one person, Karen Busfield, and that was almost twenty years after the trial. Do you remember?”

  It came back to me with the same clarity as the trial, as if it were happening all over again—as if I were seeing my own life being replayed in the Urartu Chamber. Karen called me late one night; Bo and I were asleep.

  “Hi, Karen,” I said, yawning into the phone. “What time is it? Are you ok?”

  “2 a.m. Sorry for calling you so late. I need a lawyer.”

  “I told you this day would come,” I quipped. The sounds of a jail echoed in the background; rough voices, the slamming ech
o of steel doors. “Where are you?”

  “Fort Leavenworth.”

  “Fort Leavenworth? What are you doing there, counseling inmates?”

  “I am an inmate.”

  I could tell she wasn’t joking.

  Bo rolled over. “What’s going on?” he said.

  “It’s Karen,” I whispered, covering the phone. “I think she’s been arrested.”

  I uncovered the phone. “You’re a chaplain, Karen,” I said. “What could you have possibly done?”

  “I can’t talk about that right now,” she said.

  “Ok. Can you tell me what they’re charging you with?”

  “Assault, destruction of government property and....”

  “And what?”

  “Treason.”

  “Treason? Are you serious?” Bo’s eyes widened.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m coming, and I’m bringing Bill Gwynne with me.”

  “No, just you,” she said.

  “Treason is a big deal, Karen; I don’t want to scare you, but it carries the death penalty. I’m bringing Bill with me—and maybe twenty other lawyers. Let me call the airlines. We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

  “Just you, Brek, okay?” she said, desperately, on the verge of breaking down. “Please?”

  “Okay,” I said. “For now. We can talk about it when I get there.”

  “Thanks,” she said. “Don’t rush, take care of Sarah first. I’ll be fine. I’m really sorry about this. How’s she doing?”

  “She’s fine. It’s you I’m worried about.”

  “I’m really sorry—”

  “Don’t worry about it. Let me pack a bag. Do you need anything?”

  “Just you,” she said. She was crying and I could hear voices in the background. “They’re saying I’ve got to hang up now,” she sniffled.

  “Everything will be all right,” I said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. Stay strong. And no matter what you do, don’t answer any questions, okay? Tell them you’re invoking your right to remain silent until you’ve spoken with your attorney.”