The Eighth Life

by Nino Haratischwili

  ‘Comrade Jashi. We’re sorry we’ve kept you waiting so long. We know it’s not easy for you in this heat, in your condition. So we’ll quickly explain to you our concern. As you know, our Motherland is in the midst of a devastating war. The Generalissimus is attempting the impossible in order to safeguard freedom for our country and independence for our people. Our country’s best men are fighting in this murderous war, and you’ll understand, won’t you, how important loyalty, allegiance to the homeland, and belief in socialism are in times like these? And you’ll also know what a grave matter treachery is at such a time? Do you agree with us, Comrade Jashi?’

  The woman spoke Russian with a Moscow accent. She had delicate features and was wearing red lipstick. The lipstick had smudged a little in the heat, giving her mouth a clownish aspect. Kitty couldn’t stop staring at this mouth. The nondescript man started walking up and down in the gathering dusk. No one turned on the light.

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  Perhaps it was only then that Kitty understood this journey would not lead to the hoped-for message from Andro. But she still didn’t realise where it was all heading. Because she had nothing to hide. And she was heavily pregnant. She remained calm. She still didn’t know then the price she would pay for her dreams.

  ‘The child’s father has betrayed his Motherland. He was recruited by the fascists and is fighting against us. Against his homeland. Against his friends. I’m asking you outright, woman to woman, comrade to comrade: where exactly is your fiancé at present? You are engaged, aren’t you? Tell us his current whereabouts and we’ll drive you straight home.’

  Kitty continued to stare at the woman’s lips. She had a pleasant voice, very soft, with a velvety timbre. Although her words were clear and almost brusque, her manner peremptory, her voice made it sound as if she were flattering you and giving you compliments. The words she spoke did not fit the voice.

  ‘I haven’t had any news from him at all since he was called up. I’m afraid I don’t know where he is at present, and also I very much doubt that Andro would betray his country,’ squeaked Kitty, clasping her belly. ‘Please could you turn the light on? I can hardly see you.’

  ‘Believe me, Comrade Jashi, we’d also like to go home soon, but you must cooperate with us. Otherwise we’ll be stuck here for a long time yet.’

  All Kitty could see of the woman now was her silhouette. She sounded genuinely concerned, as if she found it unpleasant to have to ask these questions. Her mild tone gave Kitty hope that she might indeed soon be going home. For some reason it seemed comforting that the person interrogating her was a woman.

  ‘I really don’t know anything. But Andro isn’t a traitor, I can assure you of that; he would never …’ Kitty felt helpless; she didn’t know what more she could say.

  ‘We’re not going to leave this room until you talk.’ The woman propped her face on her right hand and leaned forward a little.

  ‘But I really don’t know anything.’

  And so it went on: hours that felt to Kitty like days. The blonde woman’s calm, compassionate tone; always the same answers from Kitty. The silent man in the background. The darkness. The pale moonlight that crept in through the uncurtained window. Kitty’s nervous movements, teetering on the chair, shaking her head, chewing her fingernails. Sighing. The groans, and the woman’s calm, mild tone that suddenly no longer seemed reassuring, but almost eerie. Her voice had deceived Kitty. It had given her false hope. Gradually, her sense of time began to recede, and eventually dissolved altogether. When the sky began to pale, Kitty wept. A weeping that became hysterical sobbing. She was hungry, she was afraid; she felt the baby kicking in her belly, she felt its fear.

  She begged and pleaded with them to let her go, to take her home, she didn’t know anything, she didn’t know anything, she didn’t know anything. When the woman ignored her pleas and just went on mechanically repeating her questions, Kitty started calling for help. At this, the woman, who had been sitting so still all this time, as if made of marble, jumped up and ran out. Two Red Army soldiers entered the classroom, grabbed Kitty by the elbows, and dragged her out into the corridor. She was taken down to the basement of the school building and locked in, in total darkness. She rattled and hammered on the door, shouted furious insults, threatened, cursed, finally begged them to let her out, appealed to their consciences, the baby was hungry, it was permanently agitated; but no one responded, and so she sank into a state of profound exhaustion, lay down on the cold floor, and fell asleep.

  When she woke, she was lying on a stretcher, strapped down by two leather belts across her thighs and upper body. She was in the same classroom in which she had been interrogated the previous evening, only now the benches had been removed and the portrait of the Generalissimus taken down: it stood on the floor, turned towards the wall, leaning against it. A pale rectangle marked the spot where it had hung, wonderfully symmetrical and impressively clean.

  She didn’t have the strength to scream. Nor did she make any attempt to free herself from the straps; she knew it was useless. She wriggled a little to the left, trying to find a more comfortable position, a position in which they didn’t cut into her flesh so deeply. A naked light bulb hung from the ceiling, blinding her with cold, almost white, light. Kitty blinked and tried to turn her head away from its glaring beams.

  The uniformed woman was sitting in a corner. Kitty looked over at her and once again was unable to tear her eyes from those red lips. They were perfectly made up today. The woman had beautiful, harmonious features, a dainty nose that almost looked painted, and she wore her hair in a sophisticated, pinned-up style that seemed strangely incongruous here, in such a place. As if she had hurried over from an elegant party to get this bothersome and disagreeable work over with and return to the party as quickly as possible. Who was she? Where did she come from? From what sort of world? What did her world smell like? Was she loved there? Did she love? Was she sad sometimes, as well? Did she like tomatoes, or did she prefer cucumber? Was she a mountain person, or did she love the sea? Did she go to bed late, did she have children? Did she have a mother who had sung her nursery rhymes? Did her skin smell slightly sweet, as Kitty imagined?

  Kitty looked at her for a moment, even though it was difficult for her to turn her head in that direction, as the strap cut into the flesh of her thighs. She was morbidly pleased to see the woman again. She was still there. She still wanted something from her. She still looked composed and compassionate, as if she wouldn’t hand Kitty over to these coarse, silent men, as if she wouldn’t push things to the limit. But what exactly was the limit? A black, dark hole, bottomless and noiseless? Would it be a cell with dripping pipes? More straps? Or just her endless repeated questions about Andro’s whereabouts? The blonde woman’s skin shimmered like porcelain in the bluish light. She didn’t belong in this deserted, dysfunctional place. No, this woman wouldn’t take things to the limit, Kitty was sure of it. She was too beautiful, too smartly dressed for the limit. And besides, she was a woman. A woman, like herself.

  *

  Beads of sweat stood out on Kitty’s forehead, she was ravenously hungry, and her lips were cracked. The woman stood, walked slowly towards her, and put a carafe to her mouth, and Kitty drank the water from it greedily. Half the liquid ran over her face, but its coolness felt good on her skin.

  ‘I appreciate that it’s very upsetting for you to have to endure all this, but you must cooperate with us.’

  The blonde woman wiped the sweat from Kitty’s forehead with a delicate handkerchief plucked from the inside pocket of her uniform jacket. The handkerchief smelled sweetish, as Kitty had presumed the woman’s skin would smell. Sweetish, seductive; even, Kitty was shocked to discover, slightly familiar.

  ‘I’m hungry … I want to go home. Please. I don’t know anything.’ Kitty mumbled her words mechanically, almost apathetically, without much emphasis. Her eyes were fixed on the white rect
angle on the wall. Was it midday, or was it afternoon? Was Christine already looking for her? If so, what were the prospects of her aunt finding her?

  ‘Tell me where he is, give me the recruiter’s name, give me an address, give me some information I can use, and I will drive you home myself. But you have to give me something, Ketevan!’

  ‘Do you think I would do this to my child if I knew anything? I’ve waited so long for a message from him; I don’t even know if he’s still alive, and he doesn’t know we’re expecting a baby, and in a month it’ll be born. Andro isn’t a traitor, he just wanted to go to Vienna …’

  ‘To Vienna — good, good, that’s a start. Who did he know in Vienna? What did he want to do there?’

  ‘He didn’t know anyone, he just wanted to go to Vienna because there are such beautiful coffee houses there and they do psychoanalysis there and sculpture is something you can … Andro wants to be a sculptor. Please. I don’t know anything. The baby’s frightened, I can feel it.’

  ‘My dear girl, you’re little more than a baby yourself. Your parents should have done a better job of protecting you.’

  ‘My father is with the Red Army, my brother’s serving in the Baltic Fleet. They’re serving the Motherland, they’re serving the Generalissimus, they—’

  ‘That is why we find it all the more regrettable that you, of all people, have chosen a traitor to be the father of your child.’

  The sentence echoed in Kitty’s head. There was something sickening about the way the blonde woman said it.

  She was taken back to the basement, then brought out again and strapped back onto the stretcher. Hours passed. She no longer knew what day, what time it was. Her body ached; her baby was frightened. Twice she was given a little unsalted porridge. Three times a chamber pot was shoved under her backside. She got cramps in her arms and legs. Her strength diminished; she started to hallucinate; the bright light made sleep impossible, and she squeezed her eyes shut the whole time. Whenever the baby stopped kicking against the wall of her belly she had a panic attack and started screaming for help; only when it made its presence felt again did she sink back into exhaustion.

  Suddenly, the blonde woman was standing very close to the stretcher. She was holding a syringe in her hand and scrutinising its contents in the white glare of the light bulb.

  ‘If I don’t get any useful information from you in the next few minutes, Kitty —’ the way the woman said her nickname felt like more of a threat to Kitty than the syringe in her hand ‘— we will induce labour and you will suffer a stillbirth.’

  The woman spoke deliberately, dragging out every word with artificial emphasis. But her tone remained soft, almost flattering, as if she were informing Kitty of a pleasant surprise, not putting the unthinkable into words.

  Kitty started pushing against the straps with all her might, with her whole upper body; she tried to leap up, was astonished, wondered where she had suddenly found the strength to try and free herself. As she did so, she let out a scream, deafening even herself for a moment; a terrible, inhuman sound. The woman stayed at her side, impassive; she kept shaking her head regretfully. Kitty reached a hand down through the strap and grabbed at the corner of the uniform jacket. The blonde woman continued standing there; she didn’t try to remove Kitty’s hand, and went on holding the syringe upright in hers.

  ‘You don’t really mean it, do you? You just want to frighten me, I know it, I can see it in your eyes. You’re nice, you like me, you care what happens to me, don’t you? Isn’t that right? You don’t want to hurt me, you just want to frighten me, and the syringe is just full of water, no, you don’t mean it.’

  Kitty spoke quickly, the words tumbling out breathlessly one after another. For a moment the woman seemed caught between Kitty’s hand on her jacket and her own eyes on the syringe. Between the decision to keep playing this wicked game, or to free Kitty. At least that’s what Kitty thought. Yes — she too was a woman, she was ten, perhaps fifteen years older than Kitty, she was sure to have children. Surely she would never be able to go through with what she was threatening — she just wanted to prove to her superiors that she was second to none of her male colleagues. Just then, though, the woman called someone into the room.

  A young girl in a white tunic entered. She was about Kitty’s age, and she was afraid — very afraid. You could see it: her hands were trembling, although she kept them hidden in the pockets of her tunic. She didn’t dare look the blonde woman in the eye; she didn’t look directly at Kitty, either, kept her eyes on the ground, wishing that this place, this classroom, these people didn’t exist.

  She was definitely a country girl. She had red cheeks and sunburned skin. Perhaps her parents or husband had a farm to run. When she stopped in front of the woman it was impossible for her not to look at Kitty, and she began quietly reciting the Lord’s Prayer, earning herself a contemptuous look from the blonde.

  ‘Comrade Jashi doesn’t want to help us, Mariam. Comrade Jashi is betraying her country. Comrade Jashi is shielding a traitor to his country; she even means to bring another traitor into the world. Do you think that’s right? Do you think that’s a good thing, Mariam?’

  At these words, Kitty felt the urge to be sick. She started retching, but brought nothing up: the porridge was long since digested and her stomach was empty. She tried to concentrate on Mariam, the frightened girl, who had been roped into something that was beyond her imagination, that turned her knees to jelly, that made her go pale. Mariam, Mariam, Mother of God, thought Kitty to herself; and if she could, she would have laughed out loud. She had always mistrusted the saints that were still revered with such fervour in her country, even at the height of socialism. She had never understood why people allowed themselves to be tortured and tormented in the name of God — in the name of a God who had not redeemed them by his suffering, had not saved them. Mariam could have passed for a saint with her white tunic and her trembling hands, with her innocent calf’s eyes; but she couldn’t save Kitty, and she couldn’t be saved, either.

  The blonde pressed the syringe into the saint’s hand, and with her other hand she grabbed Mariam’s wrist and looked her in the eye. Mariam whimpered, tried to say something, fell silent, shrank back, but the woman went on staring at her intently. Mariam’s fingers closed around the syringe. The woman took a few steps back and nodded at her. Mariam gasped for breath; her lips opened and closed like the mouth of a fish taken from the water.

  ‘Do it!’ Kitty heard the blonde say to Mariam, and she felt Mariam brush her elbow. Kitty narrowed her eyes. Any second now her heart would explode, she was sure of it. She tried to speak to the baby in her mind, tried to calm it. She didn’t want it to be afraid. She held on tight to the stretcher with her fingers. She felt something salty fall on her face and saw Mariam’s face bent over her, saw Mariam’s tears dropping on her face, looked directly into Mariam’s eyes for the first time: with the bright light of the bulb above her it was as if a halo had formed around Mariam’s head. Kitty licked her lips and tasted Mariam’s salty tears on her tongue.

  ‘God have mercy upon me, God have mercy upon her, God have mercy upon us, God have mercy!’ whispered Mariam, bending low over Kitty’s head. In the background, the blonde stepped over to Mariam and said something in her ear; Mariam’s face contorted horribly; then Kitty felt her hand on her forearm, felt it search for a vein, felt something cold and irrevocable being injected into her.

  The blonde went out of the room and left Mariam alone with Kitty. Mariam undid the straps. Bruises had come up on Kitty’s arms and thighs. Mariam sniffed, allowed the tears to flow; she didn’t even attempt to wipe her face. Praying non-stop, she helped Kitty sit up. Everything hurt, every single part of her body; with every movement, Kitty groaned and stroked her belly.

  ‘What was in the syringe?’ She could hardly speak; she allowed her legs to dangle off the stretcher. Instead of answering, Mariam just shook her head.

/>   ‘What was in it? What?’ This time, Kitty raised her voice, reached out for Mariam, but before she could grab Mariam’s tunic and pull her towards her, she was flung back onto the stretcher by inconceivable pain in her abdomen.

  ‘Oh God, no, no, it can’t be, it can’t be, oh God!’ Kitty began to scream. The contractions set in with fearful violence, ripping Kitty’s body apart. She no longer believed she would survive this. In the few moments when the mind-numbing pain subsided, she tried to come to terms with death, tried to recall the face of her dead grandfather: how peaceful he had looked, his lips bluish, discoloured; perhaps she would manage that as well, slipping away peacefully and without fear, and it would feel like a deep, healthy sleep. Anything was better than this. Anything was better than this pain. Anything was better than this classroom and the white rectangle on the wall.

  Again and again, Mariam squeezed her hand, encouraged Kitty to push. Again and again, she urged her to breathe. And when Kitty was no longer in any doubt that she would die that very second, she felt something large, round, slide out between her legs, felt Mariam’s hands pull the little body out, and she fell back onto the stretcher. The pain abruptly subsided. She kept her eyes closed.

  ‘Keep praying. I want to … with you …’ Kitty didn’t dare open her eyes. Mariam started saying the prayer, and Kitty repeated every word after her.

  ‘Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name.’ There was no cry. No cry. Not a sound. ‘Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done.’ The child was mute. Perhaps it was just mute, it must be mute. ‘On Earth as it is in Heaven.’ A kind of rustle. Mariam was moving. Perhaps the baby had stirred. Perhaps it had taken a breath. ‘Give us this day.’ Kitty couldn’t bear it any longer: she opened her eyes, saw Mariam’s back, the splashes of blood on her apron. She saw Mariam holding her baby in her arms. ‘Our daily bread. And forgive —’ Kitty put a fist under the small of her back and propped herself up so she could see better ‘— us our trespasses, as we forgive those who —’ Mariam turned around. She didn’t finish the prayer. There was nothing left to be asked of God.