David Golder, The Ball, Snow in Autumn & The Courilof Affair (2008)

by Irene Nemirovsky

  “Every action, every battle, brings death. Ifwe are on this earth, it is to act and destroy. But when one is acting for a higher cause …” He stopped and then said, “It isn’t easy to live a good life.” His voice had changed; it was softer and tinged with sadness. I think it was his frankness, these flashes of sincerity that made him so charming and yet so frustrating.

  He stood up, calling over his shoulder, “Shall we go back?”

  We retraced our steps in silence. It was very dark now, and we had to be careful of the stones and low brambles that got caught on our clothes. In front of the house, he shook my hand. “Goodbye, Monsieur Legrand. Have a good trip; we’ll see each other again one day, I hope.”

  I said that anything was possible, and we parted.

  Very early the following morning, I was awakened by the sound of footsteps and muffled voices in the garden. I leaned forward to look out of the window and through the wooden slats, I saw my Courilof with a policeman; he was easily recognisable in spite of his disguise. I remembered seeing this policeman on several occasions when he accompanied the minister to give his reports to the Emperor. I realised that Courilofwas having me followed. As usual, he wasn’t very clever about it; but it was the one and only moment during all the time I spent with him that I suddenly understood what it truly meant to hate. Seeing this powerful man, so confident, calmly standing in his garden, knowing that all he had to do was say the word and I would be tracked down, locked up, and hanged like an animal, made me understand how easy it can be to kill in cold blood. At that very moment, I could have happily held a gun to his head and pulled the trigger.

  In the meantime, I had to get away, which I did. I openly took the train to St. Petersburg, followed by the policeman; in the middle of the night, I got off at one of the little mountain stations. From there, I made it to the Persian border. I remained in Persia for a few days; I exchanged my Swiss passport for the identity papers of a carpet salesman, given to me by some members of a revolutionary group in Tehran. Towards the end of September, I went back to Russia.

  CHAPTER 27

  I ARRIVED IN St. Petersburg and went straight to Fanny’s place; she settled me into her room and then went out. I was tired, utterly exhausted. I threw myself down on the bed and immediately fell asleep.

  I remember a dream I had, which is rare for me. My dream was very beautiful, very innocent; it seemed to rise up from the depths of an idyllic childhood, for I was young, handsome, and bursting with energy in a way I’d never really been. I stood in a meadow full of flowers bathed in sunlight; the most bizarre thing was that the children standing around me were Courilof, Prince Nelrode, Dahl, Schwann, and the stranger from Vevey. In the end, it turned into a painful, indescribably grotesque nightmare: their faces changed, becoming old and tired, yet they continued running and playing as before.

  I woke up and saw Fanny come into the room, followed by a comrade I knew. But he didn’t look as wonderfully calm as the first time we’d met: he seemed worried and annoyed. He warned me that the police had been alerted, they were already looking for me, and I was to take every precaution. I let him talk. I was so utterly frustrated by then that I felt I wanted to be done with him, as well as Courilof.

  He looked at me oddly, and I’m convinced he had me followed from that day on, right up until the assassination. His men were better at it than Courilof’s spies, but the minute I stepped out the door, I could sense them behind me.

  October had arrived. It got dark early and it was relatively easy to slip away at a street corner. It hadn’t started snowing yet, but the air had that icy heaviness peculiar to autumn in Russia; the lamps in the houses were lit from early morning. A misty, snowy fog rose up and sat low on the ground; the earth was frozen, hollow. A sad time … I spent hours on end stretched out on the bed, in the room Fanny had given up for me. I was coughing up blood; I had the smell and taste of blood in my mouth and on my skin.

  I didn’t see Fanny any more; it had been agreed that she would come to see me the night before the assassination to give the final order, since she was the one responsible for preparing the bombs and giving them to me. The comrade came to see me again, telling me the exact time to go through with it: eleven forty-five. There was no question of going inside the theatre itself, as it was by invitation only, so we’d have to wait at the entrance.

  “If you hadn’t been found out,” he said bitterly, “it would have been so simple! Courilof would have got you a seat in the theatre and during the interval you could have gone into his box and shot him! All those months we tailed him, for what! Now, with these bloody bombs, you risk killing twenty innocent people for one Courilof.”

  “I don’t give a damn,” I replied.

  Nothing had ever seemed as ridiculous to me as their false precautions. When he asked me: “What? If Courilof were in a carriage with his wife and children, you’d throw the bomb?” I said yes, and I thought I actually could have done it. What difference would it make? But I could see he didn’t believe me.

  “Well, comrade,” he finally said, “that won’t happen. He’ll be alone with his servants.”

  They, apparently, didn’t count.

  “Well, good-bye then!” he said.

  He left.

  It happened the next evening. Fanny came with me. We were carrying bombs covered in shawls and wrapped in parcel paper. We didn’t speak. We went and sat down in a brightly lit little square opposite the Marie Theatre. A long line of policemen and carriages waited in the street.

  The square was empty. The sky was low and dark; a fine, light snow fluttered through the air, turning to rain as soon as it touched the ground. Tiny needles of icy rain that stung your face.

  Fanny pointed to the parked carriages. “The court, the diplomatic corps, the German Embassy delegation, the ministers,” she whispered with a kind of exultation.

  The night was deadly long, terrible. Around eleven o’clock, the wind changed and a thick snow began to fall. We moved to another spot; we were frozen. Twice we walked around the little square.

  Suddenly we found ourselves face to face with someone who’d emerged from the shadows to look at us. Fanny pressed herself against me and I kissed her. Thinking we were lovers, the policeman was reassured and disappeared. I held Fanny in my arms; she looked up at me, and I remember that, for the first time, I saw a tear in those cruel eyes.

  I let go of her. We continued to walk in silence. I was coughing. Blood kept rushing into my mouth. I spat it out, then coughed again; blood trickled on to my hands. I wanted to lie down right there in the snow and die.

  The carriages began to move forward. You could hear the sound of doors opening and banging shut inside the theatre, and the shrill whistles of the policemen.

  I crossed the street. I was holding a bomb in my hand as if it were a flower. It was grotesque. I don’t understand how no one noticed and arrested me. Fanny followed behind. We stopped close to the entrance, beneath the columns heavy with snow, between the rows of people.

  The doors opened. Everyone came out. The Emperor, the Imperial Family, William II and his entourage had already left. I saw women in furs walk by, jewellery gleaming beneath their delicate mantillas dotted with snowflakes. There were generals whose spurs clattered against the frozen ground, and others as well, people I didn’t know, the doddery old fools of the diplomatic corps, and still others… Courilof. He turned towards me; his face was old and pale; or was it just the light from the street-lamps that made his features seem so furrowed? He looked weary and defeated, with big dark circles under his eyes. I turned towards Fanny.

  “I can’t kill him,” I said.

  I felt her grab the bomb from me. She took two steps forward and threw it.

  I remember a jumble of faces, hands, eyes, that swam around in front of me, then disappeared in explosion with the noise and light of hell itself. We weren’t hurt, but our faces were cut, our clothes burnt, our hands covered in blood. I took Fanny’s hand and we ran through the dark streets, ra
n like hunted animals. People were bumping into us, rushing in all directions. Several of them had ripped clothes and bloody hands, like us. An injured horse whinnied so horribly from pain that shivers ran down my spine. When we finally stopped, we were in the middle of a square, surrounded by an angry crowd. I knew we were finished. I felt relieved. It was there we were arrested.

  Afterwards, Fanny and I found ourselves in a room next to the one where the dead bodies were piled up. We had guards, but amidst the confusion and horror, it hadn’t occurred to them to separate us.

  Fanny suddenly burst into tears. I felt sorry for her. I’d already said that I was the one who’d thrown the bomb, as that was only fair: if she hadn’t grabbed it from my hands, I would have ended up throwing it. That… that was the easy part… And anyway, as I’ve already said, I was coughing up so much blood that I felt there was none left in my lungs; I was certain that if they just let me close my eyes and sit still, I would die; and I painfully, eagerly longed for that moment.

  I went over to Fanny, put a cigarette in her hand and whispered: “You have nothing to worry about.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not that, it’s not that… Dead! He’s dead! Dead!”

  “Who’s dead?” I asked, confused.

  “Courilof! He’s dead! Dead! And I’m the one who killed him!”

  Nevertheless, her instinct for survival remained strong within her.

  When the policeman came closer, attracted by her cries, he heard her say again: “He’s dead! And we’re the ones who killed him!”

  And so she was condemned to life in prison and I to be hanged.

  But you should never count on death any more than you count on life. I’m still here … The devil alone knows why. Later on, Fanny escaped and took part in a second assassination. She was the one who killed P. in 1907 or 1908. She was caught, and this time, she hanged herself in her cell. As for me … Well, I’ve told my story. Life is absurd. Fortunately for me, at least, the show will soon be over.

  ABOUT THE INTRODUCER

  GLAIRE MESSUD is the award-winning author of four works of fiction: When the World Was Steady; The Hunters; The Last Life; and, most recently, The Emperor’s Children.

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