The Question of Bruno

by Aleksandar Hemon

  21 The Thought Police inspectors, with the typical bureaucratic thoroughness, made an inventory of the items seized at Sorge’s house upon the arrest. Those bare objects—the physical tools of espionage—were to form the first grim and material skeleton in the body of proof to be forged against him. They included three cameras; one copying camera with accessories; three photo lenses (one telescopic); developing equipment; two rolls of film with photographed documents (the nature of the documents is unknown from the police files); one black leather wallet containing $1,782; sixteen notebooks with details of contacts with agents and notes in an unknown language; Sorge’s Nazi Party card (with membership fees paid until 1951) and a list of Party members in Japan; two volumes of the Complete Shakespeare (no data as to what edition); seven pages of reports and charts in English; and, lastly and fatally, two pages of a typewritten draft, also in English, of the final message of achievement, compiled to be sent to “Wittenberg” on October 15.

  22 Sorge: “In the summer of 1914, I visited Sweden on vacation, and returned to Germany by the last boat available. The Austrian Archduke had been assassinated in Sarajevo, and World War I broke out. I volunteered for service immediately, joining the army without reporting to my school or taking the final graduation examination.” This period may be described as “from the schoolhouse to the slaughterhouse.” Sorge was sent to the Eastern Front (Galicia). He was befriended by an old stonesman from Hamburg, a real leftist, whose head was shattered to smithereens before Sorge’s very eyes, a piece of skull bone cutting his face (a permanent scar remained). In July 1915, Sorge was wounded by shrapnel in his right leg. In 1916, a bullet struck him from the back, taking out his bowels. Sorge was transported to a field hospital, conscious, watching with listless amazement his viscera throbbing in his hands. Exhausted surgeons gave him no hope of survival, but patched him up and let him occupy a bed. Sorge’s next-bed neighbor, a Jewish boy, crushed his skull against the bed frame, as Sorge was helplessly writhing in his own pain. In early 1917, fully and miraculously recovered, Sorge was sent back to the Galician front, where he became one of the best sharpshooters in his division, specializing in eliminating enemy snipers.

  23 Sorge was a passionate chess player. He played against Kurt Gerlach (Sorge: 25—Gerlach: 50); Pyatnitski, Kuusinen, Klopstock (Sorge: 12—Pyatnitski, Kuusinen, Klopstock: 12); Berzin (Sorge: 131—Berzin: 127); Klausen (Sorge: 1—Klausen: 0); Ozaki (Sorge: 50—Ozaki: 49); Hanako (Sorge: 111—Hanako: 0); Ott (Sorge: 45—Ott: 12); and he played against himself daily.

  24 Sorge: “Legitimate and plausible cover is absolutely essential for a spy. I worked as a news reporter and found that the foreign correspondent is conveniently situated for the acquisition of information of various types, but that he’s closely observed by the police. I believe, however, that the best thing an agent can do is render himself an intellectual: a professor, a writer, a scholar. Generally speaking, the intellectual class is made up of men of average or less than average intelligence, and the agent who assumes such a cover would be quite safe from detection by police. Moreover, as an intellectual with extensive scholarly connections (which he would utilize as sources or transmitters of information) he could associate with people who possess information they know nothing about, he could ask ostensibly ludicrous questions and develop trust. I think that intellectuals are the pets of the world, digging holes in the backyards of history. They can move around without arousing suspicion.”

  25 In the files of the Frankfurt-Police, dating from 1927, there is a vague and unconfirmed report showing that a Dr. Richard Sorge left for the United States on January 24, 1926, and spent some time in California, working in Hollywood film studios. The only admission, however, made by Sorge of visiting America was on his way to Japan. Herr Alexander Hemon, a researcher at the German Foreign Office Archives, claims that there is a possibility that Dr. Richard Sorge, identified by the police as being in Frankfurt in 1925 and 1926, was “not the Soviet spy who was working in Tokyo and on mysterious missions abroad, but someone else, of whom we know nothing.”

  26 On the evening of Tuesday, October 7th, 1941, Sorge had arranged a customary meeting with Ozaki at the Asia Restaurant, in the South Manchurian Railway building. He kept the appointment in vain, devouring sake, absentmindedly flirting with a woman (“a Mary Kinzie lookalike”), gorging on escargot at the next table. Miyagi was due to come to Sorge’s house two days later, but failed to appear. On Friday, October 10th, Klausen and Voukelitch called on Sorge, by a prior arrangement, in an atmosphere of mounting disquiet. Voukelitch telephoned Ozaki’s office and received no answer. Klausen: “The air was heavy, and Sorge said gravely—as if our fate was sealed—‘Neither Joe nor Otto showed up to meet us. They must have been arrested by the police.’”

  After Voukelitch and Klausen left Sorge’s house and strayed toward their respective fates (Voukelitch: died of typhus in the prison hospital; Klausen: scorched in his prison cell by an American bomb during an air raid), Sorge could not rest and instead made frantic love to Hanako, who was gentler and smoother than ever. At two o’clock after midnight, a plainclothesman (name lost), with two uniformed, sleepy policemen, knocked politely on Sorge’s door and, receiving no answer (Sorge and Hanako approaching another climax), shouted: “We have come to see you about your recent traffic accident.” Sorge appeared at the door in pajamas and slippers and then was, without further exchange, bundled into an inconspicuously black police car, protesting (in whisper, so as not to wake his neighbors) that his arrest was illegal.

  27 The procurator directly responsible for the interrogation of Sorge was Yoshikawa Mitsusada of the Thought Department of the Tokyo District Court Procurator Bureau. Yoshikawa had an extensive knowledge of current political and economic thought, including Marxism. It was rumored that he had been a Marxist himself when he was a student at Tokyo Imperial University. Soon after graduating from the university, he had written a comprehensive study of the geisha wage system. It seems that there was some mutual admiration between the two of them. Yoshikawa: “In my whole life, I have never seen anyone as great as he was.” After the sentence, at their last meeting, Sorge asked Yoshikawa to be kind to Hanako-san: “She will marry a professor in the end and have a boring and happy life. Don’t do anything to her.”

  28 Some of Sorge’s information, seemingly petty, was passed on by way of the Fourth Bureau to the GPU, which used it to build the foundations for what would become the KGB’s Sixth Division of the First Directorate—the infamous Index. The Index was a vast collection of biographical and personal data about everyone who might, even very remotely, be of use at some time or another, to Soviet espionage. The Index files contained information about sexual preferences (obtained by voyeuristic monitoring or tempting agents); eating (restaurant bills, etc.), and sleeping (calls in the middle of the night, monitoring, etc.) habits; about sports teams affiliations; about reading interests (subscription lists, library records, etc.) and, often, recorded stories, apparently unrelated, which helped the one in charge of the particular individual to assess what sort of person he or she was to utilize. The information could be used for blackmail, or for assuming the right approach when recruiting, or for plugging damaging information into the public’s mind. Cold War defectors brought numerous stories about the Index and, almost without exception, claimed that the official slogan was “We know everything!” In pre-computer times, only the Nazi Gestapo had much the same kind of organization, but it was not nearly as detailed nor all embracing as the Index. There are claims, dating all the way from the sixties, that the United States Government agencies (CIA, FBI, or both) are building a computer database, based on the principles similar to the Index’s, but none of those claims has ever been confirmed.

  29 Major General Charles A. Willoughby, MacArthur’s Chief of Intelligence (1941–1951), confiscated all the Japanese Sorge files that survived the leveling of Tokyo and conducted an investigation of the Sorge case, which helped uncover many a Communist network back home in the United
States of America. In his book Shanghai Conspiracy: The Sorge Spy Ring (1952) he aptly notes: “Though the work of Dr. Richard Sorge and his companions belongs to history, the methods of their work should serve as a clear warning for today and for the future. They concern not just the intelligence officer but every good citizen. Some of the implications are frightening. One begins to wonder whom one can trust, what innocent-appearing friend may suddenly be discovered as an enemy.”

  30 In August 1941, Hanakosan was summoned to the Thought Police headquarters and urged by a man named Nakamura to break off relations with Sorge (“They don’t know what loyalty means! They don’t know the value of the family!”). The typically Sorgean, sardonic reaction was to invite Nakamura to dinner—an invitation that was embarrassingly ignored.

  31 In the Sugamo prison, Sorge was befriended, somewhat surprisingly, by Captain Ohashi—the head of the guards. After Sorge had written his confession, Ohashi brought newspapers to Sugamo everyday, together with a supply of Sorge’s own tea. Sometimes, they’d drink tea together in Sorge’s cell (Sorge: “If I am sentenced to death, Captain Ohashi, I shall become a ghost and haunt you”). In October 1944, after the execution day had been set, Ohashi bought some fruit and sake and gave what he described as a “farewell party” for Sorge. Ohashi begged a farewell gift from Sorge—preferably Sorge’s black Italian shoes with leather soles and silk laces. After Sorge was led to the execution, the polished pair of shoes was found in his cell (toes facing the wall), with folded silk socks inside, and a note for Ohashi: “I will never forget your kindness during the most difficult time of my eventful life.”

  32 Before getting to Yoshikawa, Sorge went through the obligatory interrogation conducted by lower procurators, which chiefly meant rather routine torture: Sorge was compelled to remain in a kneeling position, in formal Japanese style, for hours, while three procurators struck him repeatedly, stamped their feet on his knees, or twisted his head and arms in a judo hold. On occasions, they’d burn hair or pierced particularly painful points (nipples, testicles, anus) on his body. Every once in a while Sorge would just close his eyes and try to ignore the immense pain. The momentary trance would be smashed by a full-fist blow from behind to his ear or the nape of his neck—the pain would be so intense that Sorge vomited uncontrollably. Naturally, he did not sign the confession under torture.

  33 While in high school, Sorge’s best friend was a Jewish boy named Franz, with whom he shared an interest in German history—particularly Barbarossa and Bismarck. The friendship was abruptly broken off after Franz tried to kiss Ika, over the book about Barbarossa’s incursion, full of pictures of heavily armored German knights on stout curtained horses.

  34 Sorge broke down in the-Buddhist chaplain’s room in Sugamo, after the signed statements by Klausen, Voukelitch, Ozaki, and Miyagi were shown to him. Yoshikawa made the following appeal: “What about your obligations as a human being? Your friends, who have risked their lives and families to work with you, for your cause, have confessed and may hope thereby to secure some mitigation, however slight, of their sentences. Are you going to abandon them to their fate? Are you going to betray them? Are you going to be remembered as a typical Western man, caring more about himself than anyone else? If I were in your place, I’d confess.” Sorge said: “Honourable Procurator, I have been defeated, for which I congratulate you,” after which he requested the pen (black-and-green Pelikan) and paper (blank sheet, hardcover notebook). He wrote an autobiographical confession, which amounted to some 50,000 words and began with the words: “For the first time in my life, I want to tell the truth: I have been a Communist since 1928.”

  35 Neither the German, Japanese, nor Soviet public was ever informed about Sorge’s trial and execution. Indeed, there was no official acknowledgment from any of the governments, apart from a brief cable from the German ambassador (recently promoted ex-Colonel Ott) in Tokyo, closing the case as far as Berlin was concerned: “The German journalist Richard Sorge who, as previously reported, has been condemned to death for espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union, was, according to a communication from the Foreign Ministry, hanged on November 7th.” (Let us note a well-known fact: November 7, 1944, was the twenty-seventh anniversary of the October Revolution.)

  36 In 1919, Sorge wrote a poem which began with the line: “Eternally a stranger, fleeing from himself” and read it in the Gerlach’s salon before the audience of leftist university professors, Christiane, and Kurt himself. Kurt Gerlach mercilessly mocked Sorge’s poetic instincts: “‘Fleeing from himself—bah! Where would you go? That’s bourgeois gibberish, Ika. Man is a product of social relations—formed in history by history—not a self, not an essence hoarded in the center of the metaphysical fluff. ‘Eternally a stranger’—bah!” Sorge burned the sheet with his poem and made no literary attempts (his confession notwithstanding) for the rest of his life.

  37 After the disastrous courting attempt, driven by the choking desire for Christiane (“Dear Ika! I have liked you, even your self-mocking and sardonic wit. But what you did last night is not what a decent woman can bear …”), Sorge attempted suicide. Lacking courage to end his life with his mind clear, he fueled his death wishes with cheap pear schnapps, while a razor lay, ominously, on the table before him. The courage, however, reached its zenith after the second glass, declining rapidly thereafter, until he passed out. He woke up sixteen hours later (reeking of vomit, emptied of schnapps) not knowing where he was or why he was there. After that unfortunate incident, he would see Christiane only from afar, embers of his former desire suffocating under the ashes of orgiastic rampages.

  38 During Sorge’s preliminary trial, Stalingrad was under siege. Sorge, who perceived that this was the battlefield where the war was to be decided, took great interest in news about the battle. He’d ask Yoshikawa in the court, whispering, about Stalingrad, while the judge would be talking to his clerk. Yoshikawa would reply in undertone, telling him about the general situation (“They’re keeping their positions,” or “It looks good”). The preliminary judge knew what was going on, but did nothing to stop them. When Stalingrad was saved, Ohashi watched Sorge, through the peephole of his cell, dancing, clapping hands, and kissing the walls with joy.

  39 Moments before the execution, the chief chaplain of the Sugamo prison (accompanied by Yoshikawa and Ohashi) offered Sorge tea and cake and said: “Life and death are one and the same thing to one who has attained personal beatitude. Impersonal beatitude can be attained by entrusting everything to the mercy of Buddha.” Sorge said: “I thank you, but: no!”

  40 Sorge was led into a vaporous, windowless, bare room, with a gallows standing in the center. He was led across the room and placed beneath the gallows, while a noose was affixed around his neck. There was no staircase to climb, no platform to stand on. The trap was in the floor, immediately beneath his feet.

  THE ACCORDION

  1

  The horses are trotting stolidly and the coach is bobbing steadily, and Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s eyelids are listlessly sliding down his corneas. The weighty eyelids are about to reach the bottom, but then the horse on the left raises its tail—embarrassingly similar to the tussock on the Archduke’s resplendent helmet—and the Archduke can see the horse’s anus slowly opening, like a camera aperture.

  The coach is passing between two tentacles of an ostensibly exultant throng: they wave little flags and cheer in some monkey language (“Would it be called Bosnian?” wonders the Archduke). Children with filthy faces and putrid, cracked teeth run up and down between the legs of the crowd. The Archduke recognizes the secret police, with their impeccable mustaches, with stern, black hats that look clearly grotesque among blood-red fezzes—much like topsy-turvy flower pots with short tassels—and women with little curtains over their faces. The secret police stand stiff, throwing skillful side glances, waiting for the opportunity to show off their alertness. The left horse is dropping turds, like dark, deflated tennis balls. The shallow, obscure river behind the back of the Archduke’s
foreign, cunning denizens is reeking of rotten sauerkraut. In the coach ahead, the Archduke can see only the top of General Potiorek’s ceremonial helmet: the elaborate tussock is fluttering annoyingly. He decides to get rid of Potiorek as soon as he assumes the throne.

  The Archduke looks at the Archduchess and sees her face in a cramp of disgust. “It would be very unseemly if she started vomiting again in front of all these people,” he thinks. He touches her (cool) hand, carefully trying to convey his manly concern, but she turns to him with the unchanged sickened face and the Archduke quickly recoils.

  The coach rolls between two cordons of smirking people waving ridiculous, tiny flags, and vapid, marble-faced secret policemen. The Archduke then sees a man with an accordion stretched over his chest. The man is smiling, sincerely, it appears—he may even be delighted. He doesn’t seem to be playing the accordion, just holding it. The Archduke’s gaze breaks through the crowd and he can now see the man’s strong arms and the accordion belts squeezing the man’s strong forearms. He can see the beige-and-black keyboard and he can see that one of the keys is missing; he can see the dark rectangle in place of the missing key. The coach passes the man and the Archduke thinks he can sense the man’s gaze on his back. He’s tempted to turn around, but that would obviously be unseemly. The Archduke wonders about these strange people, about this man who doesn’t seem to possess any hatred toward him and the Empire (not yet, at least) and he begins to wonder what happened to that key. Can you play a song without that key? How would Liebestod sound with one of the notes never being played? Maybe that man never played that key; maybe he’ll never play that note in his entire life. “Strange people,” thinks the Archduke. He decides to tell the Archduchess about the man with the accordion, perhaps it could cheer her up.