Forty Days at Kamas

by Preston Fleming

  In the vision, I sat in the chair closest to the door in my filthy orange coveralls, flimsy rubber sandals on my feet, listening to the acne–scarred interrogator with the chipped front tooth and dirty slicked–back hair tell me once again that this was my last chance to sign a voluntary confession.

  "It's no use, Wagner," he told me. "Your partners have already told us about your plans to assassinate the Party leadership in Pittsburgh. We know everything: how you selected your targets, how you tracked their movements, what weapons you planned to use, and how you planned to make your escape.

  "Are you saying your co–conspirators are all liars? Your old friends, neighbors, and co–workers? Why on earth would they accuse you if you weren't guilty? Do you deny meeting with the persons who named you in their sworn statements? Do you deny that you owned the high–powered rifle and the large–caliber pistol that we found in your basement? You know it's a felony for civilians to keep firearms, don't you? You could be sentenced to ten years on those charges alone.

  "Why not cooperate and give yourself the chance to lighten your sentence? Have pity on your family and spare them the burden of a lengthy trial. Believe me, Wagner, this is your last chance. You can start writing out your confession here at this table right now or I can send you back downstairs to Memory Recovery and let them pull it out of you bit by bit. What's it going to be?"

  I felt every muscle fiber in my body tense into a knot while my throat constricted so tightly that I couldn't utter a word.

  "No! Never!" I wanted to scream. But was that really what I intended to say? Wasn't it, 'No! Please no more isolation!' Hadn't I made up my mind to resist? Or had I changed it? I felt confused and needed more time to think but the interrogator awaited my answer.

  I lost consciousness and regained it in a white tiled room with a grated drain in the center, strapped to a bare wooden table. By craning my neck, I could see a short, stocky figure with a shaved head facing the far wall, adjusting an instrument panel. He wore a black State Security uniform. It was Sam Renaud and his eyes smoldered with hatred.

  "You don't fool me for a minute, Wagner," he sneered. "What a hypocrite! You make yourself out to be some kind of martyr, an innocent husband and father dragged off the street by government goons for no reason at all. What horseshit! You're as guilty as any of us. You'd have killed those Party big shots in Pittsburgh if we hadn't caught you first. You’re not at all the solid citizen you make yourself out to be. You hate our guts as much as we hate yours! You'd love to kill me right now, wouldn't you? Well, think again, Wagner, the joke is on you."

  I struggled against the straps and somehow managed to pull a foot loose and reach for the floor. Then I felt the shock of the frigid water around my ankle and the scene melted away. I was lying once again on the slippery wooden bench in the isolator cell. But my breathing was labored and my limbs tensed, as if I had actually strained against the canvas straps of Renaud's torture table.

  I felt something warm and soft against my cheek and looked up to see a young woman squatting in the cell beside me as if to comfort me. For some reason I couldn't understand, there was a dim glow in the cell that offered enough light for me to see her and the rest of the cell quite clearly. The woman was about twenty–five years old and had a sweet round face with a flawless white complexion. Her hair was tied behind her head with a torn strip of cloth, camp–style, and she wore a fresh pair of orange camp coveralls.

  I tried to speak to her but no words formed on my lips. Slowly she shook her head and smiled, as if words were unnecessary. When she peered into my eyes, I felt a flush of warmth pass from my head down through my trunk and into my extremities. At that moment I recognized the woman as Lillian, the work scheduler killed on my first day in camp, but it didn't matter to me anymore whether she was alive or dead. I just wanted her to stay and comfort me.

  I don't know how long I lay there gazing into her liquid eyes before I lost my concentration and her image faded away. Then the usual torrent of random thoughts and emotions returned and I felt as if I were floating along a fast–moving stream with a flotilla of images moving alongside, some faster and some slower, but always drifting out of view to be replaced by other images.

  As I watched the pattern repeat itself with flashes of my pre–arrest life, I heard familiar voices and looked around me. The voices became louder and clearer until I recognized those of a woman and a young girl.

  "Paul, we're so happy to reach you! We want you to know that we're fine and you don't need to worry about us. Just relax and let yourself get stronger. We want you to get well just as fast as you can."

  The voices belonged to my wife and to my younger daughter, Louisa. I strained to catch sight of them at the outer edge of my vision. Before long I saw them emerge from behind a swirl of cloud or mist. They were holding hands and each wore the knee–length down parka that I had bought her shortly before my arrest. Each also wore a fleece hat and scarf and carried a small backpack and gave the impression of being dressed for a long journey. I reached out to embrace them but they were already out of reach. Suddenly I was overwhelmed by the joy of knowing that my wife and daughter were safe and that my confession had not been wasted. They had made it to London, after all.

  An instant later their images faded and slipped back into the darkness while the stream of motley scenes continued. Before long I caught sight of a bright light in the distance and, as I concentrated my attention, it drew nearer and then shone directly into my eyes. I had a sensation of looking through a keyhole into a well–lit room. And as my eyes adjusted to the light, I saw that it was an L–shaped bedroom with beige wall–to–wall carpeting, a double bed with a white chenille bedspread and pink flannel sheets, art posters on the walls, and a young girl's clothing strewn carelessly across the floor.

  At a white wooden desk sat a girl of eleven or twelve with long chestnut hair, writing out a homework assignment in a spiral notebook. Even without seeing her face, I knew it was my older daughter, Claire. I called out her name. She stopped writing and raised her head for a moment as if she had heard a distant voice, then went back to writing.

  For a long time afterward I tried to hold the picture in my mind, but eventually it faded away and the stream of random images returned. I was so elated to have experienced such a lifelike vision of Claire that I didn't think to question why she appeared separately from her mother and sister.

  From time to time when my thoughts cleared, I tried to look more closely at the visions I had of Renaud, Lillian, my wife, and daughters in an effort to uncover any hidden messages or meanings that might be there. But concentration was difficult and for a long time afterward I drifted in and out of sleep.

  The next thing I remember was the clank of the cell's steel doors opening and a blinding white light pouring in. Two guards in khaki coveralls and knee–length rubber boots entered the cell and grasped me under the shoulders. Once we were in the hallway, they wrapped my semi–naked body in a thin white terry robe and led me down the corridor to an interview room. Immediately upon entering I felt the room's luxurious warmth. After spending days at a temperature somewhere in the 40s or 50s, it seemed as if my dream of the warm Hawaiian beach had come true. I wanted to stay there forever.

  Across a rough oak table sat a lean and hard–muscled man of about forty with long graying sideburns, a trimmed mustache, and a wart on his left cheek. He wore khaki coveralls without any insignia of rank or unit, but I recognized the man at once as Jack Whiting. On the table before him were a plastic tray with a thermos pitcher, two coffee cups, and a pair of matching bowls filled with sugar and powdered creamer. Whiting poured coffee into one of the mugs, stirred in some sugar and creamer and took a long sip.

  "Like some? Go ahead. It won't hurt you," he said.

  My mouth was too dry to speak. I nodded and Whiting poured me a cup.

  "Cream and sugar?"

  He didn't even wait for my nod before ladling in two heaping teaspoons each of sugar and creamer. He handed over the
cup and I drank greedily, totally unconcerned with whether the coffee might be hot enough to burn my mouth. I could feel the warmth of the coffee flow into my stomach and spread slowly all over my shivering body.

  "It's a bit warm in here," Whiting said lazily. "Should I turn it down?"

  "It's fine," I said, having wet my mouth and throat enough to speak.

  "If you don't mind, I'll get right to the point," Whiting continued. "We know you had it in for Renaud. We haven't found any witnesses yet but we know you're the one who whacked him. Now, Renaud was one of our best warders and I hate to lose good men. Normally, when this kind of thing happens, we put the troublemaker in a maximum–security prison until he sees the error of his ways. Then we send him up north where the cold tends to keep even the most hard–edged bastards out of trouble, if you follow me.

  "Now, in your case, since this is your first offense and there may have been some extenuating circumstances, I might be prepared to make an exception. But you see, we're kind of short on help these days, so what we'd like from you is to volunteer to take Renaud's place–one for one. Not as a warder, of course. Politicals don't qualify, I'm afraid. But we could definitely use your help as a source of information. Nothing special, just everyday happenings around the camp. We'd meet privately once a week and I'd ask you some questions and you'd try to find out the answers for me. Would you like some more coffee?"

  I nodded.

  "I didn't hear you," he said.

  "Yes," I answered.

  He emptied the thermos into my cup, then added sugar and creamer and set the cup down before me. I drank some and again felt its radiating warmth.

  "I’ve taken the liberty of preparing a simple plea bargain contract for you to consider. You're welcome to read it before signing but the gist of it is that you confess to murdering Renaud. In return for your guilty plea we give you a suspended sentence for as long as you continue working for State Security."

  I made no reply.

  "Why not look it over?" Whiting suggested, pushing it across the table. "You may find our terms quite attractive, all things considered."

  I finished the cup of coffee and set it back on the table before picking up the document and ripping it in half, then doubling it up and ripping it again.

  Whiting stared at me without speaking. His cold eyes were devoid of any anger, sympathy, or pity. He called for the guards.

  "Take him back," he said. He remained seated as they yanked me onto my feet. "This one seems to be a slow learner."

  I believe that I spent another two and a half days in the isolator after my interview with Whiting. The coffee worked wonders in clearing my mind and I spent the next few hours thinking carefully about the visions I had experienced. Were they nothing more than my own subconscious mind wrestling with my guilt and grief? Or did the visions represent actual communication?

  Having resolved for so long to think only of my own survival and to not torment myself over my wife and daughters, I realized that I had made a crucial mistake. Far from distracting me from my survival, love for my family gave me a reason to survive–even to escape. Since my arrest my strength had been in decline because I had stopped believing I would ever rejoin my family and thus no longer even held it out as my goal. Now, I resolved to find a way back to my wife and daughters or die in the attempt. Within moments, I felt my strength return.

  CHAPTER 18

  "The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed."

  —Steve Biko, South African dissident

  FRIDAY, MARCH 29

  The next time I heard the cell's steel doors open I was fully awake. At first I thought it was simply my ration bars and water being delivered and was startled when the door opened and the room filled with light.

  Two guards waded across the dark waters to grasp me under the armpits and ferry me out to the corridor. Seeing that I might lack the strength to stand on my own, they set me down on a bench in the corridor while one of them closed the cell doors and the other removed my clothes and boots from the steel locker and ordered me to put them on. Desperate for warmth, my numbed fingers fumbled to remove my wet underwear before I stepped into my coveralls and boots. I stuffed the underwear into a pocket and grabbed my hat and gloves in time to be hustled down the hall toward a brightly lit holding cell. I sat shivering on the floor, eager for the warmth of the heated room to raise my temperature.

  One by one, the other prisoners who had arrived with me at the isolator appeared. The first was Dennis Martino, a sharp–witted medical student from Atlanta in his mid–twenties, who had been convicted of harboring deserters from the armed forces. At the time of his arrest, he had been moonlighting as a bartender. His fatal error had been to turn away State Security officers who had asked him to report on certain patrons of the bar. He later learned that among those patrons had been men wanted for desertion. For failing to denounce them he was sentenced to eight years of corrective labor under Title 18, Section 1381.

  I had seen Martino around the camp from time to time and I recalled him as an amiable fellow with a wide range of acquaintances. But there was no trace of his sunny disposition when the guards brought him into the holding cell. His face was a deathly white, his lips a dull blue, and his shivering even more violent than mine. Without a word, he lay on his side in a fetal position and closed his eyes.

  The next to join us was Brian Gaffney, a red–bearded giant from Portland, Oregon. Gaffney had been a commercial artist before the Events but, with the decline of marketing and advertising activity, had despaired of finding work in his specialty and had settled for work as a night shift supervisor in a Kansas City molding and extrusions plant. Gaffney had somehow managed to retain an air of cheerfulness at Kamas and could claim many friends in camp. But I barely recognized him when he shuffled into the room. His face was gaunt and his eyes seemed to have retreated back into his head. His breathing was so shallow and labored that I feared he had pneumonia. He returned my greeting with a feeble smile and then sank into sleep.

  Some ten minutes later we were joined by J.J. Johns, a black taxicab owner from St. Louis who had been convicted of economic sabotage for refusing to sell his cabs to the municipal taxi collective.

  "How are you holding up, brother?" J.J. asked.

  "Better than I expected," I replied. "Somebody once told me that solitary confinement is like going to the dentist. You always think that the worst is yet to come when it's really already behind you."

  J.J. returned a thin smile.

  "Don't I know you from somewhere?" he asked.

  "We came in on the same transport," I said.

  "Oh, yeah, one of Reineke's boys."

  I winced.

  "I didn't kill any of those stoolies, if that's what you mean."

  "I don’t mean nothing at all," J.J. replied. "You boys do what you got to do. I'm too damned worn out to think about that shit."

  The door opened and Gary Toth limped into the center of the room. His entire face and neck were a mass of swollen and discolored bruises together with fresh cuts and scratches that had barely stopped bleeding. He nodded to us without a word, then took off his boots and began winding his footcloths around his feet in preparation for our release back into the frozen outdoors.

  Moments after he finished the door opened again and eight guards stood outside.

  "Into the truck. All of you."

  All of us rose except for Martino.

  The chief guard pointed at J.J. and me.

  "You two, pick him up and bring him along. Move!"

  When the double doors opened at the end of the corridor, the sunlight reflecting off the snow nearly blinded us. The four of us lifted Martino into the waiting van, climbed in after him and took our seats on the benches facing each other as we had the week before.

  "We were nine on the way in," Gaffney pointed out as soon as the door was locked behind us. "What about the others?"

  "Dead," Toth answered. "They check once a day and remove a
nybody who's gone cold."

  Toth spoke with an odd lisp. Then I saw that the entire top row of his front teeth had been broken. Toth showed no embarrassment at the loss and continued to speak despite the pain his cut and swollen lips must have caused him.

  "Let's see if we can wake him," Toth continued, pointing to Martino. "You hold him up. I'll try to shake him out of it."

  As we lifted Martino's violently shivering body into a sitting position, he mumbled incoherently and pushed us away. After three or four minutes of vigorous rubbing on his back, arms, and thighs, Martino's eyes opened. Then Toth kept him propped up while we alternated massaging his back, legs, and arms.

  "Can you talk?" Toth asked him.

  "Leave me alone," came Martino’s faint reply.

  "He'll make it."

  Toth then turned to me.

  "Did Whiting bring you in for a talk?" he asked gruffly. "About halfway through the week? Give you hot coffee?"

  I hesitated.

  "Yeah, he called me in," I admitted.

  "How about you, J.J.?" Toth went on.

  "I saw him," J.J. said.

  "Brian?"

  "Me, too."

  "Hey, Martino, listen up," Toth continued, speaking directly into Martino's ear. "Did the Wart take you out of the can for a talk?"

  Why?" Martino asked, suddenly grown canny.

  "Don't ask me why, Martino. Did he or didn't he?"

  "Yeah."

  "Okay, that makes it unanimous. Nobody gets to the isolator without the Wart bringing him in for a little java. See these teeth? That's how I paid for mine."

  He drew back his bloodied lips and paused to make sure he had our attention.

  "Unless Whiting has changed his M.O., he leaned on every one of you to become his stool pigeon and report on your buddies. No question, the isolator softens a man. So if you turned him down, good for you. It takes grit to say no when you're half crazy from the cold and the darkness and the goddamned dripping water and everything else that rips you apart in that stinking hole.