by Ivan Klíma
‘I called you from here. Several times, but there was never any reply. I took it to be an omen.’
‘Of what?’
‘I don’t know. That I’d never get through to you.’
‘I know what you mean. An omen that I don’t belong to you. No, it wasn’t an omen, we were just away for a few days. I couldn’t stand being in a city where you were lying ill and I wasn’t allowed to visit you.’
He felt her closeness. Here she was sitting next to him again, drawing him to her again.
‘Do you realize it’s already over a year since I first came to hear you preach?’
‘Of course. I could hardly forget that day, could I?’
‘And we once sat together on a bench in Veltrusy Park, remember?’
‘My heart may be in a mess, but there’s nothing wrong with my head.’
‘There are some things you remember more with your heart than your head.’
‘And my heart’s alive too for the time being.’
‘Does your wife visit you here?’
‘Yes. She takes care of me.’
‘That’s good. Even though I envy her. I’d like to visit you and take care of you.’
‘Thank you. Thank you for coming now.’
‘Dan, don’t worry about anything,’ she said. ‘I unloaded so many of my woes on you and now I feel guilty that they were only the woes of a spoilt brat. You’re not to worry about anything. You must give your heart a rest.’
‘I’m trying to.’
‘I wrote you a letter, but don’t read it now.’ She took an envelope from her handbag. ‘Though I’d better not give it to you now either. Another time.’
‘It’s not entirely certain I’ll have another time.’
‘No, you’re going to live. I wanted to tell you that I will love you to the end of my days. You were a revelation to me and will remain so even if we never see each other again.’
‘Thank you. I wrote you a letter too.’ He pulled the envelope from his pocket.
‘All right, I’ll give you mine too. It’s like an exchange of diplomatic notes,’ she said. ‘The meeting took place in an atmosphere of mutual friendship. Shall I walk you back?’
‘Perhaps not.’
‘I’d like to stay with you. We never had much time to stay together, especially me. Now I regret it. I blame myself. Maybe I’ll still make up for it.’
‘Don’t blame yourself for anything. It’s not the amount of time that matters. Most of the time quantity doesn’t matter, even though everything tends to be measured by quantity.’
‘I know. I’m grateful to you for everything. I know it’s something you’re not supposed to measure, but it was more than I had ever received and more than I deserved. I’d better go now before your wife comes. Get well. Get well as quickly as you can, and don’t worry about anything.’
He went to put his arm around her but stopped short. They were too much on display. But what did that matter seeing he might not be alive tomorrow?
She noticed the unfinished movement and kissed him on the lips. ‘Thank you for everything, Dan!’
‘I thank you too.’
‘And don’t forsake those of us who need you!’
He watched her as she walked quickly away; as his love retreated from him.
His legs were a trifle shaky and he was obliged to sit down twice before reaching his ward. His legs weren’t important; the main thing was that his heart had survived the encounter.
When he got back to the ward Hana was already waiting for him.
‘I took a little walk,’ he said.
‘You oughtn’t to go out on your own.’
‘I feel fine.’
‘I’m glad to hear it.’ She took some fruit out of her bag.
‘How are the children?’ he asked.
‘They’re coming too. As soon as they’re out of school.’
‘And how’s the building work?’
‘All right. I think we could enrol our first children next month. You’ll be back by then. I had to pay some bills too, but I don’t want to bother you with them now.’
‘I’m looking forward to it. A lot.’
‘To being home?’
‘And to the work.’
‘So long as it won’t be too much for you! You realize you’re going to have to take it easy for some time!’
‘People aren’t born to take it easy. And besides, I won’t be preaching any more.’
‘Not preaching any more? Why not?’
‘I don’t think it would be honest.’
‘Maybe you only think that way on account of your heart. But it’ll be all right again.’
‘My heart maybe.’
‘Well, what won’t be?’ Hana is staring at him. Then, out of the blue, she asks, ‘Are the roses from her?’
‘From whom?’
‘Bára, I think you call her.’
How did she find out? It’s immaterial. She knows and that’s good. Now if he dies, he won’t die and leave behind only a lie. ‘Yes, she brought them for me.’
‘They’re nice.’
‘I wanted to tell you about her, but I didn’t want to hurt you. Never in my life have I wanted to hurt you. I loved you. I still love you,’ he corrected himself.
‘Dan, it was awful. I couldn’t believe you could lie to me, and for so long.’
‘Do you think you’ll be able to forgive me?’
‘I’ve already forgiven you, haven’t I? Haven’t you noticed?’ And his wife takes a handkerchief from her handbag and weeps. She weeps because he deceived her and because she doesn’t know whether she’ll ever believe him again.
8
Letters
Dear Bára,
Today I walked a bit for the first time, freed from the tubes. Walking is a sign of life and so I’m still alive, even though I don’t know how many steps I am destined to take. But I am alive and that means I can still talk to you, in spirit at least. Or take leave of you, so that should I depart I won’t do so without saying farewell. Taking leave doesn’t mean saying goodbye but instead saying the most important thing, the thing that I didn’t have the time or the determination to say before …
An hour later (I came over faint).
My whole life I have yearned for the closeness of a loved one, for intimacy, in other words. Is it at all possible between two people? There are many degrees of intimacy: people are close to each other when they are able to converse without fear, when they embrace, when they make love. Is love-making the ultimate, the supreme degree of intimacy? One can make love to all sorts of people (although it has never been the case with me), but is that the ultimate intimacy?
The ultimate degree of intimacy – surely that is the capacity to trust utterly and therefore to confide everything, even one’s deepest secrets, even the things one conceals from oneself. Not concealing even the things one deceives oneself about …
Night time: Where did I break off? You came to me, like many others, because you were afraid of death. I told you, as I’d told so many other people, that death had been overcome by that one single sacrifice, by that one single death on the cross. It’s what I told myself too. I wanted so dreadfully much to believe it and I confided to no one, not even my first or my second wife, that I doubted it. That I was proclaiming as the highest truth what was my own wish, yearning and hope. Now at this time, when I don’t know if it will be my last message, I admit it to you at least. You will not condemn me, I’m sure. You won’t be scandalized, but will have understanding for me.
I told you and others that God’s love will redeem us, but I think I was wrong. I don’t think there is anyone who would one day judge our faults, forgive us and give us absolution. There is no higher justice than our own. Nothing lasts for ever, except forgetting, maybe.
What is left of all the things in my life that I proclaimed and worked for? Maybe just the conviction that love is the greatest thing we can encounter in life and the most important thing we may strive for. I’m ta
lking about human love; if God’s love doesn’t exist then only the human sort remains: fleeting and imperfect. But Christ talked about that sort too, and thousands of others after him. And we are still incapable of appreciating it and living by it.
Maybe it’s a bad message, but accept it from me as something that is more than a declaration of love, something that is the ultimate degree of intimacy …
Love, Dan
Dearest, dearest, dearest,
I want to let you know I’m thinking about you all the time. I wanted to tell you that thanks to you I have discovered what love is. I’m not referring now to anything physical. I have in mind what you sometimes talked to me about. I was selfish, I wanted you for myself. I am ashamed of it and I apologize to you for it.
When I learned what had happened to you I was in despair and didn’t know what to do. I dashed around the city like a mad thing to all the places where we had been together. And I was afraid for you and I wanted to cry and then rush to the hospital to find you and be with you and hold your hand and beg you not to forsake me. Not to forsake us. To stay here. Here! And then it suddenly struck me: I knelt on the floor and I asked Him to forgive both of us for all the bad things we had done and begged Him that you should live. I told Him that I did not want it for myself, that I no longer want you for myself, I just want you to live, because it is only right, because the world without you would be worse than it is.
And all of a sudden I felt something extraordinary, something greater than relief. I felt that He was listening to me, that He could hear me and would take my entreaty into account, that He would forgive both me and you, because He knows that if we did something bad, it was out of love and out of helplessness and desperation, but never out of wickedness. And all of a sudden I knew that He existed, that I wasn’t abandoned, just as you are not abandoned, even at the moments of greatest trial.
God is with you, my dearest, and even if I can’t be with you and maybe never will be again, that’s not important. He will remain with you, just like my love, as long as you live.
Love, Bára