more complicated than that,” said the second secretary. “I think you know that we take a different view of suicide, especially now.”
In a tired, monotonous voice he explained that since the prime minister’s suicide—which, as Rudian well knew, had unraveled the greatest conspiracy in Albanian history—there was a tendency to look for a hidden meaning in every suicide, however apparently straightforward.
“You know,” he continued, “that suicides are intended to give signals and convey messages. Think of Jan Palach in Czechoslovakia, or Stefan Zweig . . . You will know better than I do. We are not ruling out this possibility—”
“Especially because the girl came from a former bourgeois family,” the investigator interrupted. “Close to the old royal court. Some of the family is in Albania and some abroad. So the investigation will take time.”
The playwright didn’t know what to say.
“It’s not just a question of the book,” the second secretary said. “The girl often mentioned your name in her diary.”
“I see,” the playwright replied uncertainly.
“That’s the reason we brought you in,” the secretary said. “If you think of anything, or remember something that might be useful to the investigation, phone me. Or drop in whenever you like. The Party’s door is open.”
“I understand,” the playwright said. “Of course.”
He was about to stretch out his hand but instead he looked from one man to the other, wondering to whom he should put his last question.
“May I know how long ago this happened?”
The investigator thought for a while.
“Four days ago,” he said. “Today is day five.”
3
Four days ago. Today is day five, he repeated to himself as he walked along the edge of the Park of Youth. He was unable to tell how many days had passed since his last meeting with Migena, on the evening of their quarrel.
Sometimes he counted four, making today day five, but sometimes the result was totally different.
He found himself on the main boulevard opposite the Dajti Hotel. Drinking coffee there among foreigners seemed even more unwise than ever. Don’t pretend life’s still the same, he told himself. It was Llukan Herri who had invented what their circle of close friends called the “Dajti test.” When you’re not sure you feel totally safe in your own skin, pass in front of the Dajti Hotel. If your feet hesitate even for an instant before entering, forget it. Admit that you’re no longer safe, to put it mildly.
The National Gallery, next door to the hotel, was closed. The Writers’ Club, on the other side of the street, offered a test of a different kind. By a strange coincidence, everybody who was marked for prison visited the bar more frequently before fate struck.
It was eleven o’clock and he was standing by the entrance to the theater. The old posters had been torn down and not replaced. Tirana had never looked so forlorn.
It seemed incredible to him that three months ago he had signed that book in the midst of the cheerful first-night
hubbub.
Migena had phoned him a week later. “Hello. I’m an art student. I’m sorry to bother you, but it was me who asked you for an autograph for her friend. Perhaps you remember?”
He had said that he remembered her very well, and the tone of the girl’s low voice at the end of the phone brightened. Her friend had been delighted with the book. He couldn’t imagine how happy it had made her. She herself too, of course.
They met two days later, and again her first words were about her friend, but when he said that next time the two girls might come together if they liked, her eyes momentarily froze. Of course her friend would be thrilled, really thrilled, but right now . . . she couldn’t. “I understand,” he had said, although he hadn’t understood anything at all. Was something stopping this girl coming to the capital?
He felt someone’s presence behind him and a stranger’s voice asked, “No performances this week?” “See for yourself,” he replied, without turning his head.
Despite his resistance, his feet then turned him back toward the Writers’ Club. Let happen what may, he thought.
At first he assumed that the main room of the club was empty, but as he sat down he noticed the familiar face of a writer in the far corner. He wanted to say hello, but the writer did not see him, or pretended not to. If you don’t want to speak, don’t bother, he thought, and sat down, turning his back to the writer. People had a point when they said of this man that he directed most of his anger at the wrong targets. Especially since he had published that ill-fated book The Winter of Bitter Winds.
Rudian tried not to think about him. He would have liked merely to tell the man that he had no reason to look so gloomy, especially in his presence. Two or three times, Rudian had almost got into trouble for things this writer had said, such as the business about cells in the front of the brain being damaged or dead.
It was enough to drive you crazy. Llukan Herri had asked him one day: “Was it you talking about the cells in the front of the brain, the ones that should invent new things in art?” When Rudian shook his head, Llukan had gone on to say that it must have been that other writer, who goes on about rain and the wind, with whom they’d been confusing him recently.
He groaned to himself, finally turning his mind back to the girl.
Migena’s icy expression became even more inexplicable on reflection, as happened to most things in the Writers’ Club. How could he have taken her look so lightly? All his concentration and haste had been focused less on what she said than on the beautiful shape of her lips and his impatience to kiss them. But that coldness had reappeared after his kisses, and even after her kisses, which were the sweetest of all. He had wanted to ask her what was troubling her, but gently, without creating alarm, as one might ask a naïve lover worried about a broken promise.
Looking back, he was astonished not at her but at his own naïveté. Particularly when, a few days after, the iciness in her eyes could be felt in her breath and seen in her shoulders. In the moments before she undressed, it had been so obvious that he had wondered if she might be a virgin.
The girl had answered vaguely, neither yes nor no, with conditional verbs: even if I were, it wouldn’t be a problem. But her transfixed expression remained the same. After making love, instead of calming down, she grew worse. She lay for a while with her face deep in the pillow, and he would have thought she was asleep but for her shoulders, which trembled with increasingly strong emotion. He tried to draw her to him, at least to see her face, but the girl gripped the pillow with her naked arms.
He asked her again what was worrying her, but less cautiously than before. It wasn’t about being a virgin, that was now clear. So what was it? Had she promised to be faithful to some boy, or was it some other nonsense? Well?
A faint rustle of her hair indicated no, and she said haltingly that it wasn’t a question of fidelity or any other nonsense, but something else.
I see, so she’s starting to play games, he thought.
“What is it, then?” he asked coldly.
Her reply was unexpected. It was better if he didn’t know.
“I see,” Rudian said, this time aloud.
Immediately his thoughts turned to the anxiety of the last few days over the new postponement of his play. He wanted to say to her: Do you remember that premiere where we met, with all the excitement in the foyer? And now this is the second time a play of mine has been postponed at the last moment. And you go on complaining about who knows what silliness.
Propped up on his elbow, he studied her bare shoulders with a certain indifferent ease that he believed came from being known to the public. He hadn’t felt suspicious, especially