Читать книгу The Contract - Anto Krajina - Страница 8

Vivien found the interview very pleasant and all the people were extraordinarily friendly. The questions were put to her in exactly the same order in which she had discussed and answered them with Mr Corner three days before.

During the rehearsal itself, only two members of the team, both lawyers, were absent. The present members were asked not to put any questions or interrupt the interview in any way. They could make notes during the interview and bring their remarks only afterwards. Mr Rocky, an elderly psychologist, was appointed by Professor Frederic to interview her.

“Dear Vivien, we do not expect any special answers from you. Tell us what you want to tell us. Do not tell us what you do not want to tell us,” the interviewer stressed at the very beginning, before the interview itself started.

Vivien thanked Mr Ricky with a smile for his friendly and encouraging words and the interview began.

“Could you tell us how you managed to endure the extraordinary physical and mental torture for such a long time?” was the first question put to her.

All the members of the managing team were overwhelmed when she said: “At the very beginning of my imprisonment I firmly decided to grow older, to grow stronger and to escape, to escape by all means and at any price. I managed it because I made myself obliged to do it, to be steadfast, to keep my promise.”

“Great! Marvellous! Tremendous!” whispered the members of the team inaudibly in the dark behind the camera.

“You said you promised something?”

“Yes, I promised not to give up.”

“But who did you promise to?”

“I made a contract with myself, a sort of a pact.”

“You made a contract?”

“Yes, I made a contract, drafted and signed in my mind.”

“You are telling us about completely new, unheard-of things. Could you please explain that to us? Because usually for a contract there must be at least two parties, mustn’t there.”

“That is true, one party was I and the other party was my future ego. My duty was to prepare myself, become older and stronger to be able to carry out the promise I had made. The duty of my ego was to carry out what I had promised to prepare.”

While she was answering this question Vivien was holding her fists clenched as she had been previously instructed to do by Mr Corner. Mr Corner, who was sitting in the back row behind the camera, was doing the same. When she came to pronounce the word ‘stronger’ he raised his clenched fists. At the same time Professor Frederic, who was sitting in the front row, didn’t raise his arm but clenched his fists in front of him. Mr Corner could not see Professor Frederic’s gesture. Vivien could see both of them and did the same. Professor Frederic and Mr Corner were independently happy, and all the members of the team were impressed.

“What you have just said sounds fantastic, but it is not easy to understand,” the interviewer pointed out.

“What I have said may sound a little strange, I know, however it was this firm decision of mine that made me think what to do when the suitable moment for escape came. That same firm decision helped me to realise that the suitable moment had come.”

“That is indeed fascinating,” said the interviewer and continued.

“Do you think that your kidnapper noticed that you intended to escape?”

“Certainly. He knew everything about my secret plan to escape. In fact he knew more than that. We often talked about it,” Vivien said.

“That is overwhelming! Could you please tell us more about it?”

“My suggestion was that the most suitable moment to escape would have been when we went out together to do the shopping, because I could easily disappear in the crowd or scream and ask the policeman or people in the street to protect me. I suggested that because I was sure that people would have helped me.”

“Did he agree with you?”

“No, he didn’t. He said that in that case he would kill anyone who tried to help me to escape.”

“Oh, how terrible!”

“Yes, of course. I realised how unjust that would have been to those nice, innocent, selfless people. I couldn’t do that to them. And for that simple reason I had to abandon the idea to escape in that way and decided to think of some other possibility.”

“Did you then discuss together any other possibility to escape?”

“Yes, we did. He suggested that I should try to escape when there were not many people about, for example when we went out for a walk at night, when we were practically alone, so that I couldn’t ask anyone to protect me. In that case he said he would not have the opportunity to kill anybody.”

“Could you accept that suggestion of his?”

“No, I couldn’t, because he threatened to kill himself if I happened to abandon him.”

“So he blackmailed you, in fact?”

“Yes, he did, he played with my conscience. He knew that I didn’t want to be the cause of his death.”

‘Thus in the midst of your suffering you tried not to harm your torturer?’

“That’s right; I simply did not want to allow him to make me his murderer. And there is also something else. His mother came regularly, cleaned the whole house and cooked for him. She thought that everything in his life was in perfect order. She did not have any idea what he was in fact doing. I did not want to break her heart by escaping and making everything public, for that would have destroyed her whole naïve world. I simply couldn’t do that to her.”

Vivien said it in a gentle manner and very slowly as if looking for the right words. She spoke in a low but very clear voice and her hands were virtuously pressed together between her knees.

At these words the faces of all the members of the team became transfigured. They then shut their eyes and covered their faces with their hands.

“What a high degree of consciousness, what a sublime feeling of responsibility!” they thought.

“Could you tell us more about your kidnapper’s behaviour towards you? Was he rude to you?”

“He was not rude to me. On the contrary, I often had the impression that he tried to be nice to me. There was always a trace of an attempt to smile in his face, however, that attempted smile could never break through the crust of sadness.”

“How did you cope with the fear, which you must have had?”

“Each time when he came in and brought the meal I was afraid, of course. But if he sat down to chat with me on this and that I was less afraid. However, that didn’t happen very often. He usually didn’t say a word. He just came in, put the tray on the table and disappeared without even granting me a single look. In such moments the noise of the key turning in the door lock seemed to be much louder than usual, and I was very afraid.”

“Were you not afraid he might kill you?”

“Certainly I was, for kidnappers are dangerous people and their behaviour is unpredictable. Each time when he did not speak to me I was afraid he might poison me and I didn’t eat anything except the fruit. I threw the rest in the toilet. Therefore I was often hungry.”

“Did you ever dare to protest against his behaviour?”

“No, I never did, because that would probably have been too dangerous. I suppose he thought that he was very generous and very kind to me.”

“Thus you never accused him of anything?”

“That’s right, but I insisted on many things that seemed important to me.”

“Tell us please a bit more about that. That is absolutely astonishing.”

“I made him for example celebrate my birthday with me every year as well as Christmas Eve, New Year’s Eve and Easter. We went shopping together and he bought all I wanted to eat or drink. I also made him buy the clothes I liked and so on.”

“And he did that for you without protesting?”

“Oh, yes, he in fact did much more than that for me. I wanted, for example, to have a TV set in my room in order to keep myself informed of what was going on in our country and in the world and how the public was reacting to my disappearance. I did that because I knew that watching TV programmes was the best way of keeping up with the latest developments in the world as a whole. I wanted to be able to speak well once I was free. I wanted to be able to give clear answers in the interview that certainly would take place once I have managed to free myself. It was clear to me that my future life would depend on public interest in my case. Thus whatever I was planning and doing had to be adjusted to that interest. If the masses had not been interested in what was happening to me at that time, then all my planning and suffering would have been in vain. I made him bring me books from the library, because I wanted to read and learn. He realised that I was very sincere and he did what I wanted. He himself was also a keen reader and we quite often walked late in the evening and discussed books that we both had read. In such moments I was not afraid he might kill me. In fact generally I was not so afraid of being killed, I was much more afraid of being locked in the room and abandoned. That might have happened because he went to town in his car every day, and when you drive a car something can always happen. Nobody would have noticed anything. My kidnapper agreed that being abandoned in the cellar would be much worse than being killed; however, he thought that the worse case would offer a much more teasing plot for a book or a film. As I have already said he dropped me a hint several times how to escape. However, each time he added that he couldn’t control himself if I tried to do that. In that case, he repeated each time, somebody would have to die. I was simply desperate, for on the one hand I had firmly decided to flee from the dungeon at any price, on the other hand I did not want to be responsible for his or anybody else’s death.”

“Unfortunately what you were so terribly afraid of has happened: your kidnapper has committed suicide.”

“I know that he has killed himself because I have fled; he simply could not continue carrying the burden of loneliness. It is a pity that he has done it. His death was completely unnecessary.”

“Now you are free, you are starting a new life. What are you going to do first?”

“First of all I will pass my baccalaureate. Then I will study at the university. Then I will see what I should do next. However, what I want to start now, without delay, is a foundation that bears my name. It should be based on my pain and my suffering, my strength and my courage. I want to help all those who are starving, all those who have disappeared in countries in which human rights are not respected, all women who do not have the same rights as men. In this interview I should like to appeal to mankind to support me generously in my effort to help those in need. Helping hundreds of millions of the starving, oppressed, deprived is a costly business. Therefore I am appealing to you to be generous. I will personally keep a sharp eye on each detail in connection with my foundation and take care that all you donate goes directly to those who are in need. I will no longer allow anything in connection with my person to happen without my knowledge. I will never again be a victim at someone’s mercy. I will help all victims in the world to become free and regain their dignity. My lawyers will support me in my endeavour.”

“Dear Vivien, thank you very much for the interview,” said the interviewer at the end.