“You’ll see, come the moment,” says Schmollowski. “There’s nothing to do but wait. It’ll pass quickly.”
Dadokian is restless with nervous shivers. He starts on gestures that don’t end and he shudders. From time to time, he hides his head in his hands. It’s unknown what is making him panic more, the loss of his cadaver or the prospect of having to slide into a womb after forty-nine days of walking. Sympathetic, Schmollowski wraps an arm around his shoulders and invites him to sit.
Now they are sitting side by side in the black sand. For a moment, they say nothing. They are two particles at the bottom of a black ocean. Two not unfriendly particles. Not unfriendly and even connected by a natural and immediately frank nuanceless camaraderie. In the heart of the shadows, a non-aggressive companion and a friend. Schmollowski comforts Dadokian however he can. He doesn’t repeat the bonzes’ lessons, himself being neither bonze nor even Buddhist. But he would like to transmit his own way of accepting adversity. He taps him on the clavicle with a communicative tranquility.
“It’ll pass quickly, Dadokian,” Schmollowski insists.
“No,” Dadokian sighs. “We have to wait. And there’s nothing more dreadful than waiting. Time transforms. It becomes unbearable. Take, for example, here, this abomination. We’re here, on the inside, waiting for death or birth. Can you deal with that?”
“On the inside of what,” asks Schmollowski.
“Persistence,” Dadokian says in a pathetic tone, “persistence becomes something monstrous, something that. . For example, Schmollowski. When I was working, before my family and shareholders had stripped me of all my rights. . Even then, before my incarceration with the lunatics. . I was aware of the death that would come one day, at a totally unforeseeable date. . I was obsessed with the idea of this approaching moment whose speed was immeasurable, unknown, I mean it could be very slow or, to the contrary, as fast as lightning. . I didn’t think about anything but that. . You know, Schmollowski, I actually wasn’t a very morbid person, I. . I hated death, the prospect of it made me physically sick. . Do you find that normal, having to live while waiting for death? With a definitive interruption in your future and nothing else? In any case, I was forced to forget that that was going to befall me. . Dang, unless you’re a village idiot or an immortal, how can you just forget that? They wanted me to ignore something that makes all action meaningless, all logic meaningless, makes existence hellish and meaningless. . I tried to put on a happy face, but in reality I waited for death day and night, it was frightening because it could come at any instant, but also because it didn’t come. . The wait crushed me. . One day more. . And one day more. . Persistence became excruciatingly heavy. . Do you understand, Schmollowski? Persistence exists just to hurt me. . It’s lost its meaning. .”
Pressed against Schmollowski, Dadokian lets his heart out in torrents. Sometimes he sobs or moans. His speech is a jumble of confused syllables. They must be translated to get to their heart. Also sometimes Dadokian becomes quiet, petrified by disarray or shaken with tics. Schmollowski remains quiet as well. With his arm around Dadokian’s shoulders, he imagines himself as an Anonymous Red Bonnet receiving the fears and pain of another human, another victim of the terrible human condition. He looks at the black tracks at the bottom of the black dune, he thinks on the horror of life and of death, he listens to Dadokian and consoles him.
“One day,” Dadokian continues, “they started sending me messages. . They tried to control me with short waves sent directly into my skull. . While sleeping or not. . And it got worse and worse. . Even more than death, I began waiting for those messages. . I knew they would speak, but I didn’t know at what moment. . Do you see what I mean, Schmollowski? It’s like we’re stuck, we wait for it, it comes or it doesn’t come. . We’re afraid of waiting, we’re afraid of no longer waiting. . Time shortens or lengthens forever. . It’s like torture. .”
“I know that feeling, Dadokian,” Schmollowski says. “That’s what you feel in prison while serving a life sentence. You can’t stand the idea of life or the idea of death anymore. Time’s flow becomes unbearable. . It’s a torture, yes.”
They ruminate for an hour or two. They are sitting, thinking about the ordeals they suffered while alive. It comes to Schmollowski to turn toward Dadokian. He is still shuddering in his plaid shirt whose color is indefinable, in the shadows. Tics pull at the top of his right cheek. Schmollowski puts a hand on his forearm. Dadokian stifles a whimper.
“What kinds of messages?” Schmollowski asks.
“They sent me absurd messages, to mock me, or messages on the progress or delay of my death. On some days, they informed me that everyone was in the same boat, balanced between the dreadful and the useless, obligated to pretend not to care. The poor and the rich alike. . You know, Schmollowski, at the time, I was one of the rich. . One of those you took down with a rifle. . Eh? You took them down, eh?”
“Yes. In the past.”
“With a rifle, yeah, Schmollowski?”
“Yes, with a rifle, or a pistol, when they were close up.”
“Alright,” Dadokian says.
They sigh a little. They are recalling images from their distant pasts.
“There you go,” Dadokian picks up. “So I decided to reduce that universal suffering. . Since I could, yeah? I thought it’d be good to divide the world’s wealth into equal parts between everyone on the planet. . Starting with the bank I directed. . Was I wrong, Schmollowski? Huh? Tell me, you specialized in bankers. Was I wrong?”
“You were right, Dadokian. I was already behind bars when you. . It made noise. Even in the high-security sector, information circulated. I remember. It was in. . I don’t remember the year. A banker applying our minimum program! It was beautiful, Dadokian! It was beautiful!”
“Afterward, they put me in a madhouse. I was in the incurables wing. Does incurable mean anything to you, Schmollowski?”
“No. I was in with the politicals.”
“Ah, that’s right, yes. So they put me in there. The stockholders settled the problem in no time at all. My children too. The bank wasn’t divided into six-billion parts, in the end. They took everything away from me. My only possessions were my cadaver and my toothbrush.”
Dadokian goes quiet. He is quiet for another hour, then he starts again:
“We are all prisoners within our flesh and within walls. But those on the outside, why are they waiting to go mad? The parading princes, those who can buy everything with their dollars, one can understand how they resist. Strictly speaking. But the others? Huh, Schmollowski? The others?”
For a minute, Dadokian loses himself in insane mutterings. Suddenly, he returns to his normal elocution.
“Oh! Excuse me, Schmollowski,” he says. “I have to cut myself off here. My radio’s started back up again. Do you hear it?”
“No,” says Schmollowski. “For me, it’s a loudspeaker. It doesn’t broadcast anything during the day. Besides at daybreak, I just have silence.”
Dadokian shivers, as if a spider was running across his face and bothering him.
“Got it,” he says. “They’re sending messages right into my head. . Can you hear them now?”
“No,” says Schmollowski. “They don’t go from head to head.”
“Do you want me to repeat what they’re telling me?” Dadokian proposes.
“If you’d like,” says Schmollowski.
“Oh noble son, Dadokian!” Dadokian proclaims in a solemn voice. “Do not fear that which is facing you, dark green in color, and which in its numerous hands shakes sometimes a club, sometimes a bell, sometimes a scalp dripping with large drops! It’s only a bloodthirsty divinity, the divinity of the fourteenth day!”