‘The heart is merely a physical organ pumping blood around the body,’ put in a young man seated along one of the arms of the T of desks. Someone else sniggered.
Porfiry regarded the speaker with interest, taking note of his intensely dark, almost black eyes. There was an arrogance to his hostility that was lacking in most of the others, a self-conscious sneer that disfigured his good looks.
‘And you must be Mr Bazarov,’ said Porfiry, with a sarcastic smile.
The young man snorted derisively at the reference to Turgenev’s archetypal nihilist. ‘Bazarov is a fictional construct. A distorted character from a failed novel written ten years ago by a superfluous writer.’
‘An interesting judgement, my friend. But am I correct in thinking that you believe all writers to be superfluous? That is the position of the radical youth, is it not? If it’s a choice of Pushkin or a boot, you would take the boot.’
‘Naturally. If a man has any talent for writing, he should devote himself to propaganda and publicity. For the cause, I mean. Utilitarian writing is the only kind that can be countenanced.’
‘You are talking about manifestos?’
‘Are you trying to entrap me?’
‘I wouldn’t dare. To have such a dangerous beast as you in my trap would surely earn me a savaging. I am simply interested in learning the opinions of young people today. If the human conscience does not reside in the heart — as natural science insists it cannot — where then would you place it? Or would you deny the very existence of human conscience?’
‘What we experience as conscience, our moral outlook if you like, arises from the conditions of our upbringing, and from the norms of the society in which we are born. It is a mental construct, and therefore it resides in the brain.’
Porfiry considered for a moment. ‘So conscience is relative, is that what you are saying? Different societies, different upbringings, will create different moral outlooks. There is no absolute right and wrong?’
‘Amongst cannibals, it is perfectly acceptable to eat people.’
‘And God? There is no room for God in this?’
The young man merely gave another derisive snort, by which he meant to repay Porfiry for the insult to his intelligence.
‘And if a society with norms — is that the word you used?’ Porfiry waited for the young man’s dismissive nod before continuing. ‘And if a society with norms that prohibit a certain act is changed to one that allows that same act, what happens to the conscience of those living in that society? Are they able to transform their consciences as easily as the society was transformed?’
‘Those living at the time of the transformation will have to be retrained so that their consciences are brought in line with the new norms. All future generations who are brought up, once the transformed society has been established, will naturally have consciences that correspond to its norms.’
‘I see. Thank you. I understand now. And if we go back to a time before the transformation has been effected, when it is in the process of being brought about, before its norms are established. . this I would imagine would be a time of great turmoil and confusion for the human conscience?’
‘It need not be.’
‘It need not be? Please, elucidate, if you would be so kind.’
‘A man, or woman, must simply choose whether his or her moral outlook is to be governed by the future or the past. Once that choice is made, everything becomes clear.’
‘And if he — ’
‘Or she.’
Porfiry acknowledged the correction with a bow. ‘If he or she chooses the future, then everything that pertains towards bringing about that future becomes permissible, and need not trouble his, or her, conscience?’
‘That is correct.’
Porfiry turned back to Blagosvetlov. ‘These are your views too?’
‘Broadly speaking, yes.’
‘And Kozodavlev’s?’
‘I believe so.’
‘And was Kozodavlev — I am sorry to speak of him in the past, but assuming that he has perished in the fire — was he such a man as to choose his conscience from the past or the future?’
Blagosvetlov’s eyes shone with certainty. ‘The future.’
‘He was a rational man too, I presume?’
‘Eminently.’
‘And so, everything that he did would be done in accordance with that choice? He would not be inconsistent?’
Blagosvetlov looked momentarily abashed, the hesitant aspect of his expression gaining precedence. ‘It is impossible to say for certain. .’
‘But from what you know of Kozodavlev?’ encouraged Porfiry.
‘From what I know of him, then yes, I would agree with that statement.’
‘So in writing to me, his conscience was governed by his commitment to the future? Whatever he hoped to initiate by this letter — which none of us can guess at — it would be consistent with his overriding desire to bring about this particular future? A future that you, and all of these here, are also working towards. That is where logic takes us, is it not?’
Blagosvetlov conceded Porfiry’s point with a series of small but decisive nods.
‘May I see Mr Kozodavlev’s drawer?’
The opposing aspects of Blagosvetlov’s expression shimmered momentarily in his eyes. A soft groan of conflicted anguish broke from his lips. His head fell in a gesture that might have been one of defeat or shame. Porfiry took it for assent.
In Kozodavlev’s drawer
The opening of another person’s private drawer is always an act freighted with a sense of transgression, even when it is committed by a magistrate going about his official duties. It may be done in the name of justice and in the interests of the law — still, when it comes down to it, one is simply prying. When the person in question is dead — or thought to be — this sense is even more acute. No permission can be either sought or granted. There is the mitigating feeling that it does not matter now, that they cannot be hurt by whatever is found; but for a man such as Porfiry, a man who could not shake off such outmoded ideas as the eternity of the soul, this was hardly persuasive. If he consoled himself with any thought, it was that Kozodavlev seemed to have led him to this drawer. He had a sense of the missing journalist standing at his shoulder, urging him to go on. This was a delusion, no doubt. Had Kozodavlev actually been there encouraging Porfiry’s investigations, he would have been going against the grain of sentiment in the room. All that Porfiry could sense behind him was the sullen hostility of the younger radicals. Blagosvetlov had retired from the office, as if he could not bear to witness what he had set in motion.
Porfiry allowed himself a moment after opening the drawer to take in the sense of the space that had been revealed. He imagined himself as Kozodavlev, looking down on the drawer’s interior. To the journalist, it would have appeared so familiar as to be hardly considered. And yet to Porfiry, it had all the strangeness and mystery of another man’s soul laid bare.
If so, Kozodavlev’s soul comprised: pencil parings and curls of tobacco, gathered in the corners with the darkness and dust; a copy of Chernyshevsky’s What Is to Be Done?; a number of issues of the conservative journal, Russian Soil; a collection of writing materials, a couple of pens, a bottle of ink, some pencils of varying lengths; an empty cigarette packet; a loose pile of papers, in truth, not as many as Porfiry had hoped for; and a photograph in a dog-eared cardboard frame.
Porfiry seized most greedily on this last item. He called over the young man who had first gone to fetch Blagosvetlov. ‘Which one is Kozodavlev?’ There were about twenty people in the photograph, arranged loosely around a central group of five seated on a sofa. Even as he asked the question, Porfiry knew which of the figures the young man would point out. He recognised a number of the people shown as the young radicals of the magazine’s staff. Blagosvetlov was there too, in the very centre of the composition. Of those he did not recognise, one man stood out. He was seated on the sofa, next to Blagosvetlov. This individual was not at all attractive, unlike almost everyone around him. But it was not for that reason alone that he drew Porfiry’s eye. His face had a haunted expression. He looked towards the camera as if he believed it capable of capturing the secret that he undoubtedly nurtured.