He blinked over to the secretary’s corner, his head turned away from the light. She had just finished taking down what he had said; he believed he saw an ironic smile on her pointed profile.
“I know,” Rubashov went on, “that my aberration, if carried into effect, would have been a mortal danger to the Revolution.
Every opposition at the critical turning-points of history carries in itself the germ of a split in the Party, and hence the germ of civil war.
Humanitarian weakness and liberal democracy, when the masses are not mature, is suicide for the Revolution.
And yet my oppositional attitude was based on a craving for just these methods—in appearance so desirable, actually so deadly.
On a demand for a liberal reform of the dictatorship; for a broader democracy, for the abolition of the Terror, and a loosening of the rigid organization of the Party, I admit that these demands, in the present situation, are objectively harmful and therefore counterrevolutionary in character. ...”
He paused again, as his throat was dry and his voice had become husky.
He heard the scratching of the secretary’s pencil in the silence; he raised his head a little, with eyes shut, and went on:
“In this sense, and in this sense only, can you call me a counter-revolutionary.
With the absurd criminal charges made in the accusation, I have nothing to do.”
“Have you finished?” asked Gletkin.
His voice sounded so brutal that Rubashov looked at him in surprise.
Gletkin’s brightly-lit silhouette showed behind the desk in his usual correct position.
Rubashov had long sought for a simple characterization of Gletkin: “correct brutality”—that was it.
Your statement is not new,” Gletkin went on in his dry, rasping voice.
“In both your preceding confessions, the first one two years ago, the second time twelve months ago, you have already publicly confessed that your attitude had been ‘objectively counter-revolutionary and opposed to the interests of the people.’
Both times you humbly asked the forgiveness of the Party, and vowed loyalty to the policy of the leadership.
Now you expect to play the same game a third time.
The statement you have just made is mere eye-wash.
You admit your ‘oppositional attitude,’ but deny the acts which are the logical consequence of it.
I have already told you that this time you will not get off so easily.”
Gletkin broke off as suddenly as he began.
In the ensuing silence Rubashov heard the faint buzzing of the current in the lamp behind the desk.
At the same time the light became another grade stronger.
“The declarations I made at that time,” Rubashov said in a low voice, “were made for tactical purposes.
You certainly know that a whole row of oppositional politicians were obliged to pay with such declarations for the privilege of remaining in the Party.
But this time I mean it differently. ...”
“That is to say, this time you are sincere?” asked Gletkin. He asked the question quickly, and his correct voice held no irony.
“Yes,” said Rubashov quietly.
“And, before, you lied?”
“Call it that,” said Rubashov.
“To save your neck?”
“To be able to go on working.”
“Without a neck one cannot work.
Hence, to save your neck?”
“Call it that.”
In the short intervals between the questions shot out by Gletkin and his own answers, Rubashov heard only the scratching of the secretary’s pencil and the buzzing of the lamp.
The lamp gave off cascades of white light, and radiated a steady heat which forced Rubashov to wipe the sweat from his forehead.
He strained to keep his smarting eyes open, but the intervals at which he opened them became longer and longer; he felt a growing sleepiness, and when Gletkin, after his last series of rapid questions, let several moments go by in silence, Rubashov, with a kind of distant interest, felt his chin sinking on to his chest.
When Gletkin’s next question jerked him up again, he had the impression of having slept for an indeterminable time.
“I repeat,” Gletkin’s voice said. “Your former declarations of repentance had the object of deceiving the Party as to your true opinions, and of saving your neck.”
“I have already admitted that,” said Rubashov.
“And your public disavowal of your secretary Arlova, had that the same object?”
Rubashov nodded dumbly.
The pressure in his eye-sockets radiated over all the nerves in the right side of his face. He noticed that his tooth had started to throb again.
“You know that Citizen Arlova had constantly called on you as the chief witness for her defence?”
“I was informed of it,” said Rubashov.
The throbbing in his tooth became stronger.
“You doubtless also know that the declaration you made at that time, which you have just described as a lie, was decisive for the passing of the death sentence on Arlova?”
“I was informed of it.”