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Authors: James Palumbo

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BOOK: Tomas
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‘Get me the Chief Bear,' he shouts into his mobile. Boss Olgarv has learnt the impressive mobile-phone-call trick. The ensuing conversation, about the ‘threat neutralised' and the ‘plan proceeding', is ignored by Tereza, who doesn't even glance in his direction, but noted in detail by Pierre. Clearly the Russians are up to something. An article on Russia's new-found militancy forms in his head.

The court crier calls for order and Judge Reynard, looking strained and white, ascends his judicial throne. From this vantage point, his gaze sweeps the court: he notices two brown ears, seemingly detached from any head, sticking up vertically from behind the jury box.

‘Good morning, Mr Prosecutor,' the judge says.

The court settles and Judge Reynard raises his hand to speak.

‘I regret to inform you that I have some repellent news which goes against every legal principle and shocks me to
the core.' Turning to Tomas, he continues. ‘A certain media network whose
raison d'être
is vile to any sane person – although not, it seems, to most of the world – has conducted a campaign of hate and vilification against you. Apparently, it is offended by your repudiation of the values it espouses. Disassociating itself from you isn't enough. It has gone a step further.'

The judge pauses, then continues. ‘The network has collected a petition of millions of signatures, the force of which appears irresistible. The Supreme Justices have considered the situation and are more concerned about the social disorder that would result from resisting this demand than the implications of capitulation to the network.'

There is a hushed silence in court, disturbed only by the clicking sound of the hens' knitting needles. The owl's pupils dilate.

‘In short,' the judge continues, ‘the petition seeks your death – televised live on the network, of course. It seems that there is no hope for natural law. We must submit to the magic of modern media. As for me, I was most interested by our discussion yesterday and feel sure that it would have led somewhere. But the matter is out of my hands. I cannot abdicate responsibility for overseeing what now must be: to leave it to someone else would only burden another conscience. I am ill and will die soon. I will therefore expedite this matter as best I can. Tomas, you have my deepest sympathies. Please speak, if you will.'

‘That's most gracious of you, judge,' says Tomas. ‘May I burden you with a condemned man's request?'

‘Of course,' says the judge.

‘You will recall my question about perpetrating a small evil to achieve a greater good?' says Tomas.

‘I do,' replies the judge.

‘Have you yet had an opportunity, judge, to consider whether you would pull the trigger?' Tomas asks.

Judge Reynard wishes to answer according to his conscience. But he's the most senior lawyer in the land; he can give only a sanitised response. However, Reynard is a talented man. He, too, has learned to speak with his eyes. He leans forward across his bench and fixes Tomas with a stare.

‘Yes, with joy in my heart,' his eyes say.

Life's lesson learnt at last
…

‘If there's one thing I could bequeath to humanity,' says Tomas, ‘it would be a law, rigorously enforced, that once a year everyone in the world should spend one night in a cell imagining they're to be executed in the morning.'

Tomas is alone in his cell the night before the fateful day, trying to squeeze toothpaste from an anorexic tube, with only the invisible voice for company. If at this moment the invisible voice transformed into a visible face, Tomas would note a quizzical look on its brow.

‘It wouldn't be a play-acting or token law. There'd also be a drug to induce a “this is the last night of my life” feeling in everyone. People's imagination of their deaths has to be real – if that's possible? After the night is over and the drug has worn off, people realise that they're not going to die. But they can remember exactly how they
felt when they thought they were, sitting alone in their cell.'

The invisible voice's imaginary visible face continues to furrow.

‘And how's this going to help the world?' the invisible voice asks.

‘Since I won't need a toothbrush after tomorrow,' Tomas replies, ‘it doesn't matter about toothpaste tonight. At last, a perspective on life. Imagine a world where once a year everyone has a compulsory moment of self-realisation.'

The invisible voice had always wanted to exist, but when this wasn't possible he applied to be a spirit. At least he could materialise every so often to frighten people. But this wasn't to be, either; the invisible voice found himself last in the visible-voice queue. ‘I'm sorry,' said his maker. ‘There are no more visible voices left, you're going to have to stay invisible. But be quick, the next step down is mute invisible voice.'

The invisible voice knows that because he doesn't exist he of course has a better understanding of life than Tomas. It stands to reason that the best thing for self-realisation is death. When alive, you blunder about confusing trivia with important things, but as Tomas has just discovered, on the brink of death you acquire a new perspective. It's only in death that you truly understand life.

‘I wish I could have discussed this with a great man in history,' says Tomas. ‘Instead of excreting in Napoleon's tomb, I should have communed with his spirit. What a fool I've been. I wonder whether Tereza's time machine can be used to raise the dead?'

‘Of course it can,' says Tereza from the door of the cell. ‘There's a special button.'

She comes to sit on the bed with Tomas, making her final visit. She takes his hands in hers. ‘But let's not worry about that now. Although you did those things, I know you're a good man, Tomas. Think about that tomorrow,' she says.

‘I'm not sure that a good man thinking he's good helps when it comes to dying,' Tomas replies. ‘If anything, it's the opposite – he's sad about all the good things he's leaving behind. It's probably easier if you're bad – then you've got no regrets.'

‘So what will you think about?' says Tereza.

‘That's easy,' Tomas replies. ‘Your beautiful face. Dying's easy if you have a single happy thought to fix in your mind. You just keep on thinking it right to the end.'

Russia and the West explained
…

‘Russia's history is written in blood,' begins Pierre's article beneath the headline: ‘Russia: The Great Bear Awakes'.

This isn't intended as an insult to the land of Tchaikovsky and Prokofiev, merely a statement of fact. Over the centuries it's been a brutal place. Whereas other nations make war on their neighbours, Russia specialises in slaughtering its own people. From the annihilation of the peasants under the Tsars to the tens of millions killed by the great dictator of the last century. Why is this?

In the largest country on earth, whole areas live in abject backwardness, untouched by the civilising hand of time, let alone television. We scoff at Russian alcoholism and take them for a nation of drunks. But this ignores a harsher truth. The Russian winter is so cold that there's no other way to keep warm. Cut off and freezing, what should the Russian masses resort to – mathematical theorems?

After the victory of the West in the Cold War, the Great Bear retreated to its wintry lair to lick its wounds. But a bear shamed isn't a bear tamed. So what stirs now in the dark forest of the Russian night?

One thing we know. Animals, like people, don't change. The bear born in the wild won't come knocking on the door one day, asking to sit by the fire like a domestic cat. The only means of entry he understands is the sort of force that leaves the door swinging on its hinges.

But force in the twenty-first century lacks subtlety. It's a big thing that can be spotted and squashed. And although animals don't change, they can be trained. What's needed are some new tricks. It seems that the Great Bear has learnt some.

For example, the new Great Bear understands sun-shifting technology. If the sun is melting your butter, why move the butter? Why not the sun? If the Constitution prevents you from continuing in office, why move the Constitution? Why not the country? In the past, Great Bears pawed and mauled. You could hear
them from miles away. This one is an altogether more dangerous beast.

The West can react in three ways to the tidal wave of Russian money flooding its shores. First, revulsion: ‘Where does this come from? Is that blood? Sorry – we only take American Express.' Second, disdain, the old European way: ‘OK, you can come in, but you must stand at the back. And don't speak.' And third, slavish acceptance; the West's actual choice. An avalanche of bankers, jewellers, estate agents and other purveyors of finery, all tripping over themselves to be of service. Why roar yourself hoarse, when all you need do is throw some meat into the arena? Then, you can watch previously virtuous animals make a spectacle of themselves.

Of course, the West had its oversized-collar wearers and dancers with champagne bottles before the Russians arrived. But how much more pendulous are the collars and heavy the bottles now that they're here? What else would you expect? If you're inclined to this behaviour, the arrival of a five-hundred-foot yacht packed with eighteen-year-old ‘producees' will have only one effect.

So where does this leave us? And what next? We don't know. But of one thing we can be sure. The winter hibernation is over. The Great Bear is awake and he has a plan. History has taught us that once his paw's in the honey pot, he'll want to eat the hive.

The fateful day
…

… dawns bright and early with a cloudless sky and just a hint of chill in the breeze. It's one of those beautiful Mediterranean dawns where, although the sun's still low in the sky, you can sense the heat ready to explode into the day.

Judge Reynard, as good as his word, takes charge of all the arrangements. As distasteful as it is, he interviews each soldier in the local battalion to select an execution squad of six. He asks each man to consult his conscience, to put aside scruples of honour and duty when considering the matter at hand. To some he says, ‘Close your eyes, my son, search your heart.' Shit TV's determined to deliver justice rough, but Reynard attempts to smooth the edges.

After the squad has been selected the judge gives the men a conscience-easing speech. ‘Soldiers,' he says. ‘Only five of the rifles will be loaded. One will contain a blank. Rifles will be selected at random. Never forget – you could be the man innocent of taking life.'

With the squad in place, Reynard makes meticulous preparations with the doctor in attendance, and a buzzard and a vulture who will take charge of the corpse. These sorry-looking carrion-eaters wear Dickensian top hats with black funeral ribbons hanging from the back. Their long necks jerk constantly; each time they do so their hats fall off.

Tomas is offered a final meal of his choice. He finds this an intriguing prospect. How could someone about to die possibly be hungry or even able to eat? He has heard of executees requesting elaborate final dinners but to what
end? It seems incongruous to eat food if you'll be unable to digest it.

He decides to take leave of the invisible voice in his cell.

‘Forgive my failure, my invisible friend,' says Tomas. ‘What a wasted, thoughtless and money-obsessed life I led before you called me to a higher purpose. But even then I blundered. I thought that eliminating some melting-butter complainers and dancers with champagne bottles, people who exist only to satisfy themselves, would send a message. But my efforts were as chaff in the wind. I ask you though, what could I do? I'm not a Messiah. I have no magic or miracles. And now I'm to die like them, a great nothing: the worst death of all.'

‘Don't worry about that,' replies the invisible voice. ‘You can try again after you're dead.'

‘That's a fine idea,' says Tomas, ‘but never having been alive, I fear you don't understand what it is to be dead. After I'm shot, I regret I won't be very good at anything.'

‘Nonsense,' says the invisible voice.

Tomas has always been intrigued by the expression ‘late for your own funeral'. Partly because it is, of course, impossible. But mostly because he has spent his life challenging the natural order of things, and it appeals to him to attempt to do the same in death. Being late for his own funeral would also facilitate another expression he likes, ‘going out with a bang'. At least this much is guaranteed.

Tomas realises that he can't cheat his date with destiny. But he can be late. Playing on the judge's indulgence and
the lack of protocol for an execution in Europe in the early twenty-first century, Tomas takes his time to dress and prepare. Without wishing to disavow his recent epiphany on the irrelevance of all things in the face of death, he now misses his toothpaste. He wishes to face his executioners with fresh breath as well as a straight back.

Tomas writes a final note to Tereza. In it he reminds her of the conversation they had at the cafe about the half measures people take in their lives. Tereza used the expression ‘quick grabbing for happiness'. Now, on the brink of death, he understands a single simple point – that life is short, too short for compromise. He urges her to take up the sword of his morality lessons where he left off, and suggests Hank as her first pupil.

Meanwhile, the firing squad lingers in the courtyard unsure what to do. No behaviour seems appropriate or inappropriate. A group of four stand talking in hushed voices emitting an occasional forced laugh. Another sits by himself on the steps leading to the barracks, hands clasped, head down in silent thought. The sixth member of the squad stands apart, smoking and looking at the sky. He catches fragments of speech from the large crowd gathered on the other side of the courtyard wall.

Eventually there's a call to order and Tomas emerges from a concealed door. The Shit TV cameras whir into action, every angle covered. Tomas wears a billowing white shirt with puffed-up sleeves, like an olden-day pirate's, with loose black trousers. The bearing of his head and half-smile on his lips betray private triumph. He managed to extract just enough toothpaste from the almost defunct
tube to complete his ablutions. He's clean as well as confident.

BOOK: Tomas
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