Agamemnon's Daughter by Ismaíl Kadaré Read Free Book Online Page A

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    I knew that the pain of losing her would be long-lived, but on that day it was almost unbearable.
    As I moved forward, with my presumably glum face contrasting with the festive mood all around me, I saw a silhouette I recognized, barely a few yards ahead of me. It was Th. D., the painter, apparently on his way, like me, to a seat in the grandstand. He was holding his younger daughter by the hand. (Well, well: where had the blue and red ribbons gone?)
    Probably in thrall to the notion that I would be less noticeable in his shadow, I elbowed through the crowd to get as close as possible to him. Perhaps I might also take advantage of the legitimacy of his presence here. In his case, at least, the reasons why he had a place in the grandstand were known to all.
    As I proceeded, I studied the expression on his face. Apart from my own, his was the only blank face in the whole junketing crowd. That’s the way he always looked on television broadcasts of the various public ceremonies where I’d seen him appear. It was likely he’d earned the right to scowl in public long ago. Indisputably a far more precious asset than all the fees he must earn.
    I knew of no one else in the whole country who was simultaneously considered privileged and persecuted. It sometimes happened that these two adjectives were both applied to him in the same after-dinner conversation, and even by the same speaker. Everyone agreed nonetheless that the nature of his relations with the state were shrouded in mystery. There was talk of him being criticized, even of his being accused of the kind of grievous error that can break a man for good, but, except on one occasion at a Party Plenum, it had all taken place behind closed doors. Then, when his fall was fully expected — He’s going to get it in the neck and He’s untouchable were equally popular topics for after-hours gossip — his face suddenly reappeared on some platform or other, looking as morose as ever.
    What had he paid for such immunity? For, like all of us, he too must have had his eagle, probably a more terrifying one than any other, to keep him going through the night.
    People said lots of other things about him in cafe conversations and after-dinner talk. He was rumored to arouse a great deal of jealousy in the upper echelons, not to say at the topmost rung of the ladder, especially because he exhibited abroad. Among the other observations that he provoked, what people disagreed about most was the role he might or might not play in the life of the nation. Some asserted that he already did play a role by means of his work; others said not. We should expect more, much more of him, they insisted, all the more so because he could rest assured that nobody would dare try to bring him down. He was well aware he was untouchable. So why didn’t he take advantage of it?
    “You’re the one who says they can’t get at him,” another would reply. “In the light of day, they’re powerless, I grant you that. But who can be sure that nothing could happen to him under cover or behind the scenes? An automobile accident, for instance, or a dinner that just happened to be off, and then, next morning, a splendid funeral, and finita la commedia! I’d go so far as to say that the irritation you can feel now and then on his account is there for him to hear the message: Aren’t you grateful to he still alive? What more do you want?”
    “Ah, yes, I hadn’t thought of that,” the first speaker replied, aghast.
    That’s what was said about the man, but as I walked just behind him, what was especially on my mind was that no one could have said that he’d earned the right to be seated in the stands by performing some ordinarily sordid act. So I kept on convincing myself blindly that I was taking advantage of some sliver of his immunity on the way to my seat, which was turning into something more like a way of the cross.
    He passed a number of senior figures in the government (well, that’s what they