Best Short Stories Omnibus - Volume 1

In the penal colony-1-1

In the penal colony––––––––

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„IT IS A VERY SPECIAL machine,” said the officer to the visiting researcher as he looked with an admiring air at the machine that he knew so well. The visitor seemed to have accepted only out of politeness the commander’s invitation to witness the execution of a soldier who had been judged guilty of disobedience and of insulting his superior. The execution had moreover not aroused much interest in the penal colony. In this deep, sandy little valley surrounded by bare slopes there were only, apart from the officer and the visitor, the prisoner – a stolid, broad-mouthed man with bedraggled hair and a dissipated face – and a soldier holding a heavy chain from which smaller chains ran out to shackle the condemned man’s feet and wrists as well as his neck, and which were linked together by other chains. Moreover the condemned man looked so cringing and doglike that it seemed as if he could be left free to wander around, as one would only have to whistle for him to come back when the execution was to begin.

The visitor had little taste for the machine and was going back and forth behind the condemned man almost visibly unconcerned while the officer mas making the final preparations, crawling under the machine that was mounted over a pit and then going up a ladder to inspect its upper part. This was work that really should have been left to a machinist, but the officer carried it out with obvious relish, either because he was a firm partisan of the machine or because for other reasons this work could be trusted to no one else.

"Now everything is ready," he finally cried out and came back down the ladder. He was very tired, breathing with his mouth wide open, and he had two delicate lady’s handkerchiefs stuffed into the collar of his uniform.

"These uniforms are really too heavy for the tropics," the visitor remarked, instead of asking about the machine as the officer had expected.

"Certainly," said the officer, washing oil and grease for his besmudged hands in a water basin standing nearby, "but they represent the homeland: we must never forger the homeland. – Now just look at this machine, " he continued straightaway, drying his hands with a towel and pointing at the same time to the machine, "up to now preparatory work has been necessary, but from here on the machine will function all on its own."

The visitor nodded and followed the officer. The latter was taking precautionary measures against possible malfunctions and said, "Naturally there are sometimes incidents; I certainly hope that there won’t be any today, however one must always take the possibility into account. The machine should function for twelve hours without incident. If however there is a problem it will only be a small one and will be easily fixed."

"Would you like to be seated?" he asked finally, taking a cane chair from a pile and offering it to the visitor, who couldn’t refuse. He now was sitting on the edge of a pit, into which he glanced. It was not very deep. On one side of the pit there was a wall of dug-up earth, on the other side was the machine.

"I don’t know," said the officer, "if the camp commander has explained the working of the machine to you."

The visitor made an uncertain movement of the hand; the officer asked for nothing better than to explain the functioning of the machine himself.

"This machine," he said and took hold of a crankshaft, on which he leaned, "is an invention of our former commander. I participated in all of the preliminary research and was also involved in the construction work right up to its completion. The credit for the invention however belongs to him alone. Have you heard about our former commander? No? Well, I am not exaggerating when I say that the organisation of the whole penal colony was his work. We, his friends, knew at his death that it was so fully developed that his successor, even if he had a thousand new projects in mind, wouldn’t be able to alter anything in the organisation of the camp for many years at least. Our prediction has been shown to be true; the new commander has had to recognize that. It is such a shame that you never knew the former commander! – But", the officer interrupted himself, "I am chatting, and his machine is standing here before us. It consists, as you can see, of three parts. Over time each part has acquired certain well-known names. The lower part is called "the bed", the upper part "the plotter", and the middle, suspended part here, "the harrow."

"The harrow?" questioned the visitor. He had not been listening attentively, the sun was starkly penetrating into the shadowless pit, one could hardly gather one’s thoughts together. All the more so did he admire the officer who, in a close-fitting parade uniform with epaulettes, his tunic laden with braids, was so avidly explaining his affair and at the same time tightening screws here and there with a screwdriver while he was speaking. The soldier seemed to be in a similar state of mind as the visitor. He had wrapped the chains around the condemned man’s wrists, was supporting himself with one hand on his weapon and had lowered his head down on his neck in an attitude of indifference to everything around him. That did not surprise the visitor, as the officer was talking in French and without a doubt neither the soldier nor the condemned man understood a word of it. It was all the more surprising that the condemned man was all the same carefully following the officer’s explanations. With a kind of sleepy perseverance he directed his gaze to wherever the officer was pointing, and now as the latter was interrupted by the question from the visitor he also, just like the officer, turned his gaze upon him.

"Yes, the harrow" said the officer, "the name is appropriate. The needles are arranged in the manner of a harrow, and the whole operation will be carried out like a harrow that efficiently and completely works over a field. You will understand that right away. The condemned man will be laid out here on the bed. I shall first describe the machine and only then start it up. You will be better able to follow that way. Moreover a cogwheel in the plotter has been too worn down: it screeches so much when it is in action that one can hardly hear oneself; spare parts are unfortunately too difficult to procure. And here is the bed, as I have said. It is completely covered over with a layer of wadding, for a reason that you will soon see. The condemned man will be laid on his stomach on this wadding, n***d of course; these straps are for the hands, these are for the feet, and these here are used to fasten the neck, to keep it solidly in place. Here at the head of the bed, where the man, as I have said, will be lying face down at first, there is this felt stump that can easily be regulated so that it goes directly into the man’s mouth. Its function is to prevent him from crying out and from biting his tongue. Of course, the man must let the felt into his mouth, otherwise the straps would break his the neck."

"Is that cotton wool?" asked the visitor, leaning forward.

"Yes, certainly," said the officer smiling, "feel it yourself." He took the hand of the visitor and led it over the bed. "It is a specially prepared cotton, which is why it has an unusual appearance; I shall talk more about its purpose later on."

The visitor had already started to be interested in the machine; with his hand over his eyes to protect them from the sun, he looked up at it. It was a big structure. The bed and the plotter had the same dimensions and seemed to be like two large dark chests. The plotter had been set some two meters over the bed; they were attached together in the corners by four brass rods that sparkled in the sun. Between the chests the harrow swung on a ribbon of steel.

The officer had scarcely noticed the earlier indifference of the visitor, but his attention was immediately caught by this newly awaked interest, so he paused in his explanations to give the visitor time to examine the machine without being disturbed. The condemned man imitated the visitor; because he couldn’t protect his eyes with his hands, he looked up at the machine blinking his unprotected eyes.

"And the man lies down like this," said the visitor, leaning back in his chair and crossing his legs.

"Yes," said the officer, pushing his cap back a little and passing his hand over his hot face, "now listen! Both the bed and the plotter have their own electrical battery; the bed uses it for itself, the plotter uses its own for the harrow. As soon as the man is firmly attached, the bed starts moving. It trembles in tiny, very rapid impulses both sideways and up and down. You will have seen similar machines in medical institutions, but all the movements of our bed have been precisely calculated; they have to be precisely adapted to the movements of the harrow. But it is the harrow that in fact carries out the verdict of the tribunal.

"What exactly is the verdict, then?" asked the visitor.

"You don’t know that either?" said the astonished officer, biting his lip: "Excuse me, if my explanation seems somewhat disorganised, I do beg your pardon. Previously it was the duty of the camp commander to give the explanation; the new commander has however declined this honour; that he hasn’t for such an important visit – the visitor tried to wave away the honour with both his hands, but the officer insisted on the expression – for such an important visit at all explained our way of carrying out the sentence is another novelty, that –," he had a curse on the tip of his tongue, but caught himself up and only said: "I did not agree, it is not my fault. It so happens that I am the most qualified person to explain our method of carrying out the sentence, for I have here – he took some papers out of his briefcase – the relevant drawings done by the former commander."

"Drawings done by the commander himself?" asked the visitor: "Was he a master of all trades, able to do everything himself? Was he soldier, judge, builder, chemist, draughtsman?"

"Certainly," said the officer, nodding in agreement, with a fixed, thoughtful look. Then he examined his hands; they didn’t seem to him to be clean enough to touch the drawings; he went over to the washbasin and washed them again. Then he took out a small leather briefcase and said: "Our sentence does not sound very severe. The rule that a man has infringed is to be written on his body by the harrow. For this man, for example," – the officer nodded towards to the condemned man – "will be written on his body: respect your superior!"

The visitor looked fleetingly at the man; he kept his head down after the officer had pointed to him and seemed to be straining to hear what was said, to learn whatever he could. But the movements of his thick lips pressed together showed openly that he couldn’t understand anything. The visitor would have liked to ask a number of questions, but only said after having glanced at the man: "Is he aware of the verdict?"

"No," replied the officer and wanted to continue with his explanations, but the visitor interrupted him: "He doesn’t know his own verdict?"

"No," the officer said again; he broke off for a moment as if he were waiting for the visitor to elaborate on his question, and then said: "It would serve no purpose to inform him of the sentence. He will be informed about it on his body."

The visitor would have liked to say no more, but he felt the eyes of the condemned man on him, who seemed to be asking if he approved the procedure that was being described. So the visitor, who has already leaned back on his chair, bent forward again and asked once more: "But surely he is aware that he has been judged?"

"No, nor that" said the officer and smiled at the visitor, as if he were expecting another bizarre statement from him.