The Confession

19

Petru Salva called Thursday morning. Perhaps for our benefit, he had attached his Party pin to his lapel and dusted his portrait of Mihai. He held the shoe-cleaned now, and polished-by the heel and the toe as he spoke. “The inquiries have been made, Comrade Inspectors. The verdict is in. Notice this, please.” He turned the toe to face us. “The corners of the leather are uneven. Very sloppy. And this.” He raised it so we could see the bottom of the heel. “Nine nails to hold the heel in place. Wear this shoe for six months, it will fall off. Guaranteed.”

“But where is it from?” asked Emil.

Salva placed the shoe on the counter. “There is a cobbler in the Fifth District. A friend of mine. He has had much experience touring the provinces in order to nationalize the means of shoe production. But provincial cobblers are a notoriously uncooperative bunch, if you get my meaning.” He was smiling again. “My friend has seen this work before-once you see such terrible work, you don’t forget it.”

“Where?” Emil repeated.

Salva’s smile spread. “There were hundreds of possibilities. You see, each village is like a little pompous ego. But my friend-”

“The village,” I said.

His smile went away.

Drebin was an hour out of town, its sign half-buried in the long grass, just past an enthusiastic billboard that said in large red letters: THE PARTY’S POLICIES EXPRESS THE INTERESTS OF THE WORKING CLASS AND THE WHOLE WORKING NATION!

It had once been a farming village, then, after collectivization, a tractor factory was built in one of the fallow fields and workers were moved from the Capital to run it. The blocks constructed to house them-two identical concrete towers-overlooked the tin-roofed village homes and Orthodox church. Earlier that day, a rain had turned the white walls gray. Along the main street lay all the stores-bakery, bar, grocer’s, butcher, post office, and cobbler. The tiny cobbler’s workshop was filled with leatherworking tools hanging from hooks. Scraps of leather covered the floor, and the old cobbler sat at a wide wooden table covered with finished shoes. He took off his glasses and smiled toothlessly. “Morning.”

“Morning.”

“What size?” he said, looking at the shoe in my hand.

“We haven’t come for that,” said Emil.

“Repair, then? Here.” He reached for the shoe, and I let him have it. He replaced his glasses as he turned it over. “My work,” he muttered, then tapped the heel on the table and examined it again. “What’s the trouble, then?”

We pulled out our Militia certificates. “Can you tell us who you made that shoe for?”

The cobbler chewed the inside of his mouth.

“We’re trying to identify a dead man,” I said. “He was found in the Capital, but his shoe was from here.”

The cobbler went to a low shelf where some cheap notebooks lay. “In the Capital, huh? Size forty-one,” he muttered, then opened a notebook on the table.

Emil eyed a hand-drawn poster with the shape of a cow’s hide, like the tanner’s sign in the Canal District. I read the labeled sections over his shoulder- the back, the bend, belly, side and double shoulder.

“Oh Lord,” said the cobbler. He was shaking his head over his notebook. He checked the shoe again, then went back to the page. His face had lost its color. “Oh poor Beatrice.”

“A woman?” I asked.

He took off his glasses and rubbed his nose. “Beatrice is the boy’s mother. Antonin,” he said. “Antonin Kullmann. That’s whose shoe this is.”