Read Online The Concert by Ismaíl Kadaré - Free Book Online

door until it was safely closed behind the intruder, then turned back to Silva again.
    â€œCuriously enough,” she said, “I really did mean what I said just now. But it’s not all that strange.”
    â€œI think we’d better drop the subject,” Silva answered, who really had no idea what she was saying.
    â€œWhy?” asked Linda, with a mixture of cajolery and regret.
    There was another knock, a more peremptory one this time, and without waiting for an answer a head appeared round the door.
    â€œAll Party members to meet at ten!” it announced. “Oh, sorry! There aren’t any here, of course!”
    The door was briskly shut again, and the voice could be heard receding along the corridor, repeating, “Short meeting of Party members at ten…”
    That’s how they’ll announce the meeting at which Arian is expelled, thought Silva, and was immediately engulfed in a wave of sorrow. He’d said it was bound to happen soon; he didn’t think there was any hope of avoiding it. You know, Silva, he’d told her, expulsion is the mildest possible punishment in a case of this kind. There had been neither regret nor resentment in his voice - that was what had frightened her most. “A case of this kind” - she kept repeating to herself. But what kind of case was it? “What is it really all about?” she’d asked him for the umpteenth time. But his answer had been as reticent as ever.
    From the corridor there came the muffled sound of doors opening and shutting. Perhaps it was the official still going round calling the meeting. Silva felt a pang. What if, unknown to her, the meeting dealing with Arian’s case had been held already, and she knew nothing about it? No, that was impossible, she thought. Even if Arian himself hadn’t let her know, Sonia would have done so. Unless…
    The door opened and the boss came in, looking even more gloomy than usual. He couldn’t help assuming this expression whenever a Party meeting was announced during working hours. He wasn’t a Party member himself, and it was common knowledge that this stood in his way. “What do you expect? — I haven’t got a red one,” he would say to his friends, referring to the Party card, whenever the question of his promotion came up. Caught up in the routine of office life, absorbed in the giving of orders to his subordinates and by his owe position as boss, he could usually forget that he wasn’t a member of the Party, and thought others forgot it too. But when, as today, someone announced a Party meeting, he felt horribly uncomfortable. His embarrassment lasted all the time the meeting was in progress, for he was afraid of coming face to face with someone who’d exclaim in astonishment — and this had actually happened several times — “Good heavens, why aren’t you at the meeting? Oh, sorry — I was forgetting…You’re not a member, are you?”
    These really were his worst moments. He never knew what to do. To avoid being found in his office he would go and wander round the corridors, sometimes managing to disappear altogether. He felt worst of all at open meetings of the Party, when, after the customary pause, the secretary would say, “Would comrades who are not Party members kindly excuse us? We have a few internal matters to discuss.” Then, wishing that the ground would open and swallow him up, he would hang his head and slink out with the rest, the picture of dejection and humiliation, as if to say, “You’d have done better not to ask us to come at all.” After such scenes he would go on feeling mortified for a couple of days at least.
    He was now poking about crossly among the papers strewn over his desk.
    â€œWhere’s the report from the planning office got to?” he demanded at last.
    â€œYou must have put it away somewhere,” said Linda affably.
    It was obvious he