Chapter summaries I Must Betray You Ruta Sepetys

Chapter 37: 36 (Treizeci Și Șase) – Summary and Analysis

⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.

Summary

Still angry and suspicious after his encounter at the American Library, Cristian walks home through the freezing Bucharest night. He wonders whether Luca is working for the Securitate, but decides it is safer to trust no one. At his apartment building, he meets the woman from Boston—Mrs. Drucan’s daughter—who has returned after many years to be with her dying mother. She asks for help moving furniture, and Cristian agrees. Inside the apartment, he sees Mrs. Drucan, now frail and barely responsive. The daughter explains the absurd bureaucratic hurdles she faces to obtain a death certificate and cremation, revealing that cigarettes (Kents) are the only reliable currency to bribe officials. The low gas pressure in Romania makes full cremation impossible. Cristian listens, shaken by the desperation masked by the woman’s chatter. When he leaves, he deliberately abandons the pack of Kents she had pressed into his hand, a small act of refusal to participate in the system of bribery.

Key Events

  • Cristian walks through the dark streets, consumed by anger and suspicion.
  • He speculates that Luca may have reported him to the Securitate intern (Paddle Hands).
  • At his building, he encounters the American woman smoking at the bottom of the stairwell.
  • She asks if his sister (Liliana) can help move furniture; Cristian offers his help instead.
  • Inside the apartment, Cristian helps reposition the dying Mrs. Drucan and sees her vulnerable state.
  • The woman reveals she left Romania in the 1970s to study at Harvard and is now an American citizen.
  • She explains how she must use cigarettes (Kents) to bribe officials for paperwork and a cremation.
  • The woman laments that due to low gas pressure, cremations are often incomplete.
  • Cristian is overwhelmed by the moral weight of the system.
  • He leaves the pack of Kents behind as he exits, rejecting the commodity of corruption.

Character Development

  • Cristian Florescu: Moves from paranoid isolation to reluctant empathy. He puts aside his own safety to help a stranger, and his decision to leave the Kents signals a growing, though cautious, moral resistance.
  • The American woman (Mrs. Drucan’s daughter): A figure of both privilege (American passport) and helplessness (caught in Romania’s bureaucracy). Her raw honesty about bribery reveals the emotional toll of navigating a corrupt system.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs

  • Bribery and Cigarettes as Currency: The Kents are a tangible symbol of the regime’s corruption—ordinary goods used to grease every official wheel, from death certificates to cremation gas.
  • Death and Dignity Under Oppression: Mrs. Drucan’s slow dying mirrors the suffocation of Romania itself. The struggle for a proper burial highlights how totalitarianism controls life even after death.
  • The American Gaze: The daughter’s presence underscores the outside world’s ignorance of Ceaușescu’s brutality. She is a reminder of what Romania has lost and what the West fails to see.
  • Small Acts of Resistance: Cristian’s refusal to take the Kents is a quiet but significant choice. He cannot dismantle the system, but he can refuse to willingly participate.

Why This Chapter Matters

Chapter 37 deepens the novel’s examination of everyday moral compromise under dictatorship. Cristian’s encounter with the American woman—a Romanian who escaped yet remains trapped by the system—forces him to confront the universal indignities of life under Ceaușescu. The chapter also advances Cristian’s ethical growth: he begins to move from self-preservation toward a fragile, dangerous empathy. The pack of Kents left on the table becomes a small but powerful act of defiance, setting the stage for later choices.

Study Questions and Answers

  1. Why does Cristian decide to help the American woman move furniture, despite his earlier resolve to avoid involvement?
    Answer: Cristian is moved by her exhaustion and the vulnerability of the dying Mrs. Drucan. His empathy overrides his caution, illustrating a step away from the isolated survival mentality the regime has forced on him.

  2. What does the exchange about Kents reveal about Romanian society under Ceaușescu?
    Answer: It reveals a system where basic bureaucratic services—like issuing a death certificate or performing a cremation—require bribery. Cigarettes, especially Western brands like Kents, become a de facto currency, showing how shortages and corruption pervade every aspect of life.

  3. In what way does Cristian’s action of leaving the Kents represent a form of resistance?
    Answer: By leaving the cigarettes behind, Cristian refuses to accept what amounts to payment for a humane act. It is a silent rejection of the notion that every interaction must be transactional, and a small assertion that kindness should not be corrupted.

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