The truth of the matter was that Giancarlo simply did not know what to make of his new pupil. To be sure, Carter was not the first highly motivated student to come his way, and certainly not the only one to pursue his study of the language with enthusiasm and dedication. Indeed, the same could be said of virtually all the people Giancarlo had ever taught. He demanded it as a prerequisite above all others before he even considered taking on someone new. What intrigued him about Carter was the rapidity with which he seemed to learn. He had covered more ground in his first week of lessons than most students achieved in a month or more. It was uncanny.They flew from one lesson to the next, rarely needing to cover the same material twice. Giancarlo would have liked to flatter himself by crediting his teaching skill with this result, but he knew better.Whatever his academic abilities might have been in other subjects, Carter was obviously gifted with a distinct ear for language.

Ironically, it was a gift that Carter did not seem to realize he possessed—and one of which Giancarlo was hesitant to apprise him.There was an earnest modesty in the way the young man approached his lessons that Giancarlo believed served him well.Taking nothing for granted, he came to every session well prepared and eager to work and learn. Giancarlo could not have known it, but these were the very same traits Carter had always displayed as an athlete and the reasons he had made the most of his God-given talents on the playing fields. Just as his former coaches had once taught him to stretch and push his body to achieve its greatest potential, Giancarlo was now teaching him to stretch and push his mind. And Carter, he realized, was a young man who did not mind being pushed to his limits. To the contrary, he seemed to relish it. In short, he was tough.

In light of this toughness, Giancarlo had taken a sterner, more unforgiving approach with Carter than he might have used with another pupil, for he wanted him to make the most of his abilities. And so he pressured and prodded him, demanding nothing less than complete concentration from the start of each lesson to its finish. He eased off only when they hit the occasional snag (like the lui incident). Lest Carter become discouraged from his teacher’s constant haranguing, he sprinkled in just enough praise to bolster his confidence without letting him become cocky. The results to this point had been astonishing. But how far, Giancarlo wondered, could he push him?