“You will in due course. Actions are better at explaining feelings: actions are everything. After all, even the very best definition of love is no match for a kiss from the girl you’re courting, and, if memory serves me right, an ancient philosopher once demonstrated movement by walking. So let’s cut to the chase. Let us see how, as the consciousness of the man was slowly being obliterated, that of the officer was becoming intensely alive. Human suffering and human joys, if that’s all they were, barely won from me so much as an apathetic nod or a condescending smile. After three weeks, I was a different person, changed utterly. I was all lieutenant and nothing else. Then one day, Auntie Marcolina received some grave news. One of her daughters, married to a farmer who lived five leagues away, was ill, perhaps dying. Farewell, nephew! Farewell, Lieutenant! The distraught mother immediately made arrangements to travel, asked her brother-in-law to go with her, and me to take charge of the farm. I believe that had she not been so upset she would have done the opposite, leaving the brother-in-law behind and taking me with her. As it turned out, however, I was left on my own, with a couple of household slaves. I immediately felt a great sense of oppression, as if the four walls of a prison had suddenly closed around me. It was my external soul contracting, you see, for now it was limited to a handful of half savages. The officer continued to hold sway within me, albeit less intensely alive and less fiercely conscious. The slaves put a note of humility into their bows and curtsys, which somewhat made up for the lack of family affection and the interruption of domestic intimacy. That same night, they noticeably redoubled their cheerful expressions of respect and admiration. It was ‘Massa’ Lieutenant every other minute. Massa Lieutenant very handsome, Massa Lieutenant soon be colonel, Massa Lieutenant marry pretty girl, general’s daughter; a concerto of praise and prophesies that left me feeling ecstatic. Ah, the traitors! Little did I suspect the scoundrels’ secret intentions.”

“What? To kill you?”

“If only.”

“Worse?”