I looked out of the window again. There was nothing to say. I already know all that, how vile a monster this man is. I know he is not only ruthless but cruel, that to conquer and gain power is his only objective and the only objective of the king he serves.

“It is a very luscious thought,” remarked the Dictatress. “He will soon be quite dead.”

“No son to govern the army in his place?”

“No, my dear, no. The only man who could possibly take over from him is his cousin, an ineffectual boy. That great country will be no longer be a power in the world when it has lost the General.”

“The General.”

“Contemptuous swine.” The Dictatress’ hands clenched. “He and his father between them have twice caused this city to be reduced to a pitiful barren place of ashes and weeds and creaking gibbets. Now he is so assured of our negligibility that he goes off to conquer another country far to the west, contemptuously leaving us at his back. He is leaving behind with us a sneeringly minute portion of his forces.”

“Well, can’t we send our own army at his rear as soon as he is gone?”

“How can we, my love? Apart from the fact that our army has not even yet recovered from the former ravages, he is taking with him hostages of whom you, my darling, are only one. There are sons and daughters and even wives of our most important individuals. In a way it was lucky for my plans that the other day he suddenly demanded my daughter as one of them. (I had previously merely been gently preparing the way, telling him of your existence, and thought he’d been seeming uninterested. It just shows you.) In all, he has taken about eight ‘guests’ as he calls them. The cur, the cur, the contemptuous sneering hybrid cur.”

“Hybrid?”

“His mother was one of the huge black women of the north.” She is really astonishingly eager. “I almost envy you,” she then said with another sigh.

“It is such a responsibility,” I excused myself. “I am sure I will not strike home deeply enough, or that I will strike at the wrong place.”