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“Are you not aware that your daughter has sold herself to this man?” she asked him bluntly.

He lurched as if she’d stabbed him.

“Don’t talk about her,” he said, choking on his words.

“Ah! So you’re aware of it but look the other away. I can’t bear the thought of it.”

“I said be quiet.”

“Who’s going to help you face the truth if not me?” she cried.

“I won’t allow anyone, anyone to …”

“I judge you, I do,” she continued pitilessly.

“Oh, no, you can’t do that. You have no right. Do you know what it’s like to deal with them? Have you ever seen them up close? Have you heard how they talk, how they threaten?”

She shrugged.

“I’ve had to drink from this chalice to its bitter dregs,” he confided in her. “Pity me instead of pointing the finger.”

He took his hat and she went to get the car from the garage. Neither of them said a word during the entire ride. Before going their separate ways, she offered him her lips but he refused to kiss her.

“I didn’t think you ever could insult me like that,” he reproached her. “I may not be the bravest man, but I am not so lacking in character that I don’t see what’s behind your harshness. I will only return to your house to pay you back. Farewell, Maud.”

“So I tell you the truth and you hold it against me?” she asked, astonished by this almost violent reaction that had suddenly revealed another man.

“What I hold against you is that you don’t love me enough to understand me. We can’t control others, Maud. What can a father do against his own daughter?” he replied sadly. “And what can we do against the people who’ve taken our land and persecute us?”

He went home to find his wife in bed. He stood at the window for a long time, facing the sky, his eyes on the indifferent, twinkling stars so far away. And beneath the sublime majesty of that night, the weight of his misfortune, their misfortune, filled him with rebellion. “Why? Why?” he heard himself murmur just as he had when he was eight and his mother died. Maybe for too long we lived tranquil and carefree lives in the midst of others’ tears and lamentations. To accept crime even if you don’t participate in it is still criminal. In that case, I’ve been a coward and a criminal my entire life. Now I am being punished for thinking that because the flames of hell didn’t reach me, I could warm my hands over them. I looked at the others writhing and twisting their faces in pain without losing my peace of mind, and today, here I am deep in the midst of the flames along with all those I love! My entire life, all I could do was keep my head down and resign myself. And now they’ve come to teach me hatred and rebellion. Their presence is nothing but calculation on the part of fate. Their numbers are swelling and others will bear what we have borne. Misfortune has fallen upon us and will soon spread everywhere. Once all of us feel its heavy hand, maybe then we’ll understand what solidarity and courage mean. In the old days, my mother would start crying whenever my father yelled. She did nothing but tremble and weep before him. Maybe I get it from her. And me, do I know who I am? I’m fifty and still asking myself such a question. I can strut, stand up to the Gorilla, play the cynic, but I know that deep down I am dreadfully afraid. Ah! The pain of it! They forced me to kneel, held me by the hair and rubbed my face in the mud. And hatred found its way into me. I play their game. I play my role to perfection. Accolades for me! I wallow with them in immorality, without shame or remorse. And for that too, I will have to answer. But what should I do? I am alone against them all. It’s an unequal struggle.

He reached the bed and lay down carefully. When the memory of Maud suddenly came rushing back, he realized with some surprise that he had forgotten her, as if she had been submerged in his painful daydreaming. For before she came along, there had been children and this woman lying by his side.

He closed his eyes and the silence of the night immediately took hold of him. There was a slight moaning in the mother’s breath.