noumena

Jacob and the Prisoner

“I got two things to say to you and then that’s it.  First: you’re going to hell.  That’s a dead certain fact.”

Jacob saw something change in the prisoner’s face.  That slight sardonic line of the lips did not twitch, nor did the insolent eyes falter.  It was more like an incremental tensile adjustment of the skin of his face, perhaps a gritting of molars.  That was how Jacob knew the work he had come to do would be successful.  His intuition had been proved correct.

A guard in dress uniform stood at the cell door.  The holster on his hip was empty.  His revolver was with the other guard on the other side of the door.

“Second thing.”

Jacob had selected his words beforehand with care.  They were calculated words, chosen like a velvet gloved hand might choose among an assortment of rapiers, calculated to inflict the gravest injury, to maximize the prisoner’s suffering in his final two days.

“It would have been better that you’d never existed.  It would have been better for everyone in the world that you’d never existed.  More importantly, it would have been better for you that you’d never existed.  Because on earth you mostly suffered, and starting forty-eight hours from now you’re going to suffer in agony for ever and ever.”

Jacob took up his hat and stood.  The prisoner’s manacled hands were between his knees.  He looked even younger than his young age, a lank of black hair come free hanging across his forehead.  That sardonic cast to his mouth lingered yet.  As Jacob turned to leave the prisoner spoke.

“I don’t believe in hell and neither do you.”

Jacob was facing the door.  Yes, he was surprised – not that the prisoner had fought back on Jacob’s own terms, but because he had evidently understood the game well enough to see where his only remaining piece lay.  Jacob had underestimated him.  But he was unperturbed, briskly exiting the cell as the guard stood aside.  He knew that half of what the prisoner had said was false.