by Antonio Napoli

“I must watch out for them,” said to himself the jailer of one of the most closely monitored prisons of ancient Africa.

“Everyone knows that I am immune to corruption, that I am not tempted by anything. What I fear is something else. It is their ability to speak, I mean the prisoners. Anyone locked in a cell would know how to be persuasive. Where freedom is lacking, people resort to all the seductive words and well-thought-out tricks to regain it. Besides, there’s plenty of time here to think. If I were to listen to them all day, I’m sure that sooner or later I would change my mind about them, feel pity, and find myself opening the prison door, dazed as if in a dream.”

“They consider themselves prisoners, while they are the condemned,” the jailer continued his monologue. “Could you imagine the life of men without a king or a judge to judge them? Not all those who preach lies in the face of truth are here, I am aware of that. But I do not live in the outside world, and I must first watch out for the dangers closer to me… then those further away. A week ago, a new convict arrived. Precisely because he is new, I am keeping a close eye on him, more than on the others. New and unusual. He is ugly but fascinating; that alone is not what makes him worth noting. Without making friends with anyone, he speaks to everyone. To some of the most hardened criminals, he said, ‘If the bad man is the one who breaks the Law, then perhaps we should consider him the freest man in the whole city; but why, if he is so free internally, does he not also break the impulse to do evil? Isn’t that impulse also a law, even if an unjust one?’ The prisoners who heard him laugh at those words. I think they didn’t understand that reasoning. Here, his companions rack their brains to find a way out, while he seems at ease. That’s why I didn’t consider him dangerous, and I was sorry when I was told that today is his last day in our common house. I brought him what he asked for and what I was obliged to bring. He drank for the last time, slowly drinking poison, and speaking to me, as to a faithful friend, he said, ‘What a better city ours would be, if everyone knew that they do not know!'”

At that moment, his voice faded. In his silence, it seemed as if I had lost the jingling bunch of keys to all the cells.