Translated by N. N. Trakakis
Upon deeper reflection, of course, one could excuse him, it was something I had provoked all on my own, I was born with that hideous condition, even though I always tried to hide it. But people are not so easily deceived, they observe you with a thousand eyes, from a thousand angles, until they have discovered your secret. And then you’re finished. Believe me, not even I understood how it happened, it all came about unexpectedly. The tortoise was so big, gentlemen of the jury, that it could not but kill him.
