Dom Casmurro 15.50 · 15.50

The imperative closes the trap of hospitality: 'ande ver' — come and see. Pádua sweeps the boy toward the cage as though the visit were the most obvious thing, and Bentinho, courteous and cornered, has no way to refuse a father's friendly summons. The scene has been engineered so that good manners keep him from the one person he needs.

Machado loves these gentle detours. In the architecture of the chapter, Pádua's cage is the second 'sudden voice' that diverts the boy's momentum, just as José Dias's denunciation set it going. Between the two adults, Bentinho is pushed and pulled without ever acting for himself — a foreshadow of the whole novel, in which he is forever reacting to voices around him rather than seizing his own life. The cage he is invited to admire is, quietly, a picture of his own coming confinement.

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