Dom Casmurro 3.22 · 3.22

Her whole answer is the name given back as a question. 'A gente do Padua?' — the repetition is disbelief buying time, a mother who has watched these children play and cannot yet see the danger her adviser sees. Machado's dialogue keeps working by echo: José Dias plants a phrase, Dona Glória returns it, and in the small gap between statement and echo we feel her resistance, still intact, about to be worn down.

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