A Escrava Isaura 3.31 · 3.31

And here is the refusal, bare: 'nem tão tolo sou eu, que me desfaça… de uma joia tão preciosa' — I'm not fool enough to give up so precious a jewel. Freedom for Isaura is, in Leôncio's ledger, mere foolishness — a squandering of an asset. The verb 'desfazer-se de' is the language of disposing of goods; the noun 'joia', jewel, is the language of a hoard. There is no person anywhere in the sentence, only a valuable and a man too shrewd to let it go. This is the flat, unanswerable wall Malvina's pleading breaks against: she argues from a mother's dying wish and a girl's humanity; he answers from the account book. You cannot move with moral appeal a man who has decided the question is one of value, and he has.

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