"I—I—cannot read," Ah Q said with terror and shame as he grasped the brush in his hand.
"We'll let you off easily. You can just draw a circle."
Ah Q was willing but in spite of himself the brush shook in his hand. The man spread the paper on the ground. Ah Q stooped over and tried with all his might to make the circle as directed. But the mischievous brush was not only heavy but also unruly. Just as he was about to close the circle with his trembling hand, it jerked with a centrifugal motion with the result that the circle was shaped like a melon seed.
Ah Q felt humiliated that he had not made a good round circle, but the man assisting took the paper without finding fault with it. Ah Q was then taken behind the grilled door for a third time.
He did not feel particularly distressed. He probably thought that in a man's life there must be times when he would be seized and thrust behind grilled doors, and be required to make a circle on a sheet of paper. But he did feel keenly the blot on his "life and deeds" because he could not make a truly round circle. The last thought, however, troubled him only for a brief moment, for he soon decided that no decent man could draw a perfect circle anyway. He fell asleep.
Strangely enough His Honor the graduate could not sleep that night. He had had a disagreement with the captain; for he had held that the recovery of the loot was the most important thing while the captain, who had become very insolent of late, had insisted that the most important thing was to make an example of the prisoner. Pounding loudly on the conference table, the captain had shouted: "We must punish him as a warning to others. Look, more than ten robberies have occurred during the less than twenty days since I be-
