The idea of killing himself was now more real to him than it had ever been, and he understood for the first time how it is that men can prefer extinction to the continuation of agonizing mental pain. He simply must somehow stop himself from suffering in this way. A guilt about Sophie roved sharply inside him and a cinematograph in his head re-enacted and re-enacted certain scenes. He must, he thought, now somehow switch himself off or else move on into some new and even more awful mode of being.

We are all prisoner, but the name of our cure is not freedom

I took a deep breath, however, and followed my rule of never speaking frankly to women in moments of emotion. No good ever comes of this.