In abandoned captivity, within a wrought iron cage, within a cold Caen limestone walled cell, within a forgotten fortress set in the shadow of the dark side of civilization, sits an innocent occupant, determined by his sniggering contemporaries to be the guilty party, his crime, the stealing of the hearts of a divided nation. He tells lies. To himself. There was, after all, not another living soul to speak with or at insofar as he was aware.

Often, he would latch onto the merest glimpse of the enchanted boulevard where belles dames de la nuit would promenade when off duty, from the single arrowslit that sadly, for him at least, did not exist. For his sins, he lived in permanent darkness, his eyes as  functionless as his appendix. On other occasions he would pray that he had a beard, in denial that his beard, one he regularly tripped over, now…