Hector, left alone, contracts his brows, and falls into a day-dream. He does not move for some time. Then he folds his arms. Then, throwing his hands behind him, and gripping one with the other, he strides tragically once to and fro. Suddenly he snatches his walking stick from the teak table, and draws it; for it is a swordstick. He fights a desperate duel with an imaginary antagonist, and after many vicissitudes runs him through the body up to the hilt. He sheathes his sword and throws it on the sofa, falling into another reverie as he does so. He looks straight into the eyes of an imaginary woman; seizes her by the arms; and says in a deep and thrilling tone, "Do you love me!" The captain comes out of the pantry at this moment; and Hector, caught with his arms stretched out and his fists clenched, has to account for his attitude by going through a series of gymnastic exercises. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. That sort of strength is no good. You will never be as strong as a gorilla. HECTOR. What is the dynamite for? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. To kill fellows like Mangan. HECTOR. No use. They will always be able to buy more dynamite than you. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. I will make a dynamite that he cannot explode. HECTOR. And that you can, eh? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Yes: when I have attained the seventh degree of concentration. HECTOR. What's the use of that? You never do attain it. CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. What then is to be done? Are we to be kept forever in the mud by these hogs to whom the universe is nothing but a machine for greasing their bristles and filling their snouts? HECTOR. Are Mangan's bristles worse than Randall's lovelocks? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER,. We must win powers of life and death over them both. I refuse to die until I have invented the means. HECTOR. Who are we that we should judge them? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. What are they that they should judge us? Yet they do, unhesitatingly. There is enmity between our seed and their seed. They know it and act on it, strangling our souls. They believe in themselves. When we believe in ourselves, we shall kill them. HECTOR. It is the same seed. You forget that your pirate has a very nice daughter. Mangan's son may be a Plato: Randall's a Shelley. What was my father? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. The damnedst scoundrel I ever met. [He replaces the drawing-board; sits down at the table; and begins to mix a wash of color]. HECTOR. Precisely. Well, dare you kill his innocent grandchildren? CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. They are mine also.