The book's protagonist, Richard Thompson, is the enigmatic voyeur and hired killer who assumes the pivotal role in convincing Hampton's community that he, a public servant, has only the interests of his hometown at heart when he systematically kills his yearly quota of Hampton residents in the name of the Festival. Whether by poison, drowning or cross-bow, Thompson eerily assumes the role created for him, becoming the consummate executioner and the town's moralist hero. I have been invited to Buenos Aires to address an international forum on cruelty. I hate the idea of cruelty. I wouldn't even wish to torture a torturer.
Cruelty is superstition.
It says there's a finite amount of evil in the world, and the more evil you inflict on others, the less evil will remain to be inflicted on you. Of course, the opposite is true. Cruelty is a muscle. The magnifying glass you held above the unsuspecting ant as a child gave you some idea of what it would be like to be a malevolent God. But finally you were forced to concede that belief in the possibility of a truly evil God was as cruel as any cruelty you could inflict.