“Now I know all there is to know about it,” the traveler said as the officer returned to his side. “All but the most important thing,” he replied, seizing the traveler by the arm and pointing upward. “Up there in the designer is the machinery that controls the movements of the harrow, and this mechanism is then programmed to correspond with the drawing of the prescribed sentence. I am still using the former commandant’s drawings. Here they are”—he pulled some sheets out of the leather folder—”unfortunately I can’t let you touch them, they’re my most prized and valuable possession. Just sit, and I’ll show them to you from here, then you’ll be able to see everything perfectly.” He held up the first drawing. The traveler would gladly have said something complimentary, but all he saw was a labyrinth of crisscrossing lines that covered the paper so thickly that it was difficult to discern the blank spaces between them. The officer said: “Read it.” “I can’t,” said the traveler. “Well, it’s clear enough,” remarked the officer. “It’s very artistic,” the traveler offered evasively, “but I can’t make it out.” “Sure,” agreed the officer, with a laugh, and put away the folder, “it’s not calligraphy for schoolchildren. It must be carefully studied. I’m sure you’d eventually understand it too. Of course the script can’t be too simple: It’s not meant to kill on first contact, but only after twelve hours, on average; but the turning point is calculated to come at the sixth hour. So the lettering itself must be surrounded by lots and lots of flourishes; the actual wording runs around the body only in a narrow strip, and the rest of the body is reserved for the ornamentation. Now do you appreciate the work of the harrow and the whole apparatus?—Just watch!” and he leaped up the ladder, rotated a wheel, and called out: “Look out, step to the side!” then everything started up. If it had not been for the screeching gear it would have been fantastic. As if he were surprised by the noisy gear, he shook his fist at it, then shrugged apologetically to the traveler and clambered down the ladder to check the working of the apparatus from below. Something that only he could detect was still not in order; he climbed up again and reached inside the designer with both hands, then, instead of using the ladder, slid down one of the rails to get down quicker and started hollering into the traveler’s ear at the top of his lungs in order to be heard above the din: “Are you following the process? First, the harrow begins to write; as soon as it has finished the initial draft of the inscription on the man’s back, the layer of cotton wool is set rolling and slowly turns the body onto its side, giving the harrow fresh room to write. Meanwhile, the raw flesh that has already been inscribed rests against the cotton wool, which is specially prepared to staunch the bleeding immediately and ready everything for a further deepening of the script. Then, as the body continues to turn, these teeth here at the edge of the harrow tear the cotton wool away from the wounds and toss it into the pit; now there is fresh work for the harrow. So it keeps on writing more and more deeply for all twelve hours. For the first six hours the condemned man is alive almost as before, he only suffers pain. The felt gag is removed after two hours, as he no longer has the strength to scream. This electrically heated bowl at the head of the bed is filled with warm rice gruel, and the man is welcome, should he so desire, to take as much as his tongue can reach. No one ever passes up the opportunity; I don’t know of one, and my experience is vast. The man loses his pleasure in eating only around the sixth hour. At this point I usually kneel down to observe the phenomenon. The man rarely swallows the last mouthful but merely rolls it around in his mouth and spits it into the pit. I have to duck just then, otherwise he would spit it in my face. But how still the man becomes in the sixth hour! Enlightenment comes to even the dimmest. It begins around the eyes, and it spreads outward from there—a sight that might tempt one to lie down under the harrow oneself. Nothing more happens, just that the man starts to interpret the writing, he screws up his mouth as if he were listening. You’ve seen yourself how difficult the writing is to decipher with your eyes, but our man deciphers it with his wounds. Of course it is hard work and it takes him six hours to accomplish it, but then the harrow pierces him clean through and throws him into the pit, where he’s flung down onto the cotton wool and bloody water. This concludes the sentence and we, the soldier and I, bury him.”