As Long As He Has Something to Lose

Two ways of shutting Craig down collide in one bedroom. Jacob: “as long as he has something to lose, he’s on a leash” — the factory, the family, one word to his father; “I take no pleasure in it. But it works.” Simon: the director, Ashley, the paper, a formal statement — an institution instead of leverage. And Jacob’s panic: “A man with nothing to lose is a grenade with the pin out! Do you have any idea what he can do? To you! To—” — “Or to you, Jacob? Finish it.”

Here it comes out who in this pair is the real hostage. “I have no secrets. I have nothing to lose — I’ve already lost everything. You’re the only one hiding here.” Leverage holds only as long as a person has something to lose — and that is true not only of Craig. A secret makes the one who keeps it vulnerable (see “Each Other’s Rock Bottom”); for the first time Simon is stronger than Jacob precisely because he has nothing to hide. “You forged the chain. Three years of it. Deal with your own dog yourself” — that is how people talk once they have stopped answering for other people’s dogs.