192 I Can Read You Like a Book A
hands about a foot apart top to bottom. We looked at him in aston-
ishment. Again in Arabic, we asked him if it was to be used on
children. He heard the word for children (“atfal”) and seized on it,
thinking something innocent. He presumed we understood that he
would go to a waterfall and fill the rubber container. He then held
his hands up as if drinking from a large cylinder. Imagine the confu-
sion and the result if this were real life instead of training. At no
point did he feel threatened because we had a friendly demeanor
and a light tone as we accused him of child rape. The false cog-
nates confused him because he was looking for common ground—
projection, once again.
The best way to find out a person’s baseline for normal vocal
utterances is to observe for a short period of time in a non-stressful
environment. In Prisoner of War terms, this means watching him
talk to other prisoners. In a prisoner’s daily life, it may mean listen-
ing to mumbled conversations between cells—not for content, but
for tone. How does your boss sound when he is secretive, maybe
doing nothing more than telling his wife he loves her at the end of a
phone conversation? His tone changes as he fears how the simple
statement will be perceived by his subordinates. How does he
demonstrate he has lost his patience even when masking?
Non-verbal: Servant to the mind
Gesturing, typically under the control of the will, can occasion-
ally break out of the cage. This is primarily because gesturing is a
learned trait, as is verbal, and, as such, is subject to rules about
common usage and taboos, just as the verbal is.
