If you are able to look beyond someone's pain, anger, fear and self-destructive behavior, and see the angel of light in their face, you offer them something very precious.

"She was crying now, her voice breaking." How could you do something like that and still look me in the face?

Behind the look on his face - as if he'd just tasted something sour - the real Alan Rickman was, as ever, hiding in plain sight.