“You need less support than you did at one time,” the male who had fostered her from hatchlinghood replied. “Your adolescence is nearly completed. Soon you will be an adult, as independent as any other.”
“Yes, superior sir,” Kassquit said dutifully, but she could not help adding, “An adult what? For I am not a Tosevite, not in any sense except my biology, but I cannot fully be a female of the Race, for that same biology prevents me from doing so.”
She did not think Ttomalss would have an answer for her; he never had before when she’d asked similar questions. But now he did: “An adult citizen of the Empire, Kassquit. Rabotevs and Hallessi are not members of the Race, either, but they reverence the Emperor, and spirits of Emperors past watch over them when they die. The same will be true for you in all respects.”
She tasted the words. “An adult citizen of the Empire,” she repeated. “I would be the first Tosevite citizen of the Empire, would I not?”
“You would indeed,” Ttomalss agreed. “By your actions-even by your standing up to a male who unjustly abused you-you have proved you deserve the designation. Eventually, all Tosevites will be citizens of the Empire. You will be remembered as the one who showed the way, as one who made a bridge between Tosevites on the one fork of the tongue and the Empire on the other.”
Kassquit’s tongue, as Tessrek had reminded her, had no fork. For the first time since she’d realized how different she was from everyone around her, she didn’t care. “It is good, superior sir,” she said to Ttomalss. She meant every word of it. For the first time since she’d realized how different she was, she knew her place again.
The telephone in David Goldfarb’s flat rang. Naomi, who was closer, went and answered it: “Hullo?” She paused, listening, then turned to her husband. “It’s for you, David.”
He got off the sofa. “Who is it?”
“I don’t know,” Naomi answered, a hand cupped over the mouthpiece. “Not a familiar voice… I don’t think.” She sounded a little doubtful.
With a shrug, he took the telephone. “Goldfarb here.”
“And I’m glad of it, old man,” the fellow on the other end of the line replied. “How are you and your lovely wife this evening?”
“Fine, thank you, Group Captain Roundbush,” Goldfarb answered tightly. He’d recognized that upper-crust accent at once, though Naomi would have heard it only a few times over the years. “What can I do for you, sir?” He knew, with a grim and mournful certainty, that Basil Roundbush had not rung him up to pass a few pleasant minutes.
“Funny you should ask that,” Roundbush said, though Goldfarb didn’t think it was funny at all. “There is a spot of work you could do for me, if you happen to feel like it.”
He made it sound as if he were truly asking a favor rather than giving a thinly veiled order. Maybe that amused him. It didn’t amuse David Goldfarb. “What have you got in mind, sir?” he asked. “Canvassing for Mosley’s bill, perhaps? A bit late for that, I’m afraid; it seems dead for this session of Parliament.” Naomi’s eyes got round.
“Why, so it does, and, if you want my opinion, a good thing, too,” Roundbush said. “Tell me the truth, Goldfarb: have I ever denigrated you on account of your faith? Ever in all the years we’ve known each other?”
“You’ve used me on account of my faith,” Goldfarb said. “Isn’t that enough?”
“Oh, but my dear fellow, that’s business. It’s not personal.” Roundbush sounded hurt that Goldfarb couldn’t make the distinction.
“It’s not just business when I’m so vulnerable to it.” Goldfarb wondered if he should have said that, but it couldn’t be anything Roundbush didn’t know. “You still haven’t told me what you want from me tonight.”
“Quite,” Roundbush said, which wasn’t an answer. “Perhaps we could meet tomorrow afternoon at that pub with the excellent Guinness-what was the name of the place again? — and discuss it there.”
“Robinsons,” Goldfarb said automatically.
“Right. See you at Robinsons, then, at half past five tomorrow.” The line went dead.
“What was that in aid of?” Naomi asked after David hung up, too.
“I don’t precisely know,” he answered. “Whatever it was, it was something the distinguished group captain”-he laced the words with as much sarcasm as he could-“didn’t care to discuss over the telephone wires. Which means, all too likely, it’s something that won’t stand the light of day.”
“Something to do with ginger,” Naomi said.
“I can’t think of any other business Roundbush is involved in that he doesn’t care to discuss over the telephone,” David said. “Of course, I don’t know all the business he’s involved in, either.”
“Can’t you stay away, then?” she asked.
He shook his head. “I wish I could, but you know it’s impossible as well as I do. I have to see what he wants-and see if I can talk him out of it.”
He got his chance the next evening, pulling up in front of Robinsons on his bicycle at exactly the appointed time in spite of a cold, nasty drizzle. When he went inside, he bought himself a whiskey-it didn’t seem a night for stout-and sat as close to the fire as he could get. He’d beaten Roundbush to the pub, which left him glowing with virtue-and hoping his superior wouldn’t show up.
But in Group Captain Roundbush came, dapper as ever, and sat down at the table with Goldfarb. “That’s not the worst idea anyone ever had,” he said, pointing to the whiskey, and ordered one for himself. When it came, he raised the glass high. “Here’s to you, old man.”
“You don’t need to butter me up, sir,” Goldfarb said. “Whatever it is you’ve got in mind, I’m probably stuck with it.”
“Now that’s a fine attitude!” Basil Roundbush said. “I’m about to offer the man an expense-paid holiday on the French Riviera-sounds all the better, doesn’t it, with the drips and trickles outside? — and he says he’s stuck with it. Plenty of chaps’d be happy to pay to go there, believe you me they would.”
“The German-occupied French Riviera?” Goldfarb’s shudder had nothing to do with the weather. “Yes, sir, that’s a splendid place to send a Jew. Why not pick one of your other chaps instead?”
“You’ll have a British passport,” Roundbush said patiently. “Or, if you’d rather, you can have an American one. Might even be better: plenty of gentiles in the States who look the way you do, so to speak. And you’re the right man for this job. You speak the Lizards’ language and you can get along in German with your Yiddish.”
“There is the small matter of French,” Goldfarb remarked.
“Small matter is right.” Roundbush remained imperturbable. “Anyone you need to talk to will speak German or the Lizards’ language or both. As I may have mentioned once or twice, we have a spot of trouble down there. Seems as if the Germans have got their claws into a chap who was a freelance operator who did a deal of business for us. Anything you can do to set things right will be greatly appreciated, on that you may rest assured.”
“What do you imagine I can do there that one of your other chaps couldn’t do a thousand times better?” Goldfarb asked.
“But, my dear fellow, you are one of our chaps,” Roundbush said. “You have a more personal interest in the success of your undertaking than anyone else we could send. Do you deny it?”
“I bloody well can’t deny it, not with you beggars soaring over my family and me like vultures over a dying sheep,” Goldfarb snarled. “You have the whip hand, and you’re not ashamed to use it.”
“You take things so personally,” Roundbush said. Unspoken but hanging in the air between them was, Just another excitable Jew.
“All right: I have an interest,” Goldfarb said. “What I haven’t got is any knowledge of your operation. How am I supposed to set it to rights if I can’t tell what’s right and what’s wrong?” That was a legitimate question. A not so legitimate thought tagged along behind it. If Roundbush gives me enough dirt about his pals, maybe I can bury them in it.