“He wants me to do a monthly news program! Do you know about this?”
“I plead not, nadi-ji. I’m sure, however, if Tabini-aiji has cleared these individuals to speak to you, they’re very reputable people.”
“Reputable people.” He scanned the letter for more devastating news, found only I know the weather in this season is not the best, but I hope that you have found pleasure in the library and accommodation with the esteemed aiji-dowager, to whom I hope you will convey my personal good wishes.
“This is impossible. I have to talk to Tabini.—Jago, I need a phone. Now.”
“I’ve no authorization, Bren-ji. There isn’t a phone here, and I’ve no authorization to remove you from our—”
“The hell, Jago!”
“I’ve no authorization, Bren-ji.”
“Does Banichi?”
“I doubt so, nadi-ji.”
“Well, neither do I. I can’t talk to these people.”
Jago’s frown grew anxious. “The paidhi tells me that Tabini-aiji has authorized these people. If Tabini-aiji has authorized this interview, the paidhi is surely aware that it would be a very great embarrassment to these people and their superior, extending even to the aiji’s court. If the paidhi has any authorization in this letter to refuse this, I must ask to see this letter.”
“It’s not Tabini. I’ve no authorization from Mospheira to do any interview. I absolutely can’t do this without contacting my office. I certainly can’t do it on any half-hour notice. I need to contact my office. Immediately.”
“Is not your man’chi to Tabini? Is this not what you said?”
God, right down the predictable and unarguable slot.
“My man’chi to Tabini doesn’t exclude my arguing with him or my protecting my position of authority among my own people. It’s my obligation to do that, nadi-ji. I have no force to use. It’s all on your side. But my man’chi gives me the moral authority to call on you to do my job.”
The twists and turns of a trial lawyer were a necessary part of the paidhi’s job. But persuading Jago to reinterpret man’chi was like pleading a brief against gravity.
“Banichi would have to authorize it,” Jago said with perfect composure, “if he has the authority, which I don’t think he does, Bren-ji. If you wish me to go down to the airport, I will tell him your objection, though I fear the television crew will come when their clearance says to come, which may be before any other thing can be arranged, and I cannot conceive how Tabini could withdraw a permission he seems to have granted without—”
“I feel faint. It must be the tea.”
“Please, nadi, don’t joke.”
“I can’t deal with them!”
“This would reflect very badly on many people, nadi. Surely you understand—”
“I cannot decide such policy changes on my own, Jago! It’s not in the authority I was given—”
“Refusal of these people must necessarily have far-reaching effect. I could not possibly predict, Bren-ji, but can you not comply at least in form? This surely won’t air immediately, and if there should be policy considerations, surely there could be ameliorations. Tabini has recommended these people. Reputations are assuredly at stake in this.”
Jago was no mean lawyer herself—versed in man’chi and its obligations, at least, and the niceties on which her profession accepted or didn’t accept grievances. Life and death. Justified and not. And she had a point. She had serious points.
“May I see the letter, Bren-ji? I don’t, of course, insist on it, but it would make matters clearer.”
He handed it over, Jago walked over to the window to read it, not, he thought, because she needed the light.
“I believe,” she said, “you’re urged to be very frank with these people, nadi. I think I understand Tabini-aiji’s thinking, if I may be so forward. If anything should happen to you—it would be very useful to have popular sympathy.”
“If anything should happen to me.”
“Not fatally. But we have taken an atevi life.”
He stood stock still, hearing from Jago what he thought he heard. It was her impeccable honesty. She could not perceive that there was prejudice in what she said. She was thinking atevi politics. That was her job, for Tabini and for him.