“No you weren’t. If you had asked me in the first place,
I would have stayed.
“Then why . . .”I began, but the Djin waved me into
silence.
“I’m sorry, Skeeve. I shouldn’t tease you with head
games at a time like this. What changed my mind was
something you said while you were explaining why you
didn’t ask. You said you were scared and insecure, which
is only sane, all things considered. But then you added
something about how you were afraid to trust your own
judgment and therefore needed someone else along to tell
you whether you were right or not.”
He paused and shook his head.
“I can’t go along with that. I realized then that if I stayed,
I’d fall into the same trap all your other colleagues have . . .
of inadvertently doing your thinking for you when we ex-
press our own opinions. The sad thing is that we aren’t,
really. You decide yourself what advice you do and don’t
listen to. The trouble is, you only remember when you go
against advice and it goes wrong . . . like when you got
drunk tonight. Any correct judgment calls you assume were
made by your ‘advisors.’ Well, you’ve convinced me that
you’re a right guy, Skeeve. Now all you have to do is
convince yourself. That’s why I’m going to head on back
to Djinger and let you work this problem out on your own.
Right or wrong, there’ll be no one to take the credit or share
the blame. It’s all yours. I’m betting your solution will be
right.”
He held out his hand. I took it and carefully shook hands
with this person who had been so much help to me.
“I … well, thanks, Kalvin. You’ve given me a lot to