I was far too angry by now to make any sort of reply. President Gandhi tactfully drew General Hood into conversation and a little later Korzeniowski came up behind me and tapped me on the shoulder, leading me from the hall.
My emotions were, to put it mildly, mixed. I was torn between boiling anger, social embarrassment, loyalty to President Gandhi and his dream of peace, as well as my own responses to Hood himself. It was no surprise, now, that he had risen so swiftly to eminence in the world. Tyrant and murderer he might be, but it was undeniable that he had a magnetic personality, that he had the power to charm even those who hated him most. I had expected a swaggering barbarian and had encountered, instead, a sophisticated politician, an American (I learned later) who had been educated at Oxford and Heidelberg and whose academic career had been an outstanding one before he put down his books and took up the sword. I was shaking and close to tears as Korzeniowski took me back to my quarters and devoted himself to calming me down. But it was hours before I finished my mindless ranting. I drank a good deal, too, and I think that it was a combination of alcohol and emotional exhaustion which finally shut me up. One moment I was raging at the insults of the Black Attila and the next moment I had fallen face-forward to the floor.
Korzeniowski must have put me to bed. In the morning I woke up with the worst headache of my life, still in a filthy temper, but no longer capable of expressing it. It was a knocking at the door which had awakened me. My batman answered it and a short while later brought me my breakfast tray. On the tray was an envelope bearing the seal of the President himself. I pushed the tray aside and inspected the envelope, hardly daring to open it. Doubtless it contained some kind of reproof for my behaviour of the previous evening, but I was unrepentant.
I lay in bed, the envelope still in my hand, considering the answers I should have given Hood if I had had my wits about me.
I was determined not to be charmed by him, to judge him only by his actions, to remember how whole European cities had been destroyed by him and their populations enslaved. I regretted that I had mentioned none of this during our encounter. I have never believed in violent solutions to political problems, but I felt if there was one man who deserved to be assassinated it was Cicero Hood. The fact that he had received an excellent education only made him more of a villain in my eyes, for he had perverted that education in order to pursue his racial jehad. He might blandly deny his policies of genocide, but what he had done in the past few years spoke for itself. At that moment, I felt I could, like Caponi, cheerfully kill him with my bare hands.
It was Korzeniowski turning up that forced me to control myself. He stood at the end of my bed, looking down at me with a kind of sympathetic irony, asking me how I felt.
'Not too good,' I told him. I showed him the letter. 'I think I'm due for the sack. I'll be leaving Bantustan soon enough, I shouldn't wonder.'
'But you haven't opened the letter, old man.' I handed it up to him. 'You open it. Tell me the worse.' Korzeniowski went to my desk and took a paper-knife to slit the top of the envelope. He removed the contents - a single sheet of paper - and read it out in his precise, gutteral English:
'Dear Mr Bastable. If you have the time today, I should be grateful if you would visit me in my office. About five would be convenient for me, if that would suit you. Yours sincerely, Gandhi.'
Korzeniowski handed me the letter. 'Typical of him/ he said admiringly. 'If you have time, Mr Bastable. He is giving you the option. I shouldn't have thought that meant a carpeting, old chap, would you?'
I read the letter for myself, frowning. 'Then what on earth does it mean?' I said.
8. A DECISION IN COLD BLOOD
Needless to say, although I hemmed and hawed a lot, I eventually arrived, scrubbed and neat, at the presidential palace at five o'clock sharp and was immediately escorted into President Gandhi's office. The office was as plain and functional as all the rooms he used. He sat behind his desk looking, for him, decidedly stern, and I guessed that, after all, I was in for a wigging, that my resignation would be demanded. So I stood smartly to attention and prepared myself to take whatever the President was about to give me.
He got up, rubbing his balding head with the palm of his hand, his spectacles gleaming in the sun which flooded through the open window. 'Please sit down, captain.' It was rare for him to use a military title. I did as I was ordered.
'I have had a long talk with General Hood today,' Gandhi began. 'We have, as you know, been discussing ways of cementing good relations between Bantustan and the New Ashanti Empire. On most matters we have reached an amicable understanding, but there is one detail which concerns you. You know that I believe in free will, that it is not part of my beliefs to force a man to do something he does not wish to do. So I will put the situation to you and you must make up your own mind about it. General Hood was not joking last night when he offered you employment…'
'Not joking? I hope he was not, sir. I do not wish to be employed as a mass-murderer…'
President Gandhi raised his hand. 'Of course not. But General Hood, it seems, has taken a liking to you. He admired the way in which you answered him back last night.'
'I thought it a poor performance. I meant to apologize, sir.'
'No, no. I understand your position completely. You showed great self-control. Perhaps that was what Hood was doing - testing you. He is genuinely grateful for the part you played, apparently, in saving Miss Persson's life in England -and, I could be completely wrong, but I have the feeling he wants to vindicate himself in your eyes. Perhaps he sees you as representative of - in his terms - the better sort of white man. Perhaps he is tired of killing and actually does want to begin building a safer and saner world - though his present military plans seem to contradict that. Whatever the reason, Bastable, he has insisted that you be part of the diplomatic mission sent to his capital at New Kumasi - indeed, he has made it a condition. You will be the only, um, white member of the mission. Unless you go, he refuses to continue with our negotiations.'
'Well, sir, if those are not the actions of a madman, a despot, I do not know what they are!' I replied.
'Certainly, they are not based on the kind of logic I recognize. General Hood is used to having his way - particularly when.it comes to the fate of white men. I do not deny that. However, you know how important these talks are to me. I hope to influence the general - at least to temper his future policies towards those he conquers. Everything I have dreamed of is endangered - unless you consider that you can accept his terms. You must look to your own conscience, Mr Bastable. I do not want to influence you, I have already gone against my principles - I am aware that I am putting moral pressure on you. You must forget what I want and do only what you think is right.'
It was then that I reached what was perhaps the most coldblooded decision of my life. If I accepted, then I should be in an excellent position to get dose to Hood and, if necessary, put an end to his ambitions for good and all. I had contemplated assassination - now I was being given the opportunity to perform it. I decided that I would go to New Kumasi. I would observe the Black Attila's actions for myself. I would be Hood's jury and his judge. And if I decided that he was guilty -then I would take it upon myself to be his executioner!