Dal shook his head helplessly. "I ... I don't know what you mean."
"I think you do," Doctor Arnquist said. "Please, Dal. Trust me. This is
not the time to lie. The thing that you were planning to do at the
interview would be disastrous, even if it won you an assignment. It
would be dishonest and unworthy."
_Then he does know!_ Dal thought. _But how? I couldn't have told him, or
given him any hint._ He felt Fuzzy give a frightened shiver on his arm,
and then words were tumbling out of his mouth. "I don't know what you're
talking about, there wasn't anything I was thinking of. I mean, what
could I do? If the council wants to assign me to a ship, they will, and
if they don't, they won't. I don't know what you're thinking of."
"Please." Black Doctor Arnquist held up his hand. "Naturally you defend
yourself," he said. "I can't blame you for that, and I suppose this is
an unforgivable breach of diplomacy even to mention it to you, but I
think it must be done. Remember that we have been studying and observing
your people very carefully over the past two hundred years, Dal. It is
no accident that you have such a warm attachment to your little pink
friend here, and it is no accident that wherever a Garvian is found, his
Fuzzy is with him, isn't that so? And it is no accident that your people
are such excellent tradesmen, that you are so remarkably skillful in
driving bargains favorable to yourselves .
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