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And that’s the difference, he realized. Rigg learned to concentrate on what Ramex was saying, and devoted himself to memory and analysis. While I, in my silences, I’m thinking of all the things I’m going to decide not to say.
No, I’m storing up things to complain about later.
Is that all I am? No wonder everyone looks to Rigg for leadership—he thinks through ideas, while I think of nothing but myself. How could anyone respect me? I don’t even have ideas that are worthy of respect.
“I wonder if you’re mooning over the princess,” said Olivenko, “or resenting Noxon for having so much time with her.”
Umbo was immediately filled with fury. But, trying to learn a lesson from Rigg, he curbed that first impulse. “I was wishing I had Rigg’s patience.”
“That was a good step, then, to answer me so mildly.”
“You were trying to goad me?”
“Yes,” said Olivenko. “Because it seems to be the only way to get your attention.”
Umbo thought: By hurting my feelings? But he said, “You have it.”
“I think she does like you, Umbo. She’s overcome some of her snobbery and seen you for a good man trying to be better.”
“You think of me as a boy,” said Umbo, “so when you call me a man it sounds like mockery.” But he said it mildly, because it was simply true.
“I’m talking about how Param thinks of you,” said Olivenko. “No matter how she feels, she’ll marry for reasons of state.”
“Thank you for telling me,” said Umbo. He did not say, By no means should you let me nurse the delusion that she might have fallen in love with me.
“If you’re going to marry her, you not only have to know how she thinks, you have to learn how to think the same way. The needs of the kingdom come before your personal desires.”
This time Umbo couldn’t keep the resentment out of his voice. “How would marrying me serve the needs of the kingdom?”
“No, I won’t answer that, because you already know the answer.”
“I say I don’t,” said Umbo.
“And I say that you already have enough information to figure it out.”
“And I say I don’t need a schoolmaster.”
“I think you do,” said Olivenko. “And since Loaf already stands in for your father, being your schoolmaster gives me a way to be useful to you. Or do you think you alone have nothing to learn?”
“On the contrary,” said Umbo. “I know so little that there’s no point in teaching me.”
“Nobody knows more than can be learned in a single lifetime,” said Olivenko, “and you already know more than you realize. Prove me wrong. Try to answer my question, and when you fail, I’ll know you were right about what a hopelessly ignorant privick you are.”
Umbo knew that Olivenko was deliberately challenging him in order to provoke him into accepting him as schoolteacher, if only to prove him wrong. So the proper answer was to walk away from him, saying nothing at all.
Proper answer? Why would that be proper? Umbo imagined himself doing it and then realizing, after about ten steps, that the only person he injured by refusing the offered education was himself. But then pride would forbid him to return and ask for Olivenko’s help after all.
Only this time, Umbo hadn’t walked away the moment he realized that would be the “right” way to prove he couldn’t be manipulated or controlled by anyone. This time he had stayed long enough to think of why he should stay.
He thought back to what Olivenko had challenged him to do: Think of how Param’s marrying this privick boy would serve the needs of the kingdom.
“Maybe she’d marry me to prove that she wants to elevate the common people,” said Umbo.
“That will be a very good thing for her to tell the common people, in order to try to cement their loyalty, but she’d better not let the great families of the Sessamoto Empire think that’s why she did it,” said Olivenko.
“Why not?” asked Umbo.
“No, you tell me why not,” said Olivenko.
