The dictator gave him a wan smile. "Thank you, Mr. Schnee. I hope you'll find your successor as cooperative as yourself."
The screen darkened.
"Hmmm," Gervase mused. He took a lavender cheroot, forgetting he still held the lime one. "I wonder whether he wants me to make an appointment so he'll have a band of counter-assassins ready to kill me, saving him the expense of a stand-by guard. He is noted for his thriftiness, you know. Perhaps I just shouldn't show up at all."
"He wouldn't dream of doing anything of the sort," Florea said austerely. "Overlord Kipp knows what is due to his position. He has a sense of duty and responsibility which, unfortunately, seems to be lacking in his successor ... if you'll excuse my speaking frankly," he added in haste. "I am, of course, considerably older than you and so I feel—"
"It's quite all right," Gervase reassured him. "You may speak freely."
"Furthermore," Florea continued, "if he had you killed, the people would probably give him a painful and lingering death for attempting to interfere with the course of destiny.... There, I hear them now!"
And they could indeed hear the sound of voices raised in song—so many and so loud that they penetrated the soundproofing of the walls. "The polloi are coming to hail their new Leader," Florea beamed.
"Well, I'm not going to do it!" Gervase declared. "They can't make me kill him and take over and that's flat. I'm not the administrative type—never have been."
Florea took a cheroot of his own out of a platinum portable. "In that case, the people probably will kill you for attempting to interfere with fate."