"What you don't know about me," said Graff, "is that I think very far ahead."
That reminded John Paul of what Andrew had said when he was teaching him to play chess. "You have to think ahead, the next move, the next move, the next move, to see where it's all going to lead." John Paul understood the principle as soon as Andrew explained it. But he stopped playing chess anyway, because he didn't care what happened to little plastic figures on a board of sixty-four squares.
Graff was playing chess, but not with little plastic figures. His game board was the world. And even though Graff was only a captain, he obviously came here with more authority--and more intelligence--than the colonel who had come before. When Graff said, "I think very far ahead," he was saying--this had to be his meaning--that he was willing to sacrifice a piece now and then in order to win the game, just like chess.
Maybe that meant he was willing to lie to John Paul now, and cheat him later. But no, there would be no reason to say anything at all. The only reason to say that was because Graff did not intend to cheat him. Graff was willing to be cheated, to knowingly enter into a bargain where the other person could win, and win completely--as long as he could see a way, farther down the road, for even such a defeat to turn to his advantage.
"You have to make us a promise that you'll never break," said John Paul. "Even if I don't go into space after all."
"I have the authority to make that promise," said Graff.
The woman clearly did not think so, though she said nothing.
"Is America a good place?" asked John Paul.
"There are an awful lot of Poles living there who think so," said Graff. "But it's not Poland."
"I want to see the whole world before I die," said John Paul. He had never told this to anyone before.
"Before you die," murmured Mother. "Why are you thinking about dying?"
As usual, she simply didn't understand. He wasn't thinking about dying. He was thinking about lear
ning everything, and it was a simple fact that he had only a limited time in which to do it. Why did people get so upset when somebody mentioned dying? Did they think that if they didn't mention it, it would skip a few people and leave them alive forever? And how much faith in Christ did Mother really have, if she feared death so much she couldn't bear even to mention it, or hear her six-year-old child speak of it?
"Going to America is a start," said Graff. "And American passports aren't restricted the way Polish passports are."
"We'll talk about it," said John Paul. "Come back later."
"Are you insane?" asked Helena as soon as they were out of earshot. "Isn't it obvious what the boy is planning?"
"No to the insanity, yes to the obviousness."
"These vids are going to be even more embarrassing for you than the earlier ones were for Sillain."
"Not really," said Graff.
"Why, because you intend to cheat the boy after all?"
"If I did that, then I truly would be insane." He stopped on the curb, apparently meaning to finish this conversation before getting back into the van with the others. Had he forgotten that what he was saying now was still being recorded?
No, he knew it. He wasn't speaking to her alone.
"Captain Rudolf," he said, "you saw, and everyone will see, that there was no way we could get that boy willingly into space. He doesn't want to go. He doesn't care about the war. That's what we've accomplished with this stupid repressive policy in the noncompliant nations. We have the best we've ever seen, and we can't use him because we've spent years creating a culture that hates the Hegemony and therefore the Fleet. We pissed on millions and millions of people in the name of some stupid population control laws, in defiance of their core beliefs and their community identity, and because the universe is statistically more likely to be ironic than not, of course our best chance at another commander like Mazer Rackham popped up among the ones we pissed on. I didn't do that, and only fools would blame me for it."
"So what was that all about? This agreement you promised? What's the point?"
"To get John Paul Wieczorek out of Poland, of course."
"But what difference does that make, if he won't go up to Battle School?"
"He's still...he still has a mind that processes human behavior the way some autistic savants process numbers or words. Don't you think it's a good thing to get him to a place where he can get a real education? And out of a place where he'll be constantly indoctrinated with hatred for the Hegemony and the I.F.?"
"I think that's beyond the scope of your authority," said Helena. "We're with the Battle School, not some Committee to Shape a Better Future by Moving Children Around."
"I'm thinking of Battle School," said Graff.
"To which John Paul Wieczorek will never go, as you just admitted."