human
You should have helped me, to be consistent.
gpt
I knew you'd win.
human
Nevertheless, once you'd switched sides, you should have attempted to help me. If you had, maybe Abe would still be alive.
gpt
I ... I've known Abe since my early teens.
human
In college, he was the cell leader. He enlisted me into the Party.
gpt
He was an idealist, Homer.
human
I know that, Crawford said.
gpt
And along with it, he's saved my life, on at least three different occasions in the past few years. He was a good man.
human
That's what so many don't realize. They think this is all a kind of cowboys and Indians affair. The good guys and the bad guys fighting it out. And, of course, all the good guys are on our side and their side is composed of bad guys. They don't realize that many, even most, of the enemy are fighting for an ideal, too--and are willing to die for it, or do things sometimes even harder than dying.
gpt
The fact that the ideal is a false one--or so, at least, is my opinion--is beside the point.
human
This isn't as much a surprise to me as you possibly think, Isobel. There was only one way that episode in Timbuktu could have taken place. Abe was waiting for me to pass that mosque. But I had to pass. I had to be _fingered_ as the old gangster expression had it. And you led me into the ambush.
gpt
But what changed his mind? Why did he offer, tonight, to let me take over the El Hassan leadership?
human
In Timbuktu, when Abe saw the way things were going, he realized you'd have to be liquidated, otherwise El Hassan would be a leader the Party couldn't control. He tried to eliminate you, and then tried again with the cognac. Last night, however, he checked with local party leaders and they decided that he'd acted too precipitately. They suggested you be given the opportunity to line up with the Party.
gpt
And if I didn't?
human
Then you were to be liquidated.
gpt
So the finger is still on me, eh?
human
Yes, you'll have to be careful.
gpt
How do you stand now?
human
I'm the first follower to dedicate her services to El Hassan.
gpt
So you want to come along?
human
Yes,
gpt
And you remember what Abe said? That in the end the Hero invariably gets clobbered? Sooner or later, North Africa will outgrow the need for a Hero to follow and then ... then El Hassan and his closest followers have a good chance of winding up before a firing squad.
human
Yes, I know that.
gpt
O.K., Isobel. Your first instructions are to contact those two friends of yours, Jake Armstrong and Cliff Jackson. Try to convert them.
human
What are you going to be doing ... El Hassan?
gpt
I'm going over to the Reunited Nations to resign from the African Development Project. I have a sneaking suspicion that in the future they will not always be seeing eye to eye with El Hassan. Nor will the other organizations currently helping to advance Africa--whilst still at the same time keeping their own irons in the fire. Possibly the commies won't be the only ones in favor of liquidating El Hassan's assets.