After this review of how his life had run so far? Only one answer. “No. I don’t trust the Court at all.”

“Then that’s the first evidence of good sense I’ve witnessed in you.” She twisted her fingers ghoulishly. “I will trust you, and hope that when you leave here you might come to your senses. The Emerald City will never take you in. You’re too raw and obvious for them. Look, I have no other option. I’m not going to trust any dwarf with this matter; his allegiance is already pledged. You will have to do. You are a creature bedeviled with foolishness and bad luck, but if you’re finally smart enough to be skeptical about the honchos in the EC, well, I suppose there is some hope.”

“Let me save you from making a mistake,” he said. “You are too smart to trust in me.”

“I need your help,” she replied. “There’s no one else. It’s come down to that. I have to trust you whether I should or not.”

Well, that was it, wasn’t it? For her, for him, for anyone? Being needed? The sorry old approval game? Either it would work or it wouldn’t: She had no choice.

“All right, then, tell me,” he said. “Tell me what you have to tell me. Maybe if I become rehabilitated in the EC, I’ll be in a position to help sometime.”

“You haven’t given up, have you?”

“Look, if you’re going to trust me, you’ll have to trust me. I’ll do with your information as I see fit. And you know I don’t see very fit.”

“You see better than I do at this point.”

“A matter of opinion.” He closed his notebook. “I’m putting my pencil away. Just tell me.”

“It isn’t Liir,” she said. “It’s Liir and Candle together-it’s-their child. I need you to stand for her, if she needs standing for. As no one ever stood for you.”

“Their child,” he said.

“Born in Apple Press Farm, while Liir was absent. Nine years ago. When Candle left with that bundle, it was to draw the watching eyes away from the newborn. She left the baby for Liir to find; she swifted away to draw the hounds off scent.”

“So that is why you locked Candle in the tower with Liir? So she would have sex with Liir and perhaps conceive a child? Why would you care? Was it because you were never nine? No, not that. It was because you would never conceive a child yourself. You were too old when you were born. You were all dried up before you even got going.”

“Very sharp of you. I suppose I deserve this. I can tell you have had many dinner parties with cognoscenti who amuse themselves at guessing the motivations of others. But my motivation doesn’t matter. The thing happened, and now there is a child, a girl. And I have realized that this is why I can’t die. I was present at her conception: I was her godmother, in a sense. But I haven’t arranged for a guardian for her in my absence, as I tried to be one for Elphaba.”