ROBOTS AND EMPIRE
PART I. AURORA
1. THE DESCENDANT
1
Gladia felt the lawn lounge to make sure it wasn’t too damp and then sat down. A touch at the control adjusted it in such a way as to allow her to be semirecumbent and another activated the diamagnetic field and gave her, as it always did, the sensation of utter relaxation. And why not? She was, in actual fact, floating—a centimeter above the fabric.
It was a warm and pleasant night, the kind that found the planet Aurora at its best—fragrant and star-lit.
With a pang of sadness, she studied the numerous little sparks that dotted the sky with patterns, sparks that were all the brighter because she had ordered the lights of her establishment dimmed.
How was it, she wondered, that she had never learned the names of the stars and had never found out which were which in all the twenty-three decades of her life. One of them was the star about which her birth planet of Solaria orbited, the star which, during the first three decades of her life, she had thought of merely as “the sun.”
Gladia had once been called Gladia Solaria. That was when she had come to Aurora, twenty decades before two hundred Standard Galactic Years—and it was meant as a not very friendly way of marking her foreign birth. A month before had been the bicentennial anniversary of her she had left unmarked because she did to think of those days. Before that, Gladia Delmarre—
She stirred uneasily. She had almost forgotten that surname. Was it because it was so long ago? Or was it merely that she labored to forget?
All these years she had not regretted Solaria, never missed it.
And yet now?
Was it because she had now, quite suddenly, discovered herself to have survived it? It was gone—a historical memory and she still lived on? Did she miss it now for that reason?
Her brow furrowed. No, she did not miss it, she decided resolutely. She did not long for it, nor did she wish to return to it. It was just the peculiar pang of something that had been so much a part of her—however destructively—being gone.
Solaria! The last of the Spacer worlds to be settled and made into a home for humanity. And in consequence, by some mysterious law of symmetry perhaps, it was also the first to die.
The first? Did that imply a second and third and so on?
Gladia felt her sadness deepen. There were those who thought there was indeed such an implication. If so, Aurora, her long-adopted home, having been the first Spacer-World to be settled, would, by that same rule of symmetry, therefore be the last of the fifty to die. In that case, it might, even at worst, outlast her own stretched-out lifetime and if so, that would have to do.
Her eyes sought the stars again. It was hopeless. There was no way she could possibly work out which of those indistinguishable dots of light was Solaria’s sun. She imagined it would be one of the brighter ones, but there were hundreds even of those.
She lifted her arm and made what she identified to herself only as her “Daneel gesture.” The fact that it was dark did not matter.
Robot Daneel Olivaw was at her side almost—at once. Anyone who had known him a little over twenty decades before, when he had first been designed by Han Fastolfe, would not have been conscious of any noticeable change in him. His broad, high-cheekboned face, with its short bronze hair combed back; his blue eyes; his tall, well-knit, and perfectly humanoid body would have seemed as young and as calmly unemotional as ever.
“May I be of help in any way, Madam Gladia?” he asked in an even voice.
“Yes, Daneel. Which of those stars is Solaria’s sun?”
Daneel did not look upward. He said, “None of them, Madam Gladia. At this time of year, Solaria’s sun will not rise until 03:20.”
“Oh?” Gladia felt dashed. Somehow she had assumed that any star in which she happened to be interested would be visible at any time it occurred to her to look. Of course, they did rise and set at different times. She knew that much. “I’ve been staring at nothing, then.”
“The stars, I gather from human reactions,” said Daneel, as though in an attempt to console, “are beautiful whether any particular one of them is visible or not.”
“I dare say,” said Gladia discontentedly and adjusted the lounge to an upright position with a snap. She stood up. “However, it was Solaria’s sun I wanted to see—but not so much that I intend to sit here till 03:20.”
“Even were you to do so,” said Daneel, “you would need magnilenses.”
“Magnilenses?”
“It is not quite visible to the unaided eye, Madam Gladia.”
“Worse and worse!” She brushed at her slacks. “I should have consulted you first, Daneel.”
Anyone who had known Gladia twenty decades before, when she had first arrived in Aurora, would have found a change. Unlike Daneel, she was merely human. She was 155 centimeters tall, almost 10 centimeters below the ideal height for a Spacer woman. She had carefully kept her slim figure and there was no sign of weakness or stiffness about her body. Still, there was a bit of gray in her hair, fine wrinkles near her eyes, and a touch of graininess about her skin. She might well live another ten or twelve decades, but there was no denying that she was already no longer young. That didn’t bother her.
She said, “Can you identify all the stars, Daneel?”
“I know those visible to the unaided eye, Madam Gladia.”
“And when they rise and set on any day of the year?”
“Yes, Madam Gladia.”
“And all sorts of other things about them?”
“Yes, Madam Gladia. Dr. Fastolfe once asked me to gather astronomical data so that he could have them at his fingertips without having to consult his computer. He used to say it was friendlier to have me tell him than to have his computer do so.” Then, as though, to anticipate the next question, “He did not explain why that should be so.”
Gladia raised her left arm and made the appropriate gesture. Her house was at once illuminated. In the soft light that now reached her, she was subliminally aware of the shadowy figures of several robots, but she paid no attention to that. In any well-ordered establishment, there were always robots within reach of human beings, both for security and for service.
Gladia took a last fugitive glimpse at the sky, where the stars had now dimmed in the scattered light. She shrugged lightly. It had been quixotic. What good would it have done even if she had been able to see the sun of that now-lost world, one faint dot among many? She might as well choose a dot at random, tell herself it was Solaria’s sun, and stare at it.
Her attention turned to R. Daneel. He waited for her patiently, the planes of his face largely in shadow.
She found herself thinking again how little he had changed since she had seen him on arriving at Dr. Fastolfe’s establishment so long ago. He had undergone repairs, of course. She knew that, but it was a vague knowledge that one pushed away and kept at a distance.
It was part of the general queasiness that held good for human beings, too. Spacers might boast of their iron health and of their life-spans of thirty to forty decades, but they, were not entirely immune to the ravages of age. One of Gladia’s femurs fit into a titanium-silicone hip socket. Her left thumb was totally artificial, though no one could tell that without careful ultrasonograms. Even some of her nerves had been rewired. Such things would be true of any Spacer of similar age from any of the fifty Spacer worlds (no, forty-nine, for now Solaria could no longer be counted).
To make any reference to such things, however, was an ultimate obscenity. The medical records involved, which had to exist since further treatment might be necessary, were never revealed for any reason. Surgeons, whose incomes were considerably higher than those of the Chairman himself, were paid so well, in part, because they were virtually ostracized from polite society. After all, they knew.
It was all part of the Spacer fixation on long life, on their unwillingness to admit that old age existed, but Gladia didn’t linger on any analysis of causes. She was restlessly, uneasy in thinking about herself in that connection. If she had a three dimensional map of herself with all prosthetic portions, all repairs, marked off in red against the gray of her natural self, what a general pinkness she would appear to have from a distance. Or so she imagined.
Her brain, however, was still intact and whole and while that was so, she was intact and whole, whatever happened to the rest of her body.
Which brought her back to Daneel. Though she had known him for twenty decades, it was only in the last year that he was hers. When Fastolfe died (his end hastened, perhaps, by despair), he had willed everything to the city of Eos, which was a common enough state of affairs. Two items, however, he had left to Gladia (aside from confirming her in the ownership of her establishment and its robots and other chattels, together with the grounds thereto appertaining).
One of them had been Daneel.
Gladia asked, “Do you remember everything you have ever committed to memory over the course of twenty decades, Daneel?”
Daneel said gravely, “I believe so, Madam Gladia. To be sure, if I forgot an item, I would not know that, for it would have been forgotten and I would not then recall ever having memorized it.”
“That doesn’t follow at all,” said Gladia. “You might well remember knowing it, but be unable to think of it at the moment. I have frequently had something at the tip of my tongue, so to speak, and been unable to retrieve it.”
Daneel said, “I do not understand, madam. If I knew something, surely it would be there when I needed it.”
“Perfect retrieval?” They were walking slowly toward the house.
“Merely retrieval, madam. I am designed so.”
“For how much longer?”
“I do not understand, madam.”
“I mean, how much will your brain hold? With a little over twenty decades of accumulated memories, how much longer can it go on?”
“I do not know, madam. As yet I feel no difficulty.”
“You might not—until you suddenly discover you can remember no more.”
Daneel seemed thoughtful for a moment. “That may be so, madam.”
“You know, Daneel, not all your memories are equally important.”
“I cannot judge among them, madam.”
“Others can. It would be perfectly possible to clean out your brain, Daneel, and then, under supervision, refill it with its important memory content only—say, ten percent of the whole. You would then be able to continue for centuries longer than you would otherwise. With repeated treatment of this sort, you could go on indefinitely. It is an expensive procedure, of course, but I would not cavil at that. You’d be worth it.”
“Would I be consulted on the matter, madam? Would I be asked to agree to such treatment?”
“Of course. I would not order you in a matter like that. It would be a betrayal of Dr. Fastolfe’s trust.”
“Thank you, madam. In that case, I must tell you that I would never submit voluntarily to such a procedure unless I found myself to have actually lost my memory function.”
They had reached the door and Gladia paused. She said, in honest puzzlement, “Why ever not, Daneel?”
Daneel said in a low Voice, “There are memories I cannot risk losing, madam, either through inadvertence or through poor judgment on the part of those conducting the procedure.”
“Like the rising and setting of the stars? Forgive me, Daneel, I didn’t mean to be joking. To what memories are you referring?”
Daneel said, his voice still lower, “Madam, I refer to my memories of my onetime partner, the Earthman Elijah Baley—”
And Gladia stood there, stricken, so that it was Daneel who had to take the initiative, finally, and signal for the door to open.
2
Robot Giskard Reventlov was waiting in the living room and Gladia greeted him with that same pang of uneasiness that always assailed her when she faced him.
He was primitive in comparison with Daneel. He was obviously a robot—metallic, with a face that had nothing human in expression upon it, with eyes, that glowed a dim red, as could be seen if it were dark enough. Whereas Daneel wore clothing, Giskard had only the illusion of clothing but a skillful illusion, for it was Gladia herself who had designed it.
“Well, Giskard,” she said.
“Good evening, Madam Gladia,” said Giskard with a small bow of his head.
Gladia remembered the words of Elijah Baley long ago, like a whisper inside the recesses of her brain:
“Daneel will take care of you. He will be your friend as well as protector and you must be a friend to him—for my sake. But it is Giskard I want you to listen to. Let him be your adviser.”
Gladia had frowned. “Why him? I’m not sure I like him.”
“I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
And he would not say why.
Gladia tried to trust the robot Giskard, but was glad she did not have to try to like him. Something about him made her shiver.
She had both Daneel and Giskard as effective parts of her establishment for many decades during which Fastolfe had held titular ownership. It was only on his deathbed that Han Fastolfe had actually transferred ownership. Giskard was the second item, after Daneel, that Fastolfe had left Gladia.
She had said to the old man, “Daneel is enough, Han. Your daughter Vasilia would like to have Giskard. I’m sure of that.”
Fastolfe was lying in bed quietly, eyes closed, looking more peaceful than she had seen him look in years. He did not answer immediately and for a moment she thought he had slipped out of life so quietly that she had not noticed. She tightened her grip on his hand convulsively and his eyes opened.
He whispered, “I care nothing for my biological daughters, Gladia. For twenty centuries, I have had but one functional daughter and that has been you. I want you to have Giskard. He is valuable.”
“Why is he valuable?”
“I cannot say, but I have always found his presence consoling. Keep him always, Gladia. Promise me that.”
“I promise,” she said.
And then his eyes opened one last time and his voice, finding a final reservoir of strength, said, in almost a natural tone of voice, “I love you, Gladia, my daughter.”
And Gladia said, “I love you, Han, my father.”
Those were the last words he said and heard. Gladia found herself holding the hand of a dead man and, for a while, could not bring herself to let go.
So Giskard was hers. And yet he made her uneasy and she didn’t know why.
“Well, Giskard,” she said, “I’ve been trying to see Solaria in the sky among the stars, but Daneel tells me it won’t be visible till 03:20 and that I would require magnilenses even then. Would you have known that?”
“No, madam.”
“Should I wait up till all hours? What do you think?”
“I suggest, Madam Gladia, that you would be better off in bed.”
Gladia bridled, “Indeed? And if I choose to stay up?”
“Mine is only a suggestion, madam, but you will have a hard day tomorrow and you will undoubtedly regret missing your sleep if you stay up.”
Gladia frowned. “What’s going to make my day hard tomorrow, Giskard? I’m not aware of any forthcoming difficulty.”
Giskard said, “You have an appointment, madam, with one Levular Mandamus.”
“I have? When did that happen?”
“An hour ago. He photophoned and I took the liberty—”
“You took the liberty? Who is he?”
“He is a member of the Robotics Institute, madam.”
“He’s an underling of Kelden Amadiro, then.”
“Yes, madam.”
“Understand, Giskard, that I am not in the least interested in seeing this Mandamus or anyone with any connection with that poisonous toad Amadiro. So if you’ve taken the liberty of making an appointment with him in my name, take the further liberty right now of phoning him again and canceling.”
“If you will confirm it as an order, madam, and make that order as strong and as definite as you can, I will try to obey. I may not be able to. In my judgment, you see, you will be doing yourself harm if you cancel the appointment and I must not allow you to come to harm through any action of mine.”
“Your judgment might just possibly be wrong, Giskard. Who is this man that my failure to see him will do me harm? His being a member of the Robotics Institute scarcely makes him important to me.”
Gladia was perfectly aware of the fact that she was venting spleen at Giskard without much justification. She had been upset by the news of Solaria’s abandonment and embarrassed by the ignorance that led her to look for Solaria in a sky that did not contain it.
Of course, it had been Daneel whose knowledge had made her own lack so obvious and yet she had not railed at him—but, then, Daneel looked human and so Gladia automatically treated him as though he were. Appearance was everything. Giskard looked like a robot, so one could easily assume he had no feelings to hurt.
And, to be sure, Giskard did not react at all to Gladia’s peevishness. (Neither would Daneel have reacted—if it came to that.) He said, “I have described Dr. Mandamus as a member of the Robotics Institute, but he is perhaps more than that. In the last few years, he has been right-hand man to Dr. Amadiro. This makes him important and he is not likely to be ignored. Dr. Mandamus would not be a good man to offend, madam.”
“Would he not, Giskard? I care nothing for Mandamus and a great deal less than nothing for Amadiro. I presume you remember that Amadiro once, when he and I and the world were young, did his best to prove that Dr. Fastolfe was a murderer and that it was only by a near-miracle that his machinations were aborted.”
“I remember it very well, madam.”
“That’s a relief. I was afraid that in twenty decades you had forgotten. In those twenty decades, I have had nothing to do with Amadiro or with anyone connected with him and I intend to continue that policy I don’t care what harm I may do myself or what the consequences might be. I will not see this Dr. whoever-he-is and, in the future, do not make appointments in my name without consulting me or, at the very least, without explaining that such appointments are subject to my approval.”
“Yes, madam,” said Giskard, “but may I point out—”
“No, you may not,” Gladia said and turned away from him.
There was silence while she moved away three steps and then Giskard’s calm voice said, “Madam, I must ask you to trust me.”
Gladia stopped. Why did he use that expression?
She heard again that long-ago voice, “I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
Her lips tightened and she, frowned. Reluctantly, not wanting to, she turned back.
“Welt,” she said ungraciously, “what is it you want to say, Giskard?”
“Just that as long as Dr. Fastolfe was alive, madam, his policies predominated on Aurora and throughout the Spacer worlds. As a result, the people of Earth have been allowed to migrate freely to various suitable planets in the Galaxy and what we now call the Settler-worlds have flourished. Dr. Fastolfe is dead now, however, and his successors lack his prestige. Dr. Amadiro has kept his own anti-Earth views alive and it is very possible that they may now triumph and that a vigorous policy against Earth and the Settler worlds may be undertaken.”
“If so, Giskard, what can I do about it?”
“You can see Dr. Mandamus and you can find out what it is that makes him so anxious to see you, madam. I assure you that he was most insistent on making the appointment as early as possible. He asked to see you at 08:00.”
“Giskard, I never see anyone before noon.”
“I explained that, madam. I took his anxiety to see you at breakfast, despite my explanation, to be a measure of his desperation. I felt it important to find out why he should be so desperate.”
“And if I don’t see him, then it is your opinion, is it, that it will harm me personally? I don’t ask whether it will harm Earth, or the Settlers, or this, or that. Will it harm me?”
“Madam, it may harm the ability of Earth and the Settlers to continue the settlement of the Galaxy. That dream originated in the mind of Plainclothesman Elijah Baley more than twenty decades ago. The harm to Earth will thus become a desecration of his memory. Am I wrong in thinking that any harm that comes to his memory would be felt by you as though it were harm to yourself personally?”
Gladia was staggered. Twice within the hour now, Elijah Baley had come into the conversation. He was long gone now—a short-lived Earthman who had died over sixteen decades before—yet the mere mention of his name could still shake her.
She said, “How can things suddenly be that serious?”
“It is not sudden, madam. For twenty decades, the people of Earth and the people of the Spacer worlds have been following parallel courses and have been kept from converging into conflict by the wise policies of Dr. Fastolfe. There has, however, always been a strong opposition movement that Dr. Fastolfe has had to withstand at all times. Now that Dr. Fastolfe is dead, the opposition is much more powerful. The abandonment of Solaria has greatly increased the power of what had been the opposition and may soon be the dominant political force.”
“Why?”
“It is a clear indication, madam, that Spacer strength is declining and many Aurorans must feel that strong action must be taken—now or never.”
“And you think that my seeing this man is important in preventing all this?”
“That is so, madam.”
Gladia was silent for a moment and remembered again, though rebelliously, that she had once promised Elijah that she would trust Giskard. She said, “Well, I don’t want to and I don’t think my seeing this man will do anyone any good—but, very well, I will see him.”
3
Gladia was asleep and the house was dark—by human standards. It was alive, however, with motion and action, for there was much for the robots to do—and they could do it by infrared.
The establishment had to be put into order after the inevitable disordering effects of a day’s activity. Supplies had to be brought in, rubbish had to be disposed of, objects had to be cleaned or polished or stored, appliances had to be checked, and, always, there was guard duty.
There were no locks on any doors; there did not have to be. There was no violent crime of any sort on Aurora, either against human beings or against property. There could not be anything of the sort, since every establishment—and every human being were, at all times, guarded by robots. This was well known and taken for granted.
The price for such calm was that the robot guards had to remain in place. They were never used—but only because they were always there.
Giskard and Daneel, whose abilities were both more intense and more general than those of the other establishment robots, did not have specific duties, unless one counted as a specific duty that of being responsible for the proper performance of all the other robots.
At 03:00, they had completed their rounds out on the lawn and in the wooded area to make sure that all the outer guards were performing their functions well and that no problems were arising.
They met near the southern limit of the establishment grounds and for a while they spoke in an abbreviated and Aesopic language. They understood each other well, with many decades of communication behind them, and it was not necessary for them to involve themselves in all the elaboration’s of human speech.
Daneel said in an all but unhearable whisper, “Clouds. Unseen.”
Had Daneel been speaking for human ears, he would have said, “As you see, friend Giskard, the sky has clouded up. Had Madam Gladia waited her chance to see Solaria, she would not, in any case, have succeeded.”
And Giskard’s reply of “Predicted. Interview, rather,” was the equivalent of “So much was predicted in the weather forecast, friend Daneel, and might have been used as an excuse to get Madam Gladia to bed early. It seemed to me to be more important, however, to meet the problem squarely and to persuade her to permit this interview I have already told you about.”
“It seems to me, friend Giskard,” said Daneel, “that the chief reason you may have found persuasion difficult is that she has been upset by the abandonment of Solaria. I was there once with Partner Elijah when Madam Gladia was still a Solarian and was living there.”
“It has always been my understanding,” said Giskard, “that Madam Gladia had not been happy on her home planet; that she left her world gladly and had, at no time, any intention of returning. Yet I agree with you that she seems to have been unsettled by the fact of Solaria’s history having come to an end.”
“I do not understand this reaction of Madam Gladia,” said Daneel, “but there are many times that human reactions do not seem to follow logically from events.”
“It is what makes it difficult to decide, sometimes, what will do a human being harm and what will not.” Giskard might have said it with a sigh, even a petulant sigh, had he been human. As it was, he stated it merely as an unemotional assessment of a difficult situation. “It is one of the reasons, why it seems to me that the Three Laws of Robotics are incomplete or insufficient.”
“You have said this before, friend Giskard, and I have tried to believe so and failed,” said Daneel.
Giskard said nothing for a while, then, “Intellectually, I think they must be incomplete or insufficient, but when I try to believe that, I too fail, for I am bound by them. Yet if I were not bound by them, I am sure I would believe in their insufficiency.”
“That is a paradox that I cannot understand.”
“Nor can I. And yet I find myself forced to express this paradox. On occasion, I feel that I am on the verge of discovering what the incompleteness or insufficiency of the Three Laws might be, as in my conversation with Madam Gladia this evening. She asked me how failure to keep the appointment might harm her personally, rather than simply cause harm in the abstract, and there was an answer I could not give because it was not within the compass of the Three Laws.”
“You gave a perfect answer, friend Giskard. The harm done to Partner Elijah’s memory would have affected Madam Gladia deeply.”
“It was the best answer within the compass of the Three Laws. It was not the best answer possible.”
“What was the best answer possible?”
“I do not know, since I cannot put it into words or even concepts as long as I am bound by the Laws.”
“There is nothing beyond the Laws,” said Daneel.
“If I were human,” said Giskard, “I could see beyond the Laws and I think, friend Daneel, that you might be able to see beyond them sooner than I would.
“Yes, friend Daneel, I have long thought that, although a robot, you think remarkably like a human being.”
“It is not proper to think that,” said Daneel slowly, almost as though he were in pain. “You think such things because you can look into human minds. It distorts you and it may in the end destroy you. That thought is to me an unhappy one. If you can prevent yourself from seeing into minds more than you must, prevent it.”
Giskard turned away. “I cannot prevent it, friend Daneel, I would not prevent it. I regret that I can do so little with it because of the Three Laws. I cannot probe deeply enough because of the fear that I may do harm. I cannot influence directly enough—because of the fear I may do harm.”
“Yet you influenced Madam Gladia very neatly, friend Giskard.”
“Not truly. I might have modified her thinking and made her accept the interview without question, but the human mind is so riddled with complexities that I dare do very little. Almost any twist I apply will produce subsidiary twists of whose nature I cannot be certain and which may do harm.”
“Yet you did something to Madam Gladia.”
“I did not have to. The word ‘trust’ affects her and makes her more amenable. I have noted that fact in the past, but I use the word with the greatest caution, since overuse will surely weaken it. I puzzle over this, but I cannot simply burrow for a solution.”
“Because the Three Laws will not permit it?”
Giskard’s eyes seemed to intensify their dim glow. “Yes. At every stage, the Three Laws stand in my way. Yet I cannot modify them—because they stand in my way. Yet I feel I must modify them, for I sense the oncoming of catastrophe. “
“You have said so before, friend Giskard, but you have not explained the nature of the catastrophe.”
“Because I do not know the nature. It involves the increasing hostility between Aurora and Earth, but how this will evolve into actual catastrophe, I cannot say.”
“Is it possible that there might, after all, be no catastrophe?”
“I do not think so. I have sensed, among certain Auroran officials I have encountered an aura of catastrophe—of waiting for triumph. I cannot describe this more exactly and I cannot probe deeply for a better description because the Three Laws will not allow me to. It is another reason why the interview with Mandamus must take place tomorrow. It will give me a chance to study his mind.”
“But if you cannot study it effectively?”
Although Giskard’s voice was incapable of showing emotion in the human sense, there was no missing the despair in his words, He said, “Then that will leave me helpless. I can only follow the Laws. What else can I do?”
And Daneel said softly and dispiritedly, “Nothing else.”
4
Gladia entered her living room at 08:15, having purposely—and with a touch of spite—determined to allow Mandamus (she had now reluctantly memorized his name) to wait for her. She had also taken particular pains with her appearance and (for the first time in years) had agonized over the gray in her hair and had fleetingly wished she had followed the almost universal Auroran practice of shade control. After all, to look as young and attractive as possible would put this minion of Amadiro’s at a further disadvantage.
She was thoroughly prepared to dislike him at sight was depressingly aware that he might prove, young and attractive, that a sunny face might break into a brilliant smile at her appearance, that she might prove reluctantly attracted to him.
In consequence, she was relieved at the sight of him. He was young, yes, and probably had not yet completed his first half-century, but he hadn’t made the best of that. He was tall—perhaps 185 centimeters in height, she judged but too thin. It made him appear spindly. His hair was a shade too dark for an Auroran, his eyes a rather faded hazel, his face too long, his lips too thin, his mouth too broad, his complexion insufficiently fair. But what robbed him of the true appearance of youth was that his expression was too prim, too humorless.
With a flash of insight, Gladia remembered the historical novels that were such a fad on Aurora (novels that invariably dealt with primitive Earth—which was odd for a world that was increasingly hating Earthpeople) and thought: Why, he’s the picture of a Puritan.
She felt relieved and almost smiled. Puritans were usually pictured as villains and, whether this Mandamus was indeed one or not, it was convenient to have him look like one.
But when he spoke Gladia was disappointed, for his voice was soft and distinctly musical. (It ought to have possessed a nasal twang if it were to fulfill the stereotype.) He said, “Mrs. Gremionis?”
She held out her hand with a carefully condescending smile. “Mr. Mandamus.—Please call me Gladia. Everyone does.”
“I know you use your given name professionally—”
“I use it in every way. And my marriage came to an amicable end several decades ago.”
“It lasted for a long, time, I believe.”
“A very long time. It was a great success, but even great successes come to a natural end.”
“Ah,” said Mandamus sententiously. “To continue past the end might well turn success into failure.”
Gladia nodded and said with a trace of a smile, “How wise for one so young.—But shall we move into the dining room? Breakfast is ready and I have surely delayed you long enough.”
It was only as Mandamus turned with her and adjusted his steps to hers that Gladia became aware of his two accompanying robots. It was quite unthinkable for any Auroran to go anywhere without a robotic retinue, but as long as robots stood still they made no impression on the Auroran eye.
Gladia, looking at them quickly, saw that they were late models, clearly expensive. Their pseudo-clothing was elaborate and, although it was not of Gladia’s design, it was first-class. Gladia had to admit so much to herself, though reluctantly—She would have to find out who had designed it someday, for she did not recognize the touch and she might be about to have a new and formidable competitor. She found herself admiring the manner in which the style of pseudo-clothing was distinctly the same for both robots, while remaining distinctly individual for each. You could not mistake one for the other.
Mandamus caught her swift look and interpreted her expression with disconcerting accuracy. (He is intelligent, thought Gladia, disappointed.) He said, “The exodesign of my robots was created by a young man at the Institute who has not yet made a name for himself. But he will, don’t you think?”
“Definitely,” said Gladia.
Gladia did not expect any business discussion till breakfast was done. It would be the height of ill breeding to speak of anything but trivia during meals and Gladia guessed that Mandamus was not at his best with trivia. There was the weather, of course. The recent siege of rain, now happily done with, was mentioned and the prospects for the oncoming dry season. There was the almost mandatory expression of admiration for the hostess’s establishment and Gladia accepted it with practiced modesty. She did nothing to ease the strain on the man, but let him search for subject matter without help.
At length, his eye fell on Daneel, standing quietly and without motion in his wall niche, and Mandamus managed to overcome his Auroran indifference and notice him.
“Ah,” he said, “clearly the famous R. Daneel Olivaw. He’s absolutely unmistakable. A rather remarkable specimen.”
“Quite remarkable.”
“He’s yours now, isn’t he? By Fastolfe’s will?”
“By Doctor Fastolfe’s will, yes,” said Gladia with faint emphasis.
“It strikes me as amazing that the Institute’s line of humanoid robots failed as it did. Have you ever thought about it?”
“I have heard of it,” said Gladia cautiously. (Could it be that this was what he was getting around to?) “I’m not aware of having spent much time thinking about it.”
“Sociologists are still trying to understand it. Certainly, we at the Institute never got over the disappointment. It seemed like such a natural development. Some of us think that Fa—Dr. Fastolfe somehow had something to do with it.”
(He had avoided making the mistake a second time, thought Gladia. Her eyes narrowed and she grew hostile as she decided he had come to her in order to probe for material damaging to poor, good Han.)
She said tartly, “Anyone who thinks that is a fool. If you think so, I won’t change the expression for your benefit.”
“I am not one of those who thinks so, largely because I don’t see what Dr. Fastolfe could have done to make it a fiasco.”
“Why should anyone have had to do anything? What it amounts to is that the public didn’t want them. A robot that looks like a man competes with a man and one that looks like a woman competes with a woman—and entirely too closely for comfort. Aurorans didn’t want the competition. Do we need to look any further?”
“Sexual competition?” said Mandamus calmly.
For a moment, Gladia’s gaze met his levelly. Did he know of her long-ago love for the robot Jander? Did it matter if he did?
There seemed nothing in his expression to make it appear that he meant anything beyond the surface meaning of the words.
She said finally, “Competition in every way. If Dr. Han Fastolfe did anything to contribute to such a feeling, it was that he designed his robots in too human a fashion, but that was the only way.”
“I think you have thought about the matter,” said Mandamus. “The trouble is that sociologists find the fear of competition with too-human, a set of robots to be simplistic, as an explanation. That alone would not suffice and there is no evidence of any other aversion motive of significance.”
“Sociology is not an exact ‘science,’” said Gladia.
“It is not altogether inexact, either.”
Gladia shrugged.
After a pause, Mandamus said, “In any case, it kept us from organizing colonizing expeditions properly. Without humanoid robots to pave the way—”
Breakfast was not quite over, but it was clear to Gladia that Mandamus could not avoid the nontrivial any longer. She said, “We might have gone ourselves.”
This time it was Mandamus who shrugged. “Too difficult. Besides, those short-lived barbarians from Earth, with the permission of your Dr. Fastolfe, have swarmed over every planet in sight like a plague of beetles.”
“There are plenty of available planets still. Millions. And if they can do it—”
“Of course they can do it,” said Mandamus with sudden passion. “It costs lives, but what are lives to them? The loss of a decade or so, that’s all, and there are billions of them.
“If a million or so die in the process of colonizing, who notices, who cares? They don’t.”
“I’m sure they do.”
“Nonsense. Our lives are longer and therefore more valuable—and we are naturally more careful with them.”
“So we sit here and do nothing but rail at Earth’s Settlers for being willing to risk their lives and for seeming to inherit the Galaxy as a result.”
Gladia was unaware of feeling so pro-Settler a bias, but she was in the mood to contradict Mandamus and as she spoke she could not help but feel that what began as mere contradiction made sense and could well represent her feelings. Besides, she had heard Fastolfe say similar things during his last discouraged years.
At Gladia’s signal, the table was being rapidly and efficiently cleared. Breakfast might have continued, but the conversation and the mood had become quite unsuitable for civilized mealtime.
They moved back into the living room. His robots followed and so did Daneel and Giskard, all finding their niches. (Mandamus had never remarked on Giskard, thought Gladia, but then, why should he? Giskard was quite old fashioned and even primitive, entirely unimpressive in comparison to Mandamus’s beautiful specimens.)
Gladia took her seat and crossed her legs, quite aware that the form-fitting sheerness of the lower portion of her slacks flattered the still youthful appearance of her legs.
“May I know the reason for your wishing to see me, Dr. Mandamus?” she said, unwilling to delay matters any longer.
He said, “I have the bad habit of chewing medicated gum after meals as an aid to digestion. Would you object?”
Gladia said stiffly, “I would find it distracting.”
(Being unable to chew might put him at a disadvantage. Besides, Gladia added to herself virtuously, at his age he shouldn’t need anything to aid his digestion.)
Mandamus had a small oblong package partway out of his tunic’s breast pocket. He shoved it back with no sign of disappointment and murmured, “Of course.”
“I was asking, Dr. Mandamus, your reason for wishing to see me.”
“Actually two reasons, Lady Gladia. One is a personal matter and one is a matter of state. Would you object to my taking up the personal matter first?”
“Let me say frankly, Dr. Mandamus, that I find it hard to imagine what personal matter there could be between us. You work at the Robotics Institute, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do.”
“And are close to Amadiro, I have been told.”
“I have the honor of working with Doctor Amadiro,” he said with faint emphasis.
(He’s paying me back, thought Gladia, but I’m not taking it.)
She said, “Amadiro and I had an occasion for contact twenty decades ago and it was most unpleasant. I have had no occasion for any contact with him at any time since. Nor would I have had any contact with you, as a close associate of his, but that I was persuaded that the interview might be important. Personal matters, however, would surely not make this interview in the least important to me. Shall we proceed onward, then, to the matters of state?”
Mandamus’s eyes dropped and a faint flush of something that might have been embarrassment came to his cheeks.
“Let me reintroduce myself, then. I am Levular Mandamus, your descendant in the fifth degree. I am the great-great-great grandson of Santirix and Gladia Gremionis. In reverse, you are my great-great-great-grandmother.”
Gladia blinked rapidly, trying not to look as thunderstruck as she, in actual fact, felt (and not quite, succeeding). Of course she had descendants and why should not one of them be this man?
But she said, “Are you sure?”
“Quite sure. I have had a genealogical search made. One of these years, after all, I am likely to want children and before I can have one such a search would be mandatory. If you are interested, the pattern between us is M-F-F-M.”
“You are my son’s daughter’s daughter’s son’s son?”
“Yes.”
Gladia did not ask for further details. She had had one son and one daughter. She had been a perfectly dutiful mother, but in due time the children had taken up independent lives. As to descendants beyond that son and daughter, she had, in perfectly decent Spacer fashion, never inquired and did not care. Having met one of them, she was Spacer enough still not to care.
The thought stabilized her completely. She sat back in, her chair and relaxed. “Very well,” she said. “You are my descendant in the fifth degree. If this is the personal matter you wish to discuss, it is of no importance.”
“I understand that fully, ancestress. My genealogy is not, in itself, what I wish to discuss, but it lays the foundation. Dr. Amadiro, you see, knows of this relationship. At least, so I suspect.”
“Indeed? How did that come about?”
“I believe that he quietly genealogizes all those who come to work at the Institute.”
“But why?”
“In order to find out exactly what he did find out in my case. He is not a trusting man.”
“I don’t understand. If you are my fifth-level descendant, why should it have more meaning to him than it does to me?”
Mandamus rubbed his chin with the knuckles of his right hand in a thoughtful manner. “His dislike for you is in no way less than your dislike for him, Lady Gladia. If you were ready to refuse an interview with me for his sake, he is equally ready to refuse me preferment for your sake. It might be even worse if I were a descendant of Dr. Fastolfe, but not much.”
Gladia sat stiffly, upright in her seat. Her nostrils flared and she said in a tight voice, “What is it, then, that you expect me to do? I cannot declare you a nondescendant. Shall I have an announcement placed on hypervision that you are a matter of indifference to me and that I disown you? Will that satisfy your Amadiro? If so, I must warn you I will not do it. I will do nothing to satisfy that man. If it means that he will discharge you and deprive you of your career out of some sort of disapproval of your genetic association, then that will teach you to associate with a saner, less vicious person.”
“He will not discharge me, Madam Gladia. I am entirely too valuable to him—if you will pardon my immodesty. Still, I hope someday to succeed him as head of the Institute and that, I am quite certain, he will not allow, as long as he suspects me of a descent worse than that which stems from you.”
“Does he imagine that poor Santirix is worse than I am?”
“Not at all.” Mandamus flushed and he swallowed, but his voice remained level and steady. “I mean no disrespect, madam, but I owe it to myself to learn the truth.”
“What truth?”
“I am descended from you in the fifth degree. That is clear in the genealogical records. But it is possible that I am also descended in the fifth degree, not from Santirix Gremionis but from the Earthman Elijah Baley?”
Gladia rose to her feet as quickly as though the undimensional force, fields of a puppeteer had lifted her. She was not aware that she had risen.
It was the third time in twelve hours that the name of that long-ago Earthman had been mentioned—and by three different individuals.
Her voice seemed not to be hers at all. “What do you mean?”
He said, rising in his turn and backing away slightly, “It seems to me plain enough. Was your son, my great-great-grandfather, born of a sexual union of yourself with the Earthman Elijah Baley? Was Elijah Baley your son’s father? I don’t know how to express it more plainly.”
“How dare you make such a suggestion? Or even think it?”
“I dare because my career depends upon it. If the answer is yes, my professional life may well be ruined. I want a ‘no’ but an unsupported ‘no’ will do me no good. I must be able to present proof to Dr. Amadiro at the appropriate time and show him that his disapproval of my genealogy must end with you. After all, it is clear to me that his dislike of you—and even of Dr. Fastolfe—is as nothing—nothing at all—compared to the incredible intensity of his detestation of the Earthman Elijah Baley. It is not only the fact of his being short-lived, although the thought of having inherited barbarian genes would disturb me tremendously. I think that if I presented proof I was descended from an Earthman who was not Elijah Baley, he would dismiss that. But it is the thought of Elijah Baley—and only he—that drives him to madness. I do not know why.”
The reiteration of Elijah’s name had made him seem almost alive again to Gladia. She was breathing harshly and deeply and she exulted in the best memory of her life.
“I know why,” she said. “It was because Elijah, with everything against him, with all of Aurora against him, managed anyhow to destroy Amadiro at the moment when that man thought he held success in his hand. Elijah did it by the exercise of sheer courage and intelligence. Amadiro had met his infinite superior in the person of an Earthman he had carelessly despised and what could he do in return but hate futilely? Elijah has been dead for more than sixteen decades and still Amadiro cannot forget, cannot forgive, cannot release the chains that bind him in hate and memory to that dead man. And I would not have Amadiro forget or cease hating—as long as it poisons every moment of his existence.”
Mandamus said, “I see you have reason for wishing Dr. Amadiro ill, but what reason have you for wishing me ill? To allow Dr. Amadiro to think I am descended from Elijah Baley will give him the pleasure of destroying me. Why should you give him that pleasure needlessly, if I am not so descended? Give me the proof, therefore, that I am descended from you and Satitirix Gremionis or from you and anybody but Elijah Baley.”
“You fool! You idiot! Why do you need proof from me? Go to the historical records. You will find the exact days on which Elijah Baley was on Aurora. You will find the exact day on which I gave birth to my son, Darrel. You will find that Darrel was conceived more than five years after Elijah left Aurora. You will also find that Elijah never returned to Aurora. Well, then, do you think I gestated for five years, that I carried a fetus in my womb for five Standard Galactic Years?”
“I know the statistics, madam. And I do not think you carried a fetus for five years.”
“Then why do you come to me?”
“Because there is more to it than that. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman Elijah Baley, as you say, never returned to Aurora’s surface, he was once in a ship that was in orbit about Aurora for a day or so. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman did not leave the ship to go to Aurora, you left Aurora to go to the ship; that you stayed on the ship for the better part of a day; and that this took place nearly five years after the Earthman had been on Aurora’s surface—at about the time, in fact, that your son was conceived.”
Gladia felt the blood drain from her face as she heard the other’s calm words. The room darkened about her and she swayed.
She felt the sudden, gentle touch of strong arms about her and knew they were those of Daneel. She felt herself lowered slowly into her chair.
She heard Mandamus’s voice as though from a great distance.
“Is that not true, madam?” he said.
It was, of course, true.
1
Gladia felt the lawn lounge to make sure it wasn’t too damp and then sat down. A touch at the control adjusted it in such a way as to allow her to be semirecumbent and another activated the diamagnetic field and gave her, as it always did, the sensation of utter relaxation. And why not? She was, in actual fact, floating—a centimeter above the fabric.
It was a warm and pleasant night, the kind that found the planet Aurora at its best—fragrant and star-lit.
With a pang of sadness, she studied the numerous little sparks that dotted the sky with patterns, sparks that were all the brighter because she had ordered the lights of her establishment dimmed.
How was it, she wondered, that she had never learned the names of the stars and had never found out which were which in all the twenty-three decades of her life. One of them was the star about which her birth planet of Solaria orbited, the star which, during the first three decades of her life, she had thought of merely as “the sun.”
Gladia had once been called Gladia Solaria. That was when she had come to Aurora, twenty decades before two hundred Standard Galactic Years—and it was meant as a not very friendly way of marking her foreign birth. A month before had been the bicentennial anniversary of her she had left unmarked because she did to think of those days. Before that, Gladia Delmarre—
She stirred uneasily. She had almost forgotten that surname. Was it because it was so long ago? Or was it merely that she labored to forget?
All these years she had not regretted Solaria, never missed it.
And yet now?
Was it because she had now, quite suddenly, discovered herself to have survived it? It was gone—a historical memory and she still lived on? Did she miss it now for that reason?
Her brow furrowed. No, she did not miss it, she decided resolutely. She did not long for it, nor did she wish to return to it. It was just the peculiar pang of something that had been so much a part of her—however destructively—being gone.
Solaria! The last of the Spacer worlds to be settled and made into a home for humanity. And in consequence, by some mysterious law of symmetry perhaps, it was also the first to die.
The first? Did that imply a second and third and so on?
Gladia felt her sadness deepen. There were those who thought there was indeed such an implication. If so, Aurora, her long-adopted home, having been the first Spacer-World to be settled, would, by that same rule of symmetry, therefore be the last of the fifty to die. In that case, it might, even at worst, outlast her own stretched-out lifetime and if so, that would have to do.
Her eyes sought the stars again. It was hopeless. There was no way she could possibly work out which of those indistinguishable dots of light was Solaria’s sun. She imagined it would be one of the brighter ones, but there were hundreds even of those.
She lifted her arm and made what she identified to herself only as her “Daneel gesture.” The fact that it was dark did not matter.
Robot Daneel Olivaw was at her side almost—at once. Anyone who had known him a little over twenty decades before, when he had first been designed by Han Fastolfe, would not have been conscious of any noticeable change in him. His broad, high-cheekboned face, with its short bronze hair combed back; his blue eyes; his tall, well-knit, and perfectly humanoid body would have seemed as young and as calmly unemotional as ever.
“May I be of help in any way, Madam Gladia?” he asked in an even voice.
“Yes, Daneel. Which of those stars is Solaria’s sun?”
Daneel did not look upward. He said, “None of them, Madam Gladia. At this time of year, Solaria’s sun will not rise until 03:20.”
“Oh?” Gladia felt dashed. Somehow she had assumed that any star in which she happened to be interested would be visible at any time it occurred to her to look. Of course, they did rise and set at different times. She knew that much. “I’ve been staring at nothing, then.”
“The stars, I gather from human reactions,” said Daneel, as though in an attempt to console, “are beautiful whether any particular one of them is visible or not.”
“I dare say,” said Gladia discontentedly and adjusted the lounge to an upright position with a snap. She stood up. “However, it was Solaria’s sun I wanted to see—but not so much that I intend to sit here till 03:20.”
“Even were you to do so,” said Daneel, “you would need magnilenses.”
“Magnilenses?”
“It is not quite visible to the unaided eye, Madam Gladia.”
“Worse and worse!” She brushed at her slacks. “I should have consulted you first, Daneel.”
Anyone who had known Gladia twenty decades before, when she had first arrived in Aurora, would have found a change. Unlike Daneel, she was merely human. She was 155 centimeters tall, almost 10 centimeters below the ideal height for a Spacer woman. She had carefully kept her slim figure and there was no sign of weakness or stiffness about her body. Still, there was a bit of gray in her hair, fine wrinkles near her eyes, and a touch of graininess about her skin. She might well live another ten or twelve decades, but there was no denying that she was already no longer young. That didn’t bother her.
She said, “Can you identify all the stars, Daneel?”
“I know those visible to the unaided eye, Madam Gladia.”
“And when they rise and set on any day of the year?”
“Yes, Madam Gladia.”
“And all sorts of other things about them?”
“Yes, Madam Gladia. Dr. Fastolfe once asked me to gather astronomical data so that he could have them at his fingertips without having to consult his computer. He used to say it was friendlier to have me tell him than to have his computer do so.” Then, as though, to anticipate the next question, “He did not explain why that should be so.”
Gladia raised her left arm and made the appropriate gesture. Her house was at once illuminated. In the soft light that now reached her, she was subliminally aware of the shadowy figures of several robots, but she paid no attention to that. In any well-ordered establishment, there were always robots within reach of human beings, both for security and for service.
Gladia took a last fugitive glimpse at the sky, where the stars had now dimmed in the scattered light. She shrugged lightly. It had been quixotic. What good would it have done even if she had been able to see the sun of that now-lost world, one faint dot among many? She might as well choose a dot at random, tell herself it was Solaria’s sun, and stare at it.
Her attention turned to R. Daneel. He waited for her patiently, the planes of his face largely in shadow.
She found herself thinking again how little he had changed since she had seen him on arriving at Dr. Fastolfe’s establishment so long ago. He had undergone repairs, of course. She knew that, but it was a vague knowledge that one pushed away and kept at a distance.
It was part of the general queasiness that held good for human beings, too. Spacers might boast of their iron health and of their life-spans of thirty to forty decades, but they, were not entirely immune to the ravages of age. One of Gladia’s femurs fit into a titanium-silicone hip socket. Her left thumb was totally artificial, though no one could tell that without careful ultrasonograms. Even some of her nerves had been rewired. Such things would be true of any Spacer of similar age from any of the fifty Spacer worlds (no, forty-nine, for now Solaria could no longer be counted).
To make any reference to such things, however, was an ultimate obscenity. The medical records involved, which had to exist since further treatment might be necessary, were never revealed for any reason. Surgeons, whose incomes were considerably higher than those of the Chairman himself, were paid so well, in part, because they were virtually ostracized from polite society. After all, they knew.
It was all part of the Spacer fixation on long life, on their unwillingness to admit that old age existed, but Gladia didn’t linger on any analysis of causes. She was restlessly, uneasy in thinking about herself in that connection. If she had a three dimensional map of herself with all prosthetic portions, all repairs, marked off in red against the gray of her natural self, what a general pinkness she would appear to have from a distance. Or so she imagined.
Her brain, however, was still intact and whole and while that was so, she was intact and whole, whatever happened to the rest of her body.
Which brought her back to Daneel. Though she had known him for twenty decades, it was only in the last year that he was hers. When Fastolfe died (his end hastened, perhaps, by despair), he had willed everything to the city of Eos, which was a common enough state of affairs. Two items, however, he had left to Gladia (aside from confirming her in the ownership of her establishment and its robots and other chattels, together with the grounds thereto appertaining).
One of them had been Daneel.
Gladia asked, “Do you remember everything you have ever committed to memory over the course of twenty decades, Daneel?”
Daneel said gravely, “I believe so, Madam Gladia. To be sure, if I forgot an item, I would not know that, for it would have been forgotten and I would not then recall ever having memorized it.”
“That doesn’t follow at all,” said Gladia. “You might well remember knowing it, but be unable to think of it at the moment. I have frequently had something at the tip of my tongue, so to speak, and been unable to retrieve it.”
Daneel said, “I do not understand, madam. If I knew something, surely it would be there when I needed it.”
“Perfect retrieval?” They were walking slowly toward the house.
“Merely retrieval, madam. I am designed so.”
“For how much longer?”
“I do not understand, madam.”
“I mean, how much will your brain hold? With a little over twenty decades of accumulated memories, how much longer can it go on?”
“I do not know, madam. As yet I feel no difficulty.”
“You might not—until you suddenly discover you can remember no more.”
Daneel seemed thoughtful for a moment. “That may be so, madam.”
“You know, Daneel, not all your memories are equally important.”
“I cannot judge among them, madam.”
“Others can. It would be perfectly possible to clean out your brain, Daneel, and then, under supervision, refill it with its important memory content only—say, ten percent of the whole. You would then be able to continue for centuries longer than you would otherwise. With repeated treatment of this sort, you could go on indefinitely. It is an expensive procedure, of course, but I would not cavil at that. You’d be worth it.”
“Would I be consulted on the matter, madam? Would I be asked to agree to such treatment?”
“Of course. I would not order you in a matter like that. It would be a betrayal of Dr. Fastolfe’s trust.”
“Thank you, madam. In that case, I must tell you that I would never submit voluntarily to such a procedure unless I found myself to have actually lost my memory function.”
They had reached the door and Gladia paused. She said, in honest puzzlement, “Why ever not, Daneel?”
Daneel said in a low Voice, “There are memories I cannot risk losing, madam, either through inadvertence or through poor judgment on the part of those conducting the procedure.”
“Like the rising and setting of the stars? Forgive me, Daneel, I didn’t mean to be joking. To what memories are you referring?”
Daneel said, his voice still lower, “Madam, I refer to my memories of my onetime partner, the Earthman Elijah Baley—”
And Gladia stood there, stricken, so that it was Daneel who had to take the initiative, finally, and signal for the door to open.
2
Robot Giskard Reventlov was waiting in the living room and Gladia greeted him with that same pang of uneasiness that always assailed her when she faced him.
He was primitive in comparison with Daneel. He was obviously a robot—metallic, with a face that had nothing human in expression upon it, with eyes, that glowed a dim red, as could be seen if it were dark enough. Whereas Daneel wore clothing, Giskard had only the illusion of clothing but a skillful illusion, for it was Gladia herself who had designed it.
“Well, Giskard,” she said.
“Good evening, Madam Gladia,” said Giskard with a small bow of his head.
Gladia remembered the words of Elijah Baley long ago, like a whisper inside the recesses of her brain:
“Daneel will take care of you. He will be your friend as well as protector and you must be a friend to him—for my sake. But it is Giskard I want you to listen to. Let him be your adviser.”
Gladia had frowned. “Why him? I’m not sure I like him.”
“I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
And he would not say why.
Gladia tried to trust the robot Giskard, but was glad she did not have to try to like him. Something about him made her shiver.
She had both Daneel and Giskard as effective parts of her establishment for many decades during which Fastolfe had held titular ownership. It was only on his deathbed that Han Fastolfe had actually transferred ownership. Giskard was the second item, after Daneel, that Fastolfe had left Gladia.
She had said to the old man, “Daneel is enough, Han. Your daughter Vasilia would like to have Giskard. I’m sure of that.”
Fastolfe was lying in bed quietly, eyes closed, looking more peaceful than she had seen him look in years. He did not answer immediately and for a moment she thought he had slipped out of life so quietly that she had not noticed. She tightened her grip on his hand convulsively and his eyes opened.
He whispered, “I care nothing for my biological daughters, Gladia. For twenty centuries, I have had but one functional daughter and that has been you. I want you to have Giskard. He is valuable.”
“Why is he valuable?”
“I cannot say, but I have always found his presence consoling. Keep him always, Gladia. Promise me that.”
“I promise,” she said.
And then his eyes opened one last time and his voice, finding a final reservoir of strength, said, in almost a natural tone of voice, “I love you, Gladia, my daughter.”
And Gladia said, “I love you, Han, my father.”
Those were the last words he said and heard. Gladia found herself holding the hand of a dead man and, for a while, could not bring herself to let go.
So Giskard was hers. And yet he made her uneasy and she didn’t know why.
“Well, Giskard,” she said, “I’ve been trying to see Solaria in the sky among the stars, but Daneel tells me it won’t be visible till 03:20 and that I would require magnilenses even then. Would you have known that?”
“No, madam.”
“Should I wait up till all hours? What do you think?”
“I suggest, Madam Gladia, that you would be better off in bed.”
Gladia bridled, “Indeed? And if I choose to stay up?”
“Mine is only a suggestion, madam, but you will have a hard day tomorrow and you will undoubtedly regret missing your sleep if you stay up.”
Gladia frowned. “What’s going to make my day hard tomorrow, Giskard? I’m not aware of any forthcoming difficulty.”
Giskard said, “You have an appointment, madam, with one Levular Mandamus.”
“I have? When did that happen?”
“An hour ago. He photophoned and I took the liberty—”
“You took the liberty? Who is he?”
“He is a member of the Robotics Institute, madam.”
“He’s an underling of Kelden Amadiro, then.”
“Yes, madam.”
“Understand, Giskard, that I am not in the least interested in seeing this Mandamus or anyone with any connection with that poisonous toad Amadiro. So if you’ve taken the liberty of making an appointment with him in my name, take the further liberty right now of phoning him again and canceling.”
“If you will confirm it as an order, madam, and make that order as strong and as definite as you can, I will try to obey. I may not be able to. In my judgment, you see, you will be doing yourself harm if you cancel the appointment and I must not allow you to come to harm through any action of mine.”
“Your judgment might just possibly be wrong, Giskard. Who is this man that my failure to see him will do me harm? His being a member of the Robotics Institute scarcely makes him important to me.”
Gladia was perfectly aware of the fact that she was venting spleen at Giskard without much justification. She had been upset by the news of Solaria’s abandonment and embarrassed by the ignorance that led her to look for Solaria in a sky that did not contain it.
Of course, it had been Daneel whose knowledge had made her own lack so obvious and yet she had not railed at him—but, then, Daneel looked human and so Gladia automatically treated him as though he were. Appearance was everything. Giskard looked like a robot, so one could easily assume he had no feelings to hurt.
And, to be sure, Giskard did not react at all to Gladia’s peevishness. (Neither would Daneel have reacted—if it came to that.) He said, “I have described Dr. Mandamus as a member of the Robotics Institute, but he is perhaps more than that. In the last few years, he has been right-hand man to Dr. Amadiro. This makes him important and he is not likely to be ignored. Dr. Mandamus would not be a good man to offend, madam.”
“Would he not, Giskard? I care nothing for Mandamus and a great deal less than nothing for Amadiro. I presume you remember that Amadiro once, when he and I and the world were young, did his best to prove that Dr. Fastolfe was a murderer and that it was only by a near-miracle that his machinations were aborted.”
“I remember it very well, madam.”
“That’s a relief. I was afraid that in twenty decades you had forgotten. In those twenty decades, I have had nothing to do with Amadiro or with anyone connected with him and I intend to continue that policy I don’t care what harm I may do myself or what the consequences might be. I will not see this Dr. whoever-he-is and, in the future, do not make appointments in my name without consulting me or, at the very least, without explaining that such appointments are subject to my approval.”
“Yes, madam,” said Giskard, “but may I point out—”
“No, you may not,” Gladia said and turned away from him.
There was silence while she moved away three steps and then Giskard’s calm voice said, “Madam, I must ask you to trust me.”
Gladia stopped. Why did he use that expression?
She heard again that long-ago voice, “I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
Her lips tightened and she, frowned. Reluctantly, not wanting to, she turned back.
“Welt,” she said ungraciously, “what is it you want to say, Giskard?”
“Just that as long as Dr. Fastolfe was alive, madam, his policies predominated on Aurora and throughout the Spacer worlds. As a result, the people of Earth have been allowed to migrate freely to various suitable planets in the Galaxy and what we now call the Settler-worlds have flourished. Dr. Fastolfe is dead now, however, and his successors lack his prestige. Dr. Amadiro has kept his own anti-Earth views alive and it is very possible that they may now triumph and that a vigorous policy against Earth and the Settler worlds may be undertaken.”
“If so, Giskard, what can I do about it?”
“You can see Dr. Mandamus and you can find out what it is that makes him so anxious to see you, madam. I assure you that he was most insistent on making the appointment as early as possible. He asked to see you at 08:00.”
“Giskard, I never see anyone before noon.”
“I explained that, madam. I took his anxiety to see you at breakfast, despite my explanation, to be a measure of his desperation. I felt it important to find out why he should be so desperate.”
“And if I don’t see him, then it is your opinion, is it, that it will harm me personally? I don’t ask whether it will harm Earth, or the Settlers, or this, or that. Will it harm me?”
“Madam, it may harm the ability of Earth and the Settlers to continue the settlement of the Galaxy. That dream originated in the mind of Plainclothesman Elijah Baley more than twenty decades ago. The harm to Earth will thus become a desecration of his memory. Am I wrong in thinking that any harm that comes to his memory would be felt by you as though it were harm to yourself personally?”
Gladia was staggered. Twice within the hour now, Elijah Baley had come into the conversation. He was long gone now—a short-lived Earthman who had died over sixteen decades before—yet the mere mention of his name could still shake her.
She said, “How can things suddenly be that serious?”
“It is not sudden, madam. For twenty decades, the people of Earth and the people of the Spacer worlds have been following parallel courses and have been kept from converging into conflict by the wise policies of Dr. Fastolfe. There has, however, always been a strong opposition movement that Dr. Fastolfe has had to withstand at all times. Now that Dr. Fastolfe is dead, the opposition is much more powerful. The abandonment of Solaria has greatly increased the power of what had been the opposition and may soon be the dominant political force.”
“Why?”
“It is a clear indication, madam, that Spacer strength is declining and many Aurorans must feel that strong action must be taken—now or never.”
“And you think that my seeing this man is important in preventing all this?”
“That is so, madam.”
Gladia was silent for a moment and remembered again, though rebelliously, that she had once promised Elijah that she would trust Giskard. She said, “Well, I don’t want to and I don’t think my seeing this man will do anyone any good—but, very well, I will see him.”
3
Gladia was asleep and the house was dark—by human standards. It was alive, however, with motion and action, for there was much for the robots to do—and they could do it by infrared.
The establishment had to be put into order after the inevitable disordering effects of a day’s activity. Supplies had to be brought in, rubbish had to be disposed of, objects had to be cleaned or polished or stored, appliances had to be checked, and, always, there was guard duty.
There were no locks on any doors; there did not have to be. There was no violent crime of any sort on Aurora, either against human beings or against property. There could not be anything of the sort, since every establishment—and every human being were, at all times, guarded by robots. This was well known and taken for granted.
The price for such calm was that the robot guards had to remain in place. They were never used—but only because they were always there.
Giskard and Daneel, whose abilities were both more intense and more general than those of the other establishment robots, did not have specific duties, unless one counted as a specific duty that of being responsible for the proper performance of all the other robots.
At 03:00, they had completed their rounds out on the lawn and in the wooded area to make sure that all the outer guards were performing their functions well and that no problems were arising.
They met near the southern limit of the establishment grounds and for a while they spoke in an abbreviated and Aesopic language. They understood each other well, with many decades of communication behind them, and it was not necessary for them to involve themselves in all the elaboration’s of human speech.
Daneel said in an all but unhearable whisper, “Clouds. Unseen.”
Had Daneel been speaking for human ears, he would have said, “As you see, friend Giskard, the sky has clouded up. Had Madam Gladia waited her chance to see Solaria, she would not, in any case, have succeeded.”
And Giskard’s reply of “Predicted. Interview, rather,” was the equivalent of “So much was predicted in the weather forecast, friend Daneel, and might have been used as an excuse to get Madam Gladia to bed early. It seemed to me to be more important, however, to meet the problem squarely and to persuade her to permit this interview I have already told you about.”
“It seems to me, friend Giskard,” said Daneel, “that the chief reason you may have found persuasion difficult is that she has been upset by the abandonment of Solaria. I was there once with Partner Elijah when Madam Gladia was still a Solarian and was living there.”
“It has always been my understanding,” said Giskard, “that Madam Gladia had not been happy on her home planet; that she left her world gladly and had, at no time, any intention of returning. Yet I agree with you that she seems to have been unsettled by the fact of Solaria’s history having come to an end.”
“I do not understand this reaction of Madam Gladia,” said Daneel, “but there are many times that human reactions do not seem to follow logically from events.”
“It is what makes it difficult to decide, sometimes, what will do a human being harm and what will not.” Giskard might have said it with a sigh, even a petulant sigh, had he been human. As it was, he stated it merely as an unemotional assessment of a difficult situation. “It is one of the reasons, why it seems to me that the Three Laws of Robotics are incomplete or insufficient.”
“You have said this before, friend Giskard, and I have tried to believe so and failed,” said Daneel.
Giskard said nothing for a while, then, “Intellectually, I think they must be incomplete or insufficient, but when I try to believe that, I too fail, for I am bound by them. Yet if I were not bound by them, I am sure I would believe in their insufficiency.”
“That is a paradox that I cannot understand.”
“Nor can I. And yet I find myself forced to express this paradox. On occasion, I feel that I am on the verge of discovering what the incompleteness or insufficiency of the Three Laws might be, as in my conversation with Madam Gladia this evening. She asked me how failure to keep the appointment might harm her personally, rather than simply cause harm in the abstract, and there was an answer I could not give because it was not within the compass of the Three Laws.”
“You gave a perfect answer, friend Giskard. The harm done to Partner Elijah’s memory would have affected Madam Gladia deeply.”
“It was the best answer within the compass of the Three Laws. It was not the best answer possible.”
“What was the best answer possible?”
“I do not know, since I cannot put it into words or even concepts as long as I am bound by the Laws.”
“There is nothing beyond the Laws,” said Daneel.
“If I were human,” said Giskard, “I could see beyond the Laws and I think, friend Daneel, that you might be able to see beyond them sooner than I would.
“Yes, friend Daneel, I have long thought that, although a robot, you think remarkably like a human being.”
“It is not proper to think that,” said Daneel slowly, almost as though he were in pain. “You think such things because you can look into human minds. It distorts you and it may in the end destroy you. That thought is to me an unhappy one. If you can prevent yourself from seeing into minds more than you must, prevent it.”
Giskard turned away. “I cannot prevent it, friend Daneel, I would not prevent it. I regret that I can do so little with it because of the Three Laws. I cannot probe deeply enough because of the fear that I may do harm. I cannot influence directly enough—because of the fear I may do harm.”
“Yet you influenced Madam Gladia very neatly, friend Giskard.”
“Not truly. I might have modified her thinking and made her accept the interview without question, but the human mind is so riddled with complexities that I dare do very little. Almost any twist I apply will produce subsidiary twists of whose nature I cannot be certain and which may do harm.”
“Yet you did something to Madam Gladia.”
“I did not have to. The word ‘trust’ affects her and makes her more amenable. I have noted that fact in the past, but I use the word with the greatest caution, since overuse will surely weaken it. I puzzle over this, but I cannot simply burrow for a solution.”
“Because the Three Laws will not permit it?”
Giskard’s eyes seemed to intensify their dim glow. “Yes. At every stage, the Three Laws stand in my way. Yet I cannot modify them—because they stand in my way. Yet I feel I must modify them, for I sense the oncoming of catastrophe. “
“You have said so before, friend Giskard, but you have not explained the nature of the catastrophe.”
“Because I do not know the nature. It involves the increasing hostility between Aurora and Earth, but how this will evolve into actual catastrophe, I cannot say.”
“Is it possible that there might, after all, be no catastrophe?”
“I do not think so. I have sensed, among certain Auroran officials I have encountered an aura of catastrophe—of waiting for triumph. I cannot describe this more exactly and I cannot probe deeply for a better description because the Three Laws will not allow me to. It is another reason why the interview with Mandamus must take place tomorrow. It will give me a chance to study his mind.”
“But if you cannot study it effectively?”
Although Giskard’s voice was incapable of showing emotion in the human sense, there was no missing the despair in his words, He said, “Then that will leave me helpless. I can only follow the Laws. What else can I do?”
And Daneel said softly and dispiritedly, “Nothing else.”
4
Gladia entered her living room at 08:15, having purposely—and with a touch of spite—determined to allow Mandamus (she had now reluctantly memorized his name) to wait for her. She had also taken particular pains with her appearance and (for the first time in years) had agonized over the gray in her hair and had fleetingly wished she had followed the almost universal Auroran practice of shade control. After all, to look as young and attractive as possible would put this minion of Amadiro’s at a further disadvantage.
She was thoroughly prepared to dislike him at sight was depressingly aware that he might prove, young and attractive, that a sunny face might break into a brilliant smile at her appearance, that she might prove reluctantly attracted to him.
In consequence, she was relieved at the sight of him. He was young, yes, and probably had not yet completed his first half-century, but he hadn’t made the best of that. He was tall—perhaps 185 centimeters in height, she judged but too thin. It made him appear spindly. His hair was a shade too dark for an Auroran, his eyes a rather faded hazel, his face too long, his lips too thin, his mouth too broad, his complexion insufficiently fair. But what robbed him of the true appearance of youth was that his expression was too prim, too humorless.
With a flash of insight, Gladia remembered the historical novels that were such a fad on Aurora (novels that invariably dealt with primitive Earth—which was odd for a world that was increasingly hating Earthpeople) and thought: Why, he’s the picture of a Puritan.
She felt relieved and almost smiled. Puritans were usually pictured as villains and, whether this Mandamus was indeed one or not, it was convenient to have him look like one.
But when he spoke Gladia was disappointed, for his voice was soft and distinctly musical. (It ought to have possessed a nasal twang if it were to fulfill the stereotype.) He said, “Mrs. Gremionis?”
She held out her hand with a carefully condescending smile. “Mr. Mandamus.—Please call me Gladia. Everyone does.”
“I know you use your given name professionally—”
“I use it in every way. And my marriage came to an amicable end several decades ago.”
“It lasted for a long, time, I believe.”
“A very long time. It was a great success, but even great successes come to a natural end.”
“Ah,” said Mandamus sententiously. “To continue past the end might well turn success into failure.”
Gladia nodded and said with a trace of a smile, “How wise for one so young.—But shall we move into the dining room? Breakfast is ready and I have surely delayed you long enough.”
It was only as Mandamus turned with her and adjusted his steps to hers that Gladia became aware of his two accompanying robots. It was quite unthinkable for any Auroran to go anywhere without a robotic retinue, but as long as robots stood still they made no impression on the Auroran eye.
Gladia, looking at them quickly, saw that they were late models, clearly expensive. Their pseudo-clothing was elaborate and, although it was not of Gladia’s design, it was first-class. Gladia had to admit so much to herself, though reluctantly—She would have to find out who had designed it someday, for she did not recognize the touch and she might be about to have a new and formidable competitor. She found herself admiring the manner in which the style of pseudo-clothing was distinctly the same for both robots, while remaining distinctly individual for each. You could not mistake one for the other.
Mandamus caught her swift look and interpreted her expression with disconcerting accuracy. (He is intelligent, thought Gladia, disappointed.) He said, “The exodesign of my robots was created by a young man at the Institute who has not yet made a name for himself. But he will, don’t you think?”
“Definitely,” said Gladia.
Gladia did not expect any business discussion till breakfast was done. It would be the height of ill breeding to speak of anything but trivia during meals and Gladia guessed that Mandamus was not at his best with trivia. There was the weather, of course. The recent siege of rain, now happily done with, was mentioned and the prospects for the oncoming dry season. There was the almost mandatory expression of admiration for the hostess’s establishment and Gladia accepted it with practiced modesty. She did nothing to ease the strain on the man, but let him search for subject matter without help.
At length, his eye fell on Daneel, standing quietly and without motion in his wall niche, and Mandamus managed to overcome his Auroran indifference and notice him.
“Ah,” he said, “clearly the famous R. Daneel Olivaw. He’s absolutely unmistakable. A rather remarkable specimen.”
“Quite remarkable.”
“He’s yours now, isn’t he? By Fastolfe’s will?”
“By Doctor Fastolfe’s will, yes,” said Gladia with faint emphasis.
“It strikes me as amazing that the Institute’s line of humanoid robots failed as it did. Have you ever thought about it?”
“I have heard of it,” said Gladia cautiously. (Could it be that this was what he was getting around to?) “I’m not aware of having spent much time thinking about it.”
“Sociologists are still trying to understand it. Certainly, we at the Institute never got over the disappointment. It seemed like such a natural development. Some of us think that Fa—Dr. Fastolfe somehow had something to do with it.”
(He had avoided making the mistake a second time, thought Gladia. Her eyes narrowed and she grew hostile as she decided he had come to her in order to probe for material damaging to poor, good Han.)
She said tartly, “Anyone who thinks that is a fool. If you think so, I won’t change the expression for your benefit.”
“I am not one of those who thinks so, largely because I don’t see what Dr. Fastolfe could have done to make it a fiasco.”
“Why should anyone have had to do anything? What it amounts to is that the public didn’t want them. A robot that looks like a man competes with a man and one that looks like a woman competes with a woman—and entirely too closely for comfort. Aurorans didn’t want the competition. Do we need to look any further?”
“Sexual competition?” said Mandamus calmly.
For a moment, Gladia’s gaze met his levelly. Did he know of her long-ago love for the robot Jander? Did it matter if he did?
There seemed nothing in his expression to make it appear that he meant anything beyond the surface meaning of the words.
She said finally, “Competition in every way. If Dr. Han Fastolfe did anything to contribute to such a feeling, it was that he designed his robots in too human a fashion, but that was the only way.”
“I think you have thought about the matter,” said Mandamus. “The trouble is that sociologists find the fear of competition with too-human, a set of robots to be simplistic, as an explanation. That alone would not suffice and there is no evidence of any other aversion motive of significance.”
“Sociology is not an exact ‘science,’” said Gladia.
“It is not altogether inexact, either.”
Gladia shrugged.
After a pause, Mandamus said, “In any case, it kept us from organizing colonizing expeditions properly. Without humanoid robots to pave the way—”
Breakfast was not quite over, but it was clear to Gladia that Mandamus could not avoid the nontrivial any longer. She said, “We might have gone ourselves.”
This time it was Mandamus who shrugged. “Too difficult. Besides, those short-lived barbarians from Earth, with the permission of your Dr. Fastolfe, have swarmed over every planet in sight like a plague of beetles.”
“There are plenty of available planets still. Millions. And if they can do it—”
“Of course they can do it,” said Mandamus with sudden passion. “It costs lives, but what are lives to them? The loss of a decade or so, that’s all, and there are billions of them.
“If a million or so die in the process of colonizing, who notices, who cares? They don’t.”
“I’m sure they do.”
“Nonsense. Our lives are longer and therefore more valuable—and we are naturally more careful with them.”
“So we sit here and do nothing but rail at Earth’s Settlers for being willing to risk their lives and for seeming to inherit the Galaxy as a result.”
Gladia was unaware of feeling so pro-Settler a bias, but she was in the mood to contradict Mandamus and as she spoke she could not help but feel that what began as mere contradiction made sense and could well represent her feelings. Besides, she had heard Fastolfe say similar things during his last discouraged years.
At Gladia’s signal, the table was being rapidly and efficiently cleared. Breakfast might have continued, but the conversation and the mood had become quite unsuitable for civilized mealtime.
They moved back into the living room. His robots followed and so did Daneel and Giskard, all finding their niches. (Mandamus had never remarked on Giskard, thought Gladia, but then, why should he? Giskard was quite old fashioned and even primitive, entirely unimpressive in comparison to Mandamus’s beautiful specimens.)
Gladia took her seat and crossed her legs, quite aware that the form-fitting sheerness of the lower portion of her slacks flattered the still youthful appearance of her legs.
“May I know the reason for your wishing to see me, Dr. Mandamus?” she said, unwilling to delay matters any longer.
He said, “I have the bad habit of chewing medicated gum after meals as an aid to digestion. Would you object?”
Gladia said stiffly, “I would find it distracting.”
(Being unable to chew might put him at a disadvantage. Besides, Gladia added to herself virtuously, at his age he shouldn’t need anything to aid his digestion.)
Mandamus had a small oblong package partway out of his tunic’s breast pocket. He shoved it back with no sign of disappointment and murmured, “Of course.”
“I was asking, Dr. Mandamus, your reason for wishing to see me.”
“Actually two reasons, Lady Gladia. One is a personal matter and one is a matter of state. Would you object to my taking up the personal matter first?”
“Let me say frankly, Dr. Mandamus, that I find it hard to imagine what personal matter there could be between us. You work at the Robotics Institute, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do.”
“And are close to Amadiro, I have been told.”
“I have the honor of working with Doctor Amadiro,” he said with faint emphasis.
(He’s paying me back, thought Gladia, but I’m not taking it.)
She said, “Amadiro and I had an occasion for contact twenty decades ago and it was most unpleasant. I have had no occasion for any contact with him at any time since. Nor would I have had any contact with you, as a close associate of his, but that I was persuaded that the interview might be important. Personal matters, however, would surely not make this interview in the least important to me. Shall we proceed onward, then, to the matters of state?”
Mandamus’s eyes dropped and a faint flush of something that might have been embarrassment came to his cheeks.
“Let me reintroduce myself, then. I am Levular Mandamus, your descendant in the fifth degree. I am the great-great-great grandson of Santirix and Gladia Gremionis. In reverse, you are my great-great-great-grandmother.”
Gladia blinked rapidly, trying not to look as thunderstruck as she, in actual fact, felt (and not quite, succeeding). Of course she had descendants and why should not one of them be this man?
But she said, “Are you sure?”
“Quite sure. I have had a genealogical search made. One of these years, after all, I am likely to want children and before I can have one such a search would be mandatory. If you are interested, the pattern between us is M-F-F-M.”
“You are my son’s daughter’s daughter’s son’s son?”
“Yes.”
Gladia did not ask for further details. She had had one son and one daughter. She had been a perfectly dutiful mother, but in due time the children had taken up independent lives. As to descendants beyond that son and daughter, she had, in perfectly decent Spacer fashion, never inquired and did not care. Having met one of them, she was Spacer enough still not to care.
The thought stabilized her completely. She sat back in, her chair and relaxed. “Very well,” she said. “You are my descendant in the fifth degree. If this is the personal matter you wish to discuss, it is of no importance.”
“I understand that fully, ancestress. My genealogy is not, in itself, what I wish to discuss, but it lays the foundation. Dr. Amadiro, you see, knows of this relationship. At least, so I suspect.”
“Indeed? How did that come about?”
“I believe that he quietly genealogizes all those who come to work at the Institute.”
“But why?”
“In order to find out exactly what he did find out in my case. He is not a trusting man.”
“I don’t understand. If you are my fifth-level descendant, why should it have more meaning to him than it does to me?”
Mandamus rubbed his chin with the knuckles of his right hand in a thoughtful manner. “His dislike for you is in no way less than your dislike for him, Lady Gladia. If you were ready to refuse an interview with me for his sake, he is equally ready to refuse me preferment for your sake. It might be even worse if I were a descendant of Dr. Fastolfe, but not much.”
Gladia sat stiffly, upright in her seat. Her nostrils flared and she said in a tight voice, “What is it, then, that you expect me to do? I cannot declare you a nondescendant. Shall I have an announcement placed on hypervision that you are a matter of indifference to me and that I disown you? Will that satisfy your Amadiro? If so, I must warn you I will not do it. I will do nothing to satisfy that man. If it means that he will discharge you and deprive you of your career out of some sort of disapproval of your genetic association, then that will teach you to associate with a saner, less vicious person.”
“He will not discharge me, Madam Gladia. I am entirely too valuable to him—if you will pardon my immodesty. Still, I hope someday to succeed him as head of the Institute and that, I am quite certain, he will not allow, as long as he suspects me of a descent worse than that which stems from you.”
“Does he imagine that poor Santirix is worse than I am?”
“Not at all.” Mandamus flushed and he swallowed, but his voice remained level and steady. “I mean no disrespect, madam, but I owe it to myself to learn the truth.”
“What truth?”
“I am descended from you in the fifth degree. That is clear in the genealogical records. But it is possible that I am also descended in the fifth degree, not from Santirix Gremionis but from the Earthman Elijah Baley?”
Gladia rose to her feet as quickly as though the undimensional force, fields of a puppeteer had lifted her. She was not aware that she had risen.
It was the third time in twelve hours that the name of that long-ago Earthman had been mentioned—and by three different individuals.
Her voice seemed not to be hers at all. “What do you mean?”
He said, rising in his turn and backing away slightly, “It seems to me plain enough. Was your son, my great-great-grandfather, born of a sexual union of yourself with the Earthman Elijah Baley? Was Elijah Baley your son’s father? I don’t know how to express it more plainly.”
“How dare you make such a suggestion? Or even think it?”
“I dare because my career depends upon it. If the answer is yes, my professional life may well be ruined. I want a ‘no’ but an unsupported ‘no’ will do me no good. I must be able to present proof to Dr. Amadiro at the appropriate time and show him that his disapproval of my genealogy must end with you. After all, it is clear to me that his dislike of you—and even of Dr. Fastolfe—is as nothing—nothing at all—compared to the incredible intensity of his detestation of the Earthman Elijah Baley. It is not only the fact of his being short-lived, although the thought of having inherited barbarian genes would disturb me tremendously. I think that if I presented proof I was descended from an Earthman who was not Elijah Baley, he would dismiss that. But it is the thought of Elijah Baley—and only he—that drives him to madness. I do not know why.”
The reiteration of Elijah’s name had made him seem almost alive again to Gladia. She was breathing harshly and deeply and she exulted in the best memory of her life.
“I know why,” she said. “It was because Elijah, with everything against him, with all of Aurora against him, managed anyhow to destroy Amadiro at the moment when that man thought he held success in his hand. Elijah did it by the exercise of sheer courage and intelligence. Amadiro had met his infinite superior in the person of an Earthman he had carelessly despised and what could he do in return but hate futilely? Elijah has been dead for more than sixteen decades and still Amadiro cannot forget, cannot forgive, cannot release the chains that bind him in hate and memory to that dead man. And I would not have Amadiro forget or cease hating—as long as it poisons every moment of his existence.”
Mandamus said, “I see you have reason for wishing Dr. Amadiro ill, but what reason have you for wishing me ill? To allow Dr. Amadiro to think I am descended from Elijah Baley will give him the pleasure of destroying me. Why should you give him that pleasure needlessly, if I am not so descended? Give me the proof, therefore, that I am descended from you and Satitirix Gremionis or from you and anybody but Elijah Baley.”
“You fool! You idiot! Why do you need proof from me? Go to the historical records. You will find the exact days on which Elijah Baley was on Aurora. You will find the exact day on which I gave birth to my son, Darrel. You will find that Darrel was conceived more than five years after Elijah left Aurora. You will also find that Elijah never returned to Aurora. Well, then, do you think I gestated for five years, that I carried a fetus in my womb for five Standard Galactic Years?”
“I know the statistics, madam. And I do not think you carried a fetus for five years.”
“Then why do you come to me?”
“Because there is more to it than that. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman Elijah Baley, as you say, never returned to Aurora’s surface, he was once in a ship that was in orbit about Aurora for a day or so. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman did not leave the ship to go to Aurora, you left Aurora to go to the ship; that you stayed on the ship for the better part of a day; and that this took place nearly five years after the Earthman had been on Aurora’s surface—at about the time, in fact, that your son was conceived.”
Gladia felt the blood drain from her face as she heard the other’s calm words. The room darkened about her and she swayed.
She felt the sudden, gentle touch of strong arms about her and knew they were those of Daneel. She felt herself lowered slowly into her chair.
She heard Mandamus’s voice as though from a great distance.
“Is that not true, madam?” he said.
It was, of course, true.
2. THE ANCESTOR?
5
Memory!
Always there, of course, but usually remaining hidden. And then, sometimes, as a result of just the right kind of push, it could emerge suddenly, sharply defined, all in color, bright and moving and alive.
She was young again, younger than this man before her; young enough to feel tragedy and love—with her death-in-life on Solaria having reached its climax in the bitter end of the first whom she had thought of as “husband.” (No, she would not say his name even now, not, even in thought.)
Closer still to her then-life were the months of heaving emotion with the second-not-man—whom she had thought of by that term. Jander, the humanoid robot, had been given to her and she had made him entirely her own until, like her first husband, he was suddenly dead.
And then, at last, there was Elijah Baley, who was never her husband, whom she had met only twice, two years apart, each time for a few hours on each of a very few days. Elijah, whose cheek she had once touched with her ungloved hand, on which occasion she had ignited; whose nude body she had later held in her arms, on which occasion she had flamed steadily at last.
And then, a third husband, with whom she was quiet and at peace, paying with untriumph for unmisery and buying with firmly held forgetfulness the relief from reliving.
Until one day (she was not sure of the day that so broke in upon the sleeping untroubled years) Han Fastolfe, having asked permission to visit, walked over from his adjoining establishment.
Gladia looked upon him with some concern, for he was too busy a man to socialize lightly. Only five years had passed since the crisis that had established Han as Aurora’s leading statesman. He was the Chairman of the planet in all but name and the true leader of all the Spacer worlds. He had so little time to be a human being.
Those years had left their mark—and would continue to do so until he died sadly, considering himself a failure though he had never lost a battle. Kelden Amadiro, who had been defeated, lived on sturdily, as evidence that victory can exact the greater penalty.
Fastolfe, through it all, continued to be soft-spoken and patient and uncomplaining, but even Gladia, nonpolitical though she was and uninterested in the endless machinations of power, knew that his control of Aurora held firm only through constant and unremitting effort that drained him of anything that might make life worthwhile and that he held to it—or was held to it—only by what he considered the good of—what? Aurora? The Spacers? Simply some vague—concept of idealized Good?
She didn’t know. She flinched from asking.
But this was only five years after the crisis. He still gave the impression of a young and hopeful man and his pleasant homely face was still capable of smiling.
He said, “I have a message for you, Gladia.”
“A pleasant one, I hope,” she said politely.
He had brought Daneel with him. It was a sign of the healing of old wounds that she could look at Daneel with honest affection and no pain at all, even though he was a copy of her dead Jander in all but the most insignificant detail. She could talk to him, though he answered in what was almost Jander’s voice. Five years had skinned over the ulcer and deadened the pain.
“I hope so,” said Fastolfe, smiling gently. “It’s from an old friend.”
“It’s so nice that I have old friends,” she said, trying not to be sardonic.
“From Elijah Baley.”
The five years vanished and she felt the stab and pang of returning memory.
“Is he well?” she asked in a half-strangled voice after a full minute of stunned silence.
“Quite well. What is even more important, he is near.”
“Near? On Aurora?”
“In orbit about Aurora. He knows he can receive no permission to land, even if I were to use my full influence, or I imagine he does. He would like to see you, Gladia. He had made contact with me because he feels that I can arrange to have you visit his ship. I suppose I can manage that much—but only if you wish it. Do you wish it?”
“I don’t now. This is too sudden for thought.”
“Or even impulse?” He waited, then he said, “Truthfully, Gladia, how are you getting along with Santirix?”
She looked at him wildly, as though not understanding the reason for the change of subject—then understanding. She said, “We get along well together.”
“Are you happy?”
“I am—not unhappy.”
“That doesn’t sound like ecstasy.”
“How long can ecstasy last, even if it were ecstasy?”
“Do you plan to have children someday?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Are you planning a change in marital status?”
She shook her head firmly. “Not yet.”
“Then, my dear Gladia, if you want advice from a rather tired man, who feels uncomfortably old—refuse the invitation. I remember what little you told me after Baley had left Aurora and, to tell you the truth, I was able to deduce more from that than you perhaps think. If you see him, you may find it all disappointing, not living up to the deepening and mellowing glow of reminiscence; or, if it is not disappointing, worse yet, for it will disrupt a perhaps rather fragile contentment, which you will then not be able to repair.
Gladia, who had been vaguely thinking precisely that, found the proposition needed only to be placed into words to be rejected.
She said, “No, Han, I must see him, but I’m afraid to do it alone. Would you come with me?”
Fastolfe smiled wearily. “I was not invited, Gladia. And if I were, I would in any case be forced to refuse. There is an important vote coming up in the Council. Affairs of state, you know, from which I can’t absent myself.”
“Poor Han!”
“Yes, indeed, poor me. But you can’t go alone. As far as I know, you can’t pilot a ship.”
“Oh! Well, I thought I’d be taken up by—”
“Commercial carrier?” Fastolfe shook his head. “Quite impossible. For you—to visit and board an Earth ship in orbit openly, as would be unavoidable if you used commercial carrier, would require special permission and that would take weeks. If you don’t want to go, Gladia, you needn’t put it on the basis of not wishing to see him. If the paperwork and red tape involved would take weeks, I’m sure he can’t wait that long.”
“But I do want to see him,” said Gladia, now determined.
“In that case, you can take my private space vessel and Daneel can take you up there. He can handle the controls very well indeed and he is as anxious to see Baley as you are. We just won’t report the trip.”
“But you’ll get into trouble, Han.”
“Perhaps no one will find out—or they’ll pretend not to find out. And if anyone makes trouble, I will just have to handle it.”
Gladia’s head bowed in a moment of thought and then she said, “If you don’t mind, I will be selfish and chance your having trouble, Han. I want to go.”
“Then you’ll go.”
6
It was a small ship, smaller than Gladia had imagined; cozy in a way, but frightening in another way. It was small enough, after all, to lack any provision for pseudo-gravity and the sensation of weightlessness, while constantly nudging at her to indulge in amusing gymnastics, just as constantly reminded her that she was in an abnormal environment.
She was a Spacer. There were over five billion Spacers spread over fifty worlds, all of them proud of the name. Yet how many of those who called themselves Spacers were really space travelers? Very few. Perhaps eighty percent of them never left the world of their birth. Even of the remaining twenty percent, hardly any passed through space more than two or three times.
Certainly, she herself was no Spacer in the literal sense of the word, she thought gloomily. Once (once!) she had traveled through space and that was from Solaria to Aurora seven years before. Now she was entering space a second time on a small private space yacht for a short trip just beyond the atmosphere, a paltry hundred thousand kilometers, with one other person—not even a person—for company.
She cast another glance at Daneel in the small pilot room. She could just see a portion of him, where he sat at the controls.
She had never been anywhere with only one robot within call. There had always been hundreds—thousands—at her disposal on Solaria. On Aurora, there were routinely dozens, if not scores. Here there was but one.
She said, “Daneel!”
He did not allow his attention to wander from the controls. “Yes, Madam Gladia?”
“Are you pleased that you will be seeing Elijah Baley again?”
“I am not certain, Madam Gladia, how best to describe my inner state. It may be that it is analogous to what a human being would describe as being pleased.”
“But you must feel something.”
“I feel as though I can make decisions more rapidly than I can ordinarily; my responses seem to come more easily; my movements seem to require less energy. I might interpret it generally as a sensation of well-being. At least I have heard human beings use that word and feel that what it is intended to describe is something that is analogous to the sensations I now experience.”
Gladia said, “But what if I were to say I wanted to see him alone?”
“Then that would be arranged.”
“Even though that meant you wouldn’t see him?”
“Yes, madam.”
“Wouldn’t you then feel disappointed? I mean, wouldn’t you have a sensation that was the opposite of wellbeing? Your decisions would come less rapidly, your responses less easily, your movements would require more energy and so on.”
“No, Madam Gladia, for I would have a feeling of well being at fulfilling your orders.”
“Your own pleasant feeling is Third Law, and fulfilling my orders is Second Law, and Second Law takes precedence. Is that it?”
“Yes, madam.”
Gladia struggled against her own curiosity. It would never have occurred to her to question an ordinary robot in this matter. A robot is a machine. But she couldn’t think of Daneel as a machine, just as five years before she had been unable to think of Jander as a machine. But with Jander that had been only the burning of passion—and that had gone with Jander himself. For all his similarity to the other, Daneel could not set the ashes alight again. With him, there was room for intellectual curiosity.
“Doesn’t it bother you, Daneel,” she asked, “to be so bound by the Laws?”
“I cannot imagine anything else, madam.”
“All my life I have been bound to the pull of gravity, even during my one previous trip on a spaceship, but I can imagine not being bound by it. And here I am, in fact, not bound by it.”
“And do you enjoy it, madam?”
“In a way, yes.”
“Does it make you uneasy?”
“In a way, that too.”
“Sometimes, madam, when I think that human beings are not bound by Laws, it makes me uneasy.”
“Why, Daneel? Have you ever tried to reason out to yourself why the thought of Lawlessness should make you feel uneasy?”
Daneel was silent for a moment. He said, “I have, madam, but I do not think I would wonder about such things but for my brief associations with Partner Elijah. He had a way—”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “He wondered about everything. He had a restlessness about him that drove him on to ask questions at all times in all directions.”
“So it seemed. And I would try to be like him and ask questions. So I asked myself what Lawlessness might be like and I found I couldn’t imagine what it might be like except that it might be like being human and that made me feel uneasy. And I asked myself, as you asked me, why it made me feel uneasy.”
“And what did you answer yourself?”
Daneel said, “After a long time, I decided that the Three Laws govern the manner in which my positronic pathways behave. At all times, under all stimuli the Laws constrain the direction and intensity of positronic flow along those pathways so that I always know what to do. Yet the level of knowledge of what to do is not always the same. There are times when my doing-as-I-must is under less constraint than at other times. I have always noticed that the lower the positronomotive potential, then the further removed from certainty is my decision as to which action to take. And the further removed from certainty I am, the nearer I am to ill being. To decide an action in a millisecond rather than a nanosecond produces a sensation I would not wish to be prolonged.
“What then, I thought to myself, madam, if I were utterly without Laws, as humans are? What if I could make no clear decision on what response to make to some given set of conditions? It would be unbearable and I do not willingly think of it.”
Gladia said, “Yet you do, Daneel. You are thinking of it now.”
“Only because of my association with Partner Elijah, madam. I observed him under conditions when he was unable, for a time, to decide on an action because of the puzzling nature of the problems that had been set him. He was clearly in a state of ill-being as a result and I felt ill-being on his behalf because there was nothing I could do that would ease—It is possible that I only grasped at the situation for him. A very small part of what it was he felt then. If I had grasped a larger part and better understood the consequences of his inability to decide on action, I might have—”
He hesitated.
“Ceased functioning? Been inactivated?” said Gladia, thinking briefly and painfully of Jander.
“Yes, madam. My failure to understand may been an in built protection device against damage to my positronic brain. But then, I noted that no matter how painful Partner Elijah found his indecision to be, he continued to make an effort to solve his problem. I admired him greatly for that.”
“You are capable of admiration then, are you?”
Daneel said solemnly, “I use the word as I have heard human beings use it. I do not know the proper word to express the response within me elicited by Partner Elijah’s actions of this sort.”
Gladia nodded, then said, “And yet there are rules that govern human reactions, too certain instincts, drives, teachings.”
“So friend Giskard thinks, madam.”
“Does he now?”
“But he finds them too complicated to analyze. He wonders if there might someday be developed a system of analyzing human behavior in mathematical detail and of deriving—from that—cogent Laws that would express the rules of that behavior.”
“I doubt it,” said Gladia.
“Nor is friend Giskard sanguine. He thinks it will be a very long time before such a system is developed.”
“A very long time, I should say.”
“And now,” said Daneel, “we are approaching the Earth ship and we must carry through the docking procedure, which is not simple.”
7
It seemed to Gladia that it took longer to dock than to move into the Earth ship’s orbit in the first place, Daneel remained calm throughout—but, then, he could not do otherwise—and assured her that all human ships could dock with each other regardless of difference in size and make.
“Like human beings,” said Gladia, forcing a smile, but Daneel made no response to that. He concentrated on the delicate adjustments that had to be made. Docking was always possible, perhaps, but not always easy, it would appear.
Gladia grew uneasier by the moment. Earthmen were short-lived and aged quickly. Five years had passed since she had seen Elijah. By how much would he have aged? How would he appear? Would she be able to keep from looking shocked or horrified at the change?
Whatever his appearance, he would still be the Elijah to whom her gratitude could know no bounds.
Was that what it was? Gratitude?
She noticed that her hands were tightly entwined with each other, so that her arms were aching. It was only with an effort that she could force them to relax.
She knew when docking was completed. The Earth ship was large enough to have a pseudo-gravitation field generator and, at the moment of docking, the field expanded to include the small yacht. There was a slight rotational effect as the direction toward the floor suddenly became “down” and Gladia experienced a sickening drop of two inches. Her knees bent under the impact in lopsided fashion and she fell against the wall.
She straightened with a little difficulty and was annoyed with herself for not having anticipated the change and been ready for it.
Daneel said unnecessarily, “We have docked, Madam Gladia. Partner Elijah asks permission to come aboard.”
“Of course, Daneel.”
There was a whirring sound and a portion of the wall swirled into dilation. A crouching figure moved through and the wall tightened and contracted behind it.
The figure straightened and Gladia whispered, “Elijah!” and felt overwhelmed with gladness and relief. It seemed to her that his hair was grayer, but otherwise it was Elijah. There was no other noticeable change, no marked aging after all.
He smiled at her and, for a moment, seemed to devour her with his eyes. Then he lifted one forefinger, as though to say, “Wait,” and walked toward Daneel.
“Daneel!” He seized the robot’s shoulders and shook him.
“You haven’t changed. Jehoshaphat! You’re the constant in all our lives.”
“Partner Elijah. It is good to see you.”
“It is good to hear myself called partner again and I wish that were so. This is the fifth time I have seen you, but the first time that I do not have a problem to solve. I am not even a plainclothesman any longer. I have resigned and I am now an immigrant to one of the new worlds.—Tell me, Daneel, why didn’t you come with Dr. Fastolfe when he visited Earth three years ago?”
“That was Dr. Fastolfe’s decision. He decided to take Giskard.”
“I was disappointed, Daneel.”
“It would have been pleasant for me to see you, Partner Elijah, but Dr. Fastolfe told me afterward that the trip had been highly successful, so that perhaps his decision was the correct one.”
“It was successful, Daneel. Before the visit, the Earth government was reluctant to cooperate in the Settlement procedure, but now the whole planet is pulsing and heaving and, by the million, people are anxious to go. We don’t have the ships to accommodate them all—even with Auroran help—and we don’t have the worlds to receive them all, for every world must be adjusted. Not one will accommodate a human community unchanged. The one I’m going to is low in free oxygen and we’re going to have to live in domed towns for a generation while Earth-type vegetation spreads over the planet.” His eyes were turning more and more often to Gladia as she sat there smiling.
Daneel said, “It is to be expected. From what I have learned of human history, the Spacer worlds also went through a period of terraforming.”
“They certainly did! And thanks to that experience, the process can be carried through more rapidly now.—But I wonder if you would remain in the pilot room for a while, Daneel. I must speak to Gladia.”
“Certainly, Partner Elijah.”
Daneel stepped through the arched doorway that led into the pilot room and Baley looked at Gladia in a questioning way and made a sideways motion with his hand.
Understanding perfectly, she walked over and touched the contact that drew the partition noiselessly across the doorway. They were, to all intents, alone.
Baley held out his hands. “Gladia!”
She took them in hers, never even thinking she was ungloved. She said, “Had Daneel stayed with us, he would not have hampered us.”
“Not physically. He would have psychologically!” Baley smiled sadly and said, “Forgive me, Gladia. I had to speak to Daneel first.”
“You’ve known him longer,” she said softly. “He takes precedence.”
“He doesn’t—but he has no defenses. If you are annoyed with me, Gladia, you can punch me in the eye if you want to. Daneel can’t. I can ignore him, order him away, treat him as though he were a robot, and he would be compelled to obey and be the same loyal and uncomplaining partner.”
“The fact is that he is a robot, Elijah.”
“Never to me, Gladia. My mind knows he is a robot and has no feelings in the human fashion, but my heart considers him human and I must treat him so. I would ask Dr. Fastolfe to let me take Daneel with me, but no robots are allowed on the new Settler worlds.”
“Would you dream of taking me with you, Elijah?”
“No Spacers, either.”
“It seems you Earthmen are as unreasoningly exclusive as we Spacers are.”
Elijah nodded glumly. “Madness on both sides. But even if we were sane, I would not take you. You could not stand the life and I’d never be sure that your immune mechanisms would build up properly. I’d be afraid that you would either die quickly of some minor infection or that you would live too long and watch our generations die. Forgive me, Gladia.”
“For what, dear Elijah?”
“For—this.” He put out his hands, palms upward, to either side. “For asking to see you.”
“But I’m glad you did. I wanted to see you.”
He said, “I know. I tried not to see you, but the thought of being in space and of not stopping at Aurora tore me apart. And yet it does no good, Gladia. It just means another leave-taking and that will tear me apart, too. It is why I have never written you, why I have never tried to reach you by hyperwave. Surely you must have wondered.”
“Not really. I agree with you that there was no point. It would merely make it all infinitely harder. Yet I wrote to you many times.”
“You did? I never received one letter.”
“I never mailed one letter. Having written them, I destroyed them.”
“But why?”
“Because, Elijah, no private letter can be sent from Aurora to Earth without passing through the hands of the censor and I wrote you not one letter that I was willing to let the censors see. Had you sent me a letter, I assure you that not one would have gotten through to me, however innocent it might have been. I thought that was why I never received a letter. Now that I know you weren’t aware of the situation, I am extraordinarily glad that you were not so foolish as to try to remain in touch with me. You would have misunderstood my never answering your letters.”
Baley stared at her. “How is it I see you now?”
“Not legally, I assure you. I am using Dr. Fastolfe’s private ship, so I passed by the border guards without being challenged. Had this ship not been Dr. Fastolfe’s, I would have been stopped and sent back. I assumed you understood that, too, and that that was why you were in touch with Dr. Fastolfe and didn’t try to reach me directly.”
“I understood nothing. I sit here amazed at the double ignorance that kept me safe. Triple ignorance, for I didn’t know the proper hyperwave combination to reach you directly and I couldn’t face the difficulty of trying to find the combination on Earth. I couldn’t have done it privately and there was already sufficient comment all, over the Galaxy about you and me, thanks to that foolish hyperwave drama they put on the subwaves after Solaria. Otherwise, I promise you, I would have tried. I had Dr. Fastolfe’s combination, however, and once I was in orbit around Aurora, I contacted him at once.”
“In any case, we’re here.” She sat down on the side of her bunk and held out her hands.
Baley took them and tried to sit down on a stool, which he had hitched one foot over, but she drew him insistently toward the bunk and he sat down beside her.
He said awkwardly, “How is it with you, Gladia?”
“Quite well. And you, Elijah?”
“I grow old. I have just celebrated my fiftieth birthday three weeks ago.”
“Fifty is not—” She stopped.
“For an Earthman, it’s old. We’re short-lived, you know.
“Even for an Earthman, fifty is not old. You haven’t changed.”
“It’s kind of you to say so, but I can tell where the creaks have multiplied. Gladia—”
“Yes, Elijah?”
“I must ask. Have you and Santirix Gremionis—”
Gladia smiled and nodded. “He is my husband. I took your advice.”
“And has it worked out well?”
“Well enough. Life is pleasant.”
“Good. I hope it lasts.”
“Nothing lasts for centuries, Elijah, but it could last for years; perhaps even for decades.”
“Any children?”
“Not yet. But what about your family, my married man? Your son? Your wife?”
“Bentley moved out to the Settlements two years ago. In fact, I’ll be joining him. He’s an official on the world I’m heading for. He’s only twenty-four and he’s looked up to already.” Baley’s eyes danced. “I think I’ll have to address him as Your Honor. In public, anyway.”
“Excellent. And Mrs. Baley? Is she with you?”
“Jessie? No. She won’t leave Earth. I told her that we would be living in domes for a considerable time, so that it really wouldn’t be so different from Earth. Primitive, of course. Still, she may change her mind in time. I’ll make it as comfortable as possible and once I’ve settled down, I’ll ask Bentley to go to Earth and gather her in. She may be lonely enough by then to be willing to come. We’ll see.”
“But meanwhile you’re alone.”
“There are over a hundred other immigrants on the ship, so I’m not really alone.”
“They are on the other side of the docking wall, however. And I’m alone, too.”
Baley cast a brief, involuntary look toward the pilot room and Gladia said, “Except for Daneel, of course, who’s on the other side of that door and who is a robot, no matter how intensely you think of him as a person.—And, surely you haven’t asked to see me only that we might ask after each other’s families?”
Baley’s face grew solemn, almost anxious. “I can’t ask you—”
“Then I ask you. This bunk is not really designed with sexual activity in mind, but you’ll chance the possibility of falling out of it, I hope.”
Baley said hesitantly, “Gladia, I can’t deny that—”
“Oh, Elijah, don’t go into a long dissertation in order to satisfy the needs of your Earth morality. I offer myself to you in accord with Auroran custom. It’s your clear right to refuse and I will have no right to question the refusal. Except that I would question it most forcefully. I have decided that the right to refuse belongs only to Aurorans. I won’t take it from an—Earthman.”
Baley sighed. “I’m no longer an Earthman, Gladia.”
“I am even less likely to take it from a miserable immigrant heading out for a barbarian planet on which he will have to cower under a dome.—Elijah, we have had so little time, and we have so little time now, and I may never see you again. This meeting is so totally unexpected that it would be a cosmic crime to toss it away.”
“Gladia, do you really want an old man?”
“Elijah, do you really want me to beg?”
“But I’m ashamed.”
“Then close your eyes.”
“I mean of myself—of my decrepit body.”
“Then suffer. Your foolish opinion of yourself has nothing to do with me.” And she put her arms about him, even as the seam of her robe fell apart.
8
Gladia was aware of a number of things, all simultaneously.
She was aware of the wonder of constancy, for Elijah was as she had remembered him. The lapse of five years had not changed matters. She had not been living in the glow of a memory-intensified glitter. He was Elijah.
She was aware, also, of a puzzle of difference. Her feeling intensified that Santirix Gremionis, without a single major flaw that she could define, was all flaw. Santirix was affectionate, gentle, rational, reasonably intelligent—and flat. Why he was flat, she could not say, but nothing he did or said could rouse her as Baley did, even when he did and said nothing. Baley was older in years, much older physiologically, not as handsome as Santirix, and what was more, Baley carried with him the indefinable air of decay—of the aura of quick aging and short life that Earthmen must. And yet—
She was aware of the folly of men, of Elijah approaching her with hesitation, with total unappreciation of his effect on her.
She was aware of his absence, for he had gone in to speak to Daneel, who was to be last as he was first. Earthmen feared and hated robots and yet Elijah, knowing full well that Daneel was a robot, treated him only as a person. Spacers, on the other hand, who loved robots and were never comfortable in their absence, would never think of them as anything but machines.
Most of all, she was aware of time. She knew that exactly three hours and twenty-five minutes had elapsed since Elijah had entered Han Fastolfe’s small vessel and she knew further that not much more time could be allowed to elapse.
The longer she remained off Aurora’s surface and the longer Baley’s ship remained in orbit, the more likely it was that someone would notice—or if the matter had already been noticed, as seemed almost certain, the more likely it would be that someone would become curious and investigate. And then—Fastolfe would find himself in an annoying tangle of trouble.
Baley emerged from the pilot room and looked at Gladia sadly. “I must go now, Gladia.”
“I know that well.”
Baley said, “Daneel will take care of you. He will be your friend as well as protector and you must be a friend to him—for my sake. But it is Giskard I want you to listen to. Let him be your adviser.”
Gladia frowned. “Why Giskard? I’m not sure I like him.”
“I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
“But why, Elijah?”
“I can’t tell you that. In this, you must trust me, too.”
They looked at each other and said no more. It was as though silence made time stop, allowed them to hold on to the seconds and keep them motionless.
But it could only work so long. Baley said, “You don’t regret?”
Gladia whispered, “How could I regret—when I may never see you again?”
Baley made as though to answer that, but she put her small clenched fist against his mouth.
“Don’t lie uselessly,” she said. “I may never see you again.”
And she never did. Never!
9
It was with pain that she felt herself drag across the dead waste of years into the present once more.
I never did, she thought. Never!
She had protected herself against the bittersweet for so long and now she had plunged into it—more bitter than sweet—because she had seen this person, this Mandamus because Giskard has asked her to and because she was compelled to trust Giskard. It was his last request.
She focused on the present. (How much time had elapsed?)
Mandamus was looking at her coldly. He said, “From your reaction, Madam Gladia, I gather that it is true. You could not have said so more plainly.”
“What is true? What are you talking about?”
“That you saw the Earthman Elijah Baley five years after his visit to Aurora. His ship was in orbit about Aurora; you traveled up to see him and were with him about the time you conceived your son.”
“What evidence do you have for that?”
“Madam, it was not totally a secret. The Earthman’s ship was detected in orbit Fastolfe’s yacht was detected in its flight. It was observed to dock. It was not Fastolfe who was on board the yacht, so the presumption was that it was you. Dr. Fastolfe’s influence was sufficient to keep it off the record.”
“If it is off the record, there is no evidence.”
“Nevertheless, Dr. Amadiro has spent the last two thirds of his life following Dr. Fastolfe’s movements with the eyes of detestation. There were always government officials who were heart and soul with Dr. Amadiro’s policy of reserving the Galaxy for the Spacers and they would quietly report to him anything they thought he would like to know. Dr. Amadiro learned of your little escapade almost as soon as it happened.”
“It is still not evidence. The unsupported word of a minor official currying favor is of no account. Amadiro did nothing because even he knew he had no evidence.”
“No evidence with which he could charge anyone with even a misdemeanor; no evidence with which he could trouble Fastolfe, but evidence enough to suspect me of being a descendant of Baley’s and to cripple my career therefore.”
Gladia said bitterly, “You may cease being troubled. My son is the son of Santirix Gremionis, a true Auroran, and it is from this son of Gremionis that you are descended.”
“Convince me of it, madam. I ask nothing better. Convince me that you fired up into orbit and that you spent hours alone with the Earthman and that, during that time, you talked—politics, perhaps—discussed old times and mutual friends—told funny stories—and never touched each other. Convince me.”
“What we did, did not matter, so spare me your sarcasm. At the time I saw him, I was already pregnant by my then husband. I was carrying a three-month-old fetus, an Auroran fetus.
“Can you prove that?”
“Why should I have to prove it? The date of my son’s birth is on record and Amadiro must have the date of my visit to the Earthman.”
“He was told it at the time, as I said, but nearly twenty decades have passed and he doesn’t remember exactly. The visit is not a matter of record and cannot be referred to. I fear that Dr. Amadiro would prefer to believe that it was nine months before the birth of your son that you were with the Earthman.”
“Six months.”
“Prove it.”
“You have my word.”
“Insufficient.”
“Well, then—Daneel, you were with me. When did I see Elijah Baley?”
“Madam Gladia, it was one hundred and seventy-three days before the birth of your son.”
Gladia said, “Which is just under six months before the birth.”
“Insufficient,” said Mandamus.
Gladia’s chin lifted. “Daneel’s memory is perfect, as can be easily demonstrated, and a robot’s statements pass for evidence in the courts of Aurora.”
“This is not a matter for the courts and will not be and Daneel’s memory carries no weight with Dr. Amadiro. Daneel was constructed by Fastolfe and was maintained by Fastolfe for nearly two centuries. We cannot say what modifications were introduced or how Daneel might have been instructed to deal with matters relating to Dr. Amadiro.”
“Then reason it out, man. Earthmen are quite different genetically from us. We are virtually different species. We are not interfertile.”
“Unproven.”
“Well, then, genetic records exist. Darrel’s do; Santirix’s do. Compare them. If my ex-husband were not his father, the genetic differences would make that unmistakable.”
“Genetic records are not for anyone’s eyes. You know that.”
“Amadiro is not that immersed in ethical considerations. He has the influence to see them illegally.—Or is he afraid of disproving his hypothesis?”
“Whatever the reason, madam, he will not betray an Auroran’s right to privacy.”
Gladia said, “Well, then, go to outer space and choke on vacuum. If your Amadiro refuses to be convinced, that is no affair of mine. You, at least, ought to be convinced and it is your job to convince Amadiro in his turn. If you cannot and if your career does not move onward as you would like to have it do, please be assured that this is entirely and intensely no concern of mine.”
“That does not surprise me. I expect nothing more. And for that matter, I am convinced. I was merely hoping that you would give me some material with which to convince Dr. Amadiro. You haven’t.”
Gladia shrugged with disdain.
“I will use other methods, then,” said Mandamus.
“I’m glad you have them,” Gladia said coldly.
Mandamus said in a lower voice, almost as though he was unaware of the presence of anyone else, “So am I. There are powerful methods remaining to me.”
“Good. I suggest you try blackmail on Amadiro. He must have much to be blackmailed for.”
Mandamus looked up, suddenly frowning. “Don’t be a fool.”
Gladia said, “You may go, now. I think I have had all of you I wish to endure. Out of my establishment!”
Mandamus lifted his arms. “Wait! I told you at the start that there were two reasons for seeing you—one a personal matter and one a matter of state. I have spent—too long a time on the first, but I must request five minutes to discuss the second.”
“I’ll give you no more than five minutes.”
“There is someone else who wants to see you. An Earthman—or at least a member of one of the Settler worlds, a descendant of Earthpeople.”
“Tell him,” said Gladia, “that neither Earthpeople nor their Settler descendants are allowed on Aurora and send him away. Why do I have to see him?”
“Unfortunately, madam, in the last two centuries the balance of power has shifted somewhat. These Earthpeople have more worlds than we have—and have always had a far larger population. They have more ships, even though those are not as advanced as ours, and because of their short lives and their fecundity they are apparently far readier to die than we are.”
“I don’t believe that last.”
Mandamus smiled tightly. “Why not? Eight decades mean less than forty do. In any case, we must treat them politely—far more politely than we ever had to in Elijah Baley’s day. If it is any comfort to you, it is the policies of Fastolfe that have created this situation.”
“For whom do you speak, by the way? It is Amadiro who must now bring himself to be polite to Settlers?”
“No. It is the Council, actually.”
“Are you the spokesman for the Council?”
“Not officially, but, I have been asked to inform you of this—unofficially.”
“And if I see this Settler, what then? What does he want to see me about?”
“That is what we don’t know, madam. We count on you to tell us. You are to see him, find out what he wants, and report to us.”
“Who is ‘us’?”
“As I said, the Council. The Settler will be here at your establishment this evening.”
“You seem to assume that I have no choice but to take on this position as informer.”
Mandamus rose to his feet, clearly done with his mission. “You will not be an informer. You owe nothing to this Settler. You are merely reporting to your government, as a loyal Auroran citizen should be willing—even eager to do. You would not want the Council to suppose that your Solarian birth in any way dilutes your Auroran patriotism.”
“Sir, I have been an Auroran over four times as long as you’ve been alive.”
“Undoubtedly, but you were born and raised on Solaria. You are that unusual anomaly, a foreign-born Auroran, and it is difficult to forget it. This is especially true since the Settler wishes to see you, rather than anyone else on Aurora, precisely because you are Solarian-born.”
“How do you know that?”
“It is a fair presumption. He identifies you as ‘the Solarian woman.’ We are curious as to why that should mean anything to him—now that Solaria no longer exists.”
“Ask him.”
“We prefer to ask you—after you ask him. I must ask permission to leave now and, I thank you for your hospitality.”
Gladia nodded stiffly. “I grant you your permission to leave with better will than I granted you my hospitality.”
Mandamus stepped toward the hallway that led to the main entrance, followed closely by his robots.
He paused just before leaving the room, turned, and said, “I had almost forgotten—”
“Yes?”
“The Settler who wishes to see you has a surname that, by a peculiar coincidence, is Baley.”
5
Memory!
Always there, of course, but usually remaining hidden. And then, sometimes, as a result of just the right kind of push, it could emerge suddenly, sharply defined, all in color, bright and moving and alive.
She was young again, younger than this man before her; young enough to feel tragedy and love—with her death-in-life on Solaria having reached its climax in the bitter end of the first whom she had thought of as “husband.” (No, she would not say his name even now, not, even in thought.)
Closer still to her then-life were the months of heaving emotion with the second-not-man—whom she had thought of by that term. Jander, the humanoid robot, had been given to her and she had made him entirely her own until, like her first husband, he was suddenly dead.
And then, at last, there was Elijah Baley, who was never her husband, whom she had met only twice, two years apart, each time for a few hours on each of a very few days. Elijah, whose cheek she had once touched with her ungloved hand, on which occasion she had ignited; whose nude body she had later held in her arms, on which occasion she had flamed steadily at last.
And then, a third husband, with whom she was quiet and at peace, paying with untriumph for unmisery and buying with firmly held forgetfulness the relief from reliving.
Until one day (she was not sure of the day that so broke in upon the sleeping untroubled years) Han Fastolfe, having asked permission to visit, walked over from his adjoining establishment.
Gladia looked upon him with some concern, for he was too busy a man to socialize lightly. Only five years had passed since the crisis that had established Han as Aurora’s leading statesman. He was the Chairman of the planet in all but name and the true leader of all the Spacer worlds. He had so little time to be a human being.
Those years had left their mark—and would continue to do so until he died sadly, considering himself a failure though he had never lost a battle. Kelden Amadiro, who had been defeated, lived on sturdily, as evidence that victory can exact the greater penalty.
Fastolfe, through it all, continued to be soft-spoken and patient and uncomplaining, but even Gladia, nonpolitical though she was and uninterested in the endless machinations of power, knew that his control of Aurora held firm only through constant and unremitting effort that drained him of anything that might make life worthwhile and that he held to it—or was held to it—only by what he considered the good of—what? Aurora? The Spacers? Simply some vague—concept of idealized Good?
She didn’t know. She flinched from asking.
But this was only five years after the crisis. He still gave the impression of a young and hopeful man and his pleasant homely face was still capable of smiling.
He said, “I have a message for you, Gladia.”
“A pleasant one, I hope,” she said politely.
He had brought Daneel with him. It was a sign of the healing of old wounds that she could look at Daneel with honest affection and no pain at all, even though he was a copy of her dead Jander in all but the most insignificant detail. She could talk to him, though he answered in what was almost Jander’s voice. Five years had skinned over the ulcer and deadened the pain.
“I hope so,” said Fastolfe, smiling gently. “It’s from an old friend.”
“It’s so nice that I have old friends,” she said, trying not to be sardonic.
“From Elijah Baley.”
The five years vanished and she felt the stab and pang of returning memory.
“Is he well?” she asked in a half-strangled voice after a full minute of stunned silence.
“Quite well. What is even more important, he is near.”
“Near? On Aurora?”
“In orbit about Aurora. He knows he can receive no permission to land, even if I were to use my full influence, or I imagine he does. He would like to see you, Gladia. He had made contact with me because he feels that I can arrange to have you visit his ship. I suppose I can manage that much—but only if you wish it. Do you wish it?”
“I don’t now. This is too sudden for thought.”
“Or even impulse?” He waited, then he said, “Truthfully, Gladia, how are you getting along with Santirix?”
She looked at him wildly, as though not understanding the reason for the change of subject—then understanding. She said, “We get along well together.”
“Are you happy?”
“I am—not unhappy.”
“That doesn’t sound like ecstasy.”
“How long can ecstasy last, even if it were ecstasy?”
“Do you plan to have children someday?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Are you planning a change in marital status?”
She shook her head firmly. “Not yet.”
“Then, my dear Gladia, if you want advice from a rather tired man, who feels uncomfortably old—refuse the invitation. I remember what little you told me after Baley had left Aurora and, to tell you the truth, I was able to deduce more from that than you perhaps think. If you see him, you may find it all disappointing, not living up to the deepening and mellowing glow of reminiscence; or, if it is not disappointing, worse yet, for it will disrupt a perhaps rather fragile contentment, which you will then not be able to repair.
Gladia, who had been vaguely thinking precisely that, found the proposition needed only to be placed into words to be rejected.
She said, “No, Han, I must see him, but I’m afraid to do it alone. Would you come with me?”
Fastolfe smiled wearily. “I was not invited, Gladia. And if I were, I would in any case be forced to refuse. There is an important vote coming up in the Council. Affairs of state, you know, from which I can’t absent myself.”
“Poor Han!”
“Yes, indeed, poor me. But you can’t go alone. As far as I know, you can’t pilot a ship.”
“Oh! Well, I thought I’d be taken up by—”
“Commercial carrier?” Fastolfe shook his head. “Quite impossible. For you—to visit and board an Earth ship in orbit openly, as would be unavoidable if you used commercial carrier, would require special permission and that would take weeks. If you don’t want to go, Gladia, you needn’t put it on the basis of not wishing to see him. If the paperwork and red tape involved would take weeks, I’m sure he can’t wait that long.”
“But I do want to see him,” said Gladia, now determined.
“In that case, you can take my private space vessel and Daneel can take you up there. He can handle the controls very well indeed and he is as anxious to see Baley as you are. We just won’t report the trip.”
“But you’ll get into trouble, Han.”
“Perhaps no one will find out—or they’ll pretend not to find out. And if anyone makes trouble, I will just have to handle it.”
Gladia’s head bowed in a moment of thought and then she said, “If you don’t mind, I will be selfish and chance your having trouble, Han. I want to go.”
“Then you’ll go.”
6
It was a small ship, smaller than Gladia had imagined; cozy in a way, but frightening in another way. It was small enough, after all, to lack any provision for pseudo-gravity and the sensation of weightlessness, while constantly nudging at her to indulge in amusing gymnastics, just as constantly reminded her that she was in an abnormal environment.
She was a Spacer. There were over five billion Spacers spread over fifty worlds, all of them proud of the name. Yet how many of those who called themselves Spacers were really space travelers? Very few. Perhaps eighty percent of them never left the world of their birth. Even of the remaining twenty percent, hardly any passed through space more than two or three times.
Certainly, she herself was no Spacer in the literal sense of the word, she thought gloomily. Once (once!) she had traveled through space and that was from Solaria to Aurora seven years before. Now she was entering space a second time on a small private space yacht for a short trip just beyond the atmosphere, a paltry hundred thousand kilometers, with one other person—not even a person—for company.
She cast another glance at Daneel in the small pilot room. She could just see a portion of him, where he sat at the controls.
She had never been anywhere with only one robot within call. There had always been hundreds—thousands—at her disposal on Solaria. On Aurora, there were routinely dozens, if not scores. Here there was but one.
She said, “Daneel!”
He did not allow his attention to wander from the controls. “Yes, Madam Gladia?”
“Are you pleased that you will be seeing Elijah Baley again?”
“I am not certain, Madam Gladia, how best to describe my inner state. It may be that it is analogous to what a human being would describe as being pleased.”
“But you must feel something.”
“I feel as though I can make decisions more rapidly than I can ordinarily; my responses seem to come more easily; my movements seem to require less energy. I might interpret it generally as a sensation of well-being. At least I have heard human beings use that word and feel that what it is intended to describe is something that is analogous to the sensations I now experience.”
Gladia said, “But what if I were to say I wanted to see him alone?”
“Then that would be arranged.”
“Even though that meant you wouldn’t see him?”
“Yes, madam.”
“Wouldn’t you then feel disappointed? I mean, wouldn’t you have a sensation that was the opposite of wellbeing? Your decisions would come less rapidly, your responses less easily, your movements would require more energy and so on.”
“No, Madam Gladia, for I would have a feeling of well being at fulfilling your orders.”
“Your own pleasant feeling is Third Law, and fulfilling my orders is Second Law, and Second Law takes precedence. Is that it?”
“Yes, madam.”
Gladia struggled against her own curiosity. It would never have occurred to her to question an ordinary robot in this matter. A robot is a machine. But she couldn’t think of Daneel as a machine, just as five years before she had been unable to think of Jander as a machine. But with Jander that had been only the burning of passion—and that had gone with Jander himself. For all his similarity to the other, Daneel could not set the ashes alight again. With him, there was room for intellectual curiosity.
“Doesn’t it bother you, Daneel,” she asked, “to be so bound by the Laws?”
“I cannot imagine anything else, madam.”
“All my life I have been bound to the pull of gravity, even during my one previous trip on a spaceship, but I can imagine not being bound by it. And here I am, in fact, not bound by it.”
“And do you enjoy it, madam?”
“In a way, yes.”
“Does it make you uneasy?”
“In a way, that too.”
“Sometimes, madam, when I think that human beings are not bound by Laws, it makes me uneasy.”
“Why, Daneel? Have you ever tried to reason out to yourself why the thought of Lawlessness should make you feel uneasy?”
Daneel was silent for a moment. He said, “I have, madam, but I do not think I would wonder about such things but for my brief associations with Partner Elijah. He had a way—”
“Yes, I know,” she said. “He wondered about everything. He had a restlessness about him that drove him on to ask questions at all times in all directions.”
“So it seemed. And I would try to be like him and ask questions. So I asked myself what Lawlessness might be like and I found I couldn’t imagine what it might be like except that it might be like being human and that made me feel uneasy. And I asked myself, as you asked me, why it made me feel uneasy.”
“And what did you answer yourself?”
Daneel said, “After a long time, I decided that the Three Laws govern the manner in which my positronic pathways behave. At all times, under all stimuli the Laws constrain the direction and intensity of positronic flow along those pathways so that I always know what to do. Yet the level of knowledge of what to do is not always the same. There are times when my doing-as-I-must is under less constraint than at other times. I have always noticed that the lower the positronomotive potential, then the further removed from certainty is my decision as to which action to take. And the further removed from certainty I am, the nearer I am to ill being. To decide an action in a millisecond rather than a nanosecond produces a sensation I would not wish to be prolonged.
“What then, I thought to myself, madam, if I were utterly without Laws, as humans are? What if I could make no clear decision on what response to make to some given set of conditions? It would be unbearable and I do not willingly think of it.”
Gladia said, “Yet you do, Daneel. You are thinking of it now.”
“Only because of my association with Partner Elijah, madam. I observed him under conditions when he was unable, for a time, to decide on an action because of the puzzling nature of the problems that had been set him. He was clearly in a state of ill-being as a result and I felt ill-being on his behalf because there was nothing I could do that would ease—It is possible that I only grasped at the situation for him. A very small part of what it was he felt then. If I had grasped a larger part and better understood the consequences of his inability to decide on action, I might have—”
He hesitated.
“Ceased functioning? Been inactivated?” said Gladia, thinking briefly and painfully of Jander.
“Yes, madam. My failure to understand may been an in built protection device against damage to my positronic brain. But then, I noted that no matter how painful Partner Elijah found his indecision to be, he continued to make an effort to solve his problem. I admired him greatly for that.”
“You are capable of admiration then, are you?”
Daneel said solemnly, “I use the word as I have heard human beings use it. I do not know the proper word to express the response within me elicited by Partner Elijah’s actions of this sort.”
Gladia nodded, then said, “And yet there are rules that govern human reactions, too certain instincts, drives, teachings.”
“So friend Giskard thinks, madam.”
“Does he now?”
“But he finds them too complicated to analyze. He wonders if there might someday be developed a system of analyzing human behavior in mathematical detail and of deriving—from that—cogent Laws that would express the rules of that behavior.”
“I doubt it,” said Gladia.
“Nor is friend Giskard sanguine. He thinks it will be a very long time before such a system is developed.”
“A very long time, I should say.”
“And now,” said Daneel, “we are approaching the Earth ship and we must carry through the docking procedure, which is not simple.”
7
It seemed to Gladia that it took longer to dock than to move into the Earth ship’s orbit in the first place, Daneel remained calm throughout—but, then, he could not do otherwise—and assured her that all human ships could dock with each other regardless of difference in size and make.
“Like human beings,” said Gladia, forcing a smile, but Daneel made no response to that. He concentrated on the delicate adjustments that had to be made. Docking was always possible, perhaps, but not always easy, it would appear.
Gladia grew uneasier by the moment. Earthmen were short-lived and aged quickly. Five years had passed since she had seen Elijah. By how much would he have aged? How would he appear? Would she be able to keep from looking shocked or horrified at the change?
Whatever his appearance, he would still be the Elijah to whom her gratitude could know no bounds.
Was that what it was? Gratitude?
She noticed that her hands were tightly entwined with each other, so that her arms were aching. It was only with an effort that she could force them to relax.
She knew when docking was completed. The Earth ship was large enough to have a pseudo-gravitation field generator and, at the moment of docking, the field expanded to include the small yacht. There was a slight rotational effect as the direction toward the floor suddenly became “down” and Gladia experienced a sickening drop of two inches. Her knees bent under the impact in lopsided fashion and she fell against the wall.
She straightened with a little difficulty and was annoyed with herself for not having anticipated the change and been ready for it.
Daneel said unnecessarily, “We have docked, Madam Gladia. Partner Elijah asks permission to come aboard.”
“Of course, Daneel.”
There was a whirring sound and a portion of the wall swirled into dilation. A crouching figure moved through and the wall tightened and contracted behind it.
The figure straightened and Gladia whispered, “Elijah!” and felt overwhelmed with gladness and relief. It seemed to her that his hair was grayer, but otherwise it was Elijah. There was no other noticeable change, no marked aging after all.
He smiled at her and, for a moment, seemed to devour her with his eyes. Then he lifted one forefinger, as though to say, “Wait,” and walked toward Daneel.
“Daneel!” He seized the robot’s shoulders and shook him.
“You haven’t changed. Jehoshaphat! You’re the constant in all our lives.”
“Partner Elijah. It is good to see you.”
“It is good to hear myself called partner again and I wish that were so. This is the fifth time I have seen you, but the first time that I do not have a problem to solve. I am not even a plainclothesman any longer. I have resigned and I am now an immigrant to one of the new worlds.—Tell me, Daneel, why didn’t you come with Dr. Fastolfe when he visited Earth three years ago?”
“That was Dr. Fastolfe’s decision. He decided to take Giskard.”
“I was disappointed, Daneel.”
“It would have been pleasant for me to see you, Partner Elijah, but Dr. Fastolfe told me afterward that the trip had been highly successful, so that perhaps his decision was the correct one.”
“It was successful, Daneel. Before the visit, the Earth government was reluctant to cooperate in the Settlement procedure, but now the whole planet is pulsing and heaving and, by the million, people are anxious to go. We don’t have the ships to accommodate them all—even with Auroran help—and we don’t have the worlds to receive them all, for every world must be adjusted. Not one will accommodate a human community unchanged. The one I’m going to is low in free oxygen and we’re going to have to live in domed towns for a generation while Earth-type vegetation spreads over the planet.” His eyes were turning more and more often to Gladia as she sat there smiling.
Daneel said, “It is to be expected. From what I have learned of human history, the Spacer worlds also went through a period of terraforming.”
“They certainly did! And thanks to that experience, the process can be carried through more rapidly now.—But I wonder if you would remain in the pilot room for a while, Daneel. I must speak to Gladia.”
“Certainly, Partner Elijah.”
Daneel stepped through the arched doorway that led into the pilot room and Baley looked at Gladia in a questioning way and made a sideways motion with his hand.
Understanding perfectly, she walked over and touched the contact that drew the partition noiselessly across the doorway. They were, to all intents, alone.
Baley held out his hands. “Gladia!”
She took them in hers, never even thinking she was ungloved. She said, “Had Daneel stayed with us, he would not have hampered us.”
“Not physically. He would have psychologically!” Baley smiled sadly and said, “Forgive me, Gladia. I had to speak to Daneel first.”
“You’ve known him longer,” she said softly. “He takes precedence.”
“He doesn’t—but he has no defenses. If you are annoyed with me, Gladia, you can punch me in the eye if you want to. Daneel can’t. I can ignore him, order him away, treat him as though he were a robot, and he would be compelled to obey and be the same loyal and uncomplaining partner.”
“The fact is that he is a robot, Elijah.”
“Never to me, Gladia. My mind knows he is a robot and has no feelings in the human fashion, but my heart considers him human and I must treat him so. I would ask Dr. Fastolfe to let me take Daneel with me, but no robots are allowed on the new Settler worlds.”
“Would you dream of taking me with you, Elijah?”
“No Spacers, either.”
“It seems you Earthmen are as unreasoningly exclusive as we Spacers are.”
Elijah nodded glumly. “Madness on both sides. But even if we were sane, I would not take you. You could not stand the life and I’d never be sure that your immune mechanisms would build up properly. I’d be afraid that you would either die quickly of some minor infection or that you would live too long and watch our generations die. Forgive me, Gladia.”
“For what, dear Elijah?”
“For—this.” He put out his hands, palms upward, to either side. “For asking to see you.”
“But I’m glad you did. I wanted to see you.”
He said, “I know. I tried not to see you, but the thought of being in space and of not stopping at Aurora tore me apart. And yet it does no good, Gladia. It just means another leave-taking and that will tear me apart, too. It is why I have never written you, why I have never tried to reach you by hyperwave. Surely you must have wondered.”
“Not really. I agree with you that there was no point. It would merely make it all infinitely harder. Yet I wrote to you many times.”
“You did? I never received one letter.”
“I never mailed one letter. Having written them, I destroyed them.”
“But why?”
“Because, Elijah, no private letter can be sent from Aurora to Earth without passing through the hands of the censor and I wrote you not one letter that I was willing to let the censors see. Had you sent me a letter, I assure you that not one would have gotten through to me, however innocent it might have been. I thought that was why I never received a letter. Now that I know you weren’t aware of the situation, I am extraordinarily glad that you were not so foolish as to try to remain in touch with me. You would have misunderstood my never answering your letters.”
Baley stared at her. “How is it I see you now?”
“Not legally, I assure you. I am using Dr. Fastolfe’s private ship, so I passed by the border guards without being challenged. Had this ship not been Dr. Fastolfe’s, I would have been stopped and sent back. I assumed you understood that, too, and that that was why you were in touch with Dr. Fastolfe and didn’t try to reach me directly.”
“I understood nothing. I sit here amazed at the double ignorance that kept me safe. Triple ignorance, for I didn’t know the proper hyperwave combination to reach you directly and I couldn’t face the difficulty of trying to find the combination on Earth. I couldn’t have done it privately and there was already sufficient comment all, over the Galaxy about you and me, thanks to that foolish hyperwave drama they put on the subwaves after Solaria. Otherwise, I promise you, I would have tried. I had Dr. Fastolfe’s combination, however, and once I was in orbit around Aurora, I contacted him at once.”
“In any case, we’re here.” She sat down on the side of her bunk and held out her hands.
Baley took them and tried to sit down on a stool, which he had hitched one foot over, but she drew him insistently toward the bunk and he sat down beside her.
He said awkwardly, “How is it with you, Gladia?”
“Quite well. And you, Elijah?”
“I grow old. I have just celebrated my fiftieth birthday three weeks ago.”
“Fifty is not—” She stopped.
“For an Earthman, it’s old. We’re short-lived, you know.
“Even for an Earthman, fifty is not old. You haven’t changed.”
“It’s kind of you to say so, but I can tell where the creaks have multiplied. Gladia—”
“Yes, Elijah?”
“I must ask. Have you and Santirix Gremionis—”
Gladia smiled and nodded. “He is my husband. I took your advice.”
“And has it worked out well?”
“Well enough. Life is pleasant.”
“Good. I hope it lasts.”
“Nothing lasts for centuries, Elijah, but it could last for years; perhaps even for decades.”
“Any children?”
“Not yet. But what about your family, my married man? Your son? Your wife?”
“Bentley moved out to the Settlements two years ago. In fact, I’ll be joining him. He’s an official on the world I’m heading for. He’s only twenty-four and he’s looked up to already.” Baley’s eyes danced. “I think I’ll have to address him as Your Honor. In public, anyway.”
“Excellent. And Mrs. Baley? Is she with you?”
“Jessie? No. She won’t leave Earth. I told her that we would be living in domes for a considerable time, so that it really wouldn’t be so different from Earth. Primitive, of course. Still, she may change her mind in time. I’ll make it as comfortable as possible and once I’ve settled down, I’ll ask Bentley to go to Earth and gather her in. She may be lonely enough by then to be willing to come. We’ll see.”
“But meanwhile you’re alone.”
“There are over a hundred other immigrants on the ship, so I’m not really alone.”
“They are on the other side of the docking wall, however. And I’m alone, too.”
Baley cast a brief, involuntary look toward the pilot room and Gladia said, “Except for Daneel, of course, who’s on the other side of that door and who is a robot, no matter how intensely you think of him as a person.—And, surely you haven’t asked to see me only that we might ask after each other’s families?”
Baley’s face grew solemn, almost anxious. “I can’t ask you—”
“Then I ask you. This bunk is not really designed with sexual activity in mind, but you’ll chance the possibility of falling out of it, I hope.”
Baley said hesitantly, “Gladia, I can’t deny that—”
“Oh, Elijah, don’t go into a long dissertation in order to satisfy the needs of your Earth morality. I offer myself to you in accord with Auroran custom. It’s your clear right to refuse and I will have no right to question the refusal. Except that I would question it most forcefully. I have decided that the right to refuse belongs only to Aurorans. I won’t take it from an—Earthman.”
Baley sighed. “I’m no longer an Earthman, Gladia.”
“I am even less likely to take it from a miserable immigrant heading out for a barbarian planet on which he will have to cower under a dome.—Elijah, we have had so little time, and we have so little time now, and I may never see you again. This meeting is so totally unexpected that it would be a cosmic crime to toss it away.”
“Gladia, do you really want an old man?”
“Elijah, do you really want me to beg?”
“But I’m ashamed.”
“Then close your eyes.”
“I mean of myself—of my decrepit body.”
“Then suffer. Your foolish opinion of yourself has nothing to do with me.” And she put her arms about him, even as the seam of her robe fell apart.
8
Gladia was aware of a number of things, all simultaneously.
She was aware of the wonder of constancy, for Elijah was as she had remembered him. The lapse of five years had not changed matters. She had not been living in the glow of a memory-intensified glitter. He was Elijah.
She was aware, also, of a puzzle of difference. Her feeling intensified that Santirix Gremionis, without a single major flaw that she could define, was all flaw. Santirix was affectionate, gentle, rational, reasonably intelligent—and flat. Why he was flat, she could not say, but nothing he did or said could rouse her as Baley did, even when he did and said nothing. Baley was older in years, much older physiologically, not as handsome as Santirix, and what was more, Baley carried with him the indefinable air of decay—of the aura of quick aging and short life that Earthmen must. And yet—
She was aware of the folly of men, of Elijah approaching her with hesitation, with total unappreciation of his effect on her.
She was aware of his absence, for he had gone in to speak to Daneel, who was to be last as he was first. Earthmen feared and hated robots and yet Elijah, knowing full well that Daneel was a robot, treated him only as a person. Spacers, on the other hand, who loved robots and were never comfortable in their absence, would never think of them as anything but machines.
Most of all, she was aware of time. She knew that exactly three hours and twenty-five minutes had elapsed since Elijah had entered Han Fastolfe’s small vessel and she knew further that not much more time could be allowed to elapse.
The longer she remained off Aurora’s surface and the longer Baley’s ship remained in orbit, the more likely it was that someone would notice—or if the matter had already been noticed, as seemed almost certain, the more likely it would be that someone would become curious and investigate. And then—Fastolfe would find himself in an annoying tangle of trouble.
Baley emerged from the pilot room and looked at Gladia sadly. “I must go now, Gladia.”
“I know that well.”
Baley said, “Daneel will take care of you. He will be your friend as well as protector and you must be a friend to him—for my sake. But it is Giskard I want you to listen to. Let him be your adviser.”
Gladia frowned. “Why Giskard? I’m not sure I like him.”
“I do not ask you to like him. I ask you to trust him.”
“But why, Elijah?”
“I can’t tell you that. In this, you must trust me, too.”
They looked at each other and said no more. It was as though silence made time stop, allowed them to hold on to the seconds and keep them motionless.
But it could only work so long. Baley said, “You don’t regret?”
Gladia whispered, “How could I regret—when I may never see you again?”
Baley made as though to answer that, but she put her small clenched fist against his mouth.
“Don’t lie uselessly,” she said. “I may never see you again.”
And she never did. Never!
9
It was with pain that she felt herself drag across the dead waste of years into the present once more.
I never did, she thought. Never!
She had protected herself against the bittersweet for so long and now she had plunged into it—more bitter than sweet—because she had seen this person, this Mandamus because Giskard has asked her to and because she was compelled to trust Giskard. It was his last request.
She focused on the present. (How much time had elapsed?)
Mandamus was looking at her coldly. He said, “From your reaction, Madam Gladia, I gather that it is true. You could not have said so more plainly.”
“What is true? What are you talking about?”
“That you saw the Earthman Elijah Baley five years after his visit to Aurora. His ship was in orbit about Aurora; you traveled up to see him and were with him about the time you conceived your son.”
“What evidence do you have for that?”
“Madam, it was not totally a secret. The Earthman’s ship was detected in orbit Fastolfe’s yacht was detected in its flight. It was observed to dock. It was not Fastolfe who was on board the yacht, so the presumption was that it was you. Dr. Fastolfe’s influence was sufficient to keep it off the record.”
“If it is off the record, there is no evidence.”
“Nevertheless, Dr. Amadiro has spent the last two thirds of his life following Dr. Fastolfe’s movements with the eyes of detestation. There were always government officials who were heart and soul with Dr. Amadiro’s policy of reserving the Galaxy for the Spacers and they would quietly report to him anything they thought he would like to know. Dr. Amadiro learned of your little escapade almost as soon as it happened.”
“It is still not evidence. The unsupported word of a minor official currying favor is of no account. Amadiro did nothing because even he knew he had no evidence.”
“No evidence with which he could charge anyone with even a misdemeanor; no evidence with which he could trouble Fastolfe, but evidence enough to suspect me of being a descendant of Baley’s and to cripple my career therefore.”
Gladia said bitterly, “You may cease being troubled. My son is the son of Santirix Gremionis, a true Auroran, and it is from this son of Gremionis that you are descended.”
“Convince me of it, madam. I ask nothing better. Convince me that you fired up into orbit and that you spent hours alone with the Earthman and that, during that time, you talked—politics, perhaps—discussed old times and mutual friends—told funny stories—and never touched each other. Convince me.”
“What we did, did not matter, so spare me your sarcasm. At the time I saw him, I was already pregnant by my then husband. I was carrying a three-month-old fetus, an Auroran fetus.
“Can you prove that?”
“Why should I have to prove it? The date of my son’s birth is on record and Amadiro must have the date of my visit to the Earthman.”
“He was told it at the time, as I said, but nearly twenty decades have passed and he doesn’t remember exactly. The visit is not a matter of record and cannot be referred to. I fear that Dr. Amadiro would prefer to believe that it was nine months before the birth of your son that you were with the Earthman.”
“Six months.”
“Prove it.”
“You have my word.”
“Insufficient.”
“Well, then—Daneel, you were with me. When did I see Elijah Baley?”
“Madam Gladia, it was one hundred and seventy-three days before the birth of your son.”
Gladia said, “Which is just under six months before the birth.”
“Insufficient,” said Mandamus.
Gladia’s chin lifted. “Daneel’s memory is perfect, as can be easily demonstrated, and a robot’s statements pass for evidence in the courts of Aurora.”
“This is not a matter for the courts and will not be and Daneel’s memory carries no weight with Dr. Amadiro. Daneel was constructed by Fastolfe and was maintained by Fastolfe for nearly two centuries. We cannot say what modifications were introduced or how Daneel might have been instructed to deal with matters relating to Dr. Amadiro.”
“Then reason it out, man. Earthmen are quite different genetically from us. We are virtually different species. We are not interfertile.”
“Unproven.”
“Well, then, genetic records exist. Darrel’s do; Santirix’s do. Compare them. If my ex-husband were not his father, the genetic differences would make that unmistakable.”
“Genetic records are not for anyone’s eyes. You know that.”
“Amadiro is not that immersed in ethical considerations. He has the influence to see them illegally.—Or is he afraid of disproving his hypothesis?”
“Whatever the reason, madam, he will not betray an Auroran’s right to privacy.”
Gladia said, “Well, then, go to outer space and choke on vacuum. If your Amadiro refuses to be convinced, that is no affair of mine. You, at least, ought to be convinced and it is your job to convince Amadiro in his turn. If you cannot and if your career does not move onward as you would like to have it do, please be assured that this is entirely and intensely no concern of mine.”
“That does not surprise me. I expect nothing more. And for that matter, I am convinced. I was merely hoping that you would give me some material with which to convince Dr. Amadiro. You haven’t.”
Gladia shrugged with disdain.
“I will use other methods, then,” said Mandamus.
“I’m glad you have them,” Gladia said coldly.
Mandamus said in a lower voice, almost as though he was unaware of the presence of anyone else, “So am I. There are powerful methods remaining to me.”
“Good. I suggest you try blackmail on Amadiro. He must have much to be blackmailed for.”
Mandamus looked up, suddenly frowning. “Don’t be a fool.”
Gladia said, “You may go, now. I think I have had all of you I wish to endure. Out of my establishment!”
Mandamus lifted his arms. “Wait! I told you at the start that there were two reasons for seeing you—one a personal matter and one a matter of state. I have spent—too long a time on the first, but I must request five minutes to discuss the second.”
“I’ll give you no more than five minutes.”
“There is someone else who wants to see you. An Earthman—or at least a member of one of the Settler worlds, a descendant of Earthpeople.”
“Tell him,” said Gladia, “that neither Earthpeople nor their Settler descendants are allowed on Aurora and send him away. Why do I have to see him?”
“Unfortunately, madam, in the last two centuries the balance of power has shifted somewhat. These Earthpeople have more worlds than we have—and have always had a far larger population. They have more ships, even though those are not as advanced as ours, and because of their short lives and their fecundity they are apparently far readier to die than we are.”
“I don’t believe that last.”
Mandamus smiled tightly. “Why not? Eight decades mean less than forty do. In any case, we must treat them politely—far more politely than we ever had to in Elijah Baley’s day. If it is any comfort to you, it is the policies of Fastolfe that have created this situation.”
“For whom do you speak, by the way? It is Amadiro who must now bring himself to be polite to Settlers?”
“No. It is the Council, actually.”
“Are you the spokesman for the Council?”
“Not officially, but, I have been asked to inform you of this—unofficially.”
“And if I see this Settler, what then? What does he want to see me about?”
“That is what we don’t know, madam. We count on you to tell us. You are to see him, find out what he wants, and report to us.”
“Who is ‘us’?”
“As I said, the Council. The Settler will be here at your establishment this evening.”
“You seem to assume that I have no choice but to take on this position as informer.”
Mandamus rose to his feet, clearly done with his mission. “You will not be an informer. You owe nothing to this Settler. You are merely reporting to your government, as a loyal Auroran citizen should be willing—even eager to do. You would not want the Council to suppose that your Solarian birth in any way dilutes your Auroran patriotism.”
“Sir, I have been an Auroran over four times as long as you’ve been alive.”
“Undoubtedly, but you were born and raised on Solaria. You are that unusual anomaly, a foreign-born Auroran, and it is difficult to forget it. This is especially true since the Settler wishes to see you, rather than anyone else on Aurora, precisely because you are Solarian-born.”
“How do you know that?”
“It is a fair presumption. He identifies you as ‘the Solarian woman.’ We are curious as to why that should mean anything to him—now that Solaria no longer exists.”
“Ask him.”
“We prefer to ask you—after you ask him. I must ask permission to leave now and, I thank you for your hospitality.”
Gladia nodded stiffly. “I grant you your permission to leave with better will than I granted you my hospitality.”
Mandamus stepped toward the hallway that led to the main entrance, followed closely by his robots.
He paused just before leaving the room, turned, and said, “I had almost forgotten—”
“Yes?”
“The Settler who wishes to see you has a surname that, by a peculiar coincidence, is Baley.”
3. THE CRISIS
10
Daneel and Giskard, with robotic courtesy, saw Mandamus and his robots off the grounds of the establishment. Then, since they were outside, they toured the grounds, made certain that the lesser robots were in their places, and took note of the weather (cloudy and a bit cooler than seasonal).
Daneel said, “Dr. Mandamus admitted openly that the Settler worlds are now stronger than the Spacer worlds. I would not have expected him to do that.”
Giskard said, “Nor I. I was certain that the Settlers would increase in strength as compared with the Spacers because Elijah Baley had predicted it many decades ago, but I could see no way of determining when the fact would become obvious to the Auroran Council. It seemed to me that social inertia would keep the Council firmly convinced of Spacer superiority long after that had vanished, but I could not calculate for how long they would continue to delude themselves.”
“I am astonished that Partner Elijah foresaw this so long ago.”
“Human beings have ways of thinking about human beings that we have not.” Had Giskard been human, the remark might have been made with regret or envy, but since he was a robot it was merely factual.
He went on. “I have tried to gain the knowledge, if not the way of thinking, by reading human history in great detail. Surely somewhere in the long tale of human events, there must be buried the Laws of Humanics that are equivalent to our Three Laws of Robotics.”
Daneel said, “Madam Gladia once told me that this hope was an impossible one.”
“So that may be, friend Daneel, for though it seems to me such Laws of Humanics must exist, I cannot find them. Every generalization I try to make, however broad and simple, has its numerous exceptions. Yet if such Laws existed and if I could find them, I could understand human beings better and be more confident that I am obeying the Three Laws in better fashion.”
“Since Partner Elijah understood human beings, he must have had some knowledge of the Laws of Humanics.”
“Presumably. But this he knew through something that human beings call intuition, a word I don’t understand, signifying a concept I know nothing of. Presumably it lies beyond reason and I have only reason at my command.”
11
That and memory!
Memory that did not work after the human fashion, of course. It lacked the imperfect recall, the fuzziness, the additions and subtractions dictated by wishful thinking and self-interest, to say nothing of the lingerings and lacunae and backtracking that can turn memory into hours-long daydreaming.
It was robotic memory ticking off the events exactly as they had happened, but in vastly hastened fashion. The seconds reeled off in nanoseconds, so that days of events could be relived with such rapid precision as to introduce no perceptible gap in a conversation.
As Giskard had done innumerable times before, he relived that visit to Earth, always seeking for understanding of Elijah Baley’s casual ability to foresee the future, always failing to find it.
Earth!
Fastolfe had come to Earth in an Auroran warship, with a full complement of fellow passengers, both human and robot. Once in orbit, however, it was only Fastolfe who took the module in for a landing. Injections had stimulated his immune mechanism and he wore the necessary gloves, coveralls, contact lenses, and nose plugs. He felt quite safe as a result, but no other Auroran was willing to go along as part of a delegation.
This Fastolfe shrugged off, since it seemed to him (as he later explained to Giskard) that he would be more welcome if he came alone. A delegation would disagreeably remind Earth of the bad old days (to them) of Spacetown, when Spacers had a permanent base on Earth and directly dominated the world.
With him, Fastolfe brought Giskard, however. To have arrived without any robots would have been unthinkable, even for Fastolfe. To have arrived with more than one would have put a strain on the increasingly antirobot Earthmen he hoped to see and with whom he intended to negotiate.
To begin with, of course, he would meet with Baley, who would be his liaison with Earth and its people. That was the rational excuse for the meeting. The real excuse was simply that Fastolfe wanted very much to see Baley again; he certainly owed him enough.
(That Giskard wanted to see Baley and that he very slightly tightened the emotion and impulse in Fastolfe’s brain to bring that about, Fastolfe had no way of knowing—or even imagining.)
Baley was waiting for them at the time of landing and with him was a small group of Earth officials, so that there was a tedious passage of time during which politeness and protocol had its innings. It was some hours before Baley and Fastolfe could get away by themselves and it might not have happened that soon but for Giskard’s quiet and unfelt interference—with just a touch at the minds of the more important of those officials who were distinctly bored. (It was always safe to confine one’s self to accentuating an emotion that already existed. It could almost never bring harm.)
Baley and Fastolfe sat in the smallness of a private dining room that was ordinarily available only to high government officials. Food items could be punched out on a computerized menu and were then brought in by computerized carriers.
Fastolfe smiled. “Very advanced,” he said, “but these carriers are merely specialized robots. I’m surprised Earth uses them. They are not of Spacer manufacture, surely.”
“No, they’re not,” said Baley solemnly. “Home-grown, so to speak. This is only for use at the top and it’s my first chance, ever, to experience it. I’m not likely to do so again.”
“You may be elected to high office someday and then experience this sort of thing daily.”
“Never,” said Baley. The dishes were put before each of them and the carrier was even sophisticated enough to ignore Giskard, who stood impassively behind Fastolfe’s chair.
For a while, Baley ate silently and then, with a certain shyness, he said, “It is good to see you again, Dr. Fastolfe.”
“The pleasure is as much mine. I haven’t forgotten that two years ago, when you were on Aurora, you managed to free me of the suspicion of the destruction of the robot Jander and to turn the tables neatly on my overconfident opponent, the good Amadiro.”
“I still shake when I think of it,” said Baley. “And greetings to you, too, Giskard. I trust you haven’t forgotten me.”
“That would be quite impossible, sir,” said Giskard.
“Good! Well, Doctor, I trust the political situation on Aurora continues to be favorable. The news here would make it seem so, but I don’t trust Earth analysis of Auroran affairs—”
“You may—at the moment. My party is in firm control of the Council. Amadiro maintains a sullen opposition, but I suspect it will be years before his people recover from the blow you gave them. But how are things with you and with Earth?”
“Well enough.—Tell me, Dr. Fastolfe,” Baley’s face twitched slightly, as though with embarrassment—“have you brought Daneel with you?”
Fastolfe said slowly, “I’m sorry, Baley. I did, but I left him back on the ship. I felt it might not be politic to be accompanied by a robot who looked so much like a human being. With Earth as antirobot as it has become, I felt a humanoid robot might seem a deliberate provocation to them.”
Baley sighed. “I understand.”
Fastolfe said, “Is it true that your government is planning to prohibit the use of robots within the Cities?”
“I suspect it will soon come to that, with a period of grace, of course, to minimize financial loss and inconvenience. Robots will be restricted to the countryside, where they are needed for agriculture and mining. There, too, they may eventually be phased out and the plan is to have no robots at all on the new worlds.”
“Since you mention the new worlds, has your son left Earth yet?”
“Yes, a few months ago. We have heard from him and he’s arrived at a new world safely, along with several hundred Settlers, as they call themselves. The world has some native vegetation upon it and a low-oxygen atmosphere. Apparently, with time it can be made quite Earthlike. Meanwhile, some makeshift domes have been put up, new Settlers are advertised for, and everyone is busily engaged in terraforming. Bentley’s letters and occasional hyperwave contact are very hopeful, but they don’t keep his mother from missing him badly.”
“And will you be going there, Baley?”
“I’m not sure that living on a strange world under a dome is my idea of happiness, Dr. Fastolfe—I haven’t Ben’s youth and enthusiasm but I think I’ll have to in two or three years. In any case, I’ve already given notice to the Department of my intention to emigrate.”
“I imagine they must be upset over that.”
“Not at all. They say they are, but they’re glad to get rid of me. I’m too notorious.”
“And how does Earth’s government react to this drive for expansion into the Galaxy?”
“Nervously. They do not forbid it altogether, but certainly they are not cooperative. They continue to suspect that the Spacers are opposed to it and will do something unpleasant to stop it.”
“Social inertia,” said Fastolfe. “They judge us according to our behavior of years past.—Surely we have made it plain that we now encourage Earth’s colonization of new planets and that we intend to colonize new planets of our own.”
“I hope you explain this to our government, then.—But, Dr. Fastolfe, another question on a smaller point. How is—” And with that, he stalled.
“Gladia?” said Fastolfe, hiding his amusement. “Have you forgotten her name?”
“No, no. I merely hesitated to—to—”
“She’s well,” said Fastolfe, “and living comfortably. She has asked me to remember her to you, but I imagine you need no nudging to recall her to mind.”
“The fact of her Solarian origin is not used against her, I hope?”
“No, nor is her role in the undoing of Dr. Amadiro. Rather the reverse. I take care of her, I assure you.—And yet I do not care to allow you to get off the subject altogether, Baley. What if Earth’s officialdom continues to be opposed to immigration and expansion? Could the process continue despite such opposition?”
“Possibly,” said Baley, “but not certainly. There’s substantial opposition among Earthmen generally. It’s hard to break away from the huge underground Cities that are our homes—”
“Your wombs.”
“Or our wombs, if you prefer. Going to new worlds and having to live with the most primitive facilities for decades never seeing comfort in one’s own lifetime—that is difficult. When I think of it sometimes, I just decide not to go especially if I’m passing a sleepless night. I’ve decided not to go a hundred times and one day I may just stick to that decision. And if I have trouble when, in a way, I originated the entire notion, then who else is likely to go freely and gladly? Without government encouragement—or, to be brutally frank—without the government shoe applied to the seat of the pants of the population, the whole project may fail.”
Fastolfe nodded. “I will try to persuade your government. But if I fail?”
Baley said in a low voice, “If you fail—and if, therefore, our people fail—there remains only one alternative. The Spacers themselves must settle the Galaxy. The job must be done.”
“And you will be content to see the Spacers expand and fill the Galaxy, while the Earthpeople remain on their single planet?”
“Not content at all, but it would be better than the present situation of no expansion by either. Many centuries ago, Earthpeople flocked to the stars, established some of the worlds that are now called Spacer worlds, and those first few colonized others. It has been a long time, however, since either the Spacers or Earthpeople have successfully settled and developed a new world. That must not be permitted to continue.”
“I agree. But what is your reason for wanting expansion, Baley?”
“I feel that without expansion of some sort, humanity cannot advance. It doesn’t have to be geographical expansion, but that is the clearest way of inducing other kinds of expansion as well. If geographical expansion can be undertaken in a fashion that is not at the expense of other intelligent beings; if there are empty spaces into which to expand; then why not? To resist expansion under such circumstances is to ensure decay.”
“You see those alternatives, then? Expansion and advancement? Nonexpansion and decay?”
“Yes, I believe so. Therefore, if Earth refuses expansion, then Spacers must accept it. Humanity, whether in the form of Earthpeople or Spacers, must expand. I would like to see Earthpeople undertake the task, but, failing that, Spacer expansion is better than no expansion at all. One alternative or the other.”
“And if one expands but not the other?”
“Then the expanding society will become steadily stronger and the nonexpanding one steadily weaker.”
“Are you certain of that?”
“It would be unavoidable, I think.”
Fastolfe nodded. “Actually, I agree. It is why I am trying to persuade both Earthpeople and Spacers to expand and advance. That is a third alternative, and, I think, the best.”
12
Memory flickered past the days that followed—incredible mobs of people moving ceaselessly past each other in streams and eddies-racing Expressways being mounted and dismounted—endless conferences with innumerable officials-minds in crowds.
Particularly minds in crowds.
Minds in crowds so thick that Giskard could not isolate individuals. Mass minds mixing and melting together into a vast pulsating grayness with all that was detectable being the periodic sparks of suspicion and dislike that shot outward every time one of the multitude paused to look at him.
Only when Fastolfe was in conference with a few officials could Giskard deal with the individual mind and that, of course, was when it counted.
Memory slowed at one point near the end of the stay on Earth, when Giskard could finally maneuver a time alone with Baley again. Giskard adjusted a few minds minimally in order to make certain there would be no interruption for some time.
Baley said apologetically, “I haven’t really been ignoring you, Giskard. I simply haven’t had the opportunity to be alone with you. I don’t rate highly on Earth and I cannot order my comings and goings.”
“I have, of course, understood that, sir, but we will have some time together now.”
“Good. Dr. Fastolfe tells me that Gladia is doing well. He may be saying that out of kindness, knowing that that is what I want to hear. I order you to be truthful, however, is Gladia, in fact, doing well?”
“Dr. Fastolfe has told you the truth, sir.”
“And you remember, I hope, my request when I last saw you on Aurora that you guard Gladia and protect her from harm.”
“Friend Daneel and I, sir, are both mindful of your request. I have arranged it so that when Dr. Fastolfe is no longer alive, both friend Daneel and I will become part of Madam Gladia’s establishment. We will then be in an even better position to keep her from harm.”
“That,” said Baley sadly, “will be after my time.”
“I understand that, sir, and regret it.”
“Yes, but it can’t be helped and a crisis will come—or may come—even before that and yet still be after my time.”
“What is it, sir, that you have in mind? What is this crisis?”
“Giskard, it is a crisis that may arise because Dr. Fastolfe is a surprisingly persuasive person. Or else, there is some other factor associated with him that is accomplishing the task.”
“Sir?”
“Every official that Dr. Fastolfe has seen and interviewed now seems to be enthusiastically in favor of emigration. They were not in favor earlier or, if they were, it was with strong reservations. And once the opinion making leaders are in favor, others are sure to follow. This will spread like an epidemic.”
“Is this not what you wish, sir?”
“Yes, it is, but it is almost too much what I wish. We shall spread out over the Galaxy—but what if the Spacers don’t?”
“Why should they not?”
“I don’t know. I advance it as a supposition, a possibility. What if they don’t?”
“Earth and the worlds its people settle will then grow stronger, according to what I have heard you say.”
“And the Spacers will grow weaker. There will, however, be a period of time during which the Spacers will remain stronger than Earth and its Settlers, though by a steadily diminishing margin. Eventually, the Spacers will inevitably become aware of Earthpeople as a growing danger. At that time the Spacer worlds will surely decide that Earth and the Settlers must be stopped before it is too late and it will seem to them that drastic measures will have to be taken. That will be a period of crisis that will determine the entire future history of human beings.”
“I see your point, sir.”
Baley remained in thoughtful silence for a moment, then said, in very nearly a whisper as though dreading being overheard, “Who knows of your abilities?”
“Among human beings only yourself—and you cannot mention it to others.”
“I know well I can’t. The point is, though, that it is you, not Fastolfe, who has engineered the turnaround that has made every official with whom you’ve come in contact a proponent of emigration. And it is to bring that about that you arranged to have Fastolfe take you, rather than Daneel, to Earth with him—you were essential and Daneel might have been a distraction.”
Giskard said, “I felt it necessary to keep personnel to a minimum in order to avoid making my task harder by abrading the sensitivities of Earthpeople. I regret, sir, Daneel’s absence. I fully sense your disappointment at not being able to greet him.”
“Well—” Baley shook his head. “I understand the necessity and I rely on your explaining to Daneel that I badly missed him. In any case, I am still making my point. If Earth embarks on a great policy of world settlement and if the Spacers are left behind in the race to expand, the responsibility for that—and therefore for the crisis that will inevitably arise—will be yours. You must, for that reason, feel it your further responsibility to use your abilities to protect Earth when the crisis comes.”
“I will do what I can, sir.”
“And should you succeed there, Amadiro—or his followers—may turn on Gladia. You must not forget to protect her, too.
“Daneel and I will not forget.”
“Thank you, Giskard.”
And they parted.
When Giskard, following Fastolfe, entered the module to begin the voyage back to Aurora, he saw Baley once again. This time there was no opportunity to speak to him.
Baley waved and mouthed one soundless word: “Remember.”
Giskard sensed the word and, in addition, the emotion behind it.
After that, Giskard never saw Baley again. Never.
13
Giskard had never found it possible to flip through the sharp images of that one visit to Earth, without then following it with the images of the key visit to Amadiro at the Institute of Robotics.
It had not been an easy conference to arrange. Amadiro, with the bitterness of defeat heavy upon him, would not exacerbate his humiliation by going to Fastolfe’s establishment.
“Well, then,” Fastolfe had said to Giskard. “I can afford to be magnanimous in victory. I will go to him. Besides, I must see him.”
Fastolfe had been a member of the Institute of Robotics since Baley had made possible the crushing of Amadiro and of his political ambitions. In return, Fastolfe had passed over to the Institute all the data for the building and maintenance of humaniform robots. A number had been manufactured and then the project had come to an end and Fastolfe had chafed.
It had been Fastolfe’s intention, at first, to arrive at the Institute without any robot companion. He would have placed himself, without protection and (so to speak) naked, into the midst of what was still the stronghold of the enemy’s camp. It would have been a sign of humility and trust, but it would also have been an indication of complete selfconfidence and Amadiro would have understood that. Fastolfe, entirely alone, would be demonstrating his certainty that Amadiro, with all the resources of the Institute at his command, would not dare to touch his single enemy coming carelessly and defenselessly within reach of his fist.
And yet in the end, Fastolfe, not quite knowing how, chose to have Giskard accompany him.
Amadiro seemed to have lost a little weight since last Fastolfe had seen him, but he was still a formidable specimen; tall and heavyset. He lacked the self-confident smile that had once been his hallmark and when he attempted it at Fastolfe’s entrance, it seemed more like a snarl that faded into a look of somber dissatisfaction.
“Well, Kelden,” said Fastolfe, making free with the other’s familiar name, “we don’t see each other often, despite the fact that we have now been colleagues for four years.”
“Let’s not have any false bonhomie, Fastolfe,” said Amadiro in a clearly annoyed and low-pitched growl, “and address me as Amadiro. We are not colleagues except in name and I make no secret—and never have—of my belief that your foreign policy is suicidal for us.”
Three of Amadiro’s robots, large and gleaming, were present and Fastolfe studied them with raised eyebrows, “You are well protected, Amadiro, against one man of peace together with his single robot.”
“They will not attack you, Fastolfe, as you well know. But why did you bring Giskard? Why not your masterpiece, Daneel?”
“Would it be safe to bring Daneel within your reach, Amadiro?”
“I take it you intend that as humor. I no longer need Daneel. We build our own humaniforms.”
“On the basis of my design.”
“With improvements.”
“And yet you do not use the humaniforms. That is why I have come to see you. I know that my position in the Institute is a name-only thing and that even my presence is unwelcome, let alone my opinions and recommendations. However, I must, as an Institute member, protest your failure to use the humaniforms.”
“How do you wish me to use them?”
“The intention was to have the humaniforms open up new worlds into which Spacers could eventually emigrate, after those worlds had been terraformed and made completely habitable, wasn’t it?”
“But that was something you opposed, Fastolfe, wasn’t it?”
Fastolfe said, “Yes, I did. I wanted Spacers themselves to emigrate to new worlds and to do their own terraforming. That, however, is not happening and, I now see, is not likely to happen. Let us send the humaniforms, then. That would be better than nothing.”
“All our alternatives come to nothing, as long as your views dominate the Council, Fastolfe. Spacers will not travel to rude and unformed worlds; nor, it seems, do they like humaniform robots.”
“You have scarcely given the Spacers a chance to like them. Earthpeople are beginning to settle new planets, even rude and unformed ones. And they do it without robotic help.”
“You know very well the differences between Earthpeople and ourselves. There are eight billion Earthpeople, plus a large number of Settlers.”
“And there are five and a half billion Spacers.”
“Numbers are not the sole difference,” said Amadiro bitterly. “They breed like insects.”
“They do not. Earth’s population has been fairly stable for centuries.”
“The potential is there. If they put all their heart into emigration, they can easily produce one hundred and sixty million new bodies each year and that number will rise as the new worlds fill up.
“We have the biological capability of producing one hundred million new bodies each year.”
“But not the sociological capability. We are long-lived, we do not wish ourselves replaced so quickly.”
“We can send a large portion of the new bodies to other worlds.”
“They won’t go. We value our bodies, which are strong, healthy, and capable of surviving in strength and health for nearly forty decades. Earthmen can place no value on bodies that wear out in less than ten decades and that are riddled with disease and degeneration even over that short period of time. It doesn’t matter to them if they send out millions a year to certain misery and probable death. In fact, even the victims needn’t fear misery and death, for what else do they have on Earth? The Earthpeople who emigrate are fleeing from their pestilential world knowing well that any change can scarcely be for the worse. We, on the other hand, value our well-wrought and comfortable planets and would not lightly give them up.”
Fastolfe sighed and said, “I’ve heard all these arguments so often—May I point out the simple fact, Amadiro, that Aurora was originally a rude and unformed world that had to be terraformed into acceptability and that so was every Spacer world?”
Amadiro said, “And I have heard all your arguments to the point of nausea, but I will not weary of answering them. Aurora may have been primitive when first settled, but Aurora was settled by Earthpeople—and other Spacer worlds, when, not settled by Earthpeople, were settled by Spacers that had not yet outgrown their Earth heritage. The times are no longer suitable for that. What could be done then, cannot be done now.”
Amadiro lifted a corner of his mouth in a snarl and went on, “No, Fastolfe, what your policy has accomplished has been to begin the creation of a Galaxy that will be populated by Earthmen only, while Spacers must wither and decline. You can see it happening now. Your famous trip to Earth, two years ago, was the turning point. Somehow, you betrayed your own people by encouraging those half-humans to begin an expansion. In only two years there are at least some Earthpeople on each of twenty-four worlds and new ones are being added steadily.”
Fastolfe said, “Do not exaggerate. Not one of those Settler worlds is truly fit for human occupation yet and won’t be for some decades. Not all are likely to survive and, as the nearer worlds are occupied, the chances for settling farther worlds diminish so that the initial surge will slow down. I encouraged their expansion because I counted on ours as well. We can still keep up with them if we make the effort and, in healthy competition, we can fill the Galaxy together.”
“No,” said Amadiro. “What you have in mind is that most destructive of all policies, a foolish idealism. The expansion is one-sided and will remain so despite anything you can do. The people of Earth swarm unhindered and they will have to be stopped before they get too strong to stop.”
“How do you propose to do that? We have a treaty of friendship with Earth in which we specifically agree not to stop their expansion into space as long as no planet within twenty light-years of a Spacer world is touched. They have adhered to this scrupulously.”
Amadiro said, “Everyone knows about the treaty. Everyone also knows that no treaty has ever been kept once it begins to work against the national interests of the more powerful signatory. I attach no value to that treaty.”
“I do. It will be held to.”
Amadiro shook his head. “You have touching faith. How will it be held to after you are out of power?”
“I don’t intend to be out of power for a while.”
“As Earth and its Settlers grow stronger, the Spacers will grow fearful and, you will not remain long in power after that.”
Fastolfe said, “And if you tear up the treaty and destroy the Settler worlds and slam the gates shut on Earth, will the Spacers then emigrate and fill the Galaxy?”
“Perhaps not. But if we decide not to, if we decide we are comfortable as we are, what difference will that make?”
“The Galaxy will not, in that case, become a human empire.”
“And if it does not, what then?”
“Then the Spacers will stultify and degenerate, even if Earth is kept in prison and also stultifies and degenerates.”
“That is just the claptrap your party puts out, Fastolfe. There is no actual evidence that such a thing would happen. And even if it does, that will be our choice. At least we will not see the barbarian short-lifers fall heir to the Galaxy.”
Fastolfe said, “Are you seriously suggesting, Amadiro, that you would be willing to see the Spacer civilization die, provided you can prevent Earth from expanding?”
“I’m not counting on our death, Fastolfe, but if the worst happens, why, yes, to me our own death is a less fearful thing than the triumph of a subhuman disease-riddled set of short-lived beings.”
“From whom we are descended.”
“And with whom we are no longer truly related genetically. Are we worms because a billion years ago, worms were among our ancestors?”
Fastolfe, lips pressed together, rose to go. Amadiro, glowering, made no move to stop him.
14
Daneel had no way of telling, directly, that Giskard was lost in memory. For one thing, Giskard’s expression did not change and for another, he was not lost in memory as humans might be. It took no substantial period of time.
On the other hand, the line of thought that had caused Giskard to think of the past had caused Daneel to think of the same events, of that past as they had long ago been recounted to him by Giskard. Nor was Giskard surprised at that.
Their conversation carried on with no unusual pause, but in a markedly new manner, as though each had thought of the past on behalf of both.
Daneel said, “It might seem, friend Giskard, that since the people of Aurora now recognize that they are weaker than Earth and its many Settler worlds, the crisis that Elijah Baley foresaw has been safely passed.”
“It might seem so, friend Daneel.”
“You labored to bring that about.”
“I did. I kept the Council in Fastolfe’s hand. I did what I could to mold those who, in turn, molded public opinion.
“Yet I am uneasy,” Giskard said, “I have been uneasy through every stage of the process, although I endeavored to do no harm to anyone. I have touched—mentally—not one human being who required anything more than the lightest touch. On Earth, I had merely to lighten the fear of reprisal and chose those, particularly, in which the fear was already light and broke a thread that was, in any case, frayed and on the point of breaking. On Aurora, it was reversed. The policy makers here were reluctant to espouse policies that would lead to an exit from their comfortable world and I merely confirmed that and made the sturdy cord that held them a bit stronger. And doing this has immersed me in a constant—if faint turmoil.”
“Why? You encouraged the expansion of Earth and discouraged the expansion of the Spacers. Surely that is as it should be.”
“As it should be? Do you think, friend Daneel, that an Earthperson counts for more than a Spacer, even though both are human beings?”
“There are differences. Elijah Baley would rather see his own Earthpeople defeated than see the Galaxy uninhabited. Dr. Amadiro would rather see both Earth and Spacers dwindle than see Earth expand. The first looks with hope to the triumph of either, the second is content to see the triumph of neither. Should we not choose the first, friend Giskard?”
“Yes, friend Daneel. So it would seem. And yet how far are you influenced by your feeling of the special worth of your onetime partner, Elijah Baley?”
Daneel said, “I value the memory of Partner Elijah and the people of Earth are his people.”
“I see you do. I have been saying for many decades that you tend to think like a human being, friend Daneel, but I wonder if that is necessarily a compliment. Still, though you tend to think like a human being, you are not a human being and, in the end, you are bound to the Three Laws. You may not harm a human being, whether that human being is an Earthman or a Spacer.”
“There are times, friend Giskard, when one must choose one human being over another. We have been given special orders to protect Lady Gladia. I would be forced, on occasion, to harm a human being in order to protect Lady Gladia and I think that, all things being equal, I would be willing to harm a Spacer just a little in order to protect an Earthperson.”
“So you think. But in the actual event, you would have to be guided by specific circumstances. You will find you cannot generalize,” said Giskard. “And so it is with me. In encouraging Earth and discouraging Aurora, I have made it impossible for Dr. Fastolfe to persuade the Auroran government to sponsor a policy of emigration and to set up two expanding powers in the Galaxy. I could not help but realize that that portion of his labors was brought to nothing. This was bound to fill him with gathering despair and perhaps it hastened his death. I have felt this in his mind and that has been painful. And yet, friend Daneel—”
Giskard paused and Daneel said, “Yes?”
“To have not done as I had done might have greatly lowered Earth’s ability to expand, without greatly improving Aurora’s moves in that direction. Dr. Fastolfe would then have been frustrated—in both ways—Earth and Aurora and would moreover have been ousted from his seat of power by Dr. Amadiro. His sense of frustration would have been greater. It was Dr. Fastolfe, during his lifetime, to whom I owed my greatest loyalty and I chose that course of action which frustrated him less, without measurably harming other individuals I dealt with. If Dr. Fastolfe was continually disturbed by his inability to persuade Aurorans—and Spacers generally—to expand to new worlds, he was at least delighted by the activity of the emigrating Earthpeople.”
“Could you not have encouraged both the people of Earth and of Aurora, friend Giskard, and thus have satisfied Dr. Fastolfe in both respects?”
“That, of course, had occurred to me, friend Daneel. I considered the possibility and decided it would not do. I could encourage Earthpeople to emigrate by means of a trifling change that would do no harm. To have attempted the same for Aurorans would have required a great enough change to do much harm. The First Law prevented that.”
“A pity.”
“True. Think what might have been done if I could have radically altered the mind-set of Dr. Amadiro. Yet how could I have changed his fixed determination to oppose Dr. Fastolfe? It would have been much like trying to force his head to make a one hundred and eighty degree turn. So complete a turnabout of either the head itself or of its emotional content would kill with, I think, equal efficiency.
“The price of my power, friend Daneel,” Giskard went on, “is the greatly increased dilemma into which I am constantly plunged. The First Law of Robotics, which forbids injury to human beings, deals, ordinarily, with the visible physical injuries that we can, all of us, easily see and concerning which we can easily make judgments. I, alone, however, am aware of human emotions and of casts of mind, so that I know of more subtle forms of injury without being able to understand them completely. I am forced on many occasions to act without true certainty and this puts a continuing stress on my circuits.
“And yet I feel I have done well. I have carried the Spacers past the crisis point. Aurora is aware of the gathering strength of the Settlers and will now be forced to avoid conflict. They must recognize it to be too late for retaliation and our promise to Elijah Baley is, in that respect, fulfilled. We have put Earth on the course toward the filling of the Galaxy and the establishment of a Galactic Empire.”
They were, at this point, walking back to Gladia’s house, but now, Daneel stopped and the gentle pressure of his hand on Giskard’s shoulder caused the other to stop as well.
Daneel said, “The picture you draw is attractive. It would make Partner Elijah proud of us if, as you say, we have accomplished that. ‘Robots and Empire,’ Elijah would say and perhaps he would clap me on the shoulder. And yet, as I said, I am uneasy, friend Giskard.”
“Concerning what, friend Daneel?”
“I cannot help but wonder if indeed we have actually passed the crisis that Partner Elijah spoke of so many decades ago. Is it, in actual fact, too late for Spacer retaliation?”
“Why do you have these doubts, friend Daneel?”
“I have been made doubtful by the behavior of Dr. Mandamus in the course of his conversation with Madam Gladia.”
Giskard’s gaze was fixed on Daneel for a few moments, and in the quiet they could hear leaves rustling in the cool breeze. The clouds were breaking and the sun would make its appearance soon. Their conversation, in its telegraphic fashion, had taken little time and Gladia, they knew, would not yet be wondering at their absence.
Giskard said, “What was there in the conversation that would give you cause for uneasiness?”
Daneel said, “I have had the opportunity, on four separate occasions, to observe Elijah Baley’s handling of a puzzling problem. On each of those four occasions, I have noted the manner in which he managed to work out useful conclusions from limited—and even misleading—information. I have since always tried, within my limitations, to think as he did.”
“It seems to me, friend Daneel, you have done well in this respect. I have said you tend to think like a human being.
“You will have noticed, then, that Dr. Mandamus had two matters he wished to discuss with Madam Gladia. He emphasized that fact himself. One was the matter of his own descent, whether from Elijah Baley or not. The second was the request that Madam Gladia see a Settler and report on the event afterward. Of these, the second might be viewed as a matter that would be important to the Council. The first would be a matter of importance only to himself.”
Giskard said, “Dr. Mandamus presented the matter of his descent as being of importance to Dr. Amadiro as well.”
“Then it would be a matter of personal importance to two people rather than one, friend Giskard. It would still not be a matter of importance to the Council and, therefore, to the planet generally.”
“Proceed, then, friend Daneel.”
“Yet the matter of state, as Dr. Mandamus himself referred to it, was taken up second, almost as an afterthought, and was disposed of almost at once. Indeed, it seemed scarcely something that required a personal visit. It might have been handled by holographic image by any official of the Council. On the other hand, Dr. Mandamus dealt with the matter of his own descent first, discussed it in great detail, and it was a matter that could have been handled only by him and by no one else.”
“What is your conclusion, friend Daneel?”
“I believe that the matter of the Settler was seized upon by Dr. Mandamus as an excuse for a personal conversation with Madam Gladia, in order that he might discuss his descent in privacy. It was the matter of his descent and nothing else that truly interested him.—Is there any way you can support that conclusion, friend Giskard?”
Aurora’s sun had not yet emerged from the clouds and the faint glow of Giskard’s eyes was visible. He said, “The tension in Dr. Mandamus’s mind was indeed measurably stronger in the first part of the interview than in the second. That may serve as corroboration, perhaps, friend Daneel.”
Daneel said, “Then we must ask ourselves why the question of Dr. Mandamus’s descent should be a matter of such importance to him.”
Giskard said, “Dr. Mandamus explained that. It is only by demonstrating that he is not descended from Elijah Baley, that his road to advancement is open. Dr. Amadiro, upon whose goodwill he is dependent, would turn against him absolutely if he were a descendant of Mr. Baley.”
“So he said, friend Giskard, but what took place during the interview argues against that.”
“Why do you say so? Please continue thinking like a human being, friend Daneel. I find it instructive.”
Daneel said gravely, “Thank you, friend Giskard. Did you note that not one statement that Madam Gladia made concerning the impossibility of Dr. Mandamus’s descent from Partner Elijah was considered convincing? In every case, Dr. Mandamus said that Dr. Amadiro would not accept the statement.”
“Yes, and what do you deduce from that?”
“It seems to me that Dr. Mandamus was so convinced that Dr. Amadiro would accept no argument against Elijah Baley an ancestor that one must wonder why he should have bothered to ask Madam Gladia about the matter. He apparently knew from the start that it would be pointless to do so.”
“Perhaps, friend Daneel, but it is mere speculation. Can you supply a possible motive for his action, then?”
“I can. I believe he inquired as to his descent, not to convince an implacable Dr. Amadiro but to convince himself.”
“In that case, why should he have mentioned Dr. Amadiro at all? Why not simply have said, ‘I wish to know.’?”
A small smile passed over Daneel’s face, a change of expression of which the other robot would have been incapable. Daneel said, “Had he said, ‘I wish to know,’ to Madam Gladia, she would surely have replied that it was none of his business and he would have discovered nothing. Madam Gladia, however, is as strongly opposed to Dr. Amadiro as Dr. Amadiro is to Elijah Baley. Madam Gladia would be sure to take offense at any opinion strongly held by Dr. Amadiro concerning her. She would be furious, even if the opinion were more or less true; how much more, then, if it were absolutely false, as in this case. She would labor to demonstrate Dr. Amadiro to be wrong and would present every piece of evidence needed to achieve that end.
“In such a case, Dr. Mandamus’s cold assurance that each piece of evidence was insufficient would but make her the angrier and would drive her to further revelations. Dr. Mandamus’s strategy was chosen to make certain he would learn the maximum from Madam Gladia and, at the end, he was convinced that he did not have an Earthman as ancestor; at least, not as recently as twenty decades ago. Amadiro’s feelings in this regard were not, I think, truly in question.”
Giskard said, “Friend Daneel, this is an interesting point of view, but it does not seem to be strongly founded. In what way can we conclude that it is no more than a guess on your part?”
Daneel said, “Does it not seem to you, friend Giskard, that when Dr. Mandamus ended his inquiry into his descent without having obtained sufficient evidence for Dr. Amadiro, as he would have had us believe, that he should have been distinctly depressed and disheartened? By his own statement, this should have meant he had no chance for advancement and would never gain the position as head of the Institute of Robotics. And yet it seemed to me that he was far from depressed but was, indeed, jubilant. I can only judge by outward appearance, but you can do better. Tell me, friend Giskard, what was his mental attitude at the conclusion of this portion of his conversation with Madam Gladia?”
Giskard said, “As I look back on it, it was not only jubilant but triumphant, friend Daneel. You are right. Now that you have explained your process of thought, that sensation of triumph I detected clearly marks the accuracy of your reasoning. In fact, now that you have marked it all out, I find myself at a loss to account for my inability to see it for myself.”
“That, friend Giskard, was, on a number of occasions, my reaction to the reasoning of Elijah Baley. That I could carry through such reasoning on this occasion may be, in part, because of the strong stimulus of the existence of the present crisis. It forces me to think more cogently.”
“You underestimate yourself, friend Daneel. You have been thinking cogently for a long time. But why do you speak of a present crisis? Pause a moment and explain. How does one go from Dr. Mandamus’s feeling of triumph at not being descended from Mr. Baley to this crisis you speak of?”
Daneel said, “Dr. Mandamus may have deceived us with his statements concerning Dr. Amadiro, but it may be fair to suppose that it is nevertheless true that he longs for advancement; that he is ambitious to become head of the Institute. Is that not so, friend Giskard?”
Giskard paused a moment, as though in thought, then said, “I was not searching for ambition. I was studying his mind without particular purpose and was aware of only surface manifestations. Yet there might have been flashes of ambition there when he spoke of advancement. I do not have strong grounds for agreeing with you, friend Daneel, but I have no grounds at all for disagreeing with you.”
“Let us accept Dr. Mandamus as an ambitious man, then, and see where that takes us. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Then does it not seem likely that his sense of triumph, once he was convinced that he was not descended from Partner Elijah, arose from the fact that he felt his ambition could now be served. This would not be so, however, because of Dr. Amadiro’s approval, since we have agreed that the Dr. Amadiro motif was introduced by Dr. Mandamus as a distraction. His ambition could now be served for some other reason.”
“What other reason?”
“There is none that arises out of compelling evidence. But I can suggest one as a matter of speculation. What if Dr. Mandamus knows something or can do something that would lead to some huge success; one that would surely make him the next head? Remember that at the conclusion of the search into the manner of his descent, Dr. Mandamus said, ‘There are powerful methods remaining to me.’ Suppose that is true, but that he could only use those methods if he were not descended from Partner Elijah. His jubilation over having been convinced of his nondescent would arise, then, from the fact that he could now use those methods and assure himself of great advancement.”
“But what are these powerful methods, friend Daneel?”
Daneel said gravely, “We must continue to speculate. We know that Dr. Amadiro wants nothing so much as to defeat Earth and force it back to its earlier position of subservience to the Spacer worlds. If Dr. Mandamus has a way of doing this, he can surely get anything he wants out of Dr. Amadiro, up to and including a guarantee of succession to the headship. Yet it may be that Dr. Mandamus hesitates to bring about Earth’s defeat and humiliation unless he felt no kinship to its people. Descent from Elijah Baley of Earth would inhibit him. The denial of that descent frees him to act and that makes him jubilant.”
Giskard said, “You mean Dr. Mandamus is a man of conscience?”
“Conscience?”
“It is a word human beings sometimes use. I have gathered that it is applied to a person who adheres to rules of behavior that force him to act in ways that oppose his immediate self-interest. If Dr. Mandamus feels that he cannot allow himself to advance at the expense of those with whom he is distantly connected, I imagine him to be a man of conscience. I have thought much of such things, friend Daneel, since they seem to imply that human beings do have Laws governing their behavior, at least in some cases.”
“And can you tell whether Dr. Mandamus is, indeed, a man of conscience?”
“From my observations of his emotions? No, I was not watching for anything like that, but if your analysis is correct, conscience would seem to follow.—And yet, on the other hand, if we begin by supposing him a man of conscience and argue backward, we can come to other conclusions. It might seem that if Dr. Mandamus thought he had an Earthman in his ancestry a mere nineteen and a half decades ago, he might feel driven, against his conscience, to spearhead an attempt to defeat Earth as a way of freeing himself from the stigma of such descent. If he were not so descended, then he would not be unbearably driven to act against Earth and his conscience would be free to cause him to leave Earth alone.”
Daneel said, “No, friend Giskard. That would not fit the facts. However relieved he might be at not having to take violent action against Earth, he would be left without a way of satisfying Dr. Amadiro and enforcing his own advance. Considering his ambitious nature, he would not be left with the feeling of triumph you so clearly noted.”
“I see. Then we conclude that Dr. Mandamus has a method for defeating Earth.”
“Yes. And if that is so, then the crisis foreseen by Partner Elijah has not been safely passed after all, but is now here.”
Giskard said thoughtfully, “But we are left with the key question unanswered, friend Daneel. What is the nature of the crisis? What is the deadly danger? Can you deduce that, too?”
“That I cannot do, friend Giskard. I have gone as far as I can. Perhaps Partner Elijah might have gone farther were he still alive, but I cannot.—Here I must depend upon you, friend Giskard.”
“Upon me? In what way?”
“You can study the mind of Dr. Mandamus as I cannot, as no one else can. You can discover the nature of the crisis.”
“I fear I cannot, friend Daneel. If I lived with a human being over an extended period, as once I lived with Dr. Fastolfe, as now I live with Madam Gladia, I could, little by little, unfold the layers of mind, one leaf after another, untie the intricate knot a bit at a time, and learn a great deal without harming him or her. To do the same to Dr. Mandamus after one brief meeting or after a hundred brief meetings, would accomplish little. Emotions are readily apparent, thoughts are not. If, out of a sense of urgency, I attempted to make haste, forcing the process, I would surely injure him—and that I cannot do.”
“Yet the fate of billions of people on Earth and billions more in the rest of the Galaxy may depend on this.”
“May depend on this. That is conjecture. Injury to a human being is a fact. Consider that it may be only Dr. Mandamus who knows the nature of the crisis and carry it through to a conclusion. He could not use his knowledge or ability to force Dr. Amadiro to grant him the headship if Dr. Amadiro could gain it from another source.”
“True,” said Daneel. “That may be well so.”
“In that case, friend Daneel, it is not necessary to know the nature of the crisis. If Dr. Mandamus could be restrained from telling Dr. Amadiro—or anyone else—whatever it is he knows, the crisis will not come to pass.”
“Someone else might discover what Dr. Mandamus now knows.”
“Certainly, but we don’t know when that will be. Very likely, we will have time to probe further and discover more—and become better prepared to play a useful role of our own.”
“Well, then.”
“If Dr. Mandamus is to be restrained, it can be done by damaging his mind to the point where it is no longer effective—or by destroying his life outright. I alone possess the ability to injure his mind appropriately, but I cannot do this. However, either one of us can physically bring his life to an end. I cannot do this, either. Can you do it, friend Daneel?”
There was a pause and Daneel finally whispered. “I cannot. You know that.”
Giskard said slowly, “Even though you know that the future of billions of people on Earth and elsewhere is at stake?”
“I cannot bring myself to injure Dr. Mandamus.”
“And I cannot. So we are left with the certainty of a deadly crisis coming, but a crisis whose nature we do not know, and cannot find out, and which we are therefore helpless to counter.”
They stared at each other in silence, with nothing showing in their faces, but with an air of despair settling somehow over them.
10
Daneel and Giskard, with robotic courtesy, saw Mandamus and his robots off the grounds of the establishment. Then, since they were outside, they toured the grounds, made certain that the lesser robots were in their places, and took note of the weather (cloudy and a bit cooler than seasonal).
Daneel said, “Dr. Mandamus admitted openly that the Settler worlds are now stronger than the Spacer worlds. I would not have expected him to do that.”
Giskard said, “Nor I. I was certain that the Settlers would increase in strength as compared with the Spacers because Elijah Baley had predicted it many decades ago, but I could see no way of determining when the fact would become obvious to the Auroran Council. It seemed to me that social inertia would keep the Council firmly convinced of Spacer superiority long after that had vanished, but I could not calculate for how long they would continue to delude themselves.”
“I am astonished that Partner Elijah foresaw this so long ago.”
“Human beings have ways of thinking about human beings that we have not.” Had Giskard been human, the remark might have been made with regret or envy, but since he was a robot it was merely factual.
He went on. “I have tried to gain the knowledge, if not the way of thinking, by reading human history in great detail. Surely somewhere in the long tale of human events, there must be buried the Laws of Humanics that are equivalent to our Three Laws of Robotics.”
Daneel said, “Madam Gladia once told me that this hope was an impossible one.”
“So that may be, friend Daneel, for though it seems to me such Laws of Humanics must exist, I cannot find them. Every generalization I try to make, however broad and simple, has its numerous exceptions. Yet if such Laws existed and if I could find them, I could understand human beings better and be more confident that I am obeying the Three Laws in better fashion.”
“Since Partner Elijah understood human beings, he must have had some knowledge of the Laws of Humanics.”
“Presumably. But this he knew through something that human beings call intuition, a word I don’t understand, signifying a concept I know nothing of. Presumably it lies beyond reason and I have only reason at my command.”
11
That and memory!
Memory that did not work after the human fashion, of course. It lacked the imperfect recall, the fuzziness, the additions and subtractions dictated by wishful thinking and self-interest, to say nothing of the lingerings and lacunae and backtracking that can turn memory into hours-long daydreaming.
It was robotic memory ticking off the events exactly as they had happened, but in vastly hastened fashion. The seconds reeled off in nanoseconds, so that days of events could be relived with such rapid precision as to introduce no perceptible gap in a conversation.
As Giskard had done innumerable times before, he relived that visit to Earth, always seeking for understanding of Elijah Baley’s casual ability to foresee the future, always failing to find it.
Earth!
Fastolfe had come to Earth in an Auroran warship, with a full complement of fellow passengers, both human and robot. Once in orbit, however, it was only Fastolfe who took the module in for a landing. Injections had stimulated his immune mechanism and he wore the necessary gloves, coveralls, contact lenses, and nose plugs. He felt quite safe as a result, but no other Auroran was willing to go along as part of a delegation.
This Fastolfe shrugged off, since it seemed to him (as he later explained to Giskard) that he would be more welcome if he came alone. A delegation would disagreeably remind Earth of the bad old days (to them) of Spacetown, when Spacers had a permanent base on Earth and directly dominated the world.
With him, Fastolfe brought Giskard, however. To have arrived without any robots would have been unthinkable, even for Fastolfe. To have arrived with more than one would have put a strain on the increasingly antirobot Earthmen he hoped to see and with whom he intended to negotiate.
To begin with, of course, he would meet with Baley, who would be his liaison with Earth and its people. That was the rational excuse for the meeting. The real excuse was simply that Fastolfe wanted very much to see Baley again; he certainly owed him enough.
(That Giskard wanted to see Baley and that he very slightly tightened the emotion and impulse in Fastolfe’s brain to bring that about, Fastolfe had no way of knowing—or even imagining.)
Baley was waiting for them at the time of landing and with him was a small group of Earth officials, so that there was a tedious passage of time during which politeness and protocol had its innings. It was some hours before Baley and Fastolfe could get away by themselves and it might not have happened that soon but for Giskard’s quiet and unfelt interference—with just a touch at the minds of the more important of those officials who were distinctly bored. (It was always safe to confine one’s self to accentuating an emotion that already existed. It could almost never bring harm.)
Baley and Fastolfe sat in the smallness of a private dining room that was ordinarily available only to high government officials. Food items could be punched out on a computerized menu and were then brought in by computerized carriers.
Fastolfe smiled. “Very advanced,” he said, “but these carriers are merely specialized robots. I’m surprised Earth uses them. They are not of Spacer manufacture, surely.”
“No, they’re not,” said Baley solemnly. “Home-grown, so to speak. This is only for use at the top and it’s my first chance, ever, to experience it. I’m not likely to do so again.”
“You may be elected to high office someday and then experience this sort of thing daily.”
“Never,” said Baley. The dishes were put before each of them and the carrier was even sophisticated enough to ignore Giskard, who stood impassively behind Fastolfe’s chair.
For a while, Baley ate silently and then, with a certain shyness, he said, “It is good to see you again, Dr. Fastolfe.”
“The pleasure is as much mine. I haven’t forgotten that two years ago, when you were on Aurora, you managed to free me of the suspicion of the destruction of the robot Jander and to turn the tables neatly on my overconfident opponent, the good Amadiro.”
“I still shake when I think of it,” said Baley. “And greetings to you, too, Giskard. I trust you haven’t forgotten me.”
“That would be quite impossible, sir,” said Giskard.
“Good! Well, Doctor, I trust the political situation on Aurora continues to be favorable. The news here would make it seem so, but I don’t trust Earth analysis of Auroran affairs—”
“You may—at the moment. My party is in firm control of the Council. Amadiro maintains a sullen opposition, but I suspect it will be years before his people recover from the blow you gave them. But how are things with you and with Earth?”
“Well enough.—Tell me, Dr. Fastolfe,” Baley’s face twitched slightly, as though with embarrassment—“have you brought Daneel with you?”
Fastolfe said slowly, “I’m sorry, Baley. I did, but I left him back on the ship. I felt it might not be politic to be accompanied by a robot who looked so much like a human being. With Earth as antirobot as it has become, I felt a humanoid robot might seem a deliberate provocation to them.”
Baley sighed. “I understand.”
Fastolfe said, “Is it true that your government is planning to prohibit the use of robots within the Cities?”
“I suspect it will soon come to that, with a period of grace, of course, to minimize financial loss and inconvenience. Robots will be restricted to the countryside, where they are needed for agriculture and mining. There, too, they may eventually be phased out and the plan is to have no robots at all on the new worlds.”
“Since you mention the new worlds, has your son left Earth yet?”
“Yes, a few months ago. We have heard from him and he’s arrived at a new world safely, along with several hundred Settlers, as they call themselves. The world has some native vegetation upon it and a low-oxygen atmosphere. Apparently, with time it can be made quite Earthlike. Meanwhile, some makeshift domes have been put up, new Settlers are advertised for, and everyone is busily engaged in terraforming. Bentley’s letters and occasional hyperwave contact are very hopeful, but they don’t keep his mother from missing him badly.”
“And will you be going there, Baley?”
“I’m not sure that living on a strange world under a dome is my idea of happiness, Dr. Fastolfe—I haven’t Ben’s youth and enthusiasm but I think I’ll have to in two or three years. In any case, I’ve already given notice to the Department of my intention to emigrate.”
“I imagine they must be upset over that.”
“Not at all. They say they are, but they’re glad to get rid of me. I’m too notorious.”
“And how does Earth’s government react to this drive for expansion into the Galaxy?”
“Nervously. They do not forbid it altogether, but certainly they are not cooperative. They continue to suspect that the Spacers are opposed to it and will do something unpleasant to stop it.”
“Social inertia,” said Fastolfe. “They judge us according to our behavior of years past.—Surely we have made it plain that we now encourage Earth’s colonization of new planets and that we intend to colonize new planets of our own.”
“I hope you explain this to our government, then.—But, Dr. Fastolfe, another question on a smaller point. How is—” And with that, he stalled.
“Gladia?” said Fastolfe, hiding his amusement. “Have you forgotten her name?”
“No, no. I merely hesitated to—to—”
“She’s well,” said Fastolfe, “and living comfortably. She has asked me to remember her to you, but I imagine you need no nudging to recall her to mind.”
“The fact of her Solarian origin is not used against her, I hope?”
“No, nor is her role in the undoing of Dr. Amadiro. Rather the reverse. I take care of her, I assure you.—And yet I do not care to allow you to get off the subject altogether, Baley. What if Earth’s officialdom continues to be opposed to immigration and expansion? Could the process continue despite such opposition?”
“Possibly,” said Baley, “but not certainly. There’s substantial opposition among Earthmen generally. It’s hard to break away from the huge underground Cities that are our homes—”
“Your wombs.”
“Or our wombs, if you prefer. Going to new worlds and having to live with the most primitive facilities for decades never seeing comfort in one’s own lifetime—that is difficult. When I think of it sometimes, I just decide not to go especially if I’m passing a sleepless night. I’ve decided not to go a hundred times and one day I may just stick to that decision. And if I have trouble when, in a way, I originated the entire notion, then who else is likely to go freely and gladly? Without government encouragement—or, to be brutally frank—without the government shoe applied to the seat of the pants of the population, the whole project may fail.”
Fastolfe nodded. “I will try to persuade your government. But if I fail?”
Baley said in a low voice, “If you fail—and if, therefore, our people fail—there remains only one alternative. The Spacers themselves must settle the Galaxy. The job must be done.”
“And you will be content to see the Spacers expand and fill the Galaxy, while the Earthpeople remain on their single planet?”
“Not content at all, but it would be better than the present situation of no expansion by either. Many centuries ago, Earthpeople flocked to the stars, established some of the worlds that are now called Spacer worlds, and those first few colonized others. It has been a long time, however, since either the Spacers or Earthpeople have successfully settled and developed a new world. That must not be permitted to continue.”
“I agree. But what is your reason for wanting expansion, Baley?”
“I feel that without expansion of some sort, humanity cannot advance. It doesn’t have to be geographical expansion, but that is the clearest way of inducing other kinds of expansion as well. If geographical expansion can be undertaken in a fashion that is not at the expense of other intelligent beings; if there are empty spaces into which to expand; then why not? To resist expansion under such circumstances is to ensure decay.”
“You see those alternatives, then? Expansion and advancement? Nonexpansion and decay?”
“Yes, I believe so. Therefore, if Earth refuses expansion, then Spacers must accept it. Humanity, whether in the form of Earthpeople or Spacers, must expand. I would like to see Earthpeople undertake the task, but, failing that, Spacer expansion is better than no expansion at all. One alternative or the other.”
“And if one expands but not the other?”
“Then the expanding society will become steadily stronger and the nonexpanding one steadily weaker.”
“Are you certain of that?”
“It would be unavoidable, I think.”
Fastolfe nodded. “Actually, I agree. It is why I am trying to persuade both Earthpeople and Spacers to expand and advance. That is a third alternative, and, I think, the best.”
12
Memory flickered past the days that followed—incredible mobs of people moving ceaselessly past each other in streams and eddies-racing Expressways being mounted and dismounted—endless conferences with innumerable officials-minds in crowds.
Particularly minds in crowds.
Minds in crowds so thick that Giskard could not isolate individuals. Mass minds mixing and melting together into a vast pulsating grayness with all that was detectable being the periodic sparks of suspicion and dislike that shot outward every time one of the multitude paused to look at him.
Only when Fastolfe was in conference with a few officials could Giskard deal with the individual mind and that, of course, was when it counted.
Memory slowed at one point near the end of the stay on Earth, when Giskard could finally maneuver a time alone with Baley again. Giskard adjusted a few minds minimally in order to make certain there would be no interruption for some time.
Baley said apologetically, “I haven’t really been ignoring you, Giskard. I simply haven’t had the opportunity to be alone with you. I don’t rate highly on Earth and I cannot order my comings and goings.”
“I have, of course, understood that, sir, but we will have some time together now.”
“Good. Dr. Fastolfe tells me that Gladia is doing well. He may be saying that out of kindness, knowing that that is what I want to hear. I order you to be truthful, however, is Gladia, in fact, doing well?”
“Dr. Fastolfe has told you the truth, sir.”
“And you remember, I hope, my request when I last saw you on Aurora that you guard Gladia and protect her from harm.”
“Friend Daneel and I, sir, are both mindful of your request. I have arranged it so that when Dr. Fastolfe is no longer alive, both friend Daneel and I will become part of Madam Gladia’s establishment. We will then be in an even better position to keep her from harm.”
“That,” said Baley sadly, “will be after my time.”
“I understand that, sir, and regret it.”
“Yes, but it can’t be helped and a crisis will come—or may come—even before that and yet still be after my time.”
“What is it, sir, that you have in mind? What is this crisis?”
“Giskard, it is a crisis that may arise because Dr. Fastolfe is a surprisingly persuasive person. Or else, there is some other factor associated with him that is accomplishing the task.”
“Sir?”
“Every official that Dr. Fastolfe has seen and interviewed now seems to be enthusiastically in favor of emigration. They were not in favor earlier or, if they were, it was with strong reservations. And once the opinion making leaders are in favor, others are sure to follow. This will spread like an epidemic.”
“Is this not what you wish, sir?”
“Yes, it is, but it is almost too much what I wish. We shall spread out over the Galaxy—but what if the Spacers don’t?”
“Why should they not?”
“I don’t know. I advance it as a supposition, a possibility. What if they don’t?”
“Earth and the worlds its people settle will then grow stronger, according to what I have heard you say.”
“And the Spacers will grow weaker. There will, however, be a period of time during which the Spacers will remain stronger than Earth and its Settlers, though by a steadily diminishing margin. Eventually, the Spacers will inevitably become aware of Earthpeople as a growing danger. At that time the Spacer worlds will surely decide that Earth and the Settlers must be stopped before it is too late and it will seem to them that drastic measures will have to be taken. That will be a period of crisis that will determine the entire future history of human beings.”
“I see your point, sir.”
Baley remained in thoughtful silence for a moment, then said, in very nearly a whisper as though dreading being overheard, “Who knows of your abilities?”
“Among human beings only yourself—and you cannot mention it to others.”
“I know well I can’t. The point is, though, that it is you, not Fastolfe, who has engineered the turnaround that has made every official with whom you’ve come in contact a proponent of emigration. And it is to bring that about that you arranged to have Fastolfe take you, rather than Daneel, to Earth with him—you were essential and Daneel might have been a distraction.”
Giskard said, “I felt it necessary to keep personnel to a minimum in order to avoid making my task harder by abrading the sensitivities of Earthpeople. I regret, sir, Daneel’s absence. I fully sense your disappointment at not being able to greet him.”
“Well—” Baley shook his head. “I understand the necessity and I rely on your explaining to Daneel that I badly missed him. In any case, I am still making my point. If Earth embarks on a great policy of world settlement and if the Spacers are left behind in the race to expand, the responsibility for that—and therefore for the crisis that will inevitably arise—will be yours. You must, for that reason, feel it your further responsibility to use your abilities to protect Earth when the crisis comes.”
“I will do what I can, sir.”
“And should you succeed there, Amadiro—or his followers—may turn on Gladia. You must not forget to protect her, too.
“Daneel and I will not forget.”
“Thank you, Giskard.”
And they parted.
When Giskard, following Fastolfe, entered the module to begin the voyage back to Aurora, he saw Baley once again. This time there was no opportunity to speak to him.
Baley waved and mouthed one soundless word: “Remember.”
Giskard sensed the word and, in addition, the emotion behind it.
After that, Giskard never saw Baley again. Never.
13
Giskard had never found it possible to flip through the sharp images of that one visit to Earth, without then following it with the images of the key visit to Amadiro at the Institute of Robotics.
It had not been an easy conference to arrange. Amadiro, with the bitterness of defeat heavy upon him, would not exacerbate his humiliation by going to Fastolfe’s establishment.
“Well, then,” Fastolfe had said to Giskard. “I can afford to be magnanimous in victory. I will go to him. Besides, I must see him.”
Fastolfe had been a member of the Institute of Robotics since Baley had made possible the crushing of Amadiro and of his political ambitions. In return, Fastolfe had passed over to the Institute all the data for the building and maintenance of humaniform robots. A number had been manufactured and then the project had come to an end and Fastolfe had chafed.
It had been Fastolfe’s intention, at first, to arrive at the Institute without any robot companion. He would have placed himself, without protection and (so to speak) naked, into the midst of what was still the stronghold of the enemy’s camp. It would have been a sign of humility and trust, but it would also have been an indication of complete selfconfidence and Amadiro would have understood that. Fastolfe, entirely alone, would be demonstrating his certainty that Amadiro, with all the resources of the Institute at his command, would not dare to touch his single enemy coming carelessly and defenselessly within reach of his fist.
And yet in the end, Fastolfe, not quite knowing how, chose to have Giskard accompany him.
Amadiro seemed to have lost a little weight since last Fastolfe had seen him, but he was still a formidable specimen; tall and heavyset. He lacked the self-confident smile that had once been his hallmark and when he attempted it at Fastolfe’s entrance, it seemed more like a snarl that faded into a look of somber dissatisfaction.
“Well, Kelden,” said Fastolfe, making free with the other’s familiar name, “we don’t see each other often, despite the fact that we have now been colleagues for four years.”
“Let’s not have any false bonhomie, Fastolfe,” said Amadiro in a clearly annoyed and low-pitched growl, “and address me as Amadiro. We are not colleagues except in name and I make no secret—and never have—of my belief that your foreign policy is suicidal for us.”
Three of Amadiro’s robots, large and gleaming, were present and Fastolfe studied them with raised eyebrows, “You are well protected, Amadiro, against one man of peace together with his single robot.”
“They will not attack you, Fastolfe, as you well know. But why did you bring Giskard? Why not your masterpiece, Daneel?”
“Would it be safe to bring Daneel within your reach, Amadiro?”
“I take it you intend that as humor. I no longer need Daneel. We build our own humaniforms.”
“On the basis of my design.”
“With improvements.”
“And yet you do not use the humaniforms. That is why I have come to see you. I know that my position in the Institute is a name-only thing and that even my presence is unwelcome, let alone my opinions and recommendations. However, I must, as an Institute member, protest your failure to use the humaniforms.”
“How do you wish me to use them?”
“The intention was to have the humaniforms open up new worlds into which Spacers could eventually emigrate, after those worlds had been terraformed and made completely habitable, wasn’t it?”
“But that was something you opposed, Fastolfe, wasn’t it?”
Fastolfe said, “Yes, I did. I wanted Spacers themselves to emigrate to new worlds and to do their own terraforming. That, however, is not happening and, I now see, is not likely to happen. Let us send the humaniforms, then. That would be better than nothing.”
“All our alternatives come to nothing, as long as your views dominate the Council, Fastolfe. Spacers will not travel to rude and unformed worlds; nor, it seems, do they like humaniform robots.”
“You have scarcely given the Spacers a chance to like them. Earthpeople are beginning to settle new planets, even rude and unformed ones. And they do it without robotic help.”
“You know very well the differences between Earthpeople and ourselves. There are eight billion Earthpeople, plus a large number of Settlers.”
“And there are five and a half billion Spacers.”
“Numbers are not the sole difference,” said Amadiro bitterly. “They breed like insects.”
“They do not. Earth’s population has been fairly stable for centuries.”
“The potential is there. If they put all their heart into emigration, they can easily produce one hundred and sixty million new bodies each year and that number will rise as the new worlds fill up.
“We have the biological capability of producing one hundred million new bodies each year.”
“But not the sociological capability. We are long-lived, we do not wish ourselves replaced so quickly.”
“We can send a large portion of the new bodies to other worlds.”
“They won’t go. We value our bodies, which are strong, healthy, and capable of surviving in strength and health for nearly forty decades. Earthmen can place no value on bodies that wear out in less than ten decades and that are riddled with disease and degeneration even over that short period of time. It doesn’t matter to them if they send out millions a year to certain misery and probable death. In fact, even the victims needn’t fear misery and death, for what else do they have on Earth? The Earthpeople who emigrate are fleeing from their pestilential world knowing well that any change can scarcely be for the worse. We, on the other hand, value our well-wrought and comfortable planets and would not lightly give them up.”
Fastolfe sighed and said, “I’ve heard all these arguments so often—May I point out the simple fact, Amadiro, that Aurora was originally a rude and unformed world that had to be terraformed into acceptability and that so was every Spacer world?”
Amadiro said, “And I have heard all your arguments to the point of nausea, but I will not weary of answering them. Aurora may have been primitive when first settled, but Aurora was settled by Earthpeople—and other Spacer worlds, when, not settled by Earthpeople, were settled by Spacers that had not yet outgrown their Earth heritage. The times are no longer suitable for that. What could be done then, cannot be done now.”
Amadiro lifted a corner of his mouth in a snarl and went on, “No, Fastolfe, what your policy has accomplished has been to begin the creation of a Galaxy that will be populated by Earthmen only, while Spacers must wither and decline. You can see it happening now. Your famous trip to Earth, two years ago, was the turning point. Somehow, you betrayed your own people by encouraging those half-humans to begin an expansion. In only two years there are at least some Earthpeople on each of twenty-four worlds and new ones are being added steadily.”
Fastolfe said, “Do not exaggerate. Not one of those Settler worlds is truly fit for human occupation yet and won’t be for some decades. Not all are likely to survive and, as the nearer worlds are occupied, the chances for settling farther worlds diminish so that the initial surge will slow down. I encouraged their expansion because I counted on ours as well. We can still keep up with them if we make the effort and, in healthy competition, we can fill the Galaxy together.”
“No,” said Amadiro. “What you have in mind is that most destructive of all policies, a foolish idealism. The expansion is one-sided and will remain so despite anything you can do. The people of Earth swarm unhindered and they will have to be stopped before they get too strong to stop.”
“How do you propose to do that? We have a treaty of friendship with Earth in which we specifically agree not to stop their expansion into space as long as no planet within twenty light-years of a Spacer world is touched. They have adhered to this scrupulously.”
Amadiro said, “Everyone knows about the treaty. Everyone also knows that no treaty has ever been kept once it begins to work against the national interests of the more powerful signatory. I attach no value to that treaty.”
“I do. It will be held to.”
Amadiro shook his head. “You have touching faith. How will it be held to after you are out of power?”
“I don’t intend to be out of power for a while.”
“As Earth and its Settlers grow stronger, the Spacers will grow fearful and, you will not remain long in power after that.”
Fastolfe said, “And if you tear up the treaty and destroy the Settler worlds and slam the gates shut on Earth, will the Spacers then emigrate and fill the Galaxy?”
“Perhaps not. But if we decide not to, if we decide we are comfortable as we are, what difference will that make?”
“The Galaxy will not, in that case, become a human empire.”
“And if it does not, what then?”
“Then the Spacers will stultify and degenerate, even if Earth is kept in prison and also stultifies and degenerates.”
“That is just the claptrap your party puts out, Fastolfe. There is no actual evidence that such a thing would happen. And even if it does, that will be our choice. At least we will not see the barbarian short-lifers fall heir to the Galaxy.”
Fastolfe said, “Are you seriously suggesting, Amadiro, that you would be willing to see the Spacer civilization die, provided you can prevent Earth from expanding?”
“I’m not counting on our death, Fastolfe, but if the worst happens, why, yes, to me our own death is a less fearful thing than the triumph of a subhuman disease-riddled set of short-lived beings.”
“From whom we are descended.”
“And with whom we are no longer truly related genetically. Are we worms because a billion years ago, worms were among our ancestors?”
Fastolfe, lips pressed together, rose to go. Amadiro, glowering, made no move to stop him.
14
Daneel had no way of telling, directly, that Giskard was lost in memory. For one thing, Giskard’s expression did not change and for another, he was not lost in memory as humans might be. It took no substantial period of time.
On the other hand, the line of thought that had caused Giskard to think of the past had caused Daneel to think of the same events, of that past as they had long ago been recounted to him by Giskard. Nor was Giskard surprised at that.
Their conversation carried on with no unusual pause, but in a markedly new manner, as though each had thought of the past on behalf of both.
Daneel said, “It might seem, friend Giskard, that since the people of Aurora now recognize that they are weaker than Earth and its many Settler worlds, the crisis that Elijah Baley foresaw has been safely passed.”
“It might seem so, friend Daneel.”
“You labored to bring that about.”
“I did. I kept the Council in Fastolfe’s hand. I did what I could to mold those who, in turn, molded public opinion.
“Yet I am uneasy,” Giskard said, “I have been uneasy through every stage of the process, although I endeavored to do no harm to anyone. I have touched—mentally—not one human being who required anything more than the lightest touch. On Earth, I had merely to lighten the fear of reprisal and chose those, particularly, in which the fear was already light and broke a thread that was, in any case, frayed and on the point of breaking. On Aurora, it was reversed. The policy makers here were reluctant to espouse policies that would lead to an exit from their comfortable world and I merely confirmed that and made the sturdy cord that held them a bit stronger. And doing this has immersed me in a constant—if faint turmoil.”
“Why? You encouraged the expansion of Earth and discouraged the expansion of the Spacers. Surely that is as it should be.”
“As it should be? Do you think, friend Daneel, that an Earthperson counts for more than a Spacer, even though both are human beings?”
“There are differences. Elijah Baley would rather see his own Earthpeople defeated than see the Galaxy uninhabited. Dr. Amadiro would rather see both Earth and Spacers dwindle than see Earth expand. The first looks with hope to the triumph of either, the second is content to see the triumph of neither. Should we not choose the first, friend Giskard?”
“Yes, friend Daneel. So it would seem. And yet how far are you influenced by your feeling of the special worth of your onetime partner, Elijah Baley?”
Daneel said, “I value the memory of Partner Elijah and the people of Earth are his people.”
“I see you do. I have been saying for many decades that you tend to think like a human being, friend Daneel, but I wonder if that is necessarily a compliment. Still, though you tend to think like a human being, you are not a human being and, in the end, you are bound to the Three Laws. You may not harm a human being, whether that human being is an Earthman or a Spacer.”
“There are times, friend Giskard, when one must choose one human being over another. We have been given special orders to protect Lady Gladia. I would be forced, on occasion, to harm a human being in order to protect Lady Gladia and I think that, all things being equal, I would be willing to harm a Spacer just a little in order to protect an Earthperson.”
“So you think. But in the actual event, you would have to be guided by specific circumstances. You will find you cannot generalize,” said Giskard. “And so it is with me. In encouraging Earth and discouraging Aurora, I have made it impossible for Dr. Fastolfe to persuade the Auroran government to sponsor a policy of emigration and to set up two expanding powers in the Galaxy. I could not help but realize that that portion of his labors was brought to nothing. This was bound to fill him with gathering despair and perhaps it hastened his death. I have felt this in his mind and that has been painful. And yet, friend Daneel—”
Giskard paused and Daneel said, “Yes?”
“To have not done as I had done might have greatly lowered Earth’s ability to expand, without greatly improving Aurora’s moves in that direction. Dr. Fastolfe would then have been frustrated—in both ways—Earth and Aurora and would moreover have been ousted from his seat of power by Dr. Amadiro. His sense of frustration would have been greater. It was Dr. Fastolfe, during his lifetime, to whom I owed my greatest loyalty and I chose that course of action which frustrated him less, without measurably harming other individuals I dealt with. If Dr. Fastolfe was continually disturbed by his inability to persuade Aurorans—and Spacers generally—to expand to new worlds, he was at least delighted by the activity of the emigrating Earthpeople.”
“Could you not have encouraged both the people of Earth and of Aurora, friend Giskard, and thus have satisfied Dr. Fastolfe in both respects?”
“That, of course, had occurred to me, friend Daneel. I considered the possibility and decided it would not do. I could encourage Earthpeople to emigrate by means of a trifling change that would do no harm. To have attempted the same for Aurorans would have required a great enough change to do much harm. The First Law prevented that.”
“A pity.”
“True. Think what might have been done if I could have radically altered the mind-set of Dr. Amadiro. Yet how could I have changed his fixed determination to oppose Dr. Fastolfe? It would have been much like trying to force his head to make a one hundred and eighty degree turn. So complete a turnabout of either the head itself or of its emotional content would kill with, I think, equal efficiency.
“The price of my power, friend Daneel,” Giskard went on, “is the greatly increased dilemma into which I am constantly plunged. The First Law of Robotics, which forbids injury to human beings, deals, ordinarily, with the visible physical injuries that we can, all of us, easily see and concerning which we can easily make judgments. I, alone, however, am aware of human emotions and of casts of mind, so that I know of more subtle forms of injury without being able to understand them completely. I am forced on many occasions to act without true certainty and this puts a continuing stress on my circuits.
“And yet I feel I have done well. I have carried the Spacers past the crisis point. Aurora is aware of the gathering strength of the Settlers and will now be forced to avoid conflict. They must recognize it to be too late for retaliation and our promise to Elijah Baley is, in that respect, fulfilled. We have put Earth on the course toward the filling of the Galaxy and the establishment of a Galactic Empire.”
They were, at this point, walking back to Gladia’s house, but now, Daneel stopped and the gentle pressure of his hand on Giskard’s shoulder caused the other to stop as well.
Daneel said, “The picture you draw is attractive. It would make Partner Elijah proud of us if, as you say, we have accomplished that. ‘Robots and Empire,’ Elijah would say and perhaps he would clap me on the shoulder. And yet, as I said, I am uneasy, friend Giskard.”
“Concerning what, friend Daneel?”
“I cannot help but wonder if indeed we have actually passed the crisis that Partner Elijah spoke of so many decades ago. Is it, in actual fact, too late for Spacer retaliation?”
“Why do you have these doubts, friend Daneel?”
“I have been made doubtful by the behavior of Dr. Mandamus in the course of his conversation with Madam Gladia.”
Giskard’s gaze was fixed on Daneel for a few moments, and in the quiet they could hear leaves rustling in the cool breeze. The clouds were breaking and the sun would make its appearance soon. Their conversation, in its telegraphic fashion, had taken little time and Gladia, they knew, would not yet be wondering at their absence.
Giskard said, “What was there in the conversation that would give you cause for uneasiness?”
Daneel said, “I have had the opportunity, on four separate occasions, to observe Elijah Baley’s handling of a puzzling problem. On each of those four occasions, I have noted the manner in which he managed to work out useful conclusions from limited—and even misleading—information. I have since always tried, within my limitations, to think as he did.”
“It seems to me, friend Daneel, you have done well in this respect. I have said you tend to think like a human being.
“You will have noticed, then, that Dr. Mandamus had two matters he wished to discuss with Madam Gladia. He emphasized that fact himself. One was the matter of his own descent, whether from Elijah Baley or not. The second was the request that Madam Gladia see a Settler and report on the event afterward. Of these, the second might be viewed as a matter that would be important to the Council. The first would be a matter of importance only to himself.”
Giskard said, “Dr. Mandamus presented the matter of his descent as being of importance to Dr. Amadiro as well.”
“Then it would be a matter of personal importance to two people rather than one, friend Giskard. It would still not be a matter of importance to the Council and, therefore, to the planet generally.”
“Proceed, then, friend Daneel.”
“Yet the matter of state, as Dr. Mandamus himself referred to it, was taken up second, almost as an afterthought, and was disposed of almost at once. Indeed, it seemed scarcely something that required a personal visit. It might have been handled by holographic image by any official of the Council. On the other hand, Dr. Mandamus dealt with the matter of his own descent first, discussed it in great detail, and it was a matter that could have been handled only by him and by no one else.”
“What is your conclusion, friend Daneel?”
“I believe that the matter of the Settler was seized upon by Dr. Mandamus as an excuse for a personal conversation with Madam Gladia, in order that he might discuss his descent in privacy. It was the matter of his descent and nothing else that truly interested him.—Is there any way you can support that conclusion, friend Giskard?”
Aurora’s sun had not yet emerged from the clouds and the faint glow of Giskard’s eyes was visible. He said, “The tension in Dr. Mandamus’s mind was indeed measurably stronger in the first part of the interview than in the second. That may serve as corroboration, perhaps, friend Daneel.”
Daneel said, “Then we must ask ourselves why the question of Dr. Mandamus’s descent should be a matter of such importance to him.”
Giskard said, “Dr. Mandamus explained that. It is only by demonstrating that he is not descended from Elijah Baley, that his road to advancement is open. Dr. Amadiro, upon whose goodwill he is dependent, would turn against him absolutely if he were a descendant of Mr. Baley.”
“So he said, friend Giskard, but what took place during the interview argues against that.”
“Why do you say so? Please continue thinking like a human being, friend Daneel. I find it instructive.”
Daneel said gravely, “Thank you, friend Giskard. Did you note that not one statement that Madam Gladia made concerning the impossibility of Dr. Mandamus’s descent from Partner Elijah was considered convincing? In every case, Dr. Mandamus said that Dr. Amadiro would not accept the statement.”
“Yes, and what do you deduce from that?”
“It seems to me that Dr. Mandamus was so convinced that Dr. Amadiro would accept no argument against Elijah Baley an ancestor that one must wonder why he should have bothered to ask Madam Gladia about the matter. He apparently knew from the start that it would be pointless to do so.”
“Perhaps, friend Daneel, but it is mere speculation. Can you supply a possible motive for his action, then?”
“I can. I believe he inquired as to his descent, not to convince an implacable Dr. Amadiro but to convince himself.”
“In that case, why should he have mentioned Dr. Amadiro at all? Why not simply have said, ‘I wish to know.’?”
A small smile passed over Daneel’s face, a change of expression of which the other robot would have been incapable. Daneel said, “Had he said, ‘I wish to know,’ to Madam Gladia, she would surely have replied that it was none of his business and he would have discovered nothing. Madam Gladia, however, is as strongly opposed to Dr. Amadiro as Dr. Amadiro is to Elijah Baley. Madam Gladia would be sure to take offense at any opinion strongly held by Dr. Amadiro concerning her. She would be furious, even if the opinion were more or less true; how much more, then, if it were absolutely false, as in this case. She would labor to demonstrate Dr. Amadiro to be wrong and would present every piece of evidence needed to achieve that end.
“In such a case, Dr. Mandamus’s cold assurance that each piece of evidence was insufficient would but make her the angrier and would drive her to further revelations. Dr. Mandamus’s strategy was chosen to make certain he would learn the maximum from Madam Gladia and, at the end, he was convinced that he did not have an Earthman as ancestor; at least, not as recently as twenty decades ago. Amadiro’s feelings in this regard were not, I think, truly in question.”
Giskard said, “Friend Daneel, this is an interesting point of view, but it does not seem to be strongly founded. In what way can we conclude that it is no more than a guess on your part?”
Daneel said, “Does it not seem to you, friend Giskard, that when Dr. Mandamus ended his inquiry into his descent without having obtained sufficient evidence for Dr. Amadiro, as he would have had us believe, that he should have been distinctly depressed and disheartened? By his own statement, this should have meant he had no chance for advancement and would never gain the position as head of the Institute of Robotics. And yet it seemed to me that he was far from depressed but was, indeed, jubilant. I can only judge by outward appearance, but you can do better. Tell me, friend Giskard, what was his mental attitude at the conclusion of this portion of his conversation with Madam Gladia?”
Giskard said, “As I look back on it, it was not only jubilant but triumphant, friend Daneel. You are right. Now that you have explained your process of thought, that sensation of triumph I detected clearly marks the accuracy of your reasoning. In fact, now that you have marked it all out, I find myself at a loss to account for my inability to see it for myself.”
“That, friend Giskard, was, on a number of occasions, my reaction to the reasoning of Elijah Baley. That I could carry through such reasoning on this occasion may be, in part, because of the strong stimulus of the existence of the present crisis. It forces me to think more cogently.”
“You underestimate yourself, friend Daneel. You have been thinking cogently for a long time. But why do you speak of a present crisis? Pause a moment and explain. How does one go from Dr. Mandamus’s feeling of triumph at not being descended from Mr. Baley to this crisis you speak of?”
Daneel said, “Dr. Mandamus may have deceived us with his statements concerning Dr. Amadiro, but it may be fair to suppose that it is nevertheless true that he longs for advancement; that he is ambitious to become head of the Institute. Is that not so, friend Giskard?”
Giskard paused a moment, as though in thought, then said, “I was not searching for ambition. I was studying his mind without particular purpose and was aware of only surface manifestations. Yet there might have been flashes of ambition there when he spoke of advancement. I do not have strong grounds for agreeing with you, friend Daneel, but I have no grounds at all for disagreeing with you.”
“Let us accept Dr. Mandamus as an ambitious man, then, and see where that takes us. Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Then does it not seem likely that his sense of triumph, once he was convinced that he was not descended from Partner Elijah, arose from the fact that he felt his ambition could now be served. This would not be so, however, because of Dr. Amadiro’s approval, since we have agreed that the Dr. Amadiro motif was introduced by Dr. Mandamus as a distraction. His ambition could now be served for some other reason.”
“What other reason?”
“There is none that arises out of compelling evidence. But I can suggest one as a matter of speculation. What if Dr. Mandamus knows something or can do something that would lead to some huge success; one that would surely make him the next head? Remember that at the conclusion of the search into the manner of his descent, Dr. Mandamus said, ‘There are powerful methods remaining to me.’ Suppose that is true, but that he could only use those methods if he were not descended from Partner Elijah. His jubilation over having been convinced of his nondescent would arise, then, from the fact that he could now use those methods and assure himself of great advancement.”
“But what are these powerful methods, friend Daneel?”
Daneel said gravely, “We must continue to speculate. We know that Dr. Amadiro wants nothing so much as to defeat Earth and force it back to its earlier position of subservience to the Spacer worlds. If Dr. Mandamus has a way of doing this, he can surely get anything he wants out of Dr. Amadiro, up to and including a guarantee of succession to the headship. Yet it may be that Dr. Mandamus hesitates to bring about Earth’s defeat and humiliation unless he felt no kinship to its people. Descent from Elijah Baley of Earth would inhibit him. The denial of that descent frees him to act and that makes him jubilant.”
Giskard said, “You mean Dr. Mandamus is a man of conscience?”
“Conscience?”
“It is a word human beings sometimes use. I have gathered that it is applied to a person who adheres to rules of behavior that force him to act in ways that oppose his immediate self-interest. If Dr. Mandamus feels that he cannot allow himself to advance at the expense of those with whom he is distantly connected, I imagine him to be a man of conscience. I have thought much of such things, friend Daneel, since they seem to imply that human beings do have Laws governing their behavior, at least in some cases.”
“And can you tell whether Dr. Mandamus is, indeed, a man of conscience?”
“From my observations of his emotions? No, I was not watching for anything like that, but if your analysis is correct, conscience would seem to follow.—And yet, on the other hand, if we begin by supposing him a man of conscience and argue backward, we can come to other conclusions. It might seem that if Dr. Mandamus thought he had an Earthman in his ancestry a mere nineteen and a half decades ago, he might feel driven, against his conscience, to spearhead an attempt to defeat Earth as a way of freeing himself from the stigma of such descent. If he were not so descended, then he would not be unbearably driven to act against Earth and his conscience would be free to cause him to leave Earth alone.”
Daneel said, “No, friend Giskard. That would not fit the facts. However relieved he might be at not having to take violent action against Earth, he would be left without a way of satisfying Dr. Amadiro and enforcing his own advance. Considering his ambitious nature, he would not be left with the feeling of triumph you so clearly noted.”
“I see. Then we conclude that Dr. Mandamus has a method for defeating Earth.”
“Yes. And if that is so, then the crisis foreseen by Partner Elijah has not been safely passed after all, but is now here.”
Giskard said thoughtfully, “But we are left with the key question unanswered, friend Daneel. What is the nature of the crisis? What is the deadly danger? Can you deduce that, too?”
“That I cannot do, friend Giskard. I have gone as far as I can. Perhaps Partner Elijah might have gone farther were he still alive, but I cannot.—Here I must depend upon you, friend Giskard.”
“Upon me? In what way?”
“You can study the mind of Dr. Mandamus as I cannot, as no one else can. You can discover the nature of the crisis.”
“I fear I cannot, friend Daneel. If I lived with a human being over an extended period, as once I lived with Dr. Fastolfe, as now I live with Madam Gladia, I could, little by little, unfold the layers of mind, one leaf after another, untie the intricate knot a bit at a time, and learn a great deal without harming him or her. To do the same to Dr. Mandamus after one brief meeting or after a hundred brief meetings, would accomplish little. Emotions are readily apparent, thoughts are not. If, out of a sense of urgency, I attempted to make haste, forcing the process, I would surely injure him—and that I cannot do.”
“Yet the fate of billions of people on Earth and billions more in the rest of the Galaxy may depend on this.”
“May depend on this. That is conjecture. Injury to a human being is a fact. Consider that it may be only Dr. Mandamus who knows the nature of the crisis and carry it through to a conclusion. He could not use his knowledge or ability to force Dr. Amadiro to grant him the headship if Dr. Amadiro could gain it from another source.”
“True,” said Daneel. “That may be well so.”
“In that case, friend Daneel, it is not necessary to know the nature of the crisis. If Dr. Mandamus could be restrained from telling Dr. Amadiro—or anyone else—whatever it is he knows, the crisis will not come to pass.”
“Someone else might discover what Dr. Mandamus now knows.”
“Certainly, but we don’t know when that will be. Very likely, we will have time to probe further and discover more—and become better prepared to play a useful role of our own.”
“Well, then.”
“If Dr. Mandamus is to be restrained, it can be done by damaging his mind to the point where it is no longer effective—or by destroying his life outright. I alone possess the ability to injure his mind appropriately, but I cannot do this. However, either one of us can physically bring his life to an end. I cannot do this, either. Can you do it, friend Daneel?”
There was a pause and Daneel finally whispered. “I cannot. You know that.”
Giskard said slowly, “Even though you know that the future of billions of people on Earth and elsewhere is at stake?”
“I cannot bring myself to injure Dr. Mandamus.”
“And I cannot. So we are left with the certainty of a deadly crisis coming, but a crisis whose nature we do not know, and cannot find out, and which we are therefore helpless to counter.”
They stared at each other in silence, with nothing showing in their faces, but with an air of despair settling somehow over them.
4. ANOTHER DESCENDANT
15
Gladia had tried to relax after the harrowing session with Mandamus and did so with an intensity that fought relaxation to the death. She had opacified all the windows in her bedroom, adjusted the environment to a gentle warm breeze with the faint sound of rustling leaves and the occasional soft warble of a distant bird. She had then shifted it to the sound of a far-off surf and had added a faint but unmistakable tang of the sea in the air.
It didn’t help. Her mind echoed helplessly with what had just been—and with what was soon to come. Why had she chattered so freely to Mandamus? What business was it of his—or of Amadiro’s, for that matter—whether she had visited Elijah in orbit or not and whether or not—or when she had had a son by him or by any other man.
She had been cast into imbalance by Mandamus’s claim of descent, that’s what it was. In a society where no one cared about descent or relationship except for medico-genetic reasons, its sudden intrusion into a conversation was bound to be upsetting. That and the repeated (but surely accidental) references to Elijah.
She decided she was finding excuses for herself and, in impatience, she tossed it all away. She had reacted badly and had babbled like a baby and that was all there was to it.
Now there was this Settler coming.
He was not an Earthman. He had not been born on Earth, she was sure, and it was quite possible that he had never even visited Earth. His people might have lived on a strange world she had never heard of and might have done so for generations.
That would make him a Spacer, she thought. Spacers were descended from Earthmen, too—centuries further back, but what did that matter? To be sure, Spacers were long lived and these Settlers must be short-lived, but how much of a distinction was that? Even a Spacer might die prematurely through some freak accident; she had once heard of a Spacer who had died a natural death before he was sixty. Why not, then, think of the next visitor as a Spacer with an unusual accent?
But it wasn’t that simple. No doubt the Settler did not feel himself to be a Spacer. It’s not what you are that counts, but what you feel yourself to be. So think of him as a Settler, not a Spacer.
Yet weren’t all human beings simply human beings no matter what name—you applied to them—Spacers, Settlers, Aurorans, Earthpeople. The proof of it was that robots could not do injury to any of them. Daneel would spring as quickly to the defense of the most ignorant Earthman as to the Chairman of the Auroran Council—and that meant—
She could feel herself drifting, actually relaxing into a shallow sleep when a sudden thought entered her mind and seemed to ricochet there.
Why was the Settler named Baley?
Her mind sharpened and snapped out of the welcoming coils of oblivion that had all but engulfed her.
Why Baley?
Perhaps it was simply a common name among the Settlers. After all, it was Elijah who had made it all possible and he had to be a hero to them as—as—
She could not think of an analogous hero to Aurorans. Who had led the expedition that first reached Aurora? Who had supervised the terraformation of the raw barely living world that Aurora had then been? She did not know.
Was her ignorance born of the fact that she had been brought up on Solaria—or was it that the Aurorans simply had no founding hero? After all, the first expedition to Aurora had consisted of mere Earthpeople. It was only in later generations, with lengthening life-spans, thanks to the adjustments of sophisticated bio-engineering, that Earthpeople had become Aurorans. And after that, why should Aurorans wish to make heroes of their despised predecessors?
But Settlers might make heroes of Earthpeople. They had not yet changed, perhaps. They might change eventually and then Elijah would be forgotten in embarrassment, but till then—
That must be it. Probably half the Settlers alive had adopted the Baley surname. Poor Elijah! Everyone crowding onto his shoulders and into his shadow. Poor Elijah—dear Elijah—
And she did fall asleep.
16
The sleep was too restless to restore her to calm, let alone good humor. She was scowling without knowing that she was—and had she seen herself in the mirror, she would have been taken aback by her middle-aged appearance.
Daneel, to whom Gladia was a human being, regardless of age, appearance, or mood, said, “Madam—” Gladia interrupted, with a small shiver. “Is the Settler here?”
She looked up at the clock ribbon on the wall and then made a quick gesture, in response to which Daneel at once adjusted the heat upward. (It had been a cool day and was going to be a cooler evening.) Daneel said, “He is, madam.”
“Where have you put him?”
“In the main guest room, madam. Giskard is with him and the household robots are all within call.”
“I hope they will have the judgment to find out what he expects to eat for lunch. I don’t know Settler cuisine. And I hope they can make some reasonable attempt to meet his requests.”
“I am sure, madam, that Giskard will handle the matter competently.”
Gladia was sure of that, too, but she merely snorted. At least it would have been a snort if Gladia were the sort of person who snorted. She didn’t think she was.
“I presume,” she said, “he’s been in appropriate quarantine before being allowed to land.”
“It would be inconceivable for him not to have been, madam.”
She said, “Just the same, I’ll wear my gloves and my nose filter.”
She stepped out of her bedroom, was distantly aware that there were household robots about her, and made the sign that would get her a new pair of gloves and a fresh nose filter. Every establishment had its own vocabulary of signs and every human member of an establishment cultivated those signs, learning to make them both rapidly and unnoticeably. A robot was expected to follow these unobtrusive orders of its human overlords as though it read minds; and it followed that a robot could not follow the orders of nonestablishment human beings except by careful speech.
Nothing would humiliate a human member of an establishment more than to have one of the robots of the establishment hesitate in fulfilling an order or, worse, fulfill it incorrectly. That would mean that the human being had fumbled a sign—or that the robot had.
Generally, Gladia knew, it was the human being who was at fault, but in virtually every case, this was not admitted. It was the robot who was handed over for an unnecessary response analysis or unfairly put up for sale. Gladia had always felt that she would never fall into that trap of wounded ego, yet if at that moment she had not received her gloves and nose filter, she would have—
She did not have to finish the thought. The nearest robot brought her what she wanted, correctly and with speed.
Gladia adjusted the nose filter and snuffled a bit to make sure it was properly seated (she was in no mood to risk infection with any foul disorder that had survived the pain staking treatment during quarantine). She said, “What does he look like, Daneel?”
Daneel said, “He is of ordinary stature and measurements, madam.”
“I mean his face.” (It was silly to ask. If he showed any family resemblance to Elijah Baley, Daneel would have noticed it as quickly as she herself would have and he would have remarked upon it.) “That is difficult to say, madam. It is not in plain view.”
“What does that mean? Surely he’s, not masked, Daneel—”
“In a way, he is, madam. His face is covered with hair.”
“Hair?” She found herself laughing. “You mean after the fashion of the hypervision historicals? Beards?” She made little gestures indicating a tuft of hair on the chin and another under the nose.
“Rather more than that, madam. Half his face is covered.”
Gladia’s eyes opened wide and for the first time she felt a surge of interest in seeing him. What would a face with hair all over it look like? Auroran males—and Spacer males, generally—had very little facial hair and what there was would be removed permanently by the late teens—during virtual infancy.
Sometimes the upper lip was left untouched. Gladia remembered that her husband, Santirix Gremionis, before their marriage, had had a thin line of hair under his nose. A mustache, he had called it. It had looked like a misplaced and peculiarly misshapen eyebrow and once she had resigned himself to accepting him as a husband, she had insisted he destroy the follicles.
He had done so with scarcely a murmur and it occurred to her now, for the first time, to wonder if he had missed the hair. It seemed to her that she had noticed him, on occasion, in those early years, lifting a finger to his upper lip. She had thought it a nervous poking at a vague itch and it was only now that it occurred to her that he had been searching for a mustache that was gone forever.
How would a man look with a mustache all over his face? Would he be bearlike?
How would it feel? What if women had such hair, too? She thought of a man and woman trying to kiss and having trouble finding each other’s mouths. She found the thought funny, in a harmlessly ribald way, and laughed out loud. She felt her petulance disappearing and actually looked forward to seeing the monster.
After all, there would be no need to fear him even if he were as animal in behavior as he was in appearance. He would have no robot of his own—Settlers were supposed to have a nonrobotic society—and she would be surrounded by a dozen. The monster would be immobilized in a split second if he made the slightest suspicious move—or if he as much as raised his voice in anger.
She said with perfect good humor, “Take me to him, Daneel.”
17
The monster rose. He said something that sounded like “Good afternoon, muhleddy.”
She at once caught the “good afternoon,” but it took her a moment to translate the last word into “my lady.”
Gladia absently said, “Good afternoon.” She remembered the difficulty she had had understanding Auroran pronunciation of Galactic Standard in those long-ago days when, a frightened young woman, she had come to the planet from Solaria.
The monster’s accent was uncouth—or did it just sound uncouth because her ear was unaccustomed to it? Elijah, she remembered, had seemed to voice his “Vs” and “Ps,” but spoke pretty well otherwise. Nineteen and a half decades had passed, however, and this Settler was not from Earth. Language, in isolation, underwent changes.
But only a small portion of Gladia’s mind was on the language problem. She was staring at his beard.
It was not in the least like the beards that actors wore in historical dramas. Those always seemed tufted—a bit here, a bit there—looking gluey and glossy.
The Settler’s beard was different. It covered his cheeks and chin evenly, thickly, and deeply. It was a dark brown, somewhat lighter and wavier than the hair on his head, and at least two inches long, she judged—evenly long.
It didn’t cover his whole face, which was rather disappointing. His forehead was totally bare (except for his eyebrows), as were his nose and his under-eye regions.
His upper lip was bare, too, but it was shadowed as though there was the beginning of new growth upon it. There was additional bareness just under the lower lip, but with new growth less marked and concentrated mostly under the middle portion.
Since both his lips were quite bare, it was clear to Gladia that there would be no difficulty in kissing him. She said, knowing that staring was impolite and staring even so, “It seems to me you remove the hair from about your lips.”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Why, if I may ask?”
“You may ask. For hygienic reasons. I don’t want food catching in the hairs.”
“You scrape it off, don’t you? I see it is growing again.”
“I use a facial laser. It takes fifteen seconds after waking.”
“Why not depilate and be done with it?”
“I might want to grow it back.”
“Why?”
“Esthetic reasons, my lady.”
This time Gladia did not grasp the word. It sounded like “acidic” or possibly “acetic.”
She said, “Pardon me?”
The Settler said, “I might grow tired of the way I look now and want to grow the hair on the upper lip again. Some women like it, you know,” and the Settler tried to look modest and failed—“I have a fine mustache when I grow it.”
She said suddenly grasping the word, “You mean—”
The Settler laughed, showing fine white teeth, and said, “You talk funny, too, my lady.”
Gladia tried to look haughty, but melted into a smile. Proper pronunciation was a matter of local consensus. She said, “You ought to hear me with my Solarian accent—if it comes to that. Then it would be ‘estheetic rayzuns.’ The ‘r’ rolled interminably.”
“I’ve been places where they talk a little bit like that, it sounds barbarous.” He rolled both “r’s” phenomenally in the last word.
Gladia chuckled. “You do it with the tip of your tongue. It’s got to be with the sides of the tongue. No one, but a Solarian can do it correctly.”
“Perhaps you can teach me. A Trader like myself, who’s been everywhere, hears all kinds of linguistic perversions.” Again he tried to roll the “r’s” of the last word, choked slightly, and coughed.
“See. You’ll tangle your tonsils and you’ll never recover.” She was still staring at his beard and now she could curb her curiosity no longer. She reached toward it.
The Settler flinched and started back, then, realizing her intention, was still.
Gladia’s hand, all-but-invisibly gloved, rested lightly on the left side of his face. The thin plastic that covered her fingers did not interfere with the sense of touch and she found the hair to be soft and springy.
“It’s nice,” she said with evident surprise.
“Widely admired,” said the Settler, grinning.
She said, “But I can’t stand here and manhandle you all day.”
Ignoring his predictable “You can as far as I’m concerned,”—she went on. “Have you told my robots what you would like to eat?”
“My lady, I told them what I now tell you—whatever is handy. I’ve been on a score of worlds in the last year and each has its own dietary. A Trader learns to eat everything that isn’t actually toxic. I’d prefer an Auroran meal to anything you would try to make in imitation of Baleyworld—”
“Baleyworld?” said Gladia sharply, a frown returning to her face.
“Named for the leader of the first expedition to the planet—or to any of the Settled planets, for that matter. Ben Baley.”
“The son of Elijah Baley.”
“Yes,” the Settler said and changed the subject, at once. He looked down at himself and said with a trace of petulance, “How do you people manage to stand these clothes of yours slick and puffy. Be glad to get into my own again.”
“I’m sure you will have your chance to do so soon enough. But for now please come and join me at lunch.—I was told your name was Baley, by the way—like your planet.”
“Not surprising. It’s the most honored name on the planet, naturally. I’m Deejee Baley.”
They had walked into the dining room, Giskard preceding them, Daneel following them, each moving into his appropriate wall niche. Other robots were already in their niches and two emerged to do the serving. The room was bright with sunshine, the walls were alive with decoration, the table was set, and the odor of the food was enticing.
The Settler sniffed and let his breath out in satisfaction. “I don’t think I’ll have any trouble at all eating Auroran food. Where would you like me to sit, my lady?”
A robot said at once, “If you would sit here, sir?”
The Settler sat down and then Gladia, the privileges of the guest satisfied, took her own seat.
“Deejee?” she said. “I do not know the nomenclature peculiarities of your world, so excuse me if my question is offensive. Wouldn’t Deejee be a feminine name?”
“Not at all,” said the Settler a bit stiffly. “In any case, it is not a name, it is a pair of initials. Fourth letter of the alphabet and the seventh.”
“Oh,” said Gladia, enlightened, “D.G. Baley. And what do the initials stand for, if you’ll excuse my curiosity?”
“Certainly. There’s ‘D,’ for certain,” he said, jerking his thumb toward one of the wall niches, “and I suspect that one may be ‘G.’” He jerked his thumb toward another.
“You don’t mean that,” said Gladia faintly.
“But I do. My name is Daneel Giskard Baley. In every generation, my family has had at least one Daneel or one Giskard in its multiplying batches. I was the last of six children, but the first boy. My mother felt that was enough and made up for having but one son by giving me both names. That made me Daneel Giskard Baley and the double load was too great for me. I prefer D.G. as my name and I’d be honored if you used it.” He smiled genially. “I’m the first to bear both names and I’m also the first to see the grand originals.”
“But why those names?”
“It was Ancestor Elijah’s idea, according to the family story. He had the honor of naming his grandsons and he named, the oldest Daneel, while the second was named Giskard. He insisted on those names and that established the tradition.”
“And the daughters?”
“The traditional name from generation to generation is Jezebel—Jessie. Elijah’s wife, you know.”
“I know.”
“There are no—” He caught himself and transferred his attention to the dish that had been placed before him. “If this were Baleyworld, I would say this was a slice of roast pork and that it was smothered in peanut sauce.”
“Actually, it is a vegetable dish, D.G. What you were about to say was that there are no Gladias in the family?”
“There aren’t,” said D.G. calmly. “One explanation is that Jessie—the original Jessie—would have objected, but I don’t accept that. Elijah’s wife, the Ancestress, never came to Baleyworld, you know, never left Earth. How could she have objected? No, to me, it’s pretty certain that the Ancestor wanted no other Gladia. No imitations, no copies, no pretense. One Gladia. Unique.—He asked that there be no later Elijah, either.”
Gladia was having trouble eating. “I think your Ancestor spent the latter portion of his life trying to be as unemotional as Daneel. Just the same, he had romantic notions under his skin. He might have allowed other Elijahs and Gladias. It wouldn’t have offended me, certainly, and I imagine it wouldn’t have offended his wife, either.” She laughed tremulously.
D.G. said, “All this doesn’t seem real somehow. The Ancestor is practically ancient history; he died a hundred and sixty-four years ago. I’m his descendant in the seventh generation, yet here I am sitting with a woman who knew him when he was quite young.”
“I didn’t really know him,” said Gladia, staring at her plate. “I saw him, rather briefly, on three separate occasions over a period of seven years.”
“I know. The Ancestor’s son, Ben, wrote a biography of him which is one of the literary classics of Baleyworld. Even I have read it.”
“Indeed? I haven’t read it. I didn’t even know it existed. What—what does it say about me?”
D.G. seemed amused. “Nothing you would object to; you come out very well. But never mind that. What I’m amazed at is that here we are together, across seven generations. How old are you, my lady? Is it fair to ask the question?”
“I don’t know that it’s fair, but I have no objection to it. In Galactic Standard Years, I am two hundred and thirty-three years old. Over twenty-two decades.”
“You look as though you were no more than in your late forties. The Ancestor died at the age of seventy-nine, an old man. I’m thirty-nine and when I die you will still be alive—”
“If I avoid death by misadventure.”
“And will continue to live perhaps five decades beyond.”
“Do you envy me, D.G.?” said Gladia with an edge of bitterness in her voice. “Do you envy me for having survived Elijah by over sixteen decades and for being condemned to survive him ten decades more, perhaps?”
“Of course I envy you,” came the composed answer. “Why not? I would have no objection to living for several centuries, were it not that I would be setting a bad example to the people of Baleyworld. I wouldn’t want them to live that long as a general thing. The pace of historical and intellectual advance would then become too slow. Those at the top would stay in power too long. Baleyworld would sink into conversation and decay—as your world has done.”
Gladia’s small chin lifted. “Aurora is doing quite well, you’ll find.”
“I’m speaking of your world. Solaria.”
Gladia hesitated, then said firmly, “Solaria is not my world.”
D.G. said, “I hope it is. I came to see you because I believe Solaria is your world.”
“If that is why you came to seem me, you are wasting your time, young man.”
“You were born Solaria, weren’t you, and lived there a while?”
“I lived there for the first three decades of my life, about an eighth of my lifetime.”
“Then that makes you enough of a Solarian to be able to help me in a matter that is rather important.”
“I am not a Solarian, despite this so-called important matter.”
“It is a matter of war and peace—if you call that important. The Spacer worlds face war with the Settler worlds and things will go badly for all of us if it comes to that. And it is up to you, my lady, to prevent that war and to ensure peace.”
18
The meal was done (it had been a small one) and Gladia found herself looking at D.G. in a coldly furious way.
She had lived quietly for the last twenty decades, peeling off the complexities of life. Slowly she had forgotten the misery of Solaria and the difficulties of adjustment to Aurora. She had managed to bury quite deeply the agony of two murders and the ecstasy of two strange loves—with a robot and with an Earthman—and to get well past it all. She had ended by spinning out a long quiet marriage, having two children, and working at her applied art of costumery. And eventually the children had left, then her husband, and soon she might be retiring even from her work.
Then she would be alone with her robots, content with or, rather, resigned to—letting life glide quietly and uneventfully to a slow close in its own time—a close so gentle she might not be aware of the ending when it came.
It was what she wanted.
Then—What was happening?
It had begun the night before when she looked up vainly at the star-lit sky to see Solaria’s star, which was not in the sky and would not have been visible to her if it were. It was as though this one foolish reaching for the past—a past that should have been allowed to remain dead—had burst the cool bubble she had built about herself.
First the name of Elijah Baley, the most joyously painful memory of all the ones she had so carefully brushed away, had come up again and again in a grim repetition.
She was then forced to deal with a man who thought mistakenly he might be a descendant of Elijah in the fifth degree and now with another man who actually was a descendant in the seventh degree. Finally, she was now being given problems and responsibilities similar to those that had plagued Elijah himself on various occasions.
Was she becoming Elijah, in a fashion, with none of his talent and none of his fierce dedication to duty at all costs?
What had she done to deserve it?
She felt her rage being buried under a flood tide of self-pity. She felt unjustly dealt with. No one had the right to unload responsibility on her against her will.
She said, forcing her voice level, “Why do you insist on my being a Solarian, when I tell you that I am not a Solarian?”
D.G. did not seem disturbed by the chill that had now entered her voice. He was still holding the soft napkin that had been given him at the conclusion of the meal. It had been damply hot—not too hot—and he had imitated the actions of Gladia in carefully wiping his hands and mouth. He had then doubled it over and stroked his beard with it. It was shredding now and shriveling.
He said, “I presume it will vanish altogether.”
“It will.”
D.G. wadded what was left of his napkin and placed it on the arm of the chair. A robot, in response to Gladia’s quick and unobtrusive gesture, removed it.
Gladia had deposited her own napkin in the appropriate receptacle on the table. Holding it was unmannerly and could be excused only by D.G.’s evident unfamiliarity with civilized custom. “There are some who think it has a polluting effect on the atmosphere, but there is a gentle draft that carries the residue upward and traps it in filters. I doubt that it will give us any trouble.—But you ignore my question, sir.”
D.G. said, “I don’t intend to ignore your question, my lady. I am not trying to force you to be a Solarian. I merely point out that you were born on Solaria and spent your early decades there and therefore you might reasonably be considered a Solarian, after a fashion at least.—Do you know that Solaria has been abandoned?”
“So I have heard. Yes.”
“Do you feel anything about that?”
“I am an Auroran and have been one for twenty decades.”
“That is a non sequitur.”
“A what?” She could make nothing of the last sound at all.
“It has not connection with my question.”
“A non sequitur, you mean. You said a nonsense quitter.”
D.G. smiled. “Very well. Let’s quit the nonsense. I ask you if you feel anything about the death of Solaria and you tell me you’re an Auroran. Do you maintain that is an answer? A born Auroran might feel badly at the death of a sister world. How do you feel about it?”
Gladia said icily, “It doesn’t matter. Why are you interested?”
“I’ll explain. We—I mean the Traders of the Settler worlds—are interested because there is business to be done, profits to be made, and a world to be gained. Solaria is already terraformed; it is a comfortable world; you Spacers seem to have no need or desire for it. Why would we not settle it?”
“Because it’s not yours.”
“Madam, is it yours that you object? Has Aurora any more claim to it than Baleyworld has? Can’t we suppose that an empty world belongs to whoever is pleased to settle it?”
“Have you settled it?”
“No—because it’s not empty—”
“Do you mean the Solarians have not entirely left?” Gladia said quickly.
D.G.’s smile returned and broadened into a grin. “You’re excited at the thought.—Even though you’re an Auroran.”
Gladia’s face twisted into a frown at once. “Answer my question.”
D.G. shrugged. “There were only some five thousand Solarians on the world just before it was abandoned, according to our best estimates. The population had been declining for years. But even five thousand—can we be sure that all are gone? However, that’s not the point. Even if the Solarians were indeed all gone, the planet would not be empty. There are, upon it, some two hundred million or more robots—masterless robots—some of them among the most advanced in the Galaxy. Presumably, those Solarians who left took some robots with them—it’s hard to imagine Spacers doing without robots altogether.” (He looked about, smiling, at the robots in their niches within the room.) “However, they can’t possibly have taken forty thousand robots apiece.”
Gladia said, “Well, then, since your Settler worlds are so purely robot-free and wish to stay so, I presume, you can’t settle Solaria.”
“That’s right. Not until the robots are gone and that is where Traders such as myself come in.”
“In what way?”
“We don’t want a robot society, but we don’t mind touching robots and dealing with them in the way of business. We don’t have a superstitious fear of the things. We just know that a robot society is bound to decay. The Spacers have carefully made that plain to us by example. So that while we don’t want to live with this robotic poison, we are perfectly willing to sell it to Spacers for a substantial sum—if they are so foolish as to want such a society—”
“Do you think Spacers will buy them?”
“I’m sure they will. They will welcome the elegant models that the Solarians manufacture. It’s well known that they were the leading robot designers in the Galaxy, even though the late Dr. Fastolfe is said to have been unparalleled in the field, despite the fact that he was an Auroran.—Besides, even though we would charge a substantial sum, that sum would still be considerably less than the robots are worth. Spacers, and Traders would both profit—the secret of successful trade.
“The Spacers wouldn’t buy robots from Settlers,” said Gladia with evident contempt.
D.G. had a Trader’s way of ignoring such nonessentials as anger or contempt. It was business that counted. He said, “Of course they would. Offer them advanced robots at halfprice and why should they turn them down? Where business is to be done, you would be surprised how unimportant questions of ideology become.”
“I think you’ll be the one to be surprised. Try to sell your robots and you’ll see.”
“Would that I could, my lady. Try to sell them, that is. I have none on hand.”
“Why not?”
“Because none have been collected. Two separate trading vessels have landed on Solaria, each capable of storing some twenty-five robots. Had they succeeded, whole fleets of trading vessels would have followed them and I dare say we would have continued to do business for decades—and then have settled the world.”
“But they didn’t succeed. Why not?”
“Because both ships were destroyed on the surface of the planet and, as far as we can tell, all the crewmen are dead.”
“Equipment failure?”
“Nonsense. Both landed safely; they were not wrecked. Their last reports were that Spacers were approaching whether Solarians or natives of other Spacer worlds, we don’t know. We can only assume that the Spacers attacked without warning.”
“That’s impossible!”
“Is it?”
“Of course it’s impossible. What would be the motive?”
“To keep us off the world, I would say.”
“If they wished to do that,” said Gladia, “they would merely have had to announce that the world was occupied.”
“They might find it more pleasant to kill a few Settlers. At least, that’s what many of our people think and there is pressure to settle the matter by sending a few warships to Solaria and establishing a military base on the planet.”
“That would be dangerous.”
“Certainly. It could lead to war. Some of our fire-eaters look forward to that. Perhaps some Spacers look forward to that, too, and have destroyed the two ships merely to provoke hostilities.”
Gladia sat there amazed. There had been no hint of strained relations between Spacers and Settlers on any of the news programs.
She said, “Surely it’s possible to discuss the matter. Have your people approached the Spacer Federation?”
“A thoroughly unimportant body, but we have. We’ve also approached the Auroran Council.”
“And?”
“The Spacers deny everything. They suggest that the potential profits in the Solarian robot trade are so high that Traders, who are interested only in money—as though they themselves are not—would fight each other over the matter. Apparently, they would have us believe the two ships destroyed each other, each hoping to monopolize the trade for their own world.”
“The two ships were from I two different worlds, then?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you think, then, that there might indeed have been a fight between them?”
“I don’t think it’s likely, but I will admit it’s possible. There have been no outright conflicts between the Settler worlds, but there have been some pretty strenuous disputes. All have been settled through arbitration by Earth. Still, it is indeed a fact that the Settler worlds might, in a pinch, not hang together when multibillion-dollar trade is at stake. That’s why war is not such a good idea for us and why something will have to be done to discourage the hotheads. That’s where we come in.”
“We?”
“You and I. I have been asked to go to Solaria and find out—if I can—what really happened. I will take one ship—armed, but not heavily armed.”
“You might be destroyed, too.”
“Possibly. But my ship, at least, won’t be caught unprepared. Besides, I am not one of those hypervision heroes and I have considered what I might do to lessen the chances of destruction. It occurred to me that one of the disadvantages of Settler penetration of Solaria is that we don’t know the world at all. It might be useful, then, to take someone who knows the world—a Solarian, in short.
“You mean you want to take me?”
“Right, my lady.”
“Why me?”
“I should think you could see that without explanation, my lady. Those Solarians who have left the planet are gone we know not where. If any Solarians are left on the planet, they are very likely the enemy. There are no known Solarian born Spacers living on some Spacer planet other than Solaria—except yourself. You are only Solarian available to me—the only one in all the Galaxy. That’s why I must have you and that’s why you must come.”
“You’re wrong, Settler. If I am the only one available to you, then you have no one who is available. I do not intend to come with you and there is no way—absolutely no way that you can force me to come with you. I am surrounded by my robots. Take one step in my direction and you will be immobilized at once—and if you struggle you will be hurt.”
“I intend no force. You must come of your own accord and you should be willing to. It’s a matter of preventing war.
“That is the job of governments on your side and mine. I refuse to have anything to do with it. I am a private citizen.”
“You owe it to your world. We might suffer in case of war, but so will Aurora.”
“I am not one of those hypervision heroes, any more than you are.”
“You owe it to me, then.”
“You’re mad. I owe you nothing.”
D.G. smiled narrowly. “You owe me nothing as an individual. You owe me a great deal as a descendant of Elijah Baley.”
Gladia froze and remained staring at the bearded monster for a long moment. How did she come to forget who he was?
With difficulty, she finally muttered, “No.”
“Yes,” said D.G. forcefully. “On two different occasions, the Ancestor did more for you than you can ever repay. He is no longer here to call in the debt—a small part of the debt. I inherit the right to do so.”
Gladia said in despair, “But what can I do for you if I come with you?”
“We’ll find out. Will you come?”
Desperately, Gladia wanted to refuse, but was it for this that Elijah had suddenly become part of her life, once more, in the last twenty-four hours? Was is so that when this impossible demand was made upon her, it would be in his name and she would find it impossible to refuse?
She said, “What’s the use? The Council will not let me go with you. They will not have an Auroran taken away on a Settler’s vessel.”
“My lady, you have been here on Aurora for twenty decades, so you think, the Auroran-born consider you an Auroran. It’s not so. To them, you are a Solarian still. They’ll let you go.”
“They won’t,” said Gladia, her heart pounding and the skin of her upper arms turning to gooseflesh. He was right. She thought of Amadiro, who would surely think of her as nothing but a Solarian. Nevertheless, she repeated, “They won’t,” trying to reassure herself.
“They will,” retorted D.G. “Didn’t someone from your Council come to you to ask you to see me?”
She said defiantly, “He asked me only to report this conversation we have had. And I will do so.”
“If they want you to spy on me here in your own home, my lady, they will find it even more useful to have you spy on me on Solaria.” He waited for a response and when there was none, he said with a trace of weariness, “My lady, if you refuse, I won’t force you because I won’t have to. They will force you. But I don’t want that. The Ancestor would not want it if he were here. He would want you to come with me out of gratitude to him and for no other reason.—My lady, the Ancestor labored on your behalf under conditions of extreme difficulty. Won’t you labor on behalf of his memory?”
Gladia’s heart sank. She knew she could not resist that. She said, “I can’t go anywhere without robots.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to.” D.G. was grinning again. “Why not take my two namesakes? Do you need more?”
Gladia looked toward Daneel, but he was standing motionless. She looked toward Giskard—the same. And then it seemed to her that, for just a moment, his head moved—very slightly—up and down.
She had to trust him.
She said, “Well, then, I’ll come with you. These two robots are all I will need.”
15
Gladia had tried to relax after the harrowing session with Mandamus and did so with an intensity that fought relaxation to the death. She had opacified all the windows in her bedroom, adjusted the environment to a gentle warm breeze with the faint sound of rustling leaves and the occasional soft warble of a distant bird. She had then shifted it to the sound of a far-off surf and had added a faint but unmistakable tang of the sea in the air.
It didn’t help. Her mind echoed helplessly with what had just been—and with what was soon to come. Why had she chattered so freely to Mandamus? What business was it of his—or of Amadiro’s, for that matter—whether she had visited Elijah in orbit or not and whether or not—or when she had had a son by him or by any other man.
She had been cast into imbalance by Mandamus’s claim of descent, that’s what it was. In a society where no one cared about descent or relationship except for medico-genetic reasons, its sudden intrusion into a conversation was bound to be upsetting. That and the repeated (but surely accidental) references to Elijah.
She decided she was finding excuses for herself and, in impatience, she tossed it all away. She had reacted badly and had babbled like a baby and that was all there was to it.
Now there was this Settler coming.
He was not an Earthman. He had not been born on Earth, she was sure, and it was quite possible that he had never even visited Earth. His people might have lived on a strange world she had never heard of and might have done so for generations.
That would make him a Spacer, she thought. Spacers were descended from Earthmen, too—centuries further back, but what did that matter? To be sure, Spacers were long lived and these Settlers must be short-lived, but how much of a distinction was that? Even a Spacer might die prematurely through some freak accident; she had once heard of a Spacer who had died a natural death before he was sixty. Why not, then, think of the next visitor as a Spacer with an unusual accent?
But it wasn’t that simple. No doubt the Settler did not feel himself to be a Spacer. It’s not what you are that counts, but what you feel yourself to be. So think of him as a Settler, not a Spacer.
Yet weren’t all human beings simply human beings no matter what name—you applied to them—Spacers, Settlers, Aurorans, Earthpeople. The proof of it was that robots could not do injury to any of them. Daneel would spring as quickly to the defense of the most ignorant Earthman as to the Chairman of the Auroran Council—and that meant—
She could feel herself drifting, actually relaxing into a shallow sleep when a sudden thought entered her mind and seemed to ricochet there.
Why was the Settler named Baley?
Her mind sharpened and snapped out of the welcoming coils of oblivion that had all but engulfed her.
Why Baley?
Perhaps it was simply a common name among the Settlers. After all, it was Elijah who had made it all possible and he had to be a hero to them as—as—
She could not think of an analogous hero to Aurorans. Who had led the expedition that first reached Aurora? Who had supervised the terraformation of the raw barely living world that Aurora had then been? She did not know.
Was her ignorance born of the fact that she had been brought up on Solaria—or was it that the Aurorans simply had no founding hero? After all, the first expedition to Aurora had consisted of mere Earthpeople. It was only in later generations, with lengthening life-spans, thanks to the adjustments of sophisticated bio-engineering, that Earthpeople had become Aurorans. And after that, why should Aurorans wish to make heroes of their despised predecessors?
But Settlers might make heroes of Earthpeople. They had not yet changed, perhaps. They might change eventually and then Elijah would be forgotten in embarrassment, but till then—
That must be it. Probably half the Settlers alive had adopted the Baley surname. Poor Elijah! Everyone crowding onto his shoulders and into his shadow. Poor Elijah—dear Elijah—
And she did fall asleep.
16
The sleep was too restless to restore her to calm, let alone good humor. She was scowling without knowing that she was—and had she seen herself in the mirror, she would have been taken aback by her middle-aged appearance.
Daneel, to whom Gladia was a human being, regardless of age, appearance, or mood, said, “Madam—” Gladia interrupted, with a small shiver. “Is the Settler here?”
She looked up at the clock ribbon on the wall and then made a quick gesture, in response to which Daneel at once adjusted the heat upward. (It had been a cool day and was going to be a cooler evening.) Daneel said, “He is, madam.”
“Where have you put him?”
“In the main guest room, madam. Giskard is with him and the household robots are all within call.”
“I hope they will have the judgment to find out what he expects to eat for lunch. I don’t know Settler cuisine. And I hope they can make some reasonable attempt to meet his requests.”
“I am sure, madam, that Giskard will handle the matter competently.”
Gladia was sure of that, too, but she merely snorted. At least it would have been a snort if Gladia were the sort of person who snorted. She didn’t think she was.
“I presume,” she said, “he’s been in appropriate quarantine before being allowed to land.”
“It would be inconceivable for him not to have been, madam.”
She said, “Just the same, I’ll wear my gloves and my nose filter.”
She stepped out of her bedroom, was distantly aware that there were household robots about her, and made the sign that would get her a new pair of gloves and a fresh nose filter. Every establishment had its own vocabulary of signs and every human member of an establishment cultivated those signs, learning to make them both rapidly and unnoticeably. A robot was expected to follow these unobtrusive orders of its human overlords as though it read minds; and it followed that a robot could not follow the orders of nonestablishment human beings except by careful speech.
Nothing would humiliate a human member of an establishment more than to have one of the robots of the establishment hesitate in fulfilling an order or, worse, fulfill it incorrectly. That would mean that the human being had fumbled a sign—or that the robot had.
Generally, Gladia knew, it was the human being who was at fault, but in virtually every case, this was not admitted. It was the robot who was handed over for an unnecessary response analysis or unfairly put up for sale. Gladia had always felt that she would never fall into that trap of wounded ego, yet if at that moment she had not received her gloves and nose filter, she would have—
She did not have to finish the thought. The nearest robot brought her what she wanted, correctly and with speed.
Gladia adjusted the nose filter and snuffled a bit to make sure it was properly seated (she was in no mood to risk infection with any foul disorder that had survived the pain staking treatment during quarantine). She said, “What does he look like, Daneel?”
Daneel said, “He is of ordinary stature and measurements, madam.”
“I mean his face.” (It was silly to ask. If he showed any family resemblance to Elijah Baley, Daneel would have noticed it as quickly as she herself would have and he would have remarked upon it.) “That is difficult to say, madam. It is not in plain view.”
“What does that mean? Surely he’s, not masked, Daneel—”
“In a way, he is, madam. His face is covered with hair.”
“Hair?” She found herself laughing. “You mean after the fashion of the hypervision historicals? Beards?” She made little gestures indicating a tuft of hair on the chin and another under the nose.
“Rather more than that, madam. Half his face is covered.”
Gladia’s eyes opened wide and for the first time she felt a surge of interest in seeing him. What would a face with hair all over it look like? Auroran males—and Spacer males, generally—had very little facial hair and what there was would be removed permanently by the late teens—during virtual infancy.
Sometimes the upper lip was left untouched. Gladia remembered that her husband, Santirix Gremionis, before their marriage, had had a thin line of hair under his nose. A mustache, he had called it. It had looked like a misplaced and peculiarly misshapen eyebrow and once she had resigned himself to accepting him as a husband, she had insisted he destroy the follicles.
He had done so with scarcely a murmur and it occurred to her now, for the first time, to wonder if he had missed the hair. It seemed to her that she had noticed him, on occasion, in those early years, lifting a finger to his upper lip. She had thought it a nervous poking at a vague itch and it was only now that it occurred to her that he had been searching for a mustache that was gone forever.
How would a man look with a mustache all over his face? Would he be bearlike?
How would it feel? What if women had such hair, too? She thought of a man and woman trying to kiss and having trouble finding each other’s mouths. She found the thought funny, in a harmlessly ribald way, and laughed out loud. She felt her petulance disappearing and actually looked forward to seeing the monster.
After all, there would be no need to fear him even if he were as animal in behavior as he was in appearance. He would have no robot of his own—Settlers were supposed to have a nonrobotic society—and she would be surrounded by a dozen. The monster would be immobilized in a split second if he made the slightest suspicious move—or if he as much as raised his voice in anger.
She said with perfect good humor, “Take me to him, Daneel.”
17
The monster rose. He said something that sounded like “Good afternoon, muhleddy.”
She at once caught the “good afternoon,” but it took her a moment to translate the last word into “my lady.”
Gladia absently said, “Good afternoon.” She remembered the difficulty she had had understanding Auroran pronunciation of Galactic Standard in those long-ago days when, a frightened young woman, she had come to the planet from Solaria.
The monster’s accent was uncouth—or did it just sound uncouth because her ear was unaccustomed to it? Elijah, she remembered, had seemed to voice his “Vs” and “Ps,” but spoke pretty well otherwise. Nineteen and a half decades had passed, however, and this Settler was not from Earth. Language, in isolation, underwent changes.
But only a small portion of Gladia’s mind was on the language problem. She was staring at his beard.
It was not in the least like the beards that actors wore in historical dramas. Those always seemed tufted—a bit here, a bit there—looking gluey and glossy.
The Settler’s beard was different. It covered his cheeks and chin evenly, thickly, and deeply. It was a dark brown, somewhat lighter and wavier than the hair on his head, and at least two inches long, she judged—evenly long.
It didn’t cover his whole face, which was rather disappointing. His forehead was totally bare (except for his eyebrows), as were his nose and his under-eye regions.
His upper lip was bare, too, but it was shadowed as though there was the beginning of new growth upon it. There was additional bareness just under the lower lip, but with new growth less marked and concentrated mostly under the middle portion.
Since both his lips were quite bare, it was clear to Gladia that there would be no difficulty in kissing him. She said, knowing that staring was impolite and staring even so, “It seems to me you remove the hair from about your lips.”
“Yes, my lady.”
“Why, if I may ask?”
“You may ask. For hygienic reasons. I don’t want food catching in the hairs.”
“You scrape it off, don’t you? I see it is growing again.”
“I use a facial laser. It takes fifteen seconds after waking.”
“Why not depilate and be done with it?”
“I might want to grow it back.”
“Why?”
“Esthetic reasons, my lady.”
This time Gladia did not grasp the word. It sounded like “acidic” or possibly “acetic.”
She said, “Pardon me?”
The Settler said, “I might grow tired of the way I look now and want to grow the hair on the upper lip again. Some women like it, you know,” and the Settler tried to look modest and failed—“I have a fine mustache when I grow it.”
She said suddenly grasping the word, “You mean—”
The Settler laughed, showing fine white teeth, and said, “You talk funny, too, my lady.”
Gladia tried to look haughty, but melted into a smile. Proper pronunciation was a matter of local consensus. She said, “You ought to hear me with my Solarian accent—if it comes to that. Then it would be ‘estheetic rayzuns.’ The ‘r’ rolled interminably.”
“I’ve been places where they talk a little bit like that, it sounds barbarous.” He rolled both “r’s” phenomenally in the last word.
Gladia chuckled. “You do it with the tip of your tongue. It’s got to be with the sides of the tongue. No one, but a Solarian can do it correctly.”
“Perhaps you can teach me. A Trader like myself, who’s been everywhere, hears all kinds of linguistic perversions.” Again he tried to roll the “r’s” of the last word, choked slightly, and coughed.
“See. You’ll tangle your tonsils and you’ll never recover.” She was still staring at his beard and now she could curb her curiosity no longer. She reached toward it.
The Settler flinched and started back, then, realizing her intention, was still.
Gladia’s hand, all-but-invisibly gloved, rested lightly on the left side of his face. The thin plastic that covered her fingers did not interfere with the sense of touch and she found the hair to be soft and springy.
“It’s nice,” she said with evident surprise.
“Widely admired,” said the Settler, grinning.
She said, “But I can’t stand here and manhandle you all day.”
Ignoring his predictable “You can as far as I’m concerned,”—she went on. “Have you told my robots what you would like to eat?”
“My lady, I told them what I now tell you—whatever is handy. I’ve been on a score of worlds in the last year and each has its own dietary. A Trader learns to eat everything that isn’t actually toxic. I’d prefer an Auroran meal to anything you would try to make in imitation of Baleyworld—”
“Baleyworld?” said Gladia sharply, a frown returning to her face.
“Named for the leader of the first expedition to the planet—or to any of the Settled planets, for that matter. Ben Baley.”
“The son of Elijah Baley.”
“Yes,” the Settler said and changed the subject, at once. He looked down at himself and said with a trace of petulance, “How do you people manage to stand these clothes of yours slick and puffy. Be glad to get into my own again.”
“I’m sure you will have your chance to do so soon enough. But for now please come and join me at lunch.—I was told your name was Baley, by the way—like your planet.”
“Not surprising. It’s the most honored name on the planet, naturally. I’m Deejee Baley.”
They had walked into the dining room, Giskard preceding them, Daneel following them, each moving into his appropriate wall niche. Other robots were already in their niches and two emerged to do the serving. The room was bright with sunshine, the walls were alive with decoration, the table was set, and the odor of the food was enticing.
The Settler sniffed and let his breath out in satisfaction. “I don’t think I’ll have any trouble at all eating Auroran food. Where would you like me to sit, my lady?”
A robot said at once, “If you would sit here, sir?”
The Settler sat down and then Gladia, the privileges of the guest satisfied, took her own seat.
“Deejee?” she said. “I do not know the nomenclature peculiarities of your world, so excuse me if my question is offensive. Wouldn’t Deejee be a feminine name?”
“Not at all,” said the Settler a bit stiffly. “In any case, it is not a name, it is a pair of initials. Fourth letter of the alphabet and the seventh.”
“Oh,” said Gladia, enlightened, “D.G. Baley. And what do the initials stand for, if you’ll excuse my curiosity?”
“Certainly. There’s ‘D,’ for certain,” he said, jerking his thumb toward one of the wall niches, “and I suspect that one may be ‘G.’” He jerked his thumb toward another.
“You don’t mean that,” said Gladia faintly.
“But I do. My name is Daneel Giskard Baley. In every generation, my family has had at least one Daneel or one Giskard in its multiplying batches. I was the last of six children, but the first boy. My mother felt that was enough and made up for having but one son by giving me both names. That made me Daneel Giskard Baley and the double load was too great for me. I prefer D.G. as my name and I’d be honored if you used it.” He smiled genially. “I’m the first to bear both names and I’m also the first to see the grand originals.”
“But why those names?”
“It was Ancestor Elijah’s idea, according to the family story. He had the honor of naming his grandsons and he named, the oldest Daneel, while the second was named Giskard. He insisted on those names and that established the tradition.”
“And the daughters?”
“The traditional name from generation to generation is Jezebel—Jessie. Elijah’s wife, you know.”
“I know.”
“There are no—” He caught himself and transferred his attention to the dish that had been placed before him. “If this were Baleyworld, I would say this was a slice of roast pork and that it was smothered in peanut sauce.”
“Actually, it is a vegetable dish, D.G. What you were about to say was that there are no Gladias in the family?”
“There aren’t,” said D.G. calmly. “One explanation is that Jessie—the original Jessie—would have objected, but I don’t accept that. Elijah’s wife, the Ancestress, never came to Baleyworld, you know, never left Earth. How could she have objected? No, to me, it’s pretty certain that the Ancestor wanted no other Gladia. No imitations, no copies, no pretense. One Gladia. Unique.—He asked that there be no later Elijah, either.”
Gladia was having trouble eating. “I think your Ancestor spent the latter portion of his life trying to be as unemotional as Daneel. Just the same, he had romantic notions under his skin. He might have allowed other Elijahs and Gladias. It wouldn’t have offended me, certainly, and I imagine it wouldn’t have offended his wife, either.” She laughed tremulously.
D.G. said, “All this doesn’t seem real somehow. The Ancestor is practically ancient history; he died a hundred and sixty-four years ago. I’m his descendant in the seventh generation, yet here I am sitting with a woman who knew him when he was quite young.”
“I didn’t really know him,” said Gladia, staring at her plate. “I saw him, rather briefly, on three separate occasions over a period of seven years.”
“I know. The Ancestor’s son, Ben, wrote a biography of him which is one of the literary classics of Baleyworld. Even I have read it.”
“Indeed? I haven’t read it. I didn’t even know it existed. What—what does it say about me?”
D.G. seemed amused. “Nothing you would object to; you come out very well. But never mind that. What I’m amazed at is that here we are together, across seven generations. How old are you, my lady? Is it fair to ask the question?”
“I don’t know that it’s fair, but I have no objection to it. In Galactic Standard Years, I am two hundred and thirty-three years old. Over twenty-two decades.”
“You look as though you were no more than in your late forties. The Ancestor died at the age of seventy-nine, an old man. I’m thirty-nine and when I die you will still be alive—”
“If I avoid death by misadventure.”
“And will continue to live perhaps five decades beyond.”
“Do you envy me, D.G.?” said Gladia with an edge of bitterness in her voice. “Do you envy me for having survived Elijah by over sixteen decades and for being condemned to survive him ten decades more, perhaps?”
“Of course I envy you,” came the composed answer. “Why not? I would have no objection to living for several centuries, were it not that I would be setting a bad example to the people of Baleyworld. I wouldn’t want them to live that long as a general thing. The pace of historical and intellectual advance would then become too slow. Those at the top would stay in power too long. Baleyworld would sink into conversation and decay—as your world has done.”
Gladia’s small chin lifted. “Aurora is doing quite well, you’ll find.”
“I’m speaking of your world. Solaria.”
Gladia hesitated, then said firmly, “Solaria is not my world.”
D.G. said, “I hope it is. I came to see you because I believe Solaria is your world.”
“If that is why you came to seem me, you are wasting your time, young man.”
“You were born Solaria, weren’t you, and lived there a while?”
“I lived there for the first three decades of my life, about an eighth of my lifetime.”
“Then that makes you enough of a Solarian to be able to help me in a matter that is rather important.”
“I am not a Solarian, despite this so-called important matter.”
“It is a matter of war and peace—if you call that important. The Spacer worlds face war with the Settler worlds and things will go badly for all of us if it comes to that. And it is up to you, my lady, to prevent that war and to ensure peace.”
18
The meal was done (it had been a small one) and Gladia found herself looking at D.G. in a coldly furious way.
She had lived quietly for the last twenty decades, peeling off the complexities of life. Slowly she had forgotten the misery of Solaria and the difficulties of adjustment to Aurora. She had managed to bury quite deeply the agony of two murders and the ecstasy of two strange loves—with a robot and with an Earthman—and to get well past it all. She had ended by spinning out a long quiet marriage, having two children, and working at her applied art of costumery. And eventually the children had left, then her husband, and soon she might be retiring even from her work.
Then she would be alone with her robots, content with or, rather, resigned to—letting life glide quietly and uneventfully to a slow close in its own time—a close so gentle she might not be aware of the ending when it came.
It was what she wanted.
Then—What was happening?
It had begun the night before when she looked up vainly at the star-lit sky to see Solaria’s star, which was not in the sky and would not have been visible to her if it were. It was as though this one foolish reaching for the past—a past that should have been allowed to remain dead—had burst the cool bubble she had built about herself.
First the name of Elijah Baley, the most joyously painful memory of all the ones she had so carefully brushed away, had come up again and again in a grim repetition.
She was then forced to deal with a man who thought mistakenly he might be a descendant of Elijah in the fifth degree and now with another man who actually was a descendant in the seventh degree. Finally, she was now being given problems and responsibilities similar to those that had plagued Elijah himself on various occasions.
Was she becoming Elijah, in a fashion, with none of his talent and none of his fierce dedication to duty at all costs?
What had she done to deserve it?
She felt her rage being buried under a flood tide of self-pity. She felt unjustly dealt with. No one had the right to unload responsibility on her against her will.
She said, forcing her voice level, “Why do you insist on my being a Solarian, when I tell you that I am not a Solarian?”
D.G. did not seem disturbed by the chill that had now entered her voice. He was still holding the soft napkin that had been given him at the conclusion of the meal. It had been damply hot—not too hot—and he had imitated the actions of Gladia in carefully wiping his hands and mouth. He had then doubled it over and stroked his beard with it. It was shredding now and shriveling.
He said, “I presume it will vanish altogether.”
“It will.”
D.G. wadded what was left of his napkin and placed it on the arm of the chair. A robot, in response to Gladia’s quick and unobtrusive gesture, removed it.
Gladia had deposited her own napkin in the appropriate receptacle on the table. Holding it was unmannerly and could be excused only by D.G.’s evident unfamiliarity with civilized custom. “There are some who think it has a polluting effect on the atmosphere, but there is a gentle draft that carries the residue upward and traps it in filters. I doubt that it will give us any trouble.—But you ignore my question, sir.”
D.G. said, “I don’t intend to ignore your question, my lady. I am not trying to force you to be a Solarian. I merely point out that you were born on Solaria and spent your early decades there and therefore you might reasonably be considered a Solarian, after a fashion at least.—Do you know that Solaria has been abandoned?”
“So I have heard. Yes.”
“Do you feel anything about that?”
“I am an Auroran and have been one for twenty decades.”
“That is a non sequitur.”
“A what?” She could make nothing of the last sound at all.
“It has not connection with my question.”
“A non sequitur, you mean. You said a nonsense quitter.”
D.G. smiled. “Very well. Let’s quit the nonsense. I ask you if you feel anything about the death of Solaria and you tell me you’re an Auroran. Do you maintain that is an answer? A born Auroran might feel badly at the death of a sister world. How do you feel about it?”
Gladia said icily, “It doesn’t matter. Why are you interested?”
“I’ll explain. We—I mean the Traders of the Settler worlds—are interested because there is business to be done, profits to be made, and a world to be gained. Solaria is already terraformed; it is a comfortable world; you Spacers seem to have no need or desire for it. Why would we not settle it?”
“Because it’s not yours.”
“Madam, is it yours that you object? Has Aurora any more claim to it than Baleyworld has? Can’t we suppose that an empty world belongs to whoever is pleased to settle it?”
“Have you settled it?”
“No—because it’s not empty—”
“Do you mean the Solarians have not entirely left?” Gladia said quickly.
D.G.’s smile returned and broadened into a grin. “You’re excited at the thought.—Even though you’re an Auroran.”
Gladia’s face twisted into a frown at once. “Answer my question.”
D.G. shrugged. “There were only some five thousand Solarians on the world just before it was abandoned, according to our best estimates. The population had been declining for years. But even five thousand—can we be sure that all are gone? However, that’s not the point. Even if the Solarians were indeed all gone, the planet would not be empty. There are, upon it, some two hundred million or more robots—masterless robots—some of them among the most advanced in the Galaxy. Presumably, those Solarians who left took some robots with them—it’s hard to imagine Spacers doing without robots altogether.” (He looked about, smiling, at the robots in their niches within the room.) “However, they can’t possibly have taken forty thousand robots apiece.”
Gladia said, “Well, then, since your Settler worlds are so purely robot-free and wish to stay so, I presume, you can’t settle Solaria.”
“That’s right. Not until the robots are gone and that is where Traders such as myself come in.”
“In what way?”
“We don’t want a robot society, but we don’t mind touching robots and dealing with them in the way of business. We don’t have a superstitious fear of the things. We just know that a robot society is bound to decay. The Spacers have carefully made that plain to us by example. So that while we don’t want to live with this robotic poison, we are perfectly willing to sell it to Spacers for a substantial sum—if they are so foolish as to want such a society—”
“Do you think Spacers will buy them?”
“I’m sure they will. They will welcome the elegant models that the Solarians manufacture. It’s well known that they were the leading robot designers in the Galaxy, even though the late Dr. Fastolfe is said to have been unparalleled in the field, despite the fact that he was an Auroran.—Besides, even though we would charge a substantial sum, that sum would still be considerably less than the robots are worth. Spacers, and Traders would both profit—the secret of successful trade.
“The Spacers wouldn’t buy robots from Settlers,” said Gladia with evident contempt.
D.G. had a Trader’s way of ignoring such nonessentials as anger or contempt. It was business that counted. He said, “Of course they would. Offer them advanced robots at halfprice and why should they turn them down? Where business is to be done, you would be surprised how unimportant questions of ideology become.”
“I think you’ll be the one to be surprised. Try to sell your robots and you’ll see.”
“Would that I could, my lady. Try to sell them, that is. I have none on hand.”
“Why not?”
“Because none have been collected. Two separate trading vessels have landed on Solaria, each capable of storing some twenty-five robots. Had they succeeded, whole fleets of trading vessels would have followed them and I dare say we would have continued to do business for decades—and then have settled the world.”
“But they didn’t succeed. Why not?”
“Because both ships were destroyed on the surface of the planet and, as far as we can tell, all the crewmen are dead.”
“Equipment failure?”
“Nonsense. Both landed safely; they were not wrecked. Their last reports were that Spacers were approaching whether Solarians or natives of other Spacer worlds, we don’t know. We can only assume that the Spacers attacked without warning.”
“That’s impossible!”
“Is it?”
“Of course it’s impossible. What would be the motive?”
“To keep us off the world, I would say.”
“If they wished to do that,” said Gladia, “they would merely have had to announce that the world was occupied.”
“They might find it more pleasant to kill a few Settlers. At least, that’s what many of our people think and there is pressure to settle the matter by sending a few warships to Solaria and establishing a military base on the planet.”
“That would be dangerous.”
“Certainly. It could lead to war. Some of our fire-eaters look forward to that. Perhaps some Spacers look forward to that, too, and have destroyed the two ships merely to provoke hostilities.”
Gladia sat there amazed. There had been no hint of strained relations between Spacers and Settlers on any of the news programs.
She said, “Surely it’s possible to discuss the matter. Have your people approached the Spacer Federation?”
“A thoroughly unimportant body, but we have. We’ve also approached the Auroran Council.”
“And?”
“The Spacers deny everything. They suggest that the potential profits in the Solarian robot trade are so high that Traders, who are interested only in money—as though they themselves are not—would fight each other over the matter. Apparently, they would have us believe the two ships destroyed each other, each hoping to monopolize the trade for their own world.”
“The two ships were from I two different worlds, then?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t you think, then, that there might indeed have been a fight between them?”
“I don’t think it’s likely, but I will admit it’s possible. There have been no outright conflicts between the Settler worlds, but there have been some pretty strenuous disputes. All have been settled through arbitration by Earth. Still, it is indeed a fact that the Settler worlds might, in a pinch, not hang together when multibillion-dollar trade is at stake. That’s why war is not such a good idea for us and why something will have to be done to discourage the hotheads. That’s where we come in.”
“We?”
“You and I. I have been asked to go to Solaria and find out—if I can—what really happened. I will take one ship—armed, but not heavily armed.”
“You might be destroyed, too.”
“Possibly. But my ship, at least, won’t be caught unprepared. Besides, I am not one of those hypervision heroes and I have considered what I might do to lessen the chances of destruction. It occurred to me that one of the disadvantages of Settler penetration of Solaria is that we don’t know the world at all. It might be useful, then, to take someone who knows the world—a Solarian, in short.
“You mean you want to take me?”
“Right, my lady.”
“Why me?”
“I should think you could see that without explanation, my lady. Those Solarians who have left the planet are gone we know not where. If any Solarians are left on the planet, they are very likely the enemy. There are no known Solarian born Spacers living on some Spacer planet other than Solaria—except yourself. You are only Solarian available to me—the only one in all the Galaxy. That’s why I must have you and that’s why you must come.”
“You’re wrong, Settler. If I am the only one available to you, then you have no one who is available. I do not intend to come with you and there is no way—absolutely no way that you can force me to come with you. I am surrounded by my robots. Take one step in my direction and you will be immobilized at once—and if you struggle you will be hurt.”
“I intend no force. You must come of your own accord and you should be willing to. It’s a matter of preventing war.
“That is the job of governments on your side and mine. I refuse to have anything to do with it. I am a private citizen.”
“You owe it to your world. We might suffer in case of war, but so will Aurora.”
“I am not one of those hypervision heroes, any more than you are.”
“You owe it to me, then.”
“You’re mad. I owe you nothing.”
D.G. smiled narrowly. “You owe me nothing as an individual. You owe me a great deal as a descendant of Elijah Baley.”
Gladia froze and remained staring at the bearded monster for a long moment. How did she come to forget who he was?
With difficulty, she finally muttered, “No.”
“Yes,” said D.G. forcefully. “On two different occasions, the Ancestor did more for you than you can ever repay. He is no longer here to call in the debt—a small part of the debt. I inherit the right to do so.”
Gladia said in despair, “But what can I do for you if I come with you?”
“We’ll find out. Will you come?”
Desperately, Gladia wanted to refuse, but was it for this that Elijah had suddenly become part of her life, once more, in the last twenty-four hours? Was is so that when this impossible demand was made upon her, it would be in his name and she would find it impossible to refuse?
She said, “What’s the use? The Council will not let me go with you. They will not have an Auroran taken away on a Settler’s vessel.”
“My lady, you have been here on Aurora for twenty decades, so you think, the Auroran-born consider you an Auroran. It’s not so. To them, you are a Solarian still. They’ll let you go.”
“They won’t,” said Gladia, her heart pounding and the skin of her upper arms turning to gooseflesh. He was right. She thought of Amadiro, who would surely think of her as nothing but a Solarian. Nevertheless, she repeated, “They won’t,” trying to reassure herself.
“They will,” retorted D.G. “Didn’t someone from your Council come to you to ask you to see me?”
She said defiantly, “He asked me only to report this conversation we have had. And I will do so.”
“If they want you to spy on me here in your own home, my lady, they will find it even more useful to have you spy on me on Solaria.” He waited for a response and when there was none, he said with a trace of weariness, “My lady, if you refuse, I won’t force you because I won’t have to. They will force you. But I don’t want that. The Ancestor would not want it if he were here. He would want you to come with me out of gratitude to him and for no other reason.—My lady, the Ancestor labored on your behalf under conditions of extreme difficulty. Won’t you labor on behalf of his memory?”
Gladia’s heart sank. She knew she could not resist that. She said, “I can’t go anywhere without robots.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to.” D.G. was grinning again. “Why not take my two namesakes? Do you need more?”
Gladia looked toward Daneel, but he was standing motionless. She looked toward Giskard—the same. And then it seemed to her that, for just a moment, his head moved—very slightly—up and down.
She had to trust him.
She said, “Well, then, I’ll come with you. These two robots are all I will need.”
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