Mandamus said dryly, “You have always referred to that particular Spacer woman as ‘the Solarian woman.’”
“She is ‘the Solarian woman’ to us, but she will be considered a Spacer woman once a Settler is involved. If his ship lands on Solaria, as he suggests it will, it may be destroyed as the others were, together with him and the woman. I may then be accused by my enemies, with some color of justification, of murder—and my political career may not survive that.”
Mandamus said, “Think, instead, of the fact that we have labored nearly seven years in order to arrange the final destruction of Earth and that we are now only a few months from the completion of the project. Shall we risk war now and, at a stroke, ruin everything we’ve done when we are so close to final victory?”
Amadiro shook his head. “It isn’t as though I have a choice in the matter, my friend. The Council wouldn’t follow me if I try to argue them into surrendering the woman to a Settler. And the mere fact that I have suggested it will be used against me. My political career will be shaken and we may then have a war in addition. Besides, the thought of a Spacer woman dying in service to a Settler is unbearable.”
“One would suppose you were fond of the Solarian woman.”
“You know I am not. With all my heart I wish she had died twenty decades ago, but not this way, not on a Settler ship. But I should remember that she is an ancestress of yours in the fifth generation.”
Mandamus looked a bit more dour than he usually did. “Of what consequence is that to me? I am a Spacer individual, conscious of myself and of my society. I am not an ancestor-worshiping member of a tribal conglomerate.”
For a moment, Mandamus fell silent and his thin face took on a look of intense concentration. “Dr. Amadiro,” he said, “could you not explain to the Council that this ancestress of mine is being taken, not as a Spacer hostage but only because her unique knowledge of Solaria, where she spent her childhood and youth, could make her an essential part of the exploration and that this exploration might even be helpful to us, as well as to the Settlers? After all, in truth, wouldn’t it be desirable for us to know what those miserable Solarians are up to? The woman will presumably bring back a report of the events—if she survives.”
Amadiro thrust out his lower lip. “That might work if the woman went on board voluntarily, if she made it clear that she understood the importance of the work and wished to perform her patriotic duty. To put her on board ship by force, though, is unthinkable.”
“Well, then, suppose I were to see this ancestress of mine and try to persuade her to get on the ship willingly; and suppose, also, that you speak to this Settler captain by hyperwave and tell them he can land on Aurora and have the woman if he can persuade her to go with him willingly or, at least, say that she’ll go with him willingly, whether she does or not.”
“I suppose we can’t lose by making the effort, but I don’t see how we can win.”
Yet to Amadiro’s surprise, they did win. He had listened with astonishment as Mandamus told him the details.
“I brought up the matter of the humanoid robots,” Mandamus said, “and it’s clear she knew nothing about them, from which I deduced Fastolfe had known nothing about them. It has been one of those things that nagged at me. Then I talked a great deal about my ancestry in such a way as to force her to talk of that Earthman Elijah Baley.”
“What about him?” said Amadiro harshly.
“Nothing, except that she talked about him and remembered. This Settler who wants her is a descendant of Baley and I thought it might influence her to consider the Settler’s request more favorably than she might otherwise have done.”
In any case, it had worked and for a few days Amadiro felt a relief from the almost continuous pressure that had plagued him from the start of the Solarian crisis.
But only for a very few days.
61
One point that worked to Amadiro’s advantage at this time was that he had not seen Vasilia, thus far, during the Solarian crisis.
It would certainly not have been an appropriate time to see her. He did not wish to be annoyed by her petty concern over a robot she claimed as her own—with total disregard for the legalities of the situation—at a time when a true crisis exercised his every nerve and thought. Nor did he wish to expose himself to the kind of quarrel that might easily arise between her and Mandamus over the question of which was eventually to preside over the Robotics Institute.
In any case, he had about come to the decision that Mandamus ought to be his successor. Throughout the Solarian crisis, he had kept his eye fixed on what was important. Even when Amadiro himself had felt shaken, Mandamus had remained icily calm. It was Mandamus who thought it conceivable that the Solarian woman might accompany the Settler captain voluntarily and it was he who maneuvered her into doing so.
And if his plan for the destruction of Earth worked itself out as it should—as it must—then Amadiro could see Mandamus succeeding as Council Chairman eventually. It would even be just, thought Amadiro, in a rare burst of selflessness.
On this particular evening, in consequence, he did not so much as expend a thought upon Vasilia. He left the Institute with a small squad of robots seeing him safely to his ground-car. That ground-car, driven by one robot and with two more in the backseat with him, passed quietly through a twilit and chilly rain and brought him to his establishment, where two more robots ushered him indoors. And all this time he did not think of Vasilia.
To find her sitting in his living room, then, in front of his hyperwave set, watching an intricate robot ballet, with several of Amadiro’s robots in their niches and two of her own robots behind her chair, struck him at first not as much with the anger of violated privacy, as with pure surprise.
It took some time for him to control his breathing well enough to be able to speak and then his anger arose and he said harshly, “What are you doing here? How did you get in?”
Vasilia was calm enough. Amadiro’s appearance was, after all, entirely expected. “What I’m doing here,” she said, “is waiting to see you. Getting in was not difficult. Your robots know my appearance very well and they know my standing at the Institute. Why shouldn’t they allow me to enter if I assure them I have an appointment with you?”
“Which you haven’t. You have violated my privacy.”
“Not really. There’s a limit to how much trust you can squeeze out of someone else’s robots. Look at them. They have never once taken their eyes from me. If I had wanted to disturb your belongings, look through your papers, take advantage of your absence in any way, I assure you I could not have. My two robots are no match against them.”
“Do you know,” said Amadiro, bitterly, “that you have acted in a thoroughly un-Spacer fashion. You are despicable and I will not forget this.”
Vasilia seemed to blanch slightly at the adjectives. She said in a low, hard voice, “I hope you don’t forget it, Kelden, for I’ve done what I’ve done for you—and if I reacted as I should to your foul mouth, I would leave now and let you continue for the rest of your life to be the defeated man you have been for the past twenty decades.”
“I will not remain a defeated man—whatever you do.”
Vasilia said, “You sound as though you believe that, but, you see, you do not know what I know. I must tell you that without my intervention you will remain defeated. I don’t care what scheme you have in mind. I don’t care what this thin-lipped, acid-faced Mandamus has cooked up for you—”