“I was assigned to you, it is true, Lady Vasilia, but Dr. Fastolfe retained ownership. Once you left his establishment, he resumed full control of me as my owner. He remained my owner even when he later assigned me to Lady Gladia. He was my only owner for as long as he lived. Upon his death, by his will, ownership of me was transferred to Lady Gladia and that is how it stands now.”
“Not so. I asked you if you remembered, when you were first activated and what you remembered. What you were when you were first activated is not what you are now.”
“My memory banks, madam, are now incomparably fuller than they were then and I have much in the I way of experience that I did not have then.”
Vasilia’s voice grew sterner. “I am not talking about memory, nor am I talking about experience. I am talking about capacities. I added to your positronic pathways. I adjusted them. I improved them.”
“Yes, madam, you did so, with Dr. Fastolfe’s help and approval.”
“At one time, Giskard, on one occasion, I introduced an improvement—at least, an extension, and without Dr. Fastolfe’s help and approval. Do you remember that?”
Giskard was silent for a substantial period of time. Then he said, “I remember one occasion on which I did not witness your consulting him. I assumed that you consulted him at a time when I was not a witness.”
“If you assumed that, you assumed incorrectly. In fact, since you knew he was off the world at the time, you could not possibly have assumed it. You are being evasive, to use no stronger word.”
“No, madam. You might have consulted him by hyperwave. I considered that a possibility.”
Vasilia, said, “Nevertheless, that addition was entirely mine. The result was that you became a substantially different robot afterward from what you had been before. The robot you have been ever since that change has been my design, my creation, and you know that well.”
Giskard remained silent.
“Now, Giskard, by what right was Dr. Fastolfe your master at the time you were activated?” She waited, then said sharply, “Answer me, Giskard. That is an order!”
Giskard said, “Since he was designer and supervised the construction, I was his property—”
“And when I, in effect, redesigned and reconstructed you in a very fundamental way, did you not then become my property?”
Giskard said, “I cannot answer that question. It would require the decision of a law court to argue out the specific case. It would depend, perhaps, on the degree to which I was redesigned and reconstructed.”
“Are you aware of the degree to which that took place?”
Giskard was again silent.
“This is childish, Giskard,” said Vasilia. “Am I to be required to nudge you after each question? You are not to make me do that. In this case, at any rate, silence is a sure indication of an affirmative. You know what the change was and how fundamental it was and you know that I know what it was. You put the Solarian woman to sleep because you did not want her to learn from me what it was. She doesn’t know, does she?”
“She does not, madam,” said Giskard.
“And you don’t want her to know?”
“I do not, madam,” said Giskard.
“Does Daneel know?”
“He does, madam.”
Vasilia nodded. “I rather suspected that from his eagerness to stay.—Now, then, listen to me, Giskard. Suppose that a court of law finds out that, before I redesigned you, you were an ordinary robot and that, after I redesigned you, you were a robot who could sense the mind-set of an individual human being and adjust it to his liking. Do you think they could possibly fail to consider it a change great enough to warrant the ownership to have passed into my hands?”
Giskard said, “Madam Vasilia, it would not be possible to let this come before a court of law. Under the circumstances, I would surely be declared the property of the state for obvious reasons. I might even be ordered inactivated.”
“Nonsense. Do you take me for a child? With your abilities, you could keep the court from making any such judgment. But that is not the point. I’m not suggesting that we take this to court. I am asking you for your own judgment. Would you not say that I am your rightful owner and have been since I was a very young woman?”
Giskard said, “Madam Gladia considers herself to be my owner and, until the law speaks to the contrary, she must be considered that.”
“But you know that both she and the law labor under a misapprehension. If you worry about the feelings of your Solarian woman, it would be very easy to adjust her mindset so that she wouldn’t mind your no longer being her property. You can even cause her to feel relieved that I will take you off her hands. I will order you to do so as soon as you can bring yourself to admit what you already know that I am your owner. How long has Daneel known your nature?”
“For decades, madam.”
“You can make him forget. For some time now, Dr. Amadiro has known and you can make him forget. There will be only you and I who will know.”
Daneel said suddenly, “Madam Vasilia, since Giskard does not consider himself your property, he can easily make you forget and you will then be perfectly content with matters as they are.”
Vasilia turned a cold eye on Daneel. “Can he? But you see, it is not for you to decide who it is that Giskard considers his owner. I know that Giskard knows that I am his owner, so that his duty, within the Three Laws, belongs entirely to me. If he must make someone forget and can do so without physical harm, it will be necessary for him, in making a choice, to choose anyone but me. He cannot make me forget or tamper with my mind in any way. I thank you, Daneel, for giving me the occasion of making this quite plain.”
Daneel said, “But Madam Gladia’s emotions are so enwrapped in Giskard that for him to force forgetfulness upon her might harm her.”
Vasilia said, “Giskard is the one to decide that.—Giskard, you are mine. You know you are mine and I order you to induce forgetfulness in this man-aping robot who stands beside you and in the woman who wrongfully treated you as her property. Do it while she is asleep and there will be no harm done to her of any kind.”
Daneel said, “Friend Giskard, Lady Gladia is your legal owner. If you induce forgetfulness in Lady Vasilia, it will not harm her.”
“But it will,” said Vasilia at once. “The Solarian woman will not be harmed, for she need only forget that she is under the impression that she is Giskard’s owner. I, on the other hand, also know that Giskard has mental powers. Digging that out will be more complex and Giskard can surely tell by my intense determination to keep that knowledge that he could not help but inflict damage on me in the process of removing it.”
Daneel said, “Friend Giskard—”
Vasilia said, in a voice that was diamond-hard, “I order you, Robot Daneel Olivaw, to be silent. I am not your owner, but your owner is asleep and does not countermand it, so my order must be obeyed.”
Daneel fell silent, but his lips trembled as though he were trying to talk despite the order.
Vasilia watched that manifestation with an amused smile on her lips. “You see, Daneel, you cannot talk.”
And Daneel said in a hoarse whisper, “I can, madam, I find it difficult, but I can, for I find that something takes precedence over your order, which is governed by only the Second Law.”
Vasilia’s eyes opened wide and she said sharply, “Silence, I say. Nothing takes precedence over my order but the First Law and I have already shown that Giskard will do least harm—indeed, no harm at all—if he returns to me. He will do harm to me, to whom he is least capable of doing harm, if he follows any other course of action.” She pointed her finger at Daneel and said again with a soft hiss, “Silence!”