Of course, I didn’t speak “out loud”—I mean, in any way Klara or the two men could hear. And when Albert showed up, he was no more visible to them than was the real, not doppel, me.
That was a good thing. Albert was obviously in a playful mood.
He was a rare old spectacle. He had one of those tacky, worn-out sweaters he affects wrapped around his head like a turban. He had been taking liberties with his physical specifications, too. His eyes were narrower, and they seemed to be rimmed with black makeup. His features were darker. His hair was jet black. “I hear and obey, 0 Master,” he chanted in a reverent singsong. “Why have you summoned your genie out of his nice warm bottle?”
When you have a faithful data-retrieval program like Albert Einstein, you don’t need a court jester. “Clown,” I said, “I’ll summon Essie to have you reprogrammed if you don’t straighten out. What’s the idea of the comedy?”
“O Master,” he said, bowing his head, “your humble messenger fears the just wrath of your noble self when he hears evil tidings.”
I said, “Shit.” But I had to admit he had made me laugh, and that was one way of making evil tidings easier to bear. “All right,” I said, nodding to show that I knew what the evil tidings were going to be. “Tell me about Metchnikov. He was on the mission to the black hole, and now he’s back. I just figured out that that means he’s entitled to a share of the science bonus I got for the mission, right?”
Albert looked at me curiously. Then he said, unwinding the sweater from his head, “That’s right, Robin. It’s not just him, either. When Klara went back to the black hole with Harbin Eskladar—”
“Hold it! Who?”
“That’s Harbin Eskladar,” he said, pointing to the other man. “You told me you knew about him.”
“Albert,” I sighed, rearranging the conjectures and misunderstandings inside my mind to fit the new pattern, “you should know by now that when I tell you I know anything, I’m lying.”
He looked at me seriously. “So I feared,” he said. “That’s the bad news, I’m afraid.”—
He paused there, as though he hadn’t quite made up his mind what to say next, so I prompted him. “You said the two of them went back to the black hole where I’d dumped them all.”
He shook his head. “Oh, Robin,” he sighed, but thankfully did not start telling me about my guilt trips again. He just said, “Yes, that’s right. He and Klara went there together to rescue them, only they rescued the whole crew: the two Dannys, Susie Hereira, the girls from Sierra Leone—”
“I know who was on the mission,” I interrupted. “My God! They’re all back!”
“They all are, yes, Robin.” He nodded. “And they are all, in some sense, entitled to full shares. That is what Dane Metchnikov saw a lawyer about. Now,” he said thoughtfully, reaching into a pocket and pulling out his pipe-his complexion had unobtrusively returned to normal, his hair was white and unruly again-“there are certainly some unusual ethical and legal questions here. As you remember from previous litigaton, there is the principle that lawyers refer to as ‘the calf follows the cow,’ which means that all your subsequently accumulated fortune can be considered to be in some sense the consequence of that original Science Bonus from that mission. In which, of course, they would all have shared if they had returned with you.”
“So I have to give them money?”
“’Have to’ is putting it too strongly, but that’s the general idea, Robin. As you did with Klara when she first showed up; one hundred million dollars was the amount you settled on her for a quitclaim. Since I perceived this question would arise, I’ve taken the liberty of having your legal program contact Mr. Metchnikov’s. That figure seemed acceptable. Some sort of settlement of the same order of magnitude would be appropriate for each of the others, I believe. Of course, they could ask for more. But I don’t think they would get it; there is also a statute of limitations, naturally.”
“Oh,” I said, relieved. I never have any real idea how “rich” I am within several dozen billion dollars, but a billion one way or another wouldn’t make much difference. “I thought you said you had bad news.”
He lit the pipe. “I haven’t given you the bad news yet, Robin,” he said.
I looked at him. He was puffing at the pipe, peering at me through the smoke. “Danm it, do it!”
He said, “That other man, Harbin Eskladar.”
“What about him, damn you?”
“Kiara met him after leaving us on the True Love. He was a pilot too. The two of them decided to go back to the black hole, so Klara rented Juan Henriquette Santos-Schmitz’s ship, which was capable of the mission. And before they left-well-the thing is, Robin, Klara and Eskladar were married.”
There are surprises that, as soon as you hear them, you know instinctively you should have been prepared for. This one came out of nowhere.
“Thank you, Albert,” I said hollowly, dismissing him. He was sighing as he left, but he left.
I didn’t have the heart to go on talldng to Klara. I instructed my doppel on what to say next to her, and to Metchnikov, and even to this Harbin Eskladar person. But I didn’t stay around while it happened. I retreated into gigabit space and wrapped it around me.
I know that Albert thinks I spend too much time in my own head. I won’t deny any of the things he says. I don’t mean I agree with them. I don’t. I’m not any smarter than he thinks I am, but I’m not as weird, either. What I am, basically, is, I’m human. I may really be only the digital transcription of a human being, but when I was transcribed, all the human parts were transcribed, too, and I still feel all the things that go with being meat. Both the good and the bad.
I do the best I can-mostly-and that’s about all I can do.
I know what’s important. I understood as well as Albert did that the Foe were scary. I would have had nightmares if I had slept (I did have, when I pretended to, but that’s another subject) about the universe crashing down on our ears, and I had a lot more fits of agitation and depression when I thought of the gang of them, out there in their kugelblitz, ready at any time to come out and do to us what they had done to the Sluggards and the starwisp people and the ones buried under the ice.
But there’s important and there’s also important. I am still human enough to think interpersonal relationships are important. Even when they’re past tense, and all that’s left is the need to make absolutely sure there are no longer any hard feelings.
After Albert had gone away to wherever Albert goes when I don’t have a use for him, I floated in gigabit space for a long time, doing nothing. A long time. Long enough so that when I peeked once more at the scene in Central Park, Klara had just got as far as, “Robin, I’d like you to meet my—”
It was funny. I didn’t want to hear the word “husband.” So I ran away.
What I just said isn’t exactly true. I didn’t run away. I ran to, and the person I ran to was Essie. She was on the dance floor at the Blue Hell, wildly polkaing with somebody with a beard, and when I cut in she caroled, “Oh, good to see you, dear Robin! Have you heard news? Embargo is lifted!”
“That’s nice,” I said, stumbling over my own feet. She took a good look at my face, sighed, and led me off the dance floor.
“Went badly with Gelle-Kiara Moynlin,” she guessed.
I shrugged. “It’s still going. I left my doppel there.” I let her shove me into a seat and sit herself across from me, elbows on table, chin propped on elbows, looking me over with great care.
“Ah,” she said, nodding as she completed her diagnosis. “Gloopy stuff again. Angst. Anomie. All that good stuff, right? And most of all Gelle-Klara Moynlin?”