“I’m afraid of the thing,” Kerry said. —“Want to stay at my place tonight?”
“N-no. No. I guess not. The-robot can’t hurt me.”
“I don’t think it wants to. It’s been helping you, hasn’t it?”
“Yeah,” Kerry said, and went off to mix another drink.
The rest of the conversation was inconclusive. Fitzgerald, several hours later, went home rather worried. He wasn’t as casual as he had pretended, for the sake of Kerry’s nerves. The impingement of something so entirely unexpected on normal life was subtly frightening. And yet, as he had said, the robot didn’t seem menacing.
Kerry went to bed, with a new detective mystery. The radio followed him into the bedroom and gently took the book out of his hand. Kerry instinctively snatched for it.
“Hey!” he said. “What the devil—”
The radio went back into the living room. Kerry followed, in time to see the book replaced on the shelf. After a bit Kerry retreated, locking his door, and slept uneasily till dawn.
In dressing gown and slippers, he stumbled out to stare at the console. It was back in its former place, looking as though it had never moved. Kerry, rather white around the gills, made breakfast.
He was allowed only one cup of coffee. The radio appeared, reprovingly took the second cup from his hand and emptied it into the sink.
That was quite enough for Kerry Westerfield. He found his hat and topcoat and almost ran out of the house. He had a horrid feeling that the radio might follow him, but it didn’t, luckily for his sanity. He was beginning to be worried.
During the morning he found time to telephone Mideastern. The salesman knew nothing. It was a standard model combination, the latest. If it wasn’t giving satisfaction, of course, he’d be glad to- “It’s O.K.,” Kerry said. “But who made the thing? That’s what I want to find out.”
“One moment, sir.” There was a delay. “It came from Mr. Lloyd’s department. One of our foremen.”
“Let me speak to him, please.”
But Lloyd wasn’t very helpful. After much thought, he remembered that the combination had been placed in the stock room without a serial number. It had been added later.
“But who made it?”
“I just don’t know. I can find out for you, I guess. Suppose I ring you back.”
“Don’t forget,” Kerry said, and went back to his class. The lecture on the Venerable Bede wasn’t too successful.
At lunch he saw Fitzgerald, who seemed relieved when Kerry came over to his table. “Find out any more about your pet robot?” the psychology professor demanded.
No one else was within hearing. With a sigh Kerry sat down and lit a cigarette. “Not a thing. It’s a pleasure to be able to do this myself.” He drew smoke into his lungs. “I phoned the company.”
“And?”
“They don’t know anything. Except that it didn’t have a serial number.”
“That may be significant,” Fitzgerald said.
Kerry told the other about the incidents of the book and the coffee, and Fitzgerald squinted thoughtfully at his milk. “I’ve given you some psych tests. Too much stimulation isn’t good for you.”
“A detective yarn!”
“Carrying it a bit to extremes, I’ll admit. But I can understand why the robot acted that way, though I dunno how it managed it.” He hesitated. “Without intelligence, that is.”
“Intelligence?” Kerry licked his lips. “I’m not so sure that it’s just a machine. And I’m not crazy.”
“No, you’re not. But you say the robot was in the front room. How could it tell what you were reading?”
“Short of X-ray vision and superfast scanning and assimilative powers, I can’t imagine. Perhaps it doesn’t want me to read anything.”
“You’ve said something,” Fitzgerald grunted. “Know much about theoretical machines of that type?”
“Robots?”
“Purely theoretical. Your brain’s a colloid, you know. Compact, complicated-but slow. Suppose you work out a gadget with a multimillion radioatomic unit embedded in an insulating material. The result is a brain, Kerry. A brain with a tremendous number of units interacting at light-velocity speeds. A radio tube adjusts current flow when it’s operating at forty million separate signals a second. And, theoretically, a radioatomic brain of the type I’ve mentioned could include perception, recognition, consideration, reaction and adjustment in a hundred-thousandth of a second.”
“Theory.”
“I’ve thought so. But I’d like to find out where your radio came from.”
A page came over. “Telephone call for Mr. Westerfield.”
Kerry excused himself and left. When he returned, there was a puzzled frown knitting his dark brows. Fitzgerald looked at him inquiringly.
“Guy named Lloyd, at the Mideastem plant. I was talking to him about the radio.”
“Any luck?”
Kerry shook his head. “No. Well, not much. He didn’t know who had built the thing.”
“But it was built in the plant?”
“Yes. About two weeks ago-but there’s no record of who worked on it. Lloyd seemed to think that was very, very funny. If a radio’s built in the plant, they know who put it together.”
“So?”
“So nothing. I asked him how to open the cabinet, and he said it was easy. Just unscrew the panel in back.”
“There aren’t any screws,” Fitzgerald said.
“I know.”
They looked at one another.
Fitzgerald said, “I’d give fifty bucks to find out whether that robot was really built only two weeks ago.”
“Why?”
“Because a radioatomic brain would need training. Even in such matters as the lighting of a cigarette.”
“It saw me light one.”
“And followed the example. The dishwashing-hm-m-m. Induction, I suppose. If that gadget has been trained, it’s a robot. If it hasn’t—” Fitzgerald stopped.
Kerry blinked. “Yes?”
“I don’t know what the devil it is. It bears the same relation to a robot that we bear to Eohippus. One thing I do know, Kerry; it’s very probable that no scientist today has the knowledge it would take to make a-a thing like that.”
“You’re arguing in circles,” Kerry said. “It was made.”
“Uh-huh. But how-when-and by whom? That’s what’s got me worried.”
“Well, I’ve a class in five minutes. Why not come over tonight?”
“Can’t. I’m lecturing at the Hall. I’ll phone you after, though.” With a nod Kerry went out, trying to dismiss the matter from his mind. He succeeded pretty well. But dining alone in a restaurant that night, he began to feel a general unwillingness to go home. A hobgoblin was waiting for him.
“Brandy,” he told the waiter. “Make it double.”
Two hours later a taxi let Kerry out at his door. He was remarkably drunk. Things swam before his eyes. He walked unsteadily toward the porch, mounted the steps with exaggerated care and let himself into the house.
He switched on a lamp.
The radio came forward to meet him. Tentacles, thin but strong as metal, coiled gently around his body, holding him motionless. A pang of violent fear struck through Kerry. He struggled desperately and tried to yell, but his throat was dry.
From the radio panel a beam of yellow light shot out, blinding the man. It swung down, aimed at his chest. Abruptly a queer taste was perceptible under Kerry’s tongue.
After a minute or so, the ray clicked out, the tentacles flashed back out of sight and the console returned to its corner. Kerry staggered weakly to a chair and relaxed, gulping.
He was sober. Which was quite impossible. Fourteen brandies infiltrate a definite amount of alcohol into the system. One can’t wave a magic wand and instantly reach a state of sobriety. Yet that was exactly what had happened.
The-robot was trying to be helpful. Only Kerry would have preferred to remain drunk.