The colours flowed, and suddenly jelled into bright life. Anderson Trumie, a young man. Garrick recognized the scene after a moment - it was right there on Fisherman’s Island, some pleasure spot overlooking the water. A bar, and at the end of it was Anderson Trumie, pimply and twenty, staring sombrely into an empty glass. The view was through the eyes of the robot bartender.
Anderson Trumie was weeping.
Once again, there was the objective fact - but the fact behind the fact, what was it? Trumie had been drinking, drinking. Why? Drinking, drinking. With a sudden sense of shock, Garrick saw what the drink was - the golden, fizzy liquor. Not intoxicating. Not habit-forming! Trumie had become no drunk, it was something else that kept him drinking, drinking, must drink, must keep on drinking, or else —
And again the bluish flare.
There was more; there was Trumie feverishly collecting objects of art, there was Trumie decorating a palace; there was Trumie on a world tour, and Trumie returned to Fisherman’s Island.
And then there was no more.
‘That,’ said Roosenburg, ‘is the file. Of course, if you want the raw, unedited tapes, we can try to get them from Robot Central, but-’
‘No.’ The way things were, it was best to stay away from Robot Central; there might be more breakdowns, and there wasn’t much time. Besides, something was beginning to suggest itself.
‘Run the first one again,’ said Garrick. ‘I think maybe there’s something there....’
Garrick made out a quick requisition slip and handed it to Kathryn Pender, who looked at it, raised her eyebrows, shrugged and went off to have it filled.
By the time she came back, Roosenburg had escorted Garrick to the room where the captured Trumie robot lay enchained. ‘He’s cut off from Robot Central,’ Roosenburg was saying. ‘I suppose you figured that out. Imagine! Not only has he built a whole city for himself - but even his own robot control!’
Garrick looked at the robot. It was a fisherman, or so Roosenburg had said. It was small, dark, black-haired, and possibly the hair would have been curly, if the sea water hadn’t plastered the curls to the scalp. It was still damp from the tussle that had landed it in the water, and eventually in Roosenburg’s hands.
Roosenburg was already at work. Garrick tried to think of it as a machine, but it wasn’t easy. The thing looked very nearly human - except for the crystal and copper that showed where the back of its head had been removed.
‘It’s as bad as a brain operation,’ said Roosenburg, working rapidly without looking up. ‘I’ve got to short out the input leads without disturbing the electronic balance…’
Snip, snip. A curl of copper fell free, to be grabbed by Roosenburg’s tweezers. The fisherman’s arms and legs kicked sharply like a galvanized frog’s.
Kathryn Pender said: ‘They found him this morning, casting nets into the bay and singing O Sole Mio. He’s from North Guardian, all right.’
Abruptly the lights flickered and turned yellow, then slowly returned to normal brightness. Roger Garrick got up and walked over to the window. North Guardian was a haze of light in the sky, across the water.
Click, snap. The fisherman-robot began to sing:
Tutte le serre, dopo quel fanal,
Dietro la caserma, ti stard ed -
Click. Roosenburg muttered under his breath and probed further. Kathryn Pender joined Garrick at the window. ‘Now you see,’ she said.
Garrick shrugged. ‘You can’t blame him.’
‘I blame him!’ she said hotly. ‘I’ve lived here all my life. Fisherman’s Island used to be a tourist spot - why, it was lovely here. And look at it now. The elevators don’t work. The lights don’t work. Practically all of pur robots are gone. Spare parts, construction material, everything - it’s all gone to North Guardian! There isn’t a day that passes, Garrick, when half a dozen barge-loads of stuff don’t go north, because he requisitioned them. Blame him? I’d like to kill him!’
Snap. Sputtersnap. The fisherman lifted its head and carolled:
Forse dommani, piangerai.
E dopo tu, sorriderai -
Snap. Roosenburg’s probe uncovered a flat black disc. ‘Kathryn, look this up, will you?’ He read the serial number from the disc, and then put down the probe. He stood flexing his fingers, staring irritably at the motionless figure.
Garrick joined him. Roosenburg jerked his head at the fisherman. ‘That’s robot work, trying to tinker with their insides. Trumie has his own control centre, you see. What I have to do is recontrol this one from the substation on the mainland, but keep its receptor circuits open to North Guardian on the symbolic level. You understand what I’m talking about? It’ll think from North Guardian, but act from the mainland.’
‘Sure,’ said Garrick, far from sure.
‘And it’s damned close work. There isn’t much room inside one of those things....’ He stared at the figure and picked up the probe again.
Kathryn Pender came back with a punchcard in her hand. It was one of ours, all right. Used to be a busboy in the cafeteria at the beach club.’ She scowled. ‘That Trumie!’
‘You can’t blame him,’ Garrick said reasonably. ‘He’s only trying to be good.’
She looked at him queerly. ‘He’s only -’ she began; but Roosenburg interrupted with an exultant cry.
‘Got it! All right, you. Sit up and start telling us what Trumie’s up to now!’
The fisherman figure said obligingly, ‘Sure, boss. Whatcha wanna know?’
What they wanted to know they asked; and what they asked it told them, volunteering nothing, concealing nothing.
There was Anderson Trumie, king of his island, the compulsive consumer.
It was like an echo of the bad old days of the Age of Plenty, when the world was smothering under the endless, pounding flow of goods from the robot factories and the desperate race between consumption and production strained the human fabric. But Trumie’s orders came not from society, but from within. Consume! commanded something inside him, and Use! it cried, and Devour! it ordered. And Trumie obeyed, heroically.
They listened to what the fisherman-robot had to say, and the picture was dark. Armies had sprung up on North Guardian, navies floated in its waters. Anderson Trumie stalked among his creations like a blubbery god, wrecking and ruling. Garrick could see the pattern in what the fisherman had to say. In Trumie’s mind, he was Hitler, Hoover and Genghis Khan; he was dictator, building a war machine; he was supreme engineer, constructing a mighty state. He was warrior.
‘He was playing tin soldiers,’ said Roger Garrick, and Roosenburg and the girl nodded.
‘The trouble is,’ boomed Roosenburg, ‘He has stopped playing. Invasion fleets, Garrick! He isn’t content with North Guardian any more, he wants the rest of the country too!’
‘You can’t blame him,’ said Roger Garrick for the third time, and stood up.
‘The question is,’ he said, ‘what do we do about it?’
‘That’s what you’re here for,’ Kathryn told him.
‘All right. We can forget,’ said Roger Garrick, ‘about the soldiers - qua soldiers, that is. I promise you they won’t hurt anyone. Robots can’t.’
‘I understand that,’ Kathryn snapped.
‘The problem is what to do about Trumie’s drain on the world’s resources.’ He pursed his lips. ‘According to my directive from Area Control, the first plan was to let him alone - after all, there is still plenty of everything for anyone. Why not let Trumie enjoy himself? But that didn’t work out too well.’