by Isaac Asimov
“Gladia! Please! I don't expect it to be of any use, but I must see Jander and know that seeing him is of no use. I will try to do nothing that will offend your sensibilities.”
Gladia stood up. Her gown, so simple as to be nothing more than a closely fitting sheath, was not black (as it would have been on Earth) but of a dull color that showed no sparkle anywhere in it. Baley, no connoisseur of clothing, realized how well it represented mourning.
“Come with me,” she whispered.
26
Baley followed Gladia through several rooms, the walls of which glowed dully. On one or two occasions, he caught a hint of movement, which he took to be a robot getting rapidly out of the way, since they had been told not to intrude.
Through a hallway, then, and up a short flight of stairs into a small room in which one part of one wall gleamed to give the effect of a spotlight.
The room held a cot and a chair—and no other furnishings.
“This was his room,” said Gladia. Then, as though answering Baley's thought, she went on to say, “It was all he needed. I left him alone as much as I could—all day if I could. I did not want to ever grow tired of him.” She shook her head. “I wish now I had stayed with him every second. I didn't know our time would be so short. —Here he is.”
Jander was lying on the cot and Baley looked at him gravely. The robot was covered with a smooth and shiny material. The spotlighted wall cast its glow on Jander's head, which was smooth and almost inhuman in its serenity. The eyes were wide open, but they were opaque and lusterless. He looked enough like Daneel to give ample point to Gladia's discomfort at Daneel's presence. His neck and bare shoulders showed above the sheet.
Baley said, “Has Dr. Fastolfe inspected him?”
“Yes, thoroughly. I came to him in despair and, if you had seen him rush here, the concern he felt, the pain, the—the panic, you would never think he could have been responsible. There was nothing he could do.”
“Is he unclothed?”
“Yes. Dr. Fastolfe had to remove the clothing for a thorough examination. There was no point in replacing them.”
“Would you permit me to remove the covering, Gladia?”
“Must you?”
“I do not wish to be blamed for having missed some obvious point of examination.”
“What can you possibly find that Dr. Fastolfe didn't?”
“Nothing, Gladia, but I must know that there is nothing for me to find. Please cooperate.”
“Well, then, go ahead, but please put the covering back exactly as it is now when you are done.”
She turned her back on him and on Jander, put her left arm against the wall, and rested her forehead on it. There was no sound from her—no motion—but Baley knew that she was weeping again.
The body was, perhaps, not quite human. The muscular contours were somehow simplified and a bit schematic, but all the parts were there: nipples, navel, penis, testicles, pubic hair, and so on. Even fine, light hair on the chest.
How many days was it since Jander had been killed? It struck Baley that he didn't know, but it had been sometime before his trip to Aurora had begun. Over a week had passed and there was no sign of decay, either visually or olfactorily. A clear robotic difference.
Baley hesitated and then thrust one arm under Jan-der's shoulders and another under his hips, working them through to the other side. He did not consider asking for Gladia's help—that would be impossible. He heaved and, with some difficulty, turned Jander over without throwing him off the cot.
The cot creaked. Gladia must know what he was doing, but she did not turn around. Though she did not offer to help, she did not protest either.
Baley withdrew his arms. Jander felt warm to the touch. Presumably, the power unit continued to do so simple a thing as to maintain temperature, even with the brain inoperative. The body felt firm and resilient, too. Presumably, it never went through any stage analogous to rigor mortis.
One arm was now dangling off the cot in quite a human fashion. Baley moved it gently and released it. It swung to and fro slightly and came to a halt. He bent one leg at the knee and studied the foot, then the other. The buttocks were perfectly formed and there was even an anus.
Baley could not get rid of the feeling of uneasiness. The notion that he was violating the privacy of a human being would not go away. If it were a human corpse, its coldness and its stiffness would have deprived it of humanity.
He thought uncomfortably: A robot corpse is much more human than a human corpse.
Again he reached under Jander, lifted, and turned him over.
He smoothed out the sheet as best he could, then replaced the cover as it had been and smoothed that. He stepped back and decided it was as it had been at first—or as near to that as he could manage.
“I'm finished, Gladia,” he said.
She turned, looked at Jander with wet eyes, and said, “May we go, then?”
“Yes, of course, but Gladia—”
“Well?”
“Will you be keeping him this way? I imagine he won't decay.”
“Does it matter if I do?”
“In some ways, yes. You must give yourself a chance to recover. You can't spend three centuries mourning, What is over is over.” (His statements sounded hollowly sententious in his own ear. What must they have sounded like in hers?)
She said, “I know you mean it kindly, Elijah. I have been requested to keep Jander till the investigation is done. He will then be torched at my request.”
“Torched?”
“Put under a plasma torch and reduced to his elements, as human corpses are. I will have holograms of him—and memories. Will that satisfy you?”
“Of course. I must return to Dr. Fastolfe's house now.”
“Yes. Have you learned anything from Jander's body?”
“I did not expect to, Gladia.”
She faced him full. “And Elijah, I want you to find who did this and why. I must know.”
“But Gladia—”
She shook her head violently, as though keeping out anything she wasn't ready to hear. “I know you can do this.”
7. AGAIN FASTOLFE
27
Baley emerged from Gladia's house into the sunset. He turned toward what he assumed must be the western horizon and found Aurora's sun, a deep scarlet in color, topped by thin strips of ruddy clouds set in an apple-green sky.
“Jehoshaphat,” he murmured. Clearly, Aurora's sun, cooler and more orange than Earth's sun, accentuated the difference at setting, when its light passed through a greater thickness of Aurora.
Daneel was behind him; Giskard, as before, well in front.
Daneel's voice was in his ear. “Are you well, Partner Elijah?”
“Quite well,” said Baley, pleased with himself. “I'm handling the Outside well, Daneel. I can even admire the sunset. Is it always like this?”
Daneel gazed dispassionately at the setting sun and said, “Yes. But let us move quickly toward Dr. Fastolfe's establishment. At this time of year, the twilight does not last long, Partner Elijah, and I would wish you there while you can still see easily.”
“I'm ready. Let's go.” Baley wondered if it might not be better to wait for the darkness. It would not be pleasant not to see, but, then, it would give him the illusion of being enclosed—and he was not, in his heart, sure as to how long this euphoria induced by admiring a sunset (a sunset, mind you, Outside) would last. But that was a cowardly uncertainty and he would not own up to it.
Giskard noiselessly drifted backward toward him and said, “Would you prefer to wait, sir? Would the darkness suit you better? We ourselves will not be discommoded.”
Baley became aware of other robots, farther off, on every side. Had Gladia marked off her field robots for guard duty or had Fastolfe sent his?
It accentuated the way they were all caring for him and, perversely, he would not admit to weakness. He said, “No, we'll go now,” and struck off at a brisk walk toward Fastolfe's establishme
nt, which he could just see through the distant trees.
Let the robots follow or not, as they wished, he thought boldly. He knew that, if he let himself think about it, there would be something within him that would still quail at the thought of himself on the outer skin of a planet with no protection but air between himself and the great void, but he would not think of it.
It was the exhilaration at being free of the fear that made his jaws tremble and his teeth click. Or it was the cool wind of evening that did it—and that also set the gooseflesh to appearing on his arms.
It was not the Outside.
It was not.
He said, trying to unclench his teeth, “How well did you know Jander, Daneel?”
Daneel said, “We were together for some time. From the time of friend Jander's construction, till he passed into the establishment of Miss Gladia, we were together stead-
%.”
“Did it bother you, Daneel, that Jander resembled you so closely?”
“No, sir. He and I each knew ourselves apart, Partner Elijah, and Dr. Fastolfe did not mistake us either. We were, therefore, two individuals.”
“And could you tell them apart, too, Giskard?” They were closer to him now, perhaps because the other robots had taken over the long-distance duties.
Giskard said, “There was no occasion, as I recall, on which it was important that I do so.”
“And if there had been, Giskard?”
“Then I could have done so.”
“What was your opinion of Jander, Daneel?”
Daneel said, “My opinion, Partner Elijah? Concerning what aspect of Jander do you wish my opinion?”
“Did he do his work well, for instance?”
“Certainly.”
“Was he satisfactory in every way?”
“In every way, to my knowledge.”
“How about you, Giskard? What is your opinion?”
Giskard said, “I was never as close to friend Jander as friend Daneel was and it would not be proper for me to state an opinion. I can say that, to my knowledge, Dr. Fastolfe was uniformly pleased with friend Jander. He seemed equally pleased with friend Jander and with friend Daneel. However, I do not think my programming is such as to allow me to offer certainty in such matters.”
Baley said, “What about the period after Jander entered the household of Miss Gladia? Did you know him then, Daneel?”
“No, Partner Elijah. Miss Gladia kept him at her establishment. On those occasions when she visited Dr. Fastolfe, he was never with her, as far as I was aware. On occasions when I accompanied Dr. Fastolfe on a visit to Miss Gladia's establishment, I did not see friend Jander.”
Baley felt a little surprised at that. He turned to Giskard in order to ask the same question, paused, and then shrugged. He was not really getting anywhere and, as Dr. Fastolfe had indicated earlier, there is not really much use in cross-examining a robot. They would not knowlingly say anything that would harm a human being, nor could they be badgered, bribed, or cajoled into it. They would not openly lie, but they would remain stubbornly—if politely—insistent on giving useless answers.
And—perhaps—it no longer mattered.
They were at Fastolfe's doorstep now and Baley felt his breath quickening. The trembling of his arms and lower lip, he was confident, was, indeed, only because of the cool wind.
The sun had gone now, a few stars were visible, the sky was darkening to an odd greenish-purple that made it seem bruised, and he passed through the door into the warmth of the glowing walls.
He was safe.
Fastolfe greeted him. “You are back in good time, Mr. Baley. Was your session with Gladia fruitful?”
Baley said, “Quite fruitful, Dr. Fastolfe. It is even possible that I hold the key to the answer in my hand.”
28
Fastolfe merely smiled politely, in a way that signaled neither surprise, elation, nor disbelief. He led the way into what was obviously a dining room, a smaller and friendlier one than the one in which they had had lunch.
“You and I, my dear Mr. Baley,” said Fastolfe pleasantly, “will eat an informal dinner alone. Merely the two of us. We will even have the robots absent if that will please you. Nor shall we talk business unless you desperately want to.”
Baley said nothing, but paused to look at the walls in astonishment. They were a wavering, luminous green, with differences in brightness and in tint that were slowly progressive from bottom to top. There was a hint of fronds of deeper green and shadowy flickers this way and that. The walls made the room appear to be a well-lit grotto at the bottom of a shallow arm of the sea. The effect was vertiginous—at least, Baley found it so.
Fastolfe had no trouble interpreting Baley's expression. He said, “It's an acquired taste, Mr. Baley, I admit. —Giskard, subdue the wall illumination. —Thank you.”
Baley drew a breath of relief. “And thank you, Dr. Fastolfe. May I visit the Personal, sir?”
“But of course.”
Baley hesitated. “Could you—”
Fastolfe chuckled. “You'll find it perfectly normal, Mr. Baley. You will have no complaints.”
Baley bent his head. “Thank you very much.”
Without the intolerable make-believe, the Personal—he believed it to be the same one he had used earlier in the day—was merely what it was, a much more luxurious and hospitable one than he had ever seen. It was incredibly different from those on Earth, which were rows of identical units stretching indefinitely, each ticked off for use by one—and only one—individual at a time.
It gleamed somehow with hygienic cleanliness. Its outermost molecular layer might have been peeled off after every use and a new layer laid on. Obscurely, Baley felt that, if he stayed on Aurora long enough, he would find it difficult to readjust himself to Earth's crowds, which forced hygiene and cleanliness into the background—something to pay a distant obeisance to—a not quite attainable ideal.
Baley, standing there surrounded by conveniences of ivory and gold (not real ivory, no doubt, nor real gold), gleaming and smooth, suddenly found himself shuddering at Earth's casual exchange of bacteria and wincing at its richness in infectivity. Was that not what the Spacers felt? Could he blame them?
He washed his hands thoughtfully, playing with the tiny touches here and there along the control-strip in order to change the temperature. And yet these Aurorans were so unnecessarily garish in their interior decorations, so insistent in pretending they were living in a state of nature when they had tamed nature and broken it. —Or was that only Fastolfe?
After all, Gladia's establishment had been far more austere. —Or was that only because she had been brought up on Solaria?
The dinner that followed was an unalloyed delight.
Again, as at lunch, there was the distinct feeling of being closer to nature. The dishes were numerous—each different, each in small portions—and, in a number of cases, it was possible to see that they had once been part of plants and animals. He was beginning to look upon the inconveniences—the occasional small bone, bit of gristle, strand of fiber, which might have repelled him earlier—as a bit of adventure.
The first course was a little fish—a little fish that one ate whole, with whatever internal organs it might have— and that struck him, at first sight, as another foolish way of rubbing one's nose in Nature with a capital “N.” But he swallowed the little fish anyway, as Fastolfe did, and the taste converted him at once. He had never experienced anything like it. It was as though taste buds had suddenly been invented and inserted in his tongue.
Tastes changed from dish to dish and some were distinctly odd and not entirely pleasant, but he found it didn't matter. The thrill of a distinct taste, of different distinct tastes (at Fastolfe's instruction, he took a sip of faintly flavored water between dishes) was what counted—and not the inner detail.
He tried not to gobble, nor to concentrate his attention entirely on the food, nor to lick his plate. Desperately, he continued to observe and imitate Fastol
fe and to ignore the other's kindly but definitely amused glance.
“I trust,” said Fastolfe, “you find this to your taste.”
“Quite good,” Baley managed to choke out.
“Please don't force yourself into useless politeness. Do not eat anything that seems strange or unpalatable to you. I will have additional helpings of anything you do like brought in its place.”
“Not necessary, Dr. Fastolfe. It is all rather satisfactory.”
“Good.”
Despite Fastolfe's offer to eat without robots present, it was a robot who served. (Fastolfe, accustomed to this, probably did not even notice the fact, Baley thought—and he did not bring the matter up.)
As was to be expected, the robot was silent and his motions were flawless. His handsome livery seemed to be out of historical dramas that Baley had seen on hyper-wave. It was only at very close view that one could see how much the costume was an illusion of the lighting and how close the robot exterior was to a smooth metal finish—and no more.
Baley said, “Has the waiter's surface been designed by Gladia?”
“Yes,” said Fastolfe, obviously pleased. “How complimented she will feel to know that you recognized her touch. She is good, isn't she? Her work is coming into increasing popularity and she fills a useful niche in Auroran society.”
Conversation throughout the meal had been pleasant but unimportant. Baley had had no urge to “talk business” and had, in fact, preferred to be largely silent while enjoying the meal and leaving it to his unconscious—or whatever faculty took over in the absence of hard thought—to decide on how to approach the matter that seemed to him now to be the central point of the Jander problem.
Fastolfe took the matter out of his hands, rather, by saying, “And now that you've mentioned Gladia, Mr. Baley, may I ask how it came about that you left for her establishment rather deep in despair and have returned almost buoyant and speaking of perhaps having the key to the whole affair in your hand? Did you learn something new—and unexpected, perhaps—at Gladia's?”
“That I did,” said Baley absently—but he was lost in the dessert, which he could not recognize at all, and of which (after some yearning in his eyes had acted to inspire the waiter) a second small helping was placed before him. He felt replete. He had never in his life so enjoyed the act of eating and for the first time foundiiimself resenting the physiological limits that made it impossible to eat forever. He felt rather ashamed of himself that he should feel so.
