Robots Have No Tails

by Henry Kuttner

“Joe,” Gallegher said, “why didn’t you tell me about that thing?”

  “I thought you saw it,” Joe explained.

  “I did, but—what is it?”

  “I haven’t the slightest idea.”

  “Where could it have come from?”

  “Your subconscious alone knows what you were up to last night,” Joe said. “Perhaps Grandpa and Jonas Harding know, but they’re not around, apparently.”

  Gallegher went to the teleview and put in a call to Maine. “Grandpa may have gone back home. It isn’t likely he’d have taken Harding with him, but we can’t miss any bets. I’ll check on that. One thing, my eyes have stopped watering. What was that gadget I made last night?” He passed to the workbench and studied the cryptic assemblage. “I wonder why I put a shoehorn in that circuit?”

  “If you’d keep a supply of materials available here, Gallegher Plus wouldn’t have to depend on makeshifts,” Joe said severely.

  “Uh. I could get drunk and let my subconscious take over again…no, I can’t. Joe, I can’t drink any more! I’m bound hand and foot to the water wagon!”

  “I wonder if Dalton had the right idea after all?”

  Gallegher snarled. “Do you have to extrude your eyes that way? I need help!”

  “You won’t get it from me,” Joe said. “The problem’s extremely simple, if you’d put your mind to it.”

  “Simple, is it? Then suppose you tell me the answer!”

  “I want to be sure of a certain philosophical concept first.”

  “Take all the time you want. When I’m rotting in jail, you can spend your leisure hours pondering abstracts. Get me a beer! No, never mind. I couldn’t drink it anyway. What does this little brown animal look like?”

  “Oh, use your head,” Joe said.

  Gallegher growled, “I could use it for an anchor, the way it feels. You know all the answers. Why not tell me instead of babbling?”

  “Men can know the nature of things,” Joe said. “Today is the logical development of yesterday. Obviously you’ve solved the problem Adrenals, Incorporated gave you.”

  “What? Oh. I see. Harding wanted a new animal or something.”

  “Well?”

  “I’ve got two of ’em,” Gallegher said. “That little brown invisible dipsomaniac and that blue-eyed critter sitting on the floor. Oh-ho! Where did I pick them up? Another dimension?”

  “How should I know? You’ve got ’em.”

  “I’ll sayl have,” Gallegher agreed. “Maybe I made a machine that scooped them off another world—and maybe Grandpa and Harding are on that world now! A sort of exchange of prisoners. I don’t know. Harding wanted non-dangerous beasts elusive enough to give hunters a thrill—but where’s the element of danger?” He gulped. “Conceivably the pure alienage of the critters provides that illusion. Anyway, I’m shivering.

  “ Flooding of the blood stream with adrenal gives tone to the whole system,” Joe said smugly.

  “So I captured or got hold of those beasts somehow, apparently, to solve Harding’s problem…mm-m.” Gallegher went to stand in front of the shapeless blue-eyed creature. “Hey, you,” he said.

  There was no response. The mild blue eyes continued to regard nothing. Gallegher poked a finger tentatively at one of them.

  Nothing at all happened. The eye was immovable and hard as glass. Gallegher tried the thing’s bluish, sleek skin. It felt like metal. Repressing his mild panic, he tried to lift the beast from the floor, but failed completely. It was either enormously heavy or it had sucking-disks on its bottom.

  “Eyes,” Gallegher said. “No other sensory organs, apparently. That isn’t what Harding wanted.”

  “I think it clever of the turtle,” Joe suggested.

  “Turtle? Oh. Like the armadillo. That’s right. It’s a problem, isn’t it? How can you kill or capture a…a beast like this? Its exoderm feels plenty hard, it’s immovable—that’s it, Joe. Quarry doesn’t have to depend on flight or fight. The turtle doesn’t. And a barracuda could go nuts trying to eat a turtle. This would be perfect quarry for the lazy intellectual who wants a thrill. But what about adrenalin?”

  Joe said nothing. Gallegher pondered, and presently seized upon some reagents and apparatus. He tried a diamond drill. He tried acids. He tried everyway he could think of to rouse the blue-eyed beast. After an hour his furious curses were interrupted by a remark from the robot.

  “Well, what about adrenalin?” Joe inquired ironically.

  “Shut up!” Gallegher yelped. “That thing just sits there looking at me! Adren…what?”

  “Anger as well as fear stimulate the suprarenals, you know. I suppose any human would become infuriated by continued passive resistance.”

  “That’s right,” said the sweating Gallegher, giving the creature a final kick. He turned to the couch. “Increase the nuisance quotient enough and you can substitute anger for fear. But what about the little brown animal? I’m not mad at it.”

  “Have a drink,” Joe suggested.

  “All right, I am mad at the kleptomaniacal so-and-so! You said it moved so fast I can’t see it. How can I catch it?”

  “There are undoubtedly methods.”

  “It’s as elusive as the other critter is invulnerable. Could I immobilize it by getting it drunk?”

  “Metabolism.”

  “Burns up its fuel too fast to get drunk? Probably. But it must need a lot of feed.”

  “Have you looked in the kitchen lately?” Joe asked.

  Visions of a depleted larder filling his mind, Gallegher rose. He paused beside the blue-eyed object.

  “This one hasn’t got any metabolism to speak of. But it has to eat, I suppose. Still, eat what? Air? It’s possible.”

  The doorbell sang. Gallegher moaned, “What now?” and admitted the guest. A man with a ruddy face and a belligerent expression came in, told Gallegher he was under tentative arrest, and called in the rest of his crew, who immediately began searching the house.

  “Mackenzie sent you, I suppose?” Gallegher said.

  “That’s right. My name’s Johnson. Department of Violence, Unproved. Do you want to call counsel?”

  “Yes,” said Gallegher, jumping at the opportunity. He used the visor to get an attorney he knew, and began outlining his troubles. But the lawyer interrupted him.

  “Sorry. I’m not taking any jobs on spec. You know my rates.”

  “Who said anything about spec?”

  “Your last check bounced yesterday. It’s cash on the line this time, or no deal.”

  “I…now wait! I’ve just finished a commissioned job that’s paying off big. I can have the money for you—”

  “When I see the color of your credits, I’ll be your lawyer,” the unsympathetic voice said, and the screen blanked. The detective, Johnson, tapped Gallegher on the shoulder.

  “So you’re overdrawn at the bank, eh? Needed money?”

  “That’s no secret. Besides, I’m not broke now, exactly. I finished a—”

  “A job. Yeah, I heard that, too. So you’re suddenly rich. How much did this job pay you? It wouldn’t be fifty thousand credits, would it?”

  Gallegher drew a deep breath. “I’m not saying a word,” he said and retreated to the couch, trying to ignore the Department men who were searching the lab. He needed a lawyer. He needed one bad. But he couldn’t get one without money. Suppose he saw Mackenzie—

  The visor put him in touch with the man. Mackenzie seemed cheerful.

  “Hello,” he said. “I see the police have arrived.”

  Gallegher said, “Listen, that job your partner gave me—I’ve solved your problem. I’ve got what you want.”

  “Jonas’s body, you mean?” Mackenzie seemed pleased.

  “No! The animals you wanted! The perfect quarry!”

  “Oh. Well. Why didn’t you say so sooner?”

  “Get over here and call off the police!” Gallegher insisted. “I tell you, I’ve got
your ideal Hunt animals for you!”

  “I dinna ken if I can call off the bloodhounds,” Mackenzie said, “but I’ll be over directly. I will not pay vurra much, you understand?”

  “Bah!” Gallegher snarled, and broke the connection. The visor buzzed at him. He touched the receiver, and a woman’s face came in.

  She said, “Mr. Gallegher, with reference to your call of inquiry regarding your grandfather, we report that investigation shows that he has not returned to our Maine sector. That is all.”

  She vanished. Johnson said, “What’s this? Your grandfather? Where’s he at?”

  “I ate him,” Gallegher said, twitching. “Why don’t you leave me alone?”

  Johnson made a note, “Your grandfather. I’ll just check up a bit. Incidentally, what’s that thing over there?” He pointed to the blue-eyed beast.

  “I’ve been studying a curious case of degenerative osteomyelitis affecting a baroque cephalopod!”

  “Oh, I see. Thanks. Fred, see about this guy’s grandfather. What are you gaping at?”

  Fred said, “That screen. It’s set up for projection.”

  Johnson moved to the audio-sonic recorder. “Better impound it. Probably not important, but—” He touched a switch. The screen stayed blank, but Gallegher’s voice said, “We know how to deal with spies in this house, you dirty traitor.”

  Johnson moved the switch again. He glanced at Gallegher, his ruddy face impassive and in silence began to rewind the wire tape. Gallegher said, “Joe, get me a dull knife. I want to cut my throat, and I don’t want to make it too easy for myself. I’m getting used to doing things the hard way.” But Joe, pondering philosophy, refused to answer.

  Johnson began to run off the recording. He took out a picture and compared it with what showed on the screen.

  “That’s Harding, all right,” he said. “Thanks for keeping this for us, Mr. Gallegher.”

  “Don’t mention it,” Gallegher said. “I’ll even show the hangman how to tie the knot around my neck.”

  “Ha-ha. Taking notes, Fred? Right.”

  The reel unrolled relentlessly. But, Gallegher tried to make himself believe, there was nothing really incriminating recorded.

  He was disillusioned after the screen went blank, at the point when he had thrown a blanket over the recorder last night. Johnson held up his hand for silence. The screen still showed nothing, but after a moment or two voices were clearly audible.

  “You have thirty-seven minutes to go, Mr. Gallegher.”

  “Just stay where you are. I’ll have this in a minute. Besides, I want to get my hands on yourfifty thousand credits.”

  “But—”

  “Relax. I’m getting it. In a very short time your worries will be over.”

  “Did I say that?” Gallegher thought wildly. “What a fool I am! Why didn’t I turn off the radio when I covered the lens?” Grandpa’s voice said, “Trying to kill me by inches, eh, you young whippersnapper!”

  All the old so and so wanted was another bottle, Gallegher moaned to himself. But try to make those flatfeet believe that! Still—He brightened. Maybe I can find out what really happened to Grandpa and Harding. If I shot them off to another world, there might be some clue—

  “Watch closely now,” Gallegher’s voice said from last night. “I’ll explain as I proceed. Oh-oh. Wait a minute. I’m going to patent this later, so I don’t want any spies. I can trust you two not to talk, but that recorder’s still turned on to audio. Tomorrow, if I played it back, I’d be saying to myself, ‘Gallegher, you talk too much. There’s only one way to keep a secret safe. ’ Off it goes! ”

  Someone screamed. The shriek was cut off midway. The projector stopped humming. There was utter silence.

  The door opened to admit Murdoch Mackenzie. He was rubbing his hands.

  “I came right down,” he said briskly. “So you’ve solved our problem, eh, Mr. Gallegher? Perhaps we can do business then. After all, there’s no real evidence that you killed Jonas—and I’ll be willing to drop the charges, if you’ve got what Adrenals, Incorporated wants.”

  “Pass me those handcuffs, Fred,” Johnson requested.

  Gallegher protested, “You can’t do this to me!”

  “A fallacious theorem,” Joe said, “which, I note, is now being disproved by the empirical method. How illogical all you ugly people are.”

  The social trend always lags behind the technological one. And while technology tended, in these days, toward simplification, the social pattern was immensely complicated, since it was partly an outgrowth of historical precedent and partly a result of the scientific advance of the era. Take jurisprudence. Cockburn and Blackwood and a score of others had established certain general and specific rules—say, regarding patents—but those rules could be made thoroughly impractical by a single gadget. The Integrators could solve problems no human brain could manage, so, as a governor, it was necessary to build various controls into those semimechanical colloids. Moreover, an electronic duplicator could infringe not only on patents but on property rights, and attorneys prepared voluminous briefs on such questions as whether “rarity rights” are real property, whether a gadget made on a duplicator is a “representation” or a copy, and whether mass;duplication of chinchillas is unfair competition to a chinchilla breeder who depended on old-fashioned biological principals. All of which added up to the fact that the world, slightly punchdrunk with technology, was trying desperately to walk a straight line. Eventually the confusion would settle down.

  It hadn’t settled down yet.

  So legal machinery was a construction far more complicated than an Integrator. Precedent warred with abstract theory as lawyer warred with lawyer. It was all perfectly clear to the technicians, but they were much too impractical to be consulted, they were apt to remark wickedly, “So my gadget unstabilizes property rights? Well—why have property rights, then?”

  And you can’t do that!

  Not to a world that had found security, of a sort, for thousands of years in rigid precedents of social intercourse. The ancient dyke of formal culture was beginning to leak in innumerable spots, and, had you noticed, you might have seen hundreds of thousands of frantic, small figures rushing from danger-spot to danger-spot, valorously plugging the leaks with their fingers, arms, or heads. Some day it would be discovered that there was no encroaching ocean beyond that dyke, but that day hadn’t yet come.

  In a way, that was lucky for Gallegher. Public officials were chary about sticking their necks out. A simple suit for false arrest might lead to fantastic ramifications and big trouble. The hardheaded Murdoch Mackenzie took advantage of this situation to vise his own personal attorney and toss a monkey wrench in the legal wheels. The attorney spoke to Johnson.

  There was no corpse. The audio-sonic recording was not sufficient. Moreover, there were vital questions involving habeas corpus and search warrants. Johnson called Headquarters Jurisprudence and the argument raged over the heads of Gallegher and the imperturbable Mackenzie. It ended with Johnson leaving, with his crew—and the incriminating record—and threatening to return as soon as a judge would issue the appropriate writs and papers. Meanwhile, he said, there would be officers on guard outside the house. With a malignant glare for Mackenzie, he stamped out.

  “And now to business,” said Mackenzie, rubbing his hands. “Between ourselves”—he leaned forward confidentially—“I’m just as glad to get rid of that partner of mine. Whether or no you killed him, I hope he stays vanished. Now I can run the business my way, for a change.”

  “It’s all right about that,” Gallegher said, “but what about me? I’ll be in custody again as soon as Johnson can wangle it.”

  “But not convicted,” Mackenzie pointed out. “A clever lawyer can fix you up. There was a similar case in which the defendant got off with a defense of non esse—his attorney went into metaphysics and proved that the murdered man had never existed. Quite specious, but so far the murderer’s gone free
.”

  Gallegher said, “I’ve searched the house, and Johnson’s men did, too. There’s simply no trace of Jonas Harding or my grandfather. And I’ll tell you frankly, Mr. Mackenzie, I haven’t the slightest idea what happened to them.”

  Mackenzie gestured airily. “We must be methodical. You mentioned you had solved a certain problem for Adrenals, Incorporated. Now, I’ll admit, that interested me.”

  Silently Gallegher pointed to the blueeyed dynamo. Mackenzie studied the object thoughtfully.

  “Well?” he said.

  “That’s it. The perfect quarry.” Mackenzie walked over to the thing, rapped its hide, and looked deeply into the mild azure eyes. “How fast can it run?” he asked shrewdly.

  Gallegher said: “It doesn’t have to run. You see, it’s invulnerable.”

  “Ha. Hum. Perhaps if you’d explain a wee bit more—”

  But Mackenzie did not seem pleased with the explanation. “No,” he said, “I don’t see it. There would be no thrill to hunting a critter like that. You forget our customers demand excitement—adrenal stimulation.”

  “They’ll get it. Anger has the same effect as rage—” Gallegher went into detail.

  But Mackenzie shook his head. “Both fear and anger give you excess energy you’ve got to use up. You can’t, against passive quarry. You’ll just cause neuroses. We try to get rid of neuroses, not create them.”

  Gallegher, growing desperate, suddenly remembered the little brown beast and began to discuss that. Once Mackenzie interrupted with a demand to see the creature, Gallagher slid around that one fast.

  “Ha,” Mackenzie said finally. “It is canny. How can you hunt something that’s invisible?”

  “Oh—ultraviolet. Scent-analyzers. It’s a test for ingenuity—”

  “Our customers are not ingenious. They don’t want to be. They want a change and vacation from routine, hard work—or easy work, as the case may be—they want a rest. They don’t want to beat their brains working out methods to catch a thing that moves faster than a pixy, nor do they want to chase a critter that’s out of sight before it even gets there. You are a vurra clever man, Mr. Gallegher, but it begins to look as though Jonas’s insurance is my best bet after all.”