by Isaac Asimov
"Only twice in my life have I experienced the breath of excitement and both times tragedy was involved. When I was thirty-three, younger in years than many of you who are now listening to me, there was a time—not a long one—during which a murder accusation hung over me. Two years later, there was another period of time—not long—during which I was involved in another murder. On both those occasions, Plainclothesman Elijah Baley, was at my side. I believe most of you—or perhaps all of you—are familiar with the story as given in the account written by Elijah Baley's son.
"I should now add a third occasion for, this last month, I have faced a great deal of excitement, reaching its climax with my being required to stand up before you all, something which is entirely different from anything I have ever done in all my long life. And I must admit it is only your own good nature and kind acceptance of me that makes it possible.
"Consider, each of you, the contrast of all this with your own lives, You are pioneers and you live on a pioneer world. This world has been growing all your lives and will continue to grow. This world is anything but settled down and each day is—and must be—an adventure. The very climate is an adventure. You have first cold, then heat, then cold again. It is a climate rich in wind and storms and sudden change. At no time can you sit back and let time pass drowsily in a world that changes gently or not at all.
"Many Baleyworlders are Traders or can choose to be Traders and can then spend half their time scouring the space lanes. And if ever this world grows tame, many of its inhabitants can choose to transfer their sphere of activities to another less-developed world or join an expedition that will find a suitable world that has not yet felt the step of human beings and take their share in shaping it and seeding it and making it fit for human occupancy.
"Measure the length of life by events and deeds, accomplishments and excitements, and I am a child, younger than any of you. The large number of my years has served merely to bore and weary me; the smaller number of yours to enrich and excite you. —So tell me again, Madam Lambid, how old are you?"
Lambid smiled. "Fifty-four good years, Madam Gladia."
She sat down and again the applause welled up and continued. Under cover of that, D.G. said hoarsely, "Lady Gladia, who taught you how to handle an audience like this?"
"No one," she whispered back. "I never tried before."
"But quit while you're ahead. The person now getting to his feet is our leading war hawk. There's no need to face him. Say you are tired and sit down. We will tackle Old Man Bistervan ourselves."
"But I'm not tired," said Gladia. "I'm enjoying myself."
The man now facing her from her extreme right but rather near the stage was a tall, vigorous man with shaggy white eyebrows hanging over his eyes. His thinning hair was also white and his garments were a somber black, relieved by a white stripe running down each sleeve and trouser leg, as though setting sharp limits to his body.
His voice was deep and musical. "My name," he said, "is Tomas Bistervan and I'm known to many as the Old Man, largely, I think, because they wish I were and that I would not delay too long in dying. I do not know how to address you because you do not seem to have a family name and because I do not know you well enough to use your given name. To be honest, I do not wish to know you that well.
"Apparently, you helped save a Baleyworld ship on your world against the booby traps and weapons set up by your people and we are thanking you for that. In return, you have delivered some pious nonsense about friendship and kinship. Pure hypocrisy!
"When have your people felt kin to us? When have the Spacers felt any relationship to Earth and its people? Certainly, you Spacers are descended from Earthmen. We don't forget that. Nor do we forget that you have forgotten it. For well over twenty decades, the Spacers controlled the Galaxy and treated Earthpeople as though they were hateful, shortlived, diseased animals. Now that we are growing strong, you hold out the hand of friendship, but that hand has a glove on it, as your hands do. You try to remember not to turn up your nose at us, but the nose, even if not turned up, has plugs in it. Well? Am I correct?"
Gladia held up her hands. "It may be," she said, "that the audience here in this room—and, even more so, the audience outside the room that sees me, via hyperwave—is not aware that I am wearing gloves. They are not obtrusive, but they are there. I do not deny that. And I have nose plugs that filter out dust and microorgamsms without too much interference with breathing. And I am careful to spray my throat periodically. And I wash perhaps a bit more than the requirements of cleanliness alone make necessary. I deny none of it.
"But this is the result of my shortcomings, not yours. My immune system is not strong. My life has been too comfortable and I have been exposed to too little. That was not my deliberate choice, but I must pay the penalty for it. If any of you were in my unfortunate position, what would you do? In particular, Mr. Bistervan, what would you do?"
Bistervan said grimly, "I would do as you do and I would consider it a sign of weakness, a sign that I was unfit and unadjusted to life and that I therefore ought to make way for those who are strong. Woman, don't speak of kinship to us. You are no kin of mine. You are of those who persecuted and tried to destroy us when you were strong and who come whining to us when you are weak."
There was a stir in the audience—and by no means a friendly one—but Bistervan held his ground firmly.
Gladia said softly, "Do you remember the evil we did when we were strong?"
Bistervan said, "Don't fear that we will forget. It is in our minds every day."
"Good! Because now you know what to avoid. You have learned that when the strong oppress the weak, that is wrong. Therefore, when the table turns and when you are strong and we are weak, you will not be oppressive."
"Ah, yes. I have heard the argument. When you were strong, you never heard of morality, but now that you are weak, you preach it earnestly."
"In your case, though, when you were weak, you knew all about morality and were appalled by the behavior of the strong—and now that you are strong, you forget morality. Surely it is better that the immoral learn morality through adversity than that the moral forget morality in prosperity."
"We will give what we received," said Bistervan, holding up his clenched fist.
"You should give what you would have liked to receive," said Gladia, holding out her arms, as though embracing. "Since everyone can think of some past injustice to avenge, what you are saying, my friend, is that it is right for the strong to oppress the weak. And when you say that, you justify the Spacers of the past and should therefore have no complaint of the present. What I say is that oppression was wrong when we practiced it in the past and that it will be equally wrong when you practice it in the future. We cannot change the past, unfortunately, but we can still decide on what the future shall be."
Gladia paused. When Bistervan did not answer immediately, she called out, "How many want a new Galaxy, not the bad old Galaxy endlessly repeated?"
The applause began, but Bistervan threw his arms up and shouted in stentorian fashion, "Wait! Wait! Don't be fools! Stop!"
There was a slow quieting and Bistervan said, "Do you suppose this woman believes what she is saying? Do you suppose the Spacers intend us any good whatever? They still think they are strong, and they still despise us, and they intend to destroy us—if we don't destroy them first. This woman comes here and, like fools, we greet her and make much of her. Well, put her words to the test. Let any of you apply for permission to visit a Spacer world and see if you can. Or if you have a world behind you and can use threats, as Captain Baley did, so that you are allowed to land on the world, how will you be treated? Ask the captain if he was treated like kin.
"This woman is a hypocrite, in spite of all her words—no, because of them. They are the spoken advertisements of her hypocrisy. She moans and whines about her inadequate immune system and says that she must protect herself against the danger of infection. Of course, she doesn't do this because she thi
nks we are foul and diseased. That thought, I suppose, never occurs to her.
"She whines of her passive life, protected from mischance and misfortune by a too-settled society and a too solicitous crowd of robots. How she must hate that.
"But what endangers her here? What mischance does she feel will befall her on our planet? Yet she has brought two robots with her. In this hall, we meet in order to honor her and make much of her, yet she brought her two robots even here. They are there on the platform with her. Now that the room is generally lit, you can see them. One is an imitation human being and its name is R. Daneel Olivaw. Another is a shameless robot, openly metallic in structure, and its name is R. Giskard Reventlov. Greet them, my fellow Baleyworlders. They are this woman's kinfolk."
"Checkmate!" groaned D.G. in a whisper.
"Not yet," said Gladia.
There were craning necks in the audience, as if a sudden itch had affected them all, and the word "Robots" ran across the length and breadth of the hall in thousands of intakes of breath
"You can see them without trouble," Gladia's voice rang out. "Daneel, Giskard, stand up."
The two robots rose at once behind her.
"Step to either side of me," she said, "so that my body does not block the view. —Not that my body is large enough to do much blocking, in any case.
"Now let me make a few things clear to all of you. These two robots did not come with me in order to service me. Yes, they help run my establishment on Aurora, along with fifty-one other robots, and I do no work for myself that I wish a robot to do for me. That is the custom on the world on which I live.
"Robots vary in complexity, ability, and intelligence and these two rate very high in those respects. Daneel, in particular, is, in my opinion, the robot, of all robots, whose intelligence most nearly approximates the human in those areas where comparison is possible.
"I have brought only Daneel and Giskard with me, but they perform no great services for me. If you are interested, I dress myself, bathe myself, use my own utensils when I eat, and walk without being carried."
"Do I use them for personal protection? No. They protect me, yes, but they equally well protect anyone else who needs protection. On Solaria, just recently, Daneel did what he could to protect Captain Baley and was ready to give up his existence to protect me. Without him, the ship could not have been saved.
"And I certainly need no protection on this platform. After all, there is a force field stretched across the stage that is ample protection. It is not there at my request, but it is there and it supplies all the protection I need.
"Then why are my robots here with me?
"Those of you who know the story of Elijah Baley, who freed Earth of its Spacer overlords, who initiated the new policy of settlement, and whose son led the first human being to Baleyworld—why else is it called that? —know that well before he knew me, Elijah Baley worked with Daneel. He worked with him on Earth, on Solaria, and on Aurora—on each of his great cases. To Daneel, Elijah Baley was always 'Partner Elijah.' I don't know if that fact appears in his biography, but you may safely take my word for it. And although Elijah Baley, as an Earthman, began with a strong distrust of Daneel, a friendship between them developed. When Elijah Baley was dying, here on this planet over sixteen decades ago, when it was just a cluster of prefabricated houses surrounded by garden patches, it was not his son who was with him in his last moment. Nor was it I." (For a treacherous moment, she thought her voice would not hold steady.) "He sent for Daneel and he held on to life until Daneel arrived.
"Yes, this is Daneel's second visit to this planet. I was with him, but I remained in orbit." (Steady!) "It was Daneel alone who made planetfall, Daneel who received his last words. —Well, does this mean nothing to you?"
Her voice rose a notch as she shook her fists in the air. "Must I tell you this? Don't you already know it? Here is the robot that Elijah Baley loved. Yes, loved. I wanted to see Elijah before he died, to say good-bye to him; but he wanted Daneel—and this is Daneel. This is the very one.
"And this other is Giskard, who knew Elijah only on Aurora, but who managed to save Elijah's life there.
"Without these two robots, Elijah Baley would not have achieved his goal. The Spacer worlds would still be supreme, the Settler worlds would not exist, and none of you would be here. I know that. You know that. I wonder if Mr. Tomas Bistervan knows that?
"Daneel and Giskard are honored names on this world. They are used commonly by the descendants of Elijah Baley at his request. I have arrived on a ship the captain of which is named Daneel Giskard Baley. How many, I wonder, among the people I face now—in person and via hyperwave—bear the name of Daneel or Giskard? Well, these robots behind me are the robots those names commemorate. And are they to be denounced by Tomas Bistervan?"
The growing murmur among the audience was becoming loud and Gladia lifted her arms imploringly. "One moment. One moment. Let me finish. I have not told you why I brought these two robots."
There was immediate silence.
"These two robots," Gladia said, "have never forgotten Elijah Baley, anymore than I have forgotten him. The passing decades have not in the least dimmed those memories. When I was ready to step on to Captain Baley's ship, when I knew that I might visit Baleyworld, how could I refuse to take Daneel and Giskard with me? They wanted to see the planet that Elijah Baley had made possible, the planet on which he passed his old age and on which he died.
"Yes, they are robots, but they are intelligent robots who served Elijah Baley faithfully and well. It is not enough to have respect for all human beings; one must have respect for all intelligent beings. So I brought them here." Then, in a final outcry that demanded a response, "Did I do wrong?"
She received her response. A gigantic cry of "No!" resounded throughout the hall and everyone was on his or her feet, clapping, stamping, roaring, screaming—on . . . and on . . . and on.
Gladia watched, smiling, and, as the noise continued endlessly, became aware of two things. First, she was wet with perspiration. Second, she was happier than she had ever been in her life.
It was as though all her life, she had waited for this moment—the moment when she, having been brought up in isolation, could finally learn, after twenty-three decades, that she could face crowds, and move them, and bend them to her will.
She listened to the unwearying, noisy response—on . . . and on . . . and on . . .
35.
It was a considerable time later—how long she had no way of telling—that Gladia finally came to herself.
There had first been unending noise, the solid wedge of security people herding her through the crowd, the plunge into endless tunnels that seemed to sink deeper and deeper into the ground.
She lost contact with D.G. early and was not sure that Daneel and Giskard were safely with her. She wanted to ask for them, but only faceless people surrounded her. She thought distantly that the robots had to be with her, for they would resist separation and she would hear the tumult if an attempt were made.
When she finally reached a room, the two robots were there with her. She didn't know precisely where she was, but the room was fairly large and clean. It was poor stuff compared to her home on Aurora, but compared to the shipboard cabin it was quite luxurious.
"You will be safe here, madam," said the last of the guards as he left. "If you need anything, just let us know." He indicated a device on a small table next to the bed.
She stared at it, but by the time she turned back to ask what it was and how it worked, he was gone.
Oh, well, she thought, I'll get by.
"Giskard," she said wearily, "find out which of those doors leads to the bathroom and find out how the shower works. What I must have now is a shower."
She sat down gingerly, I aware that she was damp and unwilling to saturate the chair with her perspiration. She was beginning to ache with the unnatural rigidity of her position when Giskard emerged.
"Madam, the shower is running," he sai
d, "and the temperature is adjusted. There is a solid material which I believe is soap and a primitive sort of toweling material, along with various other articles that may be useful."
"Thank you, Giskard," said Gladia, quite aware that despite her grandiloquence on the manner in which robots such as Giskard did not perform menial service, that is precisely what she had required him to do. But circumstances alter cases—
If she had never needed a shower, it seemed to her, as badly as now, she had also never enjoyed one as much. She remained in it much longer than she had to and when it was over it didn't even occur to her to wonder if the towels had been in any way irradiated to sterility until after she had dried herself—and by that time it was too late,
She rummaged about among the material Giskard had laid out for her—powder, deodorant, comb, toothpaste, hair dryer—but she could not locate anything that would serve as a toothbrush. She finally gave up and used her finger, which she found most unsatisfactory. There was no hairbrush and that too was unsatisfactory. She scrubbed the comb with soap before using it, but cringed away from it just the same. She found a garment that looked as though it were suitable for wearing to bed. It smelled clean, but it hung far too loosely, she decided.
Daneel said quietly, "Madam, the captain wishes to know if he may see you."
"I suppose so," said Gladia, still rummaging for alternate nightwear. "Let him in."
D.G. looked tired and even haggard, but when she turned to greet him, he smiled wearily at her and said, "It is hard to believe that you are over twenty-three decades old."
"What? In this thing?"
"That helps. It's semitransparent. —Or didn't you know?"
She looked down at the nightgown uncertainly, then said, "Good, if it amuses you, but I have been alive, just the same, for two and a third centuries."
"No one would guess it to look at you. You must have been very beautiful in your youth."
"I have never been told so, D.G. Quiet charm, I always believed, was the most I could aspire to. —In any case, how do I use that instrument?"
