The Robots of Dawn trs-3

by Isaac Asimov

  “In all this, Dr. Fastolfe was my friend. He alone, on all Aurora, knew everything that happened on Solaria. At least, so I think. You know that the full story was not made public and certainly did not appear in that dreadful hyperwave program that I’ve heard of—I refused to watch it.

  “Dr. Fastolfe protected me against the lack of understanding on the part of Aurorans and against their general contempt for Solarians. He protected me also against the despair that filled me after a while.

  “No, we were not lovers. I would have offered myself, but by the time it occurred to me that I might do so, I no longer felt that the feeling you had inspired, Elijah, would ever recur. I thought it might have been a trick of memory and I gave up. I did not offer myself. Nor did he offer himself. I do not know why he did not. Perhaps he could see that my despair arose over my failure to find anything useful in sex and did not want to accentuate the despair by repeating the failure. It would be typically kind of him to be careful of me in this way—so we were not lovers. He was merely my friend at a time when I needed that so much more.

  “There you are, Elijah. You have the whole answer to the questions you asked. You wanted to know my relationship with Dr. Fastolfe and said you needed information. You have it. Are you satisfied?”

  Baley tried not to let his misery show. “I am sorry, Gladia, that life has been so hard for you. You have given me the information I needed. You have given me more information than, perhaps, you think you have.”

  Gladia frowned. “In what way?”

  Baley did not answer directly. He said, “Gladia, I am glad that your memory of me has meant so much to you. It never occurred to me at any time on Solaria, that I was impressing you so and, even if it had, I would not have tried—You know.”

  “I know, Elijah,” she said, softening. “Nor would it have availed you if you had tried. I couldn’t have.”

  “And I know that.—Nor do I take what you have told me as an invitation now. One touch, one moment of sexual insight, need be no more than that. Very likely, it can never be repeated and that onetime existence ought not to be spoiled by foolish attempts at resurrection. That is a reason why I do not now offer myself. My failure to do so is not to be interpreted as one more blank ending for you. Besides—”

  “Yes. You have, as I said earlier, told me perhaps more than you realize you did. You have told me that the story does not end with your despair.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “In telling me of the feeling that was inspired by the touch upon my cheek, you said something like—‘looking back on it long afterward, when I had learned, I realized that I had very nearly experienced an orgasm.’—But then you went on to explain that sex with Aurorans was never successful and, I presume, you did not then experience orgasm either. Yet you must have, Gladia, if you recognized the sensation you experienced that time on Solaria. You could not look back and recognize it for what it was, unless you had learned to love successfully. In other words, you have had a lover and you have experienced love. If I am to believe that Dr. Fastolfe is not your lover and has not been, then it follows that someone else is—or was.”

  “And if so? Why is that your concern, Elijah?”

  “I don’t know if it is or is not, Gladia. Tell me who it is and, if it proves to be not my concern, that will be the end of it.”

  Gladia was silent.

  Baley said, “If you don’t tell me, Gladia, I will have to tell you. I told you earlier that I am not in a position to spare your feelings.”

  Gladia remained silent, the corners of her lips whitening with pressure.

  “It must be someone, Gladia, and your sorrow over Jander’s loss is extreme. You sent Daneel out because you could not bear to look at him for the reminder of Jander that his face brought. If I am wrong in deciding that it was Jander Panell—” He paused a moment, then said harshly, “If the robot, Jander Panell, was not your lover, say so.”

  And Gladia whispered, “Jander Panell, the robot, was not my lover.” Then, loudly and firmly, she said, “He was my husband!”

  25

  Baley’s lips moved soundlessly, but there was no mistaking the tetrasyllabic exclamation.

  “Yes,” said Gladia. “Jehoshaphat! You are startled. Why? Do you disapprove?”

  Baley said tonelessly, “it is not my place either to approve or disapprove.”

  “Which means you disapprove.”

  “Which means I seek only information. How does one distinguish between a lover and a husband on Aurora?”

  “If two people live together in the same establishment for a period of time, they may refer to each other as ‘wife’ or ‘husband,’ rather than as ‘lover’.”

  “How long a period of time?”

  “That varies from region to region, I understand, according to local option. In the city of Eos, the period of time is three months.”

  “It is also required that during this period of time one refrain from sexual relations with others?”

  Gladia’s eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Why?”

  “I merely ask.”

  “Exclusivity is unthinkable on Aurora. Husband or lover, it makes no difference. One engages in sex at pleasure.”

  “And did you please while you were with Jander?”

  “As it happens I did not, but that was my choice.”

  “Others offered themselves?”

  “Occasionally.”

  “And you refused?”

  “I can always refuse at will. That is part of the nonexclusivity.”

  “But did you refuse?”

  “I did.”

  “And did those whom you refused know why you refused?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did they know that you had a robot husband?”

  “I had a husband. Don’t call him a robot husband. There is no such expression.”

  “Did they know?”

  She paused. “I don’t know if they knew.”

  “Did you tell them?”

  “What reason was there to tell them?”

  “Don’t answer my questions with questions. Did you tell them?”

  “I did not.”

  “How could you avoid that? Don’t you think an explanation for your refusal would have been natural?”

  “No explanation is ever required. A refusal is simply a refusal and is always accepted. I don’t understand you.”

  Baley stopped to gather his thoughts. Gladia and he were not at cross-purposes; they were running down parallel tracks.

  He started again. “Would it have seemed natural on Solaria to have a robot for a husband?”

  “On Solaria, it would have been unthinkable and I would never have thought of such a possibility. On Solaria, everything was unthinkable.—And on Earth, too, Elijah. Would your wife ever have taken a robot for a husband?”

  “That’s irrelevant, Gladia.”

  “Perhaps, but your expression was answer enough. We may not be Aurorans, you and I, but we are on Aurora. I have lived here for two years and accept its mores.”

  “Do you mean that human-robot sexual connections are common here on Aurora?”

  “I don’t know. I merely know that they are accepted because everything is accepted where sex is concerned—everything that is voluntary, that gives mutual satisfaction, and that does no physical harm to anyone. What conceivable difference would it make to anyone else how an individual or any combination of individuals found satisfaction? Would anyone worry about which books I viewed, what food I ate, what hour I went to sleep or awoke, whether I was fond of cats or disliked roses? Sex, too, is a matter of indifference—on Aurora.”

  “On Aurora,” echoed Baley. “But you were not born on Aurora and were not brought up in its ways. You told me just a while ago that you couldn’t adjust to this very indifference to sex that you now praise. Earlier, you expressed your distaste for multiple marriages and for easy promiscuity. If you did not tell those whom you refused why you refused, it might have been b
ecause, in some hidden pocket of your being, you were ashamed of having Jander as a husband. You might have known—or suspected, or even merely supposed—that you were unusual in this—unusual even on Aurora—and you were ashamed.”

  “No, Elijah, you won’t talk me into being ashamed. If having a robot as a husband is unusual even on Aurora, that would be because robots like Jander are unusual. The robots we have on Solaria, or on Earth—or on Aurora, except for Jander and Daneel—are not designed to give any but the most primitive sexual satisfaction. They might be used as masturbation devices, perhaps, as a mechanical vibrator might be, but nothing much more. When the new humaniform robot becomes widespread, so will human-robot sex become widespread.”

  Baley said, “How did you come to possess Jander in the first place, Gladia? Only two existed—both in Dr. Fastolfe’s establishment. Did he simply give one of them—half of the total—to you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Out of kindness, I suppose. I was lonely, disillusioned, wretched, a stranger in a strange land. He gave me Jander for company and I will never be able to thank him enough for it. It only lasted for half a year, but that half-year may be worth all my life beside.”

  “Did Dr. Fastolfe know that Jander was your husband?”

  “He never referred to it, so I don’t know.”

  “Did you refer to it?”

  “No.

  “Why not?”

  “I saw no need.—And no, it was not because I felt shame.”

  “How did it happen?”

  “That I saw no need?”

  “No. That Jander became your husband.”

  Gladia stiffened. She said in a hostile voice, “Why do I have to explain that?”

  Baley said, “Gladia, it’s getting late. Don’t fight me every step of the way. Are you distressed that Jander is—is gone?”

  “Need you ask?”

  “Do you want to find out what happened?”

  “Again, need you ask?”

  “Then help me. I need all the information I can get if I am to begin—even begin—to make progress in working out an apparently insoluble problem. How did Jander become your husband?”

  Gladia sat back in her chair and her eyes were suddenly brimming with tears. She pushed at the plate of crumbs that had once been pastry and said in a choked voice:

  “Ordinary robots do not wear clothes, but they are so designed as to give the effect of wearing clothes. I know robots well, having lived on Solaria, and I have a certain amount of artistic talent—”

  “I remember your light-forms,” said Baley softly.

  Gladia nodded in acknowledgment. “I constructed a few designs for new models that would possess, in my opinion, more style and more interest than some of those in use in Aurora. Some of my paintings, based on those designs, are on the walls here. Others I have in other places in this establishment.

  Baley’s eyes moved to the paintings. He had seen them. They were of robots, unmistakably. They were not naturalistic, but seemed elongated and unnaturally curved. He noted now that the distortions were so designed as to stress, quite cleverly, those portions which, now that he looked at them from anew perspective, suggested clothing. Somehow there was an impression of servants’ costumes he had once viewed in a book devoted to Victorian England of medieval times. Did Gladia know of these things or was it a merely chance, if circumstantial, similarity? It was a question of no account, probably, but not something (perhaps) to be forgotten.

  When he had first noticed them, he had thought it was Gladia’s way of surrounding herself with robots in imitation of life on Solaria. She hated that life, she said, but that was only a product of her thinking mind—Solaria had been the only home she had really known and that is not easily sloughed off—perhaps not at all. And perhaps that remained a factor in her painting, even if her new occupation gave her a more plausible motive.

  She was speaking. “I was successful. Some of the robot manufacturing concerns paid well for my designs and there were numerous cases of existing robots being resurfaced according to my directions. There was a certain satisfaction in all this that, in a small measure, compensated for the emotional emptiness of my life.

  “When Jander was given me by Dr. Fastolfe, I had a robot who, of course, wore ordinary clothing. The dear doctor was, indeed, kind enough to give me a number of changes of clothing for Jander.

  “None of it was in the least imaginative and it amused me to buy what I considered more appropriate garb. That meant measuring him quite accurately, since I intended to have my designs made to order—and that meant having him remove his clothing in stages.

  “He did so—and it was only when he was completely unclothed that I quite realized how close to human he was. Nothing was lacking and those portions which might be expected to be erectile were, indeed, erectile. Indeed, they were under what, in a human, would be called conscious control. Jander could tumesce and detumesce on order. He told me so when I asked him if his penis was functional in that respect. I was curious and he demonstrated.

  “You must understand that, although he looked very much like a man, I knew he was a robot. I have a certain hesitation about touching men—you understand—and I have no doubt that played a part in my inability to have satisfactory sex with Aurorans. But this was not a man and I had been with robots all my life. I could touch Jander freely.

  “It didn’t take me long to realize that I enjoyed touching him and it didn’t take Jander long to realize that I enjoyed it. He was a finely tuned robot who followed the Three Laws carefully. To have failed to give joy when he could would have been to disappoint. Disappointment could be reckoned as harm and he could not harm a human being. He took infinite care then to give me joy and, because I saw in him the desire to give joy, something I never saw in Auroran men, I was indeed joyful and, eventually, I found out, to the full, I think, what an orgasm is.”

  Baley said, “You were, then, completely happy?”

  “With Jander? Of course. Completely.”

  “You never quarreled?”

  “With Jander? How could I? His only aim, his only reason for existence, was to please me.”

  “Might that not disturb you? He only pleased you because he had to.”

  “What motive would anyone have to do anything but that, for one reason or another, he had to?”

  “And you never had the urge to try real—to try Aurorans after you had learned to experience orgasm?”

  “It would have been an unsatisfactory substitute. I wanted only Jander.—And do you understand, now, what I have lost?”

  Baley’s naturally grave expression lengthened into solemnity. He said, “I understand, Gladia. If I gave you pain earlier, please forgive me, for I did not entirely understand then.”

  But she was weeping and he waited, unable to say anything more, unable to think of a reasonable way to console her.

  Finally, she shook her head and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. She whispered, “Is there anything more?”

  Baley said apologetically, “A few questions on another subject and then I will be through annoying you.” He added cautiously, “For now.”

  “What is it?” She seemed very tired.

  “Do you know that there are people who seem to think that Dr. Fastolfe was responsible for the killing of Jander?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you know, that Dr. Fastolfe himself admits that only he possesses the expertise to kill Jander in the way that he was killed?”

  “Yes.—The dear doctor told me so himself.”

  “Well, then, Gladia, do you think Dr. Fastolfe killed Jander?”

  She looked up at him, suddenly and sharply, and then said angrily, “Of course not. Why should he? Jander was his robot to begin with and he was full of care for him. You don’t know the dear doctor as I do, Elijah. He is a gentle person who would hurt no one and who would never hurt a robot. To suppose he would kill one is to suppose that a rock would fall upward.”
/>   “I have no further questions, Gladia, and the only other business I have here, at the moment, is to see Jander—what remains of Jander—if I have your permission.”

  She was suspicious again, hostile. “Why? Why?”

  “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 fired 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.