"What is it, Mr. Baley?" asked Fastolfe, startled.
Baley stared at him and heard the question only belatedly. "Nothing, Dr. Fastolfe. I was just thinking of Dr. Amadiro's infernal gall in doing the damage to Jander and then laboring to fix the blame on you, in arranging to have me go half-mad in the storm last night and then using that as a way of casting doubt on my statements. I was just - momentarily - angry."
"Well, no need to be, Mr. Baley. And actually, it is quite impossible for Amadiro to have immobilized Jander. It remains purely a chance event. - To be sure, it is possible that Amadiro's investigation may have increased the odds of such a chance event taking place, but I would not argue the matter."
Baley heard the statement with half of one ear. What he had just said to Fastolfe was fiction and what Fastolfe was saying didn't matter. It was (as the Chairman would have said) irrelevant. In fact, everything that had happened - everything that Baley had explained - was irrelevant. - But nothing had to be changed because of that.
Except one thing - after a while.
Jehoshaphat! He whispered in the silence of his mind and turned suddenly to the lunch, eating with gusto and with joy.
81
Once again, Baley crossed the lawn between Fastolfe's establishment and Gladia's. He would be seeing Gladia for the fourth time in three days - and (his heart seemed to compress into a hard knot in his chest) now for the last time.
Giskard was with him but at a distance, more intent than ever on the surroundings. Surely, with the Chairman in full possession of the facts, there should be a relaxation of any concern for Baley's safety - if there ever had been any, by rights, when it was Daneel who had been in danger. Presumably, Giskard had not yet been reinstructed in the matter.
Only once did he approach Baley and that was when the latter called out, "Giskard, where's Daneel?"
Swiftly, Giskard covered the ground between them, as though reluctant to speak in anything but a quiet tone. "Daneel is on his way to the spaceport, sir, in the company of several others, of the staff, in order to make arrangements for your transportation to Earth. When you are taken to the spaceport, he will meet you there and be on the ship with you, taking his final leave of you at Earth."
"Good news. I treasure every day of companionship with Daneel. And you, Giskard? Will you accompany us?"
"No, sir. I am instructed to remain on Aurora. However, Daneel will serve you well, even in my absence."
"I am sure of that, Giskard, but I will miss you."
"Thank you, sir," said Giskard and retreated as rapidly as he had come. Baley gazed after him speculatively for a moment or so. - No, first things first. He had to see Gladia.
82
She advanced to greet him - and what a world of change had taken place in two days. She was not joyous, she was not dancing, she was not bubbling; there was still the grave look of one who had suffered a shock and a loss - but the troubled aura around her was gone. There was a kind of serenity now, as though she had grown aware of the fact that life continued after all and might even, on occasion, be sweet.
She managed a smile, warm and friendly, as she advanced to him and held out her hand.
"Oh, take it, take it, Elijah," she said when he hesitated. "It's ridiculous for you to hang back and pretend you don't want to touch me after last night. You see, I still remember it and I haven't come to regret it. Quite the contrary."
Baley performed the unusual operation (for him) of smiling in return. "I remember it, too, Gladia. And I don't regret it either. I would even like to do it again, but I have come to say good-bye."
A shade fell across her face. "Then you'll be going back, to Earth. Yet the report I got by way of the robot network that always operates between Fastolfe's establishment and my own is that all went well. You can't have failed."
"I did not fail. Dr. Fastolfe, has, in fact, won completely. I don't believe there, will be, any suggestion at all that he was in any way involved in Jander's death."
"Because of what you had to say, Elijah?"
"I believe so."
"I knew it." There was a tinge of self-satisfaction to that. "I knew you would do it when I told them to get you on the case. - But then why are you being sent home?"
"Precisely because the case is solved. If I remain here longer, I will be a foreign irritant in the body politic, apparently."
She looked at him dubiously for a moment and said, "I'm not sure what you mean by that. It sounds like an Earth expression to me. But never mind. Were you able to find out who killed Jander? That is the important part."
Baley looked around. Giskard was standing in one niche, one of Gladia's robots in another.
Gladia interpreted the look without trouble. She said, "Now, Elijah, you must learn to stop worrying about robots. You don't worry about the presence of the chair, do you, or of these drapes?"
Baley nodded. "Well, then, Gladia, I'm sorry - I'm terribly sorry - but I had to tell them of the fact that Jander was your husband."
Her eyes opened wide and he hastened on. "I had to. It was essential to the case, but I promise it won't affect your status on Aurora." As briefly as he might, he summarized the events of the confrontation and concluded, "So, you see, no one killed Jander. The immobilization was the result of a chance change in his positronic pathways, though the probabilities of that chance change may have been enhanced by what had been going on."
"And I never knew," she moaned. "I never knew. I connived at this Amadiro's foul plan. - And he is the one responsible just as much, as though he had deliberately hacked away at him with a sledgehammer."