"I will keep that in mind," said Sir in a dry, cool tone. "You know, Dr. Mansky, I've always endeavored to think clearly and in an orderly way. I never confuse an arm with a leg or a hand with a foot or a cow with a horse, and I'll do my best not to confuse a robot with a human being, however great the temptation may become. Thank you very much for your advice. And now, if you'd like to have a quick tour of Andrew's workshop-"
Chapter Five
MISS HAD BEGUN to cross the threshold that truly separates girlhood from womanhood, now. She was enjoying an active social life and going off with her new friends-not all of them girls-on excursions to the mountains, to the deserts of the south, to the wilderness to the north. Her presence in the Martin house was becoming an increasingly rare event.
So it was Little Miss-not as little as before-who filled Andrew's horizon now. She was turning into a coltish, tireless girl who loved to run great distances along the beach, with Andrew effortlessly keeping pace beside her. She went rambling in the forested areas adjacent to the house, and relied on Andrew to help her down when she had scrambled a little too far up some tree to peer into a bird's nest, or when she had trapped herself on some precarious rocky ledge that she had climbed for the sake of getting a better view of the sea.
As ever, Andrew was vigilant and endlessly protective as Little Miss romped about. He would let her take her little tomboyish risks, yes, because they seemed to make her happy, but not without his calculating the real risk of anything serious happening to her, and he was always poised and ready to intervene swiftly on her behalf if that should be necessary.
The First Law, of course, compelled Andrew to exert constant diligence to protect Little Miss from harm. But, as he sometimes told himself, he would willingly and gladly defend her against peril of any sort even if the First Law did not exist.
That was an odd thought: that there might be no First Law. Andrew could barely conceive of that The First Law (and the Second, and the Third) were such fundamental aspects of his neural pathways that it made him dizzy to imagine himself without them. And yet he had imagined it. Andrew was puzzled by that: how strange, having a capacity to imagine the unimaginable! It made him feel almost human, when paradoxical concepts like that went through his mind.
But what did almost human mean? That was another paradox, and an even more dizzying one. Either you were human or you were not How could there be any sort of intermediate state?
You are a robot, Andrew reminded himself sternly.
You are a product of the United States Robots and Mechanical Men Corporation.
And then Andrew would look at Little Miss and a sensation of great joy and warmth would spread through his positronic brain-a sensation that he had come to identify as "love"-and he would have to remind himself, allover again, that he was nothing more than a cleverly designed structure of metal and plastic with an artificial platinum-iridium brain inside his chrome-steel skull, and he had no right to feel emotions, or to think paradoxical thoughts, or to do any other such complex and mysterious human thing. Even his woodworking art-and he did allow himself to think of it as "art"-was simply a function of the skills with which he had been programmed by his designers.
Little Miss never allowed herself to forget that the very first piece of woodcarving Andrew had done had been for her. She was rarely without the little pendant that he had made for her out of that piece of driftwood, wearing it on a silver chain about her neck and reaching up to finger it fondly again and again.
It was she who first objected to Sir's casual habit of giving away Andrew's productions to anyone who visited the house. He would proudly show his guests Andrew's latest work, and then, when the predictable expressions of admiration and even envy were uttered, would grandly exclaim, "Do you really like it that much? Then take it with you! By all means, take it! My pleasure! There are plenty more where that one came from!"
One day Sir bestowed a particularly intricate abstract carving-a shining spheroid made of slender interwoven strips of redwood with inlays of manzanita and madrone wood-on the Speaker of the Legislature. The Speaker was a loud-voiced red-faced man who had always seemed particularly dull-witted and vulgar to Little Miss, and she very much doubted that he had any ability to see the beauty in Andrew's work. No doubt he was simply being diplomatic when he had praised the carving, and he would simply toss it thoughtlessly into some closet when he got it home.
Little Miss said, after the Speaker had left, "Come on, Dad. You shouldn't have given that to him and you know it!"
"But he liked it, Mandy. He said he thought it was extremely beautiful."
"It is extremely beautiful. So is the beach in front of our house. If he said the beach was extremely beautiful, would you have deeded it over to him?"
"Mandy, Mandy-"
"Well? Would you?"
"It's a false parallel," Sir said. "Obviously you don't go handing away chunks of your real estate to people on a whim. But a small carving-given as a modest expression of affection to a friend of many years' standing who also happens to be a highly influential political leader-"
"Are you saying it was a bribe?"
For an instant real anger flashed in Sir's eyes. But it died away almost as fast as it had come and the usual twinkle with which he regarded his youngest daughter returned.
"You don't really mean that, do you, Mandy? You understand that my gift to the Speaker was merely an act of hospitality, right?"
"Well-yes. Yes. I'm sorry, Dad. What I said was uncalled-for and mean."
Sir smiled. "It was, yes. -Is it that you wanted that carving for yourself? Your room is already filled with things that Andrew has made, you know. The whole house is. We can't give them away as fast as he makes them."