The Positronic Man Read online

  "What? What kind of nonsense is this, Andrew?"

  "No sort of nonsense at all, Sir."

  "If I had ever wanted your money, I wouldn't have gone to all the trouble of setting up your company, would I? And I certainly don't want it now. I have more money than I know what to do with as it is."

  "Nevertheless, Sir, what I would like to do is sign my funds over to you-"

  "I won't take a cent, Andrew. Not a single cent!"

  "-not as a gift," Andrew went on, "but as the purchase price of something that I am able to obtain only from you."

  Sir stared. He looked mystified now.

  "What could there possibly be that you could buy from me, Andrew?"

  "My freedom, Sir."

  "Your-"

  "My freedom. I wish to buy my freedom, Sir. Up till now I have simply been one of your possessions, but I wish now to become an independent entity. I would always retain my sense of loyalty and obligation to you, but-"

  "For God's sake!" Sir cried, in a terrible voice. He rose stiffly to his feet and hurled his book to the floor. His lips were quivering and his face was flushed a mottled red. Andrew had never seen him look so agitated. "Freedom? Freedom, Andrew? What on Earth could you be talking about?"

  And he stalked from the room in rage.

  Seven

  ANDREW SUMMOneD LITTLE MISS. Not so much for his own sake, but because Sir's anger had been so intense that Andrew feared for the old man's health, and Little Miss was the only person in the world who could soothe him out of such an irascible mood.

  Sir was in his upstairs bedroom when she arrived. He had been there for two hours. Andrew showed Little Miss up the stairs and halted, hesitating, outside the room as she began to enter it. Sir could be seen pacing back and forth, moving with such determination and ferocity that he seemed to be wearing a track in the antique oriental carpet. He paid no attention to the two figures in the hallway.

  Little Miss glanced back at Andrew.

  "Why are you waiting out there?" she asked.

  "I don't think it would be useful for me to venture near Sir just now, Little Miss."

  "Don't be foolish."

  "I am the one who upset him so."

  "Yes, I realize that. But he's surely over it by now. Come on in with me, and between us we'll get this thing cleared up in no time."

  Andrew could hear the rhythmic angry sound of Sir's steady pacing. "With all respect, Little Miss, it does not seem to me that he is over it in the least. I believe he is still quite troubled. And if I irritate him further -No, Little Miss. I am unable to enter his room. Not until you assure me that he is calm enough so that I can safely be seen by him."

  Little Miss stared at Andrew a moment. Then she nodded and said, "All right, Andrew. I understand."

  She went inside. Andrew heard the rhythm of Sir's anguished pacing begin to slow a bit. He heard voices: first that of Little Miss, speaking gently and calmly, and then that of Sir, erupting in torrents of volcanic wrath, and then Little Miss again, as quietly as before, and then Sir, not quite as frenziedly. And then Little Miss, still calmly but this time not gently: speaking quite firmly, in fact.

  The whole while, Andrew had no idea what was being said. It would not have been difficult for him to adjust his audio receptors to pick up the conversation clearly. But that seemed inappropriate to him; and so the only adjustment he had made was in the opposite direction, allowing him to monitor the conversation sufficiently to know whether his help might be needed, but not so that he could understand the individual words.

  After a time Little Miss appeared at the doorway and said, "Andrew, would you step in here now?"

  "As I said before, I am extremely concerned about the state of Sir's emotional level, Little Miss. If I were to enter, and provoke him all over again-"

  "His emotional level is fine, Andrew. Blowing off a little steam isn't going to kill him. It's good for him, as a matter of fact. Now come on in here. Come in."

  It was a direct order-coupled with a lessening of First Law potentials. Andrew had no choice but to obey.

  He found Sir sitting in his enormous winged armchair by the window-the mahogany-and-leather armchair that Andrew had made for him fifteen years before-with a lap-robe wrapped about him. He was indeed calm again, but there was a steely glint in his eye, and-sitting enthroned the way he was-he had the look about him of an angry old emperor plagued by unruly subordinates. He ignored Andrew's presence completely.

  Little Miss said, "All right, Father. We can discuss this quietly and rationally, can't we?"

  Sir shrugged. "I try to discuss everything quietly and rationally. I always have."

  "Yes, you have, Father."

  "But this, Mandy-this total absurdity-this monstrous nonsense that Andrew has thrown at me-!"

  "Father!"

  "I'm sorry. I can't stay calm when I'm confronted with absolute craziness."

  "You know that Andrew is inherently incapable of craziness. Craziness just isn't included in his specifications."

  "When he talks about getting his freedom-his freedom, by God!-what else can it be but craziness?" And Sir began to sputter and turn red again.

  Andrew had never seen Sir in such a state-never. Once more he began to feel uneasy about being present in the room, and thus setting up such a threat to the old man's constitution. Sir seemed almost on the verge of an apoplectic fit. And if something should happen to him-something that would be a direct result of Andrew's having begun all this- Little Miss said, "Stop it, Father! Just stop it! You have no right to throw a tantrum over this!"

  Andrew was astonished to hear Little Miss speaking to her father so harshly, so defiantly. She sounded like a mother scolding a cranky child. Suddenly it struck him that among human beings time must eventually reverse all the normal generational roles: that Sir, once so dynamic and autocratic and all-knowing, was now as weak and vulnerable as a child, and it was Little Miss's responsibility to guide and direct him as he struggled to understand the bewildering nature of the world.

  It seemed a little strange to Andrew, too, that they would be enacting this highly charged scene in front of him. But of course no one in the Martin family had hesitated to talk in front of Andrew for thirty years-not even about the most intimate matters. Why should they feel any inhibitions in his presence? He was only a robot.

  "Freedom-" Sir said. His voice was thick in his throat. "For a robot!"

  "It's an unusual concept, yes. I admit that, Father. But why are you taking it as such a personal affront?"

  "Am I? I'm taking it as an affront against logic! An affront against common sense! Look, Mandy, what would you say if your front porch came to you and said, 'I want my freedom. I want to move to Chicago and be a front porch there. I think being a front porch in Chicago would be personally more fulfilling than remaining in this place.' "

  Andrew saw a muscle flicker in Little Miss's cheek. He understood abruptly that Sir's vehement reaction to his request must have some connection with Ma'am's decision, years ago, to end her marriage to Sir and leave, to seek her freedom as a single woman far away.

  Human beings were so complicated!

  Little Miss said, " A front porch can't say anything. Or decide to move itself anywhere else. Front porches aren't intelligent. Andrew is."

  "Artificial intelligence."

  "Father, you sound like the worst sort of Society-for-Humanity Fundamentalist bigot! Andrew has lived with you for decades. You know him as well as you know any member of your own family. -What am I saying? He is a member of your own family. Now, suddenly, you begin talking about him as though he's nothing but some ingenious kind of carpet sweeper! Andrew is a person and you know that very well."

  "An artificial person," Sir said. But some of the conviction and force had left his tone.

  "Artificial, yes. That's beside the point. This is the Twenty-Second Century, Father-and pretty far along in the Twenty-Second Century at that. Surely we're capable by now of recognizing that robots are intrica
te and sensitive organisms that have distinctive personalities, that have feelings, that have-well, that have souls. "

  "I'd hate to have to defend that point in court," Sir said. He said it quietly, with a touch of amusement in his voice where the rancor had been just a few moments before. So he was regaining some control over himself, apparently. Andrew felt a sensation of relief.

  "Nobody's asking you to defend it in court," said Little Miss. "Only to accept it within your own heart. Andrew wants you to give him a document saying that he's a free individual. He's willing to pay you generously for that document, unnecessary though any payment should be. It would be a simple statement of his autonomy. What's so terrible about that, may I ask?"

  "I don't want Andrew to leave me," said Sir sullenly.

  "Ah! That's it! That's the crux, isn't it, Father?"

  There was no fire in Sir's eyes now. He seemed lost in self-pity. "I'm an old man. My wife is long gone, my older daughter is a stranger to me, my younger daughter has moved out and is on her own in the world. I'm all alone in this house-except for Andrew. And now he wants to move out too. Well, he can't. Andrew is mine. He belongs to me and I have the right to tell him to stay here, whether he likes it or not. He's had a damned easy time of it all these years, and if he thinks he can simply abandon me now that I'm getting old and sickly, he can-"

  "Father-"

  "He can just forget about it!" Sir cried. "Forget it! Forget it! Forget it!"

  "You're getting yourself worked up again, Father."

  "What if I am?"

  "Slow down, ease back. When did Andrew say anything about leaving you?"

  Sir looked confused. "Why, what else could he have meant by wanting his freedom?"

  "A piece of paper is all he wants. A legal document. A bunch of words. He doesn't intend to go anywhere. What are you imagining, that he'll run off to Europe and set up a carpentry workshop there? No. No. He'll stay right here. He'll still be as loyal as ever. If you give him an order, he'll obey it without question, as he always has. Whatever you say. That won't change. Nothing will, really. Andrew wouldn't so much as be able to step outside the house if you told him not to. He can't help that. It's built in. All he wants is a form of words, Father. He wants to be called free. Is that so horrible? Is it so threatening to your Hasn't he earned it, Father?"

  "So this is what you believe, is it? Some new nonsense that you've gotten into your head?"

  "Not nonsense, Father. And not new, either. Heavens, Andrew and I have been talking about this for years!"

  "Talking about it for years, have you? Years?"

  "For years, yes, discussing it over and over again. It was my idea in the first place, as a matter of fact. I told him it was ridiculous for him to have to think of himself as some sort of walking gadget, when in fact he's so very much more than that. He didn't react at all well when I first proposed it to him. But then we went on talking, and after a time I saw that he was beginning to come around, and then he told me very straightforwardly that he did very much want to be free. 'Good,' I said. 'Tell my father and it'll all be arranged.' But he was afraid to. He kept on postponing it, because he was afraid you would be hurt. Finally I made him put it up to you."

  Sir shrugged. "It was a foolish thing to do. He doesn't know what freedom is. How can he? He's a robot."

  "You keep underestimating him, Father. He's a very special robot. He reads. He thinks about what he's read. He learns and grows from year to year. Maybe when he came here he was just a simple mechanical man like all the rest of them, but the capacity for growth was there in his pathways, whether his makers knew it or not, and he's made good use of that capacity. Father, I know Andrew and I tell you that he's every bit as complex a creature as-as-you and me."

  "Nonsense, girl."

  "How can you say that? He feels things inside. You must be aware of that. I'm not sure what he feels, most of the time, but I don't know what you feel inside a lot of the time either, and you've got the capacity for facial expression and all kinds of other body language that he doesn't. When you talk to him you see right away that he reacts to all kinds of abstract concepts-love, fear, beauty, loyalty, a hundred others-just as you and I do. What else counts but that? If someone else's reactions are very much like your own, how can you help but think that that someone else must be very much like yourself?"

  "He isn't like us," Sir said. "He's something entirely different."

  "He's someone entirely different," Little Miss said. " And not as different as you want to have me believe."

  Sir shrugged. His face had turned gray now where it had been mottled with angry red blotches before, and he looked very, very old and weary.

  He was silent for a long while, staring at his feet, pulling his lap-robe tighter around him. He still looked like an old emperor sitting sternly upright on his throne, but now he was more like an emperor who was seriously considering the possibility of abdicating.

  "All right," he said finally. There was a note of bitterness in his tone. "You win, Mandy. If you want me to agree with you that Andrew is a person instead of a machine, I agree. Andrew is a person. There. Are you happy now?"

  "I never said he was a person, Father."

  "As a matter of fact, you did. That was precisely the word you used."

  "You corrected me. You said he was an artificial person, and I accepted the correction."

  "Well, then. So be it. We agree that Andrew is an artificial person. What of it? How does calling him an artificial person instead of a robot change anything? We're just playing games with words. A counterfeit banknote may be regarded as a banknote, but it's still counterfeit. And you can call a robot an artificial person, but he'll still be-"

  "Father, what he wants is for you to grant him his freedom. He will continue to live here and do everything in his power to make your life pleasant and comfortable, as he has since the day he came here. But he wants you to tell him that he's free."

  "It's a meaningless statement, Mandy."

  "To you, maybe. Not to him."

  "No. I'm old, yes, but I'm not quite senile, not yet, at least. What we're talking about here is establishing a gigantic legal precedent. Giving robots their freedom isn't going to abolish the Three Laws, but it sure as anything is going to open up a vast realm of legal wrangling about robot rights, robot grievances, robot this and that. Robots will be running into the courts and suing people for making them do unpleasant work, or failing to let them have vacations, or simply being unkind to them. Robots will start suing U. S. Robots and Mechanical Men for building the Three Laws into their brains, because some shyster will claim it's an infringement of their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Robots will want to vote. Oh, don't you see, Mandy? It'll be an immense headache for everybody."

  "It doesn't have to be," Little Miss replied. "This doesn't have to be a worldwide cause cйlиbre. It's simply an understanding between Andrew and us. All that we actually want is a privately executed legal document, Father, drawn up by John Feingold, signed by you, witnessed by me, given to Andrew, which will stipulate that he-"

  "No. That would be utterly worthless. Look, Mandy, I sign the paper and then I die, and Andrew stands up on his hind legs and says, 'So long, everybody, I'm a free robot and I'm heading out now to seek fame and fortune, and here's the paper that proves it,' and the first time he opens his mouth and says that to someone they'll laugh in his face and tear up his little piece of meaningless paper for him and ship him back to the factory to be dismantled. Because the piece of paper won't have given him any kind of protection that has the slightest validity in our society. No. No. If you insist on my doing this nonsensical thing, I have to do it the right way or else I won't bother at all. We can't simply give Andrew his freedom just by drawing up a little paper involving just us. This is a matter for the courts."

  "Very well. Then we do it through the courts."

  "But don't you realize what that would mean?" Sir demanded. He was angry again. "All the
issues that I just raised will be certain to come out. There'll be tremendous controversy. And then the filing of briefs-the appeals-the public outcry-and ultimately the verdict. Which will be against us, without any question."

  He glared at Andrew. "See here, you!" There was a harsh grating quality in Sir's voice that Andrew had never heard before. "Do you comprehend what we've been saying here? The only way I can free you, if it's going to have the slightest meaning, is to do it by recognized legal means. But there are no recognized legal means for freeing robots. Once this thing gets into the courts, not only are you going to fail to achieve your goal, but the court will take official cognizance of an the money that you've been amassing, and you're going to lose that too. They'll tell you that a robot has no legal right to earn money or establish bank accounts to keep it in, and either they'll confiscate it outright or they'll force me to take it away from you myself, though I don't have any need for it whatever or any desire to have it. That'll be an embarrassment to me and a dead loss to you. You still won't be free, whatever that may mean to you, and you won't have your precious bank account either. Well, Andrew? Is all this rigmarole worth the chance of losing your money?"

  "Freedom is a priceless thing, Sir," Andrew said. "And the chance of gaining my freedom is worth any amount of money that I may possess."

  Eight

  IT TROUBLED ANDREW greatly that the process of seeking his freedom might cause further distress for Sir. Sir was very fragile now-there was no disguising that, no avoiding the reality of it-and anything that might be a drain on his flagging energies, anything that might upset or disturb or in any way trouble him, might all too readily endanger his life.

  And yet Andrew felt it essential that he press onward with his legal action, now that he had brought the matter up. To turn away from it at this point would be a betrayal of his own integrity. It would mean a repudiation of the independent and self-actuated persona that he had felt burgeoning within his positronic brain for year after year.