Robert Silverberg: The Iron Chancellor

“I beg you to reconsider, sir. Extra weight is harmful to every vital organ in the body. I plead with you to maintain my scheduling unaltered.”

“I’d rather cut my own throat. Joey, inactivate him and do your stuff.”

Grinning fiercely, the boy stepped forward and pressed the stud that opened the robot’s ribcage. A frightening assortment of gears, cams and translucent cables became visible inside the robot. With a small wrench in one hand and the open instruction book in the other, Joey prepared to make the necessary changes, while Carmichael held his breath and a pall of silence descended on the living room. Even old Clyde leaned forward to have a better view.

Joey muttered, “Lever F, with the yellow indicia, is to be advanced one notch…umm. Now twist Dial B9 to the left, thereby opening the taping compartment and—oops!”

Carmichael heard the clang of a wrench and saw the bright flare of sparks; Joey leaped back, cursing with surprisingly mature skill. Ethel and Myra gasped simultaneously.

“What happened?” four voices—Clyde’s coming in last—demanded.

“Dropped the damn wrench,” Joey said. “I guess I shorted out something in there.”

The robot’s eyes were whirling satanically and its voice box was emitting an awesome twelve-cycle rumble. The great metal creature stood stiffly in the middle of the living room; with brusque gestures of its big hands, it slammed shut the open chest plates.

“We’d better call Mr. Robinson,” Ethel said worriedly. “A short-circuited robot is likely to explode, or worse.”

“We should have called Robinson in the first place,” Carmichael murmured bitterly. “It’s my fault for letting Joey tinker with an expensive and delicate mechanism like that. Myra, get me the card Mr. Robinson left.”

“Gee, Dad, this is the first time I’ve ever had anything like that go wrong,” Joey insisted. “I didn’t know—”

“You’re darned right you didn’t know.” Carmichael took the card from his daughter and started towards the phone. “I hope we can reach him at this hour. If we can’t—”

Suddenly Carmichael felt cold fingers prying the card from his hand. He was so startled he relinquished it without a struggle. He watched as Bismarck efficiently ripped it into little fragments and shoved them into a wall disposal unit.

The robot said, “There will be no further meddling with my program tapes.” Its voice was deep and strangely harsh.

“What—”

“Mr. Carmichael, today you violated the program I set down for you. My perceptors reveal that you consumed an amount far in excess of your daily lunchtime requirement.”

“Sam, what—”

“Quiet, Ethel. Bismarck, I order you to shut yourself off at once.”

“My apologies, sir. I cannot serve you if I am shut off.”

“I don’t want you to serve me. You’re out of order. I want you to remain still until I can phone the repairman and get him to service you.”

Then he remembered the card that had gone into the disposal unit. He felt a faint tremor of apprehension.

“You took Robinson’s card and destroyed it.”

“Further alteration of my circuits would be detrimental to the Carmichael family,” said the robot. “I cannot permit you to summon the repairman.”

“Don’t get him angry, Dad,” Joey warned. “I’ll call the police. I’ll be back in—”

“You will remain within this house,” the robot said. Moving with impressive speed on its oiled treads, it crossed the room, blocking the door, and reached far above its head to activate the impassable privacy field that protected the house. Carmichael watched, aghast, as the inexorable robotic fingers twisted and manipulated the field controls.

“I have now reversed the polarity of the house privacy field,” the robot announced. “Since you are obviously not to be trusted to keep to the diet I prescribe, I cannot allow you to leave the premises. You will remain within and continue to obey my beneficial advice.”

Calmly, he uprooted the telephone. Next the windows were opaqued and the stud broken off. Finally, the robot seized the instruction book from Joey’s numbed hands and shoved it into the disposal unit.

“Breakfast will be served at the usual time,” Bismarck said mildly. “For optimum purposes of health, you are all to be asleep by 2300 hours. I shall leave you now, until morning. Good night.”

Carmichael did not sleep well that night, nor did he eat well the next day. He awoke late, for one thing—well past nine. He discovered that someone, obviously Bismarck, had neatly canceled out the impulses from the housebrain that woke him at seven each morning.

The breakfast menu was toast and black coffee. Carmichael ate disgruntledly, not speaking, indicating by brusque scowls that he did not want to be spoken to. After the miserable meal had been cleared away, he surreptitiously tiptoed to the front door in his dressing gown, and darted a hand towards the handle.

The door refused to budge. He pushed until sweat dribbled down his face. He heard Ethel whisper warningly, “Sam—” and a moment later cool metallic fingers gently disengaged him from the door.

Bismarck said, “I beg your pardon, sir. The door will not open. I explained this last night.”

Carmichael gazed sourly at the gimmicked control box of the privacy field. The robot had them utterly hemmed in. The reversed privacy field made it impossible for them to leave the house; it cast a sphere of force around the entire detached dwelling. In theory, the field could be penetrated from outside, but nobody was likely to come calling without an invitation. Not here in Westley. It wasn’t one of those neighborly subdivisions where everybody knew everybody else. Carmichael had picked it for that reason.

“Damn you,” he growled, “you can’t hold us prisoners in here!”

“My intent is only to help you,” said the robot, in a mechanical yet dedicated voice. “My function is to supervise your diet. Since you will not obey willingly, obedience must be enforced—for your own good.”

Carmichael scowled and walked away. The worst part of it was that the roboservitor sounded so sincere!

Trapped. The phone connection was severed. The windows were darkened. Somehow, Joey’s attempt at repairs had resulted in a short circuit of the robot’s obedience filters, and had also exaggeratedly stimulated its sense of function. Now Bismarck was determined to make them lose weight if it had to kill them to do so.

And that seemed very likely.

Blockaded, the Carmichael family met in a huddled little group to whisper plans for a counterattack. Clyde stood watch, but the robutler seemed to be in a state of general shock since the demonstration of the servitor-robot’s independent capacity for action, and Carmichael now regarded him as undependable.

“He’s got the kitchen walled off with some kind of electronic-based force web,” Joey said. “He must have built it during the night. I tried to sneak in and scrounge some food, and got nothing but a flat nose for trying.”

“I know,” Carmichael said sadly. “He built the same sort of doohickey around the bar. Three hundred credits of good booze in there and I can’t even grab the handle!”

“This is no time to worry about drinking,” Ethel said morosely. “We’ll be skeletons any day.”

“It isn’t that bad, Mom!” Joey said.

“Yes, it is!” cried Myra. “I’ve lost five pounds in four days!”

“Is that so terrible?”

“I’m wasting away,” she sobbed. “My figure—it’s vanishing! And—”

“Quiet,” Carmichael whispered. “Bismarck’s coming!”

The robot emerged from the kitchen, passing through the force barrier as if it had been a cobweb. It seemed to have effect on humans only, Carmichael thought. “Lunch will be served in eight minutes,” it said obsequiously, and returned to its lair.