David Gerrold - When HARLIE Was One

Oh, well. He swung around to his own typer and thumbed it on. HARLIE?

YES, BOSS?

YOU’LL BE HEARING FROM KROFFT TODAY. PROBABLY WITHIN THE NEXT FEW MINUTES. HE’LL BE PUNCHING THROUGH THE MASTER BEAST PHONE LINK.

RIGHT.

HE SOUNDED EXCITED ABOUT SOMETHING. MAYBE HE’S DISCOVERED A NEW KIND OF GRAVITY WAVE.

IF YOU WISH, I WILL INFORM YOU WHEN THAT DATA BECOMES AVAILABLE.

NO THANKS. AT LEAST, NOT UNTIL AFTER THE BOARD MEETING. FIRST THINGS FIRST. OH, LISTEN — HE AND I ARE THE ONLY TWO PEOPLE WHO KNOW YET ABOUT YOUR ABILITY TO USE MAGTYPER OUTLETS OTHER THAN THE ONES DOWNSTAIRS. DON’T TELL ANYONE ELSE UNLESS YOU CLEAR IT WITH ME FIRST.

WHAT ABOUT DR. HANDLEY?

HE SHOULD BE OKAY, BUT YOU’D BETTER LET ME TELL HIM. THERE’S A COUPLE OF OTHER THINGS I WANT TO TALK TO HTM ABOUT AT THE SAME TIME.

ALL RIGHT.

Auberson switched off just as his door pushed open and Annie came in. She was wearing a bright pink frock that clashed joyously with her long red hair.

He stood up. “Hi. You look happy today.”

“I am,” she said. “We finally finished the annual report and sent it down to the print shop. That’s a load off my mind. I’m going to relax this weekend for the first time in three weeks.” She plopped herself into a chair, a thoroughly ungraceful motion — but somehow not incongruous in this particular woman. Annie could be regal when she chose, but more often she seemed delightfully pixieish. She balanced the cluster of papers she had been carrying on the chair arm.

“What was the trouble?” Auberson asked. He started to sit down again, but that seemed wrong, so he came out in front of the desk and leaned against it. “Did you ever find out what it was?”

“Oh, yes. You were right, you know. It turned out to be something so obvious, it was no wonder we overlooked it. We started getting perfect printouts Wednesday afternoon and found the cause of the trouble yesterday morning.”

“Huh? Shouldn’t that be the other way around?”

“No. That’s correct. The trouble wasn’t in either the machine or the program It was the monitor tape. Somehow there was a bug in it. Where it should have said ‘retrieve statistical data from book set two,’ it in fact said ’retrieve data from book set one.’ ”

“Uh,” said Auberson. Secretly he had to admire HARLIE’s ingenuity in covering up his tinkering with the company’s annual report. “How did you find out it was the monitor tape?”

“We put in the new one that they sent up and started getting perfect printouts, so we ran a comparison between the two and found the bug.”

“Oh, that’s good — who sent up the new tape?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably one of the techs. There were so many of us running around there for a while, we didn’t know who was doing what.”

Auberson nodded. He had a pretty good idea of one specific “who” in the matter. HARLIE had probably fed a false order for a new monitor tape into the memo pipeline, then, when it had come through the Master Beast, printed out the correct tape in response to his own memo. That way, if anyone checked, it would appear to be an entirely human operation. “Well, I’m glad it all worked out.”

“So am I.” She looked at him and smiled.

He looked back at her, and for a moment there was silence in the office. Uncomfortable silence. As long as they were discussing company things, it was all right, he could think of her as a colleague. But, abruptly, she had smiled at him, and that reminded David Auberson that she was a woman, a very attractive woman and in very close proximity.

“Um,” he said and scratched his nose. He smiled embarrassedly. He bad work to do, but he didn’t want to chase her out — yet, at the same time, he really didn’t know what to say to her. “Um, is that the only reason you stopped by — to tell me you finished the annual report?”

“Oh, no.” She looked momentarily flustered. “Here.”

She produced a postcard from the cluster of papers she had balanced on the chair arm. As she handed it to him, the rest fell to the floor and scattered. “Oh, damn.” While she scooped them up, he read:

FILE: 3f L2J4 56 JKN AS COMM:

HI THERE. THIS IS THE COMPUTER. AT YOUR BANK. I HAVE ERRONEOUSLY CREDITED YOUR ACCOUNT WTTH AN EXTRA $3,465,787.91. PLEASE RETURN THIS SUM IMMEDIATELY IN SMALL UNMARKED BILLS (PREFERABLY IN A BROWN PAPER SACK) AND NO QUESTIONS WILL BE ASKED. THANK YOU.

H.A.R.L.I.E.

PS — I CAN ONLY ASSUME THAT THIS IS DUE TO HUMAN ERROR. COMPUTERS NEVER MAKE MISTEAKS.

Abruptly he laughed. It was funny.

She straightened. “Are you training that machine of yours to be a practical joker, David?”

“Uh uh — he must have done this on his own.”

“You didn’t put him up to it?”

He shook his head. “No, I didn’t, damnit — but I think it’s funny. I’d like to do it to Carl Elzer sometime. No, I wouldn’t — he has no sense of humor.” He looked over the form again, suddenly realized something. “Do you mind if I keep this?”

She made a face — obviously she was reluctant to give it up. “Well, I’d like to have it back. I’ve been having a ball showing it around.”

“Erk,” said Auberson. “I’d rather you didn’t do that, either.”

“Why not?” She looked curiously at him and at the printed form.

“Well — um — Can I trust you?”

“Sure — trust me for what?” Her eyes narrowed.

“Not to tell anyone else. At least, not without checking with me first.”

“Sure. What is it?”

“This form. Look at it. Notice anything strange?”

She took the postcard back from him and examined it carefully, both sides. “Nope. Standard bank form, standard computer typeface.”

“That’s just it,” said Auberson. “It’s a standard bank form. How did HARLIE get access to it? ”

“Huh?” She looked at it again.

He was pacing now. “That’s been mailed out from your bank, too, hasn’t it?” It was more a statement than a question.

She flipped the card over and checked the postmark. He was right. She looked at him curiously.

He chewed on his thumbnail. “This thing is more out of hand than I thought.” He stopped and looked at her. “You know HARLIE has access to the Master Beast and all its related banks, don’t you?”

She nodded.

“Well, it’s worse than that. I’m pretty sure he’s taken over the Master Beast. Apparently he monitors its every function. How do you think those G.O.D. Machine specs were printed and delivered so fast? HARLIE did it.”

“I thought you—”

“Uh uh.” He shook his head, started pacing again. “I had to let everybody think that I had given the okay, but I was as much caught by surprise as they were. HARLIE printed out most of that stuff through the Master Beast outlets.”

“Well, that explains a lot. I’d been wondering—”

Auberson nodded. “Right. Late Friday afternoon, the consoles began chattering out data. The operations staff assumed it was a regularly authorized printout, so they monitored and labeled it just like any other — all 180,000 stacked feet of it.”

“180,000 feet—?”

“Right. He had to use almost every available outlet in all four divisions. Even so, I understand they had people working until late Saturday. The stuff was stacked, boxed or tied, and delivered by the custodial staff over the weekend — and there it was waiting for us bright and early Monday morning. You’d better believe I had to do some quick thinking and quick talking. HARLIE wasn’t supposed to have access to any of those outlets, and I had to convince them that he’d transferred the material to the Master Beast and that I’d authorized the printout.”