Robert Heinlein - Time Enough For Love

"Lazarus, I can arrange a standard telephone hookup if that is what you want. But Dora could speak to you at once via the duo in your suite that I am now using."

"Oh. Fine!"

"Shall I supply her with holographic signal, too? Or is sound enough?"

"Sound is enough. More than enough, probably. Will you be able to hear, too?"

"If you wish, Lazarus. But you can have privacy if that is your wish."

"Stick around; I may need a referee. Put her on."

"Boss?" It was the voice of a timid little girl. It made me think of skinned knees, and no breasts as yet, and big, tragic eyes.

Lazarus answered, "Right here, baby."

"Boss! God damn your lousy soul to hell!-what do you mean by running off and not letting me know where you are? Of all the filthy, flea-bitten-"

"Pipe down!"

The timid-little-girl voice returned. "Aye, aye, Skipper," it said uncertainly.

"Where I go and when I go and how long I stay are none of your business. Your business is to pilot and to keep house, that's all."

I heard a sniffle, exactly like a small child sniffing back tears. "Yes, Boss."

"You were supposed to be alseep. I put you to bed myself."

"Somebody woke me. A strange lady."

"That was a mistake. But you used bad language to her."

"Well...I was scared. I really was, Boss. I woke up and thought you had come home...and you weren't anywhere around, not anywhere. Uh...she told on me?"

"She conveyed your message to me. Fortunately she did not understand most of your words. But I did. What have I told you about being polite to strangers?"

"I'm sorry, Boss."

"Sorry doesn't get the cows milked. Now adorable Dora, you listen to me. I'm not going to punish you; you were wakened by mistake and you were scared and lonely, so we'll forget it. But you shouldn't talk that way, not to strangers. This lady- She's a friend of mine, and she wants to be your friend, too. She's a computer-"

"She is?"

"Just as you are, dear."

"Then she couldn't hurt me, could she? I thought she was inside me, snooping around. So I yelled for you."

"She not only couldn't, she would never want to hurt you." Lazarus raised his voice slightly. "Minerva! Come in, dear, and tell Dora who you are."

My helpmeet's voice, calm and soothing, said, "I'm a computer, Dora, called 'Minerva' by my friends-and I hope you'll call me that. I'm terribly sorry I woke you. I'd be scared, too, if someone woke me like that." (Minerva never has been "asleep" in the hundred-odd years she's been activated. She rests each part of herself on some schedule I don't need to know-but she herself is always awake. Or awake so instantly whenever I speak to her as not to matter.)

The ship said, "How do you do, Minerva. I'm sorry I talked the way I did."

"I don't remember it, dear, if you did. I heard your skipper say that I transmitted a message from you to him. But it's erased, now that it's been transmitted. Private message, I suppose."

(Was Minerva truth-saying? Until she came under Lazarus' influence I would have said that she did not know how to lie. Now I'm not sure.)

"I'm glad you erased it, Minerva. I'm sorry I talked to you that way. Boss is sore at me about it."

Lazarus interrupted. "Now, now, Adorable-stop it. We always let water over the bridge lie where Jesus flang it; you know that. Will you be a good girl and go back to sleep?"

"Do I have to?"

"No. You don't even have to place yourself on slow time. But I can't come to see you-or even talk to you-earlier than late tomorrow afternoon. I'm busy today and will be house hunting tomorrow. You can stay awake and bore yourself silly any way you choose. But if you whomp up some fake emergency to get my attention, I'll spank you."

"But, Boss, you know I never do that."

"I know you do do that, little imp. But if you bother me for anything less than somebody trying to break into you or you catching on fire, you'll regret it. If I can figure out that you've set yourself on fire, you'll catch it twice as hard. Look, dear, why don't you at least sleep whenever I am asleep? Minerva, can you let Dora know when I go to sleep? And when I wake up?"

"Certainly, Lazarus!"

"But that doesn't mean you can bother me when I'm awake, Dora, other than for real emergencies. No surprise drills- this is not shipboard routine; we're dirtside and I'm busy. Uh...Minerva, how's your time-sharing capacity? Do you play chess?"

I put in, "Minerva has ample share-time capacity."

But before I could add that she was Secundus Champion, Unlimited Open Handicap (with a handicap of Q, Q's B, & K's R) Minerva said: "Perhaps Dora will teach me to play chess."

(Well, Minerva had certainly learned Lazarus' rule for telling the truth selectively. I made note that I must have a serious private talk with her.)

"I'd be glad to, Miss Minerva!"

Lazarus relaxed. "Fine. You gals get acquainted. So long till tomorrow, Dorable. Now beat it."

Minerva notified us that the yacht was no longer patched in, and Lazarus relaxed. Minerva dropped back to her record-keeping role, and kept quiet. Lazarus said apologetically, "Don't be put off by her childish manners, Ira; you won't find a sharper pilot, or a neater ship's housekeeper, between here and Galactic Center. But I had reasons for not letting her grow up in other ways, reasons that won't apply when you take over as her master. She's a good girl, she really is. It's just that she's like a cat that jumps into your lap the instant you sit down."

"I found her charming."

"She's a spoiled brat. But it's not her fault; I am practically all the company she's ever had. I get bored by a computer that just grinds out numbers, docile as a slide rule. No company on a long trip. You wanted to speak to Ishtar. About my househunting, I think. Tell her I won't let it interfere with routine-I just want a day off, that's all."

"I'll tell her." 'I turned to the Administrator for Rejuvenation and shifted to Galacta-asking her how long it would take to sterilize a suite in the Palace and install decontamination equipment for watchstanders and visitors.

Before she could answer, Lazarus said, "Wups! Hold it one fiddlin' moment. I saw you palm that card, Ira."

"I beg your pardon, sir?"

"You tried to slide one in. 'Decontam' is the same word in English as in Galacta. Not that it was news to me; my sense of smell isn't that dead. When a pretty girl leans over me, I expect to smell perfume. But when I can't even smell girl and do smell germicides-well, ipse dixit and Q.E.D. Minerva!"

"Yes, Lazarus?"

"Can you spare me some shared time to give me a refresher while I'm asleep tonight in the nine hundred basic words of Galacta or whatever number it takes? You equipped for it?"

"Certainly, Lazarus."

"Thanks, dear. One night should do it, but I'll appreciate vocabulary drill each night until we both think I'm up to adequate proficiency. Can do?"

"Can do, Lazarus. And will do."

"Thanks, dear, over and out. Now, Ira, you see that door? If it doesn't open to my voice, I'm going to attempt to break it down. If I can't, I am going to check on whether or not that suicide switch is really hooked up-by trying it. Because, if that door won't open, I am a prisoner, and any promises I made on your assurances that I am a free agent are not binding. But if it does open to my voice, I'll bet you whatever you like that there is a decontam chamber beyond it, staffed and ready to function. Say a million crowns to keep it interesting? No, you didn't flinch; let's make it ten million crowns."

I trust that I did not flinch. I have never had that much money of my own, and a Chairman Pro Tern gets out of the habit of thinking about his own money; there is no need to. I had not asked Minerva about my personal balance for some time. Years, perhaps.