Robert Heinlein - Time Enough For Love

"Lazarus, I won't bet. Yes, there is a decontam setup outside; we tried to protect you from possible infection without bringing it to your attention. I see that we have failed. I haven't checked on the door-"

"Lying again, Son. You're not good at it."

"-but if it isn't keyed to your voice now, it is my oversight; you've kept me busy. Minerva, if the door to this suite is not keyed to the Senior's voice, correct it immediately."

"It is keyed to his voice, Ira."

I relaxed when I heard how she phrased it-perhaps a computer that had learned when not to be bluntly truthful was going to be still more of a helpmeet.

Lazarus grinned diabolically. "So? Then I'm about to test out the super-override program you were a bit hasty in giving her. Minerva!"

"Awaiting your orders, Senior."

"Key the door to my suite so that it opens only to my voice. I'm going out and sashay around-while Ira and these kids stay locked inside. If I am not back in half an hour, you can unlock them."

"Conflict, Ira!"

"Carry out his orders, Minerva." I tried to keep my voice low and even.

Lazarus smiled and stayed in his chair. "No need to show openers, Ira; there is nothing outside I want to see. Minerva, you can put the door back to normal-let it open to any voice, including mine. Sorry about that conflict, dear; I hope it didn't burn out anything."

"No harm done, Lazarus. When I was given that super-override instruction, I increased the overload tolerances on my problem-resolving network."

"You're a smart girl. I'll try to avoid conflict in the future. Ira, you had better remove, that super-override; it's not fair to Minerva. She feels like a woman with two husbands."

"Minerva can handle it." I assured him, more calmly than I felt.

"You mean that I had better handle it. I shall, Did you tell Ishtar that I'm going househunting?"

"I didn't get that far. I was discussing with her the practicability of your living at the Palace."

"Now, Ira- Palaces don't appeal to me, and being a house guest is still worse. A nuisance both to host and guest. Tomorrow I'll find a residential hilton that doesn't cater to tourists or conventions. Then I'll run out to the skyport and see Dora, and pat her rump and get her calmed down. The next day or so I'll find a little house way out in the suburbs, one automated enough to be no problem-but with its own garden. Got to have a garden. I'll have to bribe somebody to move; the house I want won't be standing empty. Do you happen to know how much I still have in Harriman Trust? If anything."

"I don't know but that's no problem. Minerva, set up a drawing account for the Senior. Unlimited."

"Acknowledged, Ira. Completed."

"Completion noted. Lazarus, you would not be a nuisance. Nor will you find it palatial as long as you avoid the public rooms. As I always do. Nor will you be anyone's guest. It's called the 'Executive Palace,' but its official name is 'The Chairman's House.' You will be in residence in your own home. I will be the guest, if anyone."

"Hogwash, Ira."

"True, Lazarus."

"Quit juggling words. I would still be a stranger in a household not truly my own. A guest. I don't buy it."

"Lazarus, you said-last night"-I remembered just in time the missing day-"that you can always do business with anyone who is acting in his own interest and says so."

"I think I said 'usually' rather than 'always'-meaning that we could then look for a way that would serve both of our, self-interests."

"Then hear me out. You've got me tied down with this Scheherazade bet. As well as a research to find something new to interest you. Now you've dangled bait under my nose that makes me want to migrate as soon as-well, as soon as possible; it won't take long for the Trustees to turn me down concerning a migration of the Families. Grandfather, it's nuisance enough to chase over here every day; I don't hanker to trek way out into the boondocks, the commuting would waste what little time you have left me for work. Besides that, it's dangerous."

"Living alone? Ira, I've lived alone many times."

"Dangerous for me. Assassins. I'm safe at the Palace; the rat who can find his way through that maze hasn't been born. I'm reasonably safe here inside the Clinic, and I can get back and forth in safety, subject only to whims of automatic machinery. But if I make a daily pattern of going to an unfortified house somewhere out in the suburbs, then it is only a matter of time until some crackpot sees it as an opportunity to save the world by picking me off. Oh, he would not live through it; my guards aren't that inefficient. But if I persist in setting myself up as a target, he might get me before they get him. No, Grandfather, I do not choose to be assassinated."

The Senior looked thoughtful but not impressed. "I could answer that your safety and convenience have to do with your self-interest. Not mine."

"True," I admitted. "But let me offer what bait I can. It's in my self-interest for you to live in the Palace. There I can visit you in perfect safety, even safer than I am here, and commuting becomes a matter of seconds, negligible. I can even ask you-there-to excuse me for a half hour if something urgent comes up. That defines my self-interest. As for yours sir-would you be interested in a bachelor's cottage, rather small-four rooms-and not especially modern or luxurious but set in a pleasant garden? Three hectares, but only the part close to the house is gardened, the rest has been allowed to grow wild."

"What's the catch, Ira? How modem is 'not especially'? I did say 'automated'-as I am not yet in shape to do for myself-nor am I patient with the vagaries of servants or the whimsical uncertainties of robots."

"Oh, this cottage is sufficiently automated; it simply does not have a lot of fancy extravagances. No servants needed if your tastes are simple. Would you permit the Clinic to continue to stand watches on you if the watchstanders are as pleasant, and as pleasantly unobtrusive, as these two?"

"Eh? These kids are all right, I like them. I realize that the Clinic wants to keep an eye on me; they probably feel that I'm more of a challenge than a client only three or four hundred years old. That's okay. But you pass the word that I expect to smell perfume, not germicides. Or reasonably fresh body odors; I'm not fussy. I repeat, what's the catch?"

"The hell you aren't fussy, Lazarus; you delight in thinking up impossible conditions. This cottage is rather cluttered with old-fashioned books; the last tenant was eccentric. Did I mention a little stream running through the grounds, one which opens out into a small pool near the house?-not much, but you can take a few strokes in it. Oh, I forgot to mention an old tomcat who thinks he owns the place. But you probably won't see him; he hates most people."

"I won't bother him if he wants to be left alone; cats make good neighbors. You still haven't answered me."

"The catch is this, Lazarus. I've been describing the penthouse I had built for my own use on the roof of the Palace, some ninety years back when I decided to keep this, job awhile. It can be reached only by vertical transport from my usual quarters a couple of stories below it. I've never had time to use it much; you are welcome to it." I stood up. "But if you won't take it, then you can consider that I've lost the Scheherazade bet, and you are free to use that termination switch whenever you please. For I'm damned if I'll be a sitting duck for assassination just to cater to your whims."

"Sit back down!'

"No, thank you. I've made a reasonable offer. If you won't take it, you can go to hell in your own way. I won't let you ride my shoulders like the Old Man of the Sea. I can be pushed just so far."

"So I see. How much of your ancestry am I?"

"About thirteen percent. Considerable convergence."