Philip Dick - We Can Build You

"Yes sir, I do. You are Mr. Louis Rosen of Boise, Idaho. I recall a pleasant overnight stay with your father. Is he well?"

"Not as well as I wish he was."

"A pity."

"Sir, I'd like to ask you a question. Doesn't it seem odd to you that although you were born around 1800 you are still alive in 1982? And doesn't it seem odd to you to be shut off every now and then? And what about your being made out of transistors and relays? You didn't used to be, because in 1800 they didn't have transistors and relays." I paused, waiting.

"Yes," the Stanton agreed, "those are oddities. I have here a volume--" He held up his book. "Which deals with the new science of cybernetics, and this science has shed light on my perplexity."

That excited me. "Your perplexity!"

"Yes sir. During my stay with your father I discussed puzzling matters of this nature with him. When I consider the brief span of my life, swallowed up in the eternity before and behind it, the small space that I fill, or even see, engulfed in the infinite immensity of spaces which I know not, and which know not me, I am afraid."

"I should think so," I said.

"I am afraid, sir, and wonder to see myself here rather than there. For there is no reason why I should be here rather than there, now rather than then."

"Did you come to any conclusion?"

The Stanton cleared its throat, then got out a folded linen handkerchief and carefully blew its nose. "It seems to me that time must move in strange jumps, passing over intervening epochs. But why it would do that, or even how, I do not know. At a certain point the mind cannot fathom anything further."

"You want to hear my theory?"

"Yes sir."

"I claim there is no Edwin M. Stanton or Louis Rosen anymore. There was once, but they're dead. We're machines."

The Stanton regarded me, its round, wrinkled face twisted up. "There may be some truth in that," it said finally.

"And," I said, "Maury Rock and Pris Frauenzimmer designed us and Bob Bundy built us. And right now they're working on an Abe Lincoln simulacrum."

The round, wrinkled face darkened. "Mr. Lincoln is dead."

"I know."

"You mean they are going to bring him back?"

"Yes," I said.

"_Why?_"

"To impress Mr. Barrows."

"Who is Mr. Barrows?" The old man's voice grated.

"A multi-millionaire who lives in Seattle, Washington. It was his influence that got sub-dividers started on the Moon."

"Sir, have you ever heard of Artemus Ward?"

"No," I admitted.

"If Mr. Lincoln is revived you will be subjected to endless humorous selections from the writings of Mr. Ward." Scowling, the Stanton picked up its book and once more read. Its face was red and its hands shook.

Obviously I had said the wrong thing.

There was really not much that I knew about Edwin M. Stanton. Since everybody today looks up to Abraham Lincoin it hadn't occurred to me that the Stanton would feel otherwise. But you live and learn. After all, the simulacrum's attitude was formed well over a century ago, and there's not much you can do to change an attitude that old.

I excused myself--the Stanton barely glanced up and nodded--and set off down the street to the library. Fifteen minutes later I had the Britannica out and laid flat on a table; I looked up both Lincoln and Stanton and then the Civil War itself.

The article on Stanton was short but interesting. Stanton had started out hating Lincoln; the old man had been a Democrat, and he both hated and distrusted the new Republican Party. It described Stanton as being harsh, which I had already noticed, and it told of many squabbles with generals, especially Sherman. But, the article said, the old man was good in his job under Lincoln; he booted out fraudulent contractors and kept the troops well-equipped. And at the end of hostilities he was able to demobilize 800,000 men, no mean feat after a bloody Civil War.

The trouble hadn't started until Lincoln's death. It had really been hot-going there for a while, between Stanton and President Johnson; in fact it looked as if the Congress were going to take over and be the sole governing body. As I read the article I began to get a pretty good idea of the old man. He was a real tiger. He had a violent temper and a sharp tongue. He almost got Johnson out and himself in as a military dictator.

But the Britannica added, too, that Stanton was thoroughly honest and a genuine patriot.

The article on Johnson stated bluntly that Stanton was disloyal to his chief and in league with his enemies. It called Stanton obnoxious. It was a miracle that Johnson got the old man out.

When I put the volumes of the Britannica back on the shelf I breathed a sigh of relief; just in those little articles you could catch the atmosphere of pure poison which reigned in those days, the intrigues and hates, like something out of Medieval Russia. In fact all the plotting at the end of Stalin's lifetime--it was much like that.

As I walked slowly back to the office I thought, Kindly old gentleman hell. The Rock-Frauenzimmer combine, in their greed, had reawakened more than a man; they had reawakened what had been an awesome and awful force in this country's history. Better they should have made a Zachary Taylor simulacrum. No doubt it was Pris and her perverse, nihilistic mind that had conceived this great joker in the deck, this choice out of all the possible thousands, even millions. Why not Socrates? Or Gandhi?

Andso now they expected calmly and happily to bring to life a second simulacrum: someone whom Edwin M. Stanton had a good deal of animosity toward. Idiots!

I entered our shop once more and found the Stanton reading as before. It had almost finished its cybernetics book.

There, not more than ten feet away, on the largest of MASA's workbenches, lay the mass of half-completed circuits which would one day be the Abraham Lincoln. Had the Stanton made it out? Had it connected this electronic confusion with what I had said? I stole a glance at the new simulacrum. It did not look as if anyone--or anything--had meddled inappropriately. Bundy's careful work could be seen, nothing else. Surely if the Stanton had gone at it in my absence, there would be a few broken or burned segments... . I saw nothing like that.

Pris, I decided, was probably at home these days, putting the final life-like colors into the sunken cheeks of the Abe Lincoln shell which would house all these parts. That in itself was a full-time job. The beard, the big hands, skinny legs, the sad eyes. A field for her creativity, her artistic soul, to run and howl rampant. She would not show up until she had done a top-notch job.

Going back upstairs I confronted Maury. "Listen, friend. That Stanton thing is going to up and bang Honest Abe over the head. Or haven't you bothered to read the history books?" And then I saw it. "You _had_ to read the books in order to make the instruction tapes. So you know better than I what the Stanton feels toward Lincoln! You know he's apt to roast the Lincoln into charred rust any minute!"

"Don't get mixed up in last year's politics." Maury put down his letters for a moment, sighing. "The other day it was my daughter; now it's the Stanton. There's always some dark horror lurking. You have the mind of an old maid, you know that? Lay off and let me work."

I went back downstairs to the shop again. There, as before, sat the Stanton, but now it had finished its book; it sat pondering.

"Young man," it called to me, "give me more information about this Barrows. Did you say he lives at our nation's Capitol?"

"No sir, the state of Washington." I explained where it was.

"And is it true, as Mr. Rock tells me, that this Barrows arranged for the World's Fair to be held in that city through his great influence?"

"I've heard that. Of course, when a man is that rich and eccentric all sorts of legends crop up about him."