Isaac Asimov: Robots and Empire

Mandamus said, “I see you have reason for wishing Dr. Amadiro ill, but what reason have you for wishing me ill? To allow Dr. Amadiro to think I am descended from Elijah Baley will give him the pleasure of destroying me. Why should you give him that pleasure needlessly, if I am not so descended? Give me the proof, therefore, that I am descended from you and Satitirix Gremionis or from you and anybody but Elijah Baley.”

“You fool! You idiot! Why do you need proof from me? Go to the historical records. You will find the exact days on which Elijah Baley was on Aurora. You will find the exact day on which I gave birth to my son, Darrel. You will find that Darrel was conceived more than five years after Elijah left Aurora. You will also find that Elijah never returned to Aurora. Well, then, do you think I gestated for five years, that I carried a fetus in my womb for five Standard Galactic Years?”

“I know the statistics, madam. And I do not think you carried a fetus for five years.”

“Then why do you come to me?”

“Because there is more to it than that. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman Elijah Baley, as you say, never returned to Aurora’s surface, he was once in a ship that was in orbit about Aurora for a day or so. I know—and I imagine that Dr. Amadiro well knows—that although the Earthman did not leave the ship to go to Aurora, you left Aurora to go to the ship; that you stayed on the ship for the better part of a day; and that this took place nearly five years after the Earthman had been on Aurora’s surface—at about the time, in fact, that your son was conceived.”

Gladia felt the blood drain from her face as she heard the other’s calm words. The room darkened about her and she swayed.

She felt the sudden, gentle touch of strong arms about her and knew they were those of Daneel. She felt herself lowered slowly into her chair.

She heard Mandamus’s voice as though from a great distance.

“Is that not true, madam?” he said.

It was, of course, true.

Memory!

Always there, of course, but usually remaining hidden. And then, sometimes, as a result of just the right kind of push, it could emerge suddenly, sharply defined, all in color, bright and moving and alive.

She was young again, younger than this man before her; young enough to feel tragedy and love—with her death-in-life on Solaria having reached its climax in the bitter end of the first whom she had thought of as “husband.” (No, she would not say his name even now, not, even in thought.)

Closer still to her then-life were the months of heaving emotion with the second-not-man—whom she had thought of by that term. Jander, the humanoid robot, had been given to her and she had made him entirely her own until, like her first husband, he was suddenly dead.

And then, at last, there was Elijah Baley, who was never her husband, whom she had met only twice, two years apart, each time for a few hours on each of a very few days. Elijah, whose cheek she had once touched with her ungloved hand, on which occasion she had ignited; whose nude body she had later held in her arms, on which occasion she had flamed steadily at last.

And then, a third husband, with whom she was quiet and at peace, paying with untriumph for unmisery and buying with firmly held forgetfulness the relief from reliving.

Until one day (she was not sure of the day that so broke in upon the sleeping untroubled years) Han Fastolfe, having asked permission to visit, walked over from his adjoining establishment.

Gladia looked upon him with some concern, for he was too busy a man to socialize lightly. Only five years had passed since the crisis that had established Han as Aurora’s leading statesman. He was the Chairman of the planet in all but name and the true leader of all the Spacer worlds. He had so little time to be a human being.

Those years had left their mark—and would continue to do so until he died sadly, considering himself a failure though he had never lost a battle. Kelden Amadiro, who had been defeated, lived on sturdily, as evidence that victory can exact the greater penalty.

Fastolfe, through it all, continued to be soft-spoken and patient and uncomplaining, but even Gladia, nonpolitical though she was and uninterested in the endless machinations of power, knew that his control of Aurora held firm only through constant and unremitting effort that drained him of anything that might make life worthwhile and that he held to it—or was held to it—only by what he considered the good of—what? Aurora? The Spacers? Simply some vague—concept of idealized Good?

She didn’t know. She flinched from asking.

But this was only five years after the crisis. He still gave the impression of a young and hopeful man and his pleasant homely face was still capable of smiling.

He said, “I have a message for you, Gladia.”

“A pleasant one, I hope,” she said politely.

He had brought Daneel with him. It was a sign of the healing of old wounds that she could look at Daneel with honest affection and no pain at all, even though he was a copy of her dead Jander in all but the most insignificant detail. She could talk to him, though he answered in what was almost Jander’s voice. Five years had skinned over the ulcer and deadened the pain.

“I hope so,” said Fastolfe, smiling gently. “It’s from an old friend.”

“It’s so nice that I have old friends,” she said, trying not to be sardonic.

“From Elijah Baley.”

The five years vanished and she felt the stab and pang of returning memory.

“Is he well?” she asked in a half-strangled voice after a full minute of stunned silence.

“Quite well. What is even more important, he is near.”

“Near? On Aurora?”

“In orbit about Aurora. He knows he can receive no permission to land, even if I were to use my full influence, or I imagine he does. He would like to see you, Gladia. He had made contact with me because he feels that I can arrange to have you visit his ship. I suppose I can manage that much—but only if you wish it. Do you wish it?”

“I don’t now. This is too sudden for thought.”

“Or even impulse?” He waited, then he said, “Truthfully, Gladia, how are you getting along with Santirix?”

She looked at him wildly, as though not understanding the reason for the change of subject—then understanding. She said, “We get along well together.”

“Are you happy?”

“I am—not unhappy.”

“That doesn’t sound like ecstasy.”

“How long can ecstasy last, even if it were ecstasy?”

“Do you plan to have children someday?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Are you planning a change in marital status?”

She shook her head firmly. “Not yet.”

“Then, my dear Gladia, if you want advice from a rather tired man, who feels uncomfortably old—refuse the invitation. I remember what little you told me after Baley had left Aurora and, to tell you the truth, I was able to deduce more from that than you perhaps think. If you see him, you may find it all disappointing, not living up to the deepening and mellowing glow of reminiscence; or, if it is not disappointing, worse yet, for it will disrupt a perhaps rather fragile contentment, which you will then not be able to repair.

Gladia, who had been vaguely thinking precisely that, found the proposition needed only to be placed into words to be rejected.

She said, “No, Han, I must see him, but I’m afraid to do it alone. Would you come with me?”

Fastolfe smiled wearily. “I was not invited, Gladia. And if I were, I would in any case be forced to refuse. There is an important vote coming up in the Council. Affairs of state, you know, from which I can’t absent myself.”