Isaac Asimov - The Robots of Dawn

Baley tightened his lips. There was no use trying to mask his disappointment. “In short, then, you had the opportunity.”

“Anyone would have had the opportunity. Anyone on Aurora, provided he or she had the necessary ability.”

“And only you have the necessary ability.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Which brings us to motive, Dr. Fastolfe.”

“And it’s there that we might be able to make a good case. These humaniform robots are yours. They are based on your theory and you were involved in their construction at every step of the way, even if Dr. Sarton supervised that construction. They exist because of you and only because of you. You have spoken of Daneel as your ‘first-born.’ They are your creations, your children, your gift to humanity, your hold on immortality.” (Baley felt himself growing eloquent and, for a moment, imagined himself to be addressing a Board of Inquiry.) “Why on Earth—or Aurora, rather—why on Aurora should you undo this work? Why should you destroy a life you have produced by a miracle of mental labor?”

Fastolfe looked wanly amused. “Why, Mr. Baley, you know nothing about it. How can you possibly know that my theory was the result of a miracle of mental labor? It might have been the very dull extension of an equation that anyone might have accomplished but which none had bothered to do before me.”

“I think not,” said Baley, endeavoring to cool down. “If no one but you can understand the humaniform brain well enough to destroy it, then I think it likely that no one but you can understand it well enough to create it. Can you deny that?”

Fastolfe shook his head. “No, I won’t deny that. And yet, Mr. Baley—his face grew grimmer than it had—been since they had met—your careful analysis is succeeding only in making matters far worse for us. We have already decided that I am the only one with the means and the opportunity. As it happens, I also have a motive—the best motive in the world and my enemies know it. How on Earth, then, to quote you, or on Aurora, or on anywhere—are we going to prove I didn’t do it?”

Baley’s face crumpled into a furious frown. He stepped hastily away, making for the corner of the room, as though seeking enclosure. Then he turned suddenly and said sharply, “Dr. Fastolfe, it seems to me that you are taking some sort of pleasure in frustrating me.”

Fastolfe shrugged. “No pleasure. I’m merely presenting you with the problem as it is. Poor Jander died the robotic death by the pure uncertainty of positronic drift. Since I know I had nothing to do with it, I know that’s how it must be. However, no one else can be sure I’m innocent and all the indirect evidence points to me—and this must be faced squarely in deciding what, if anything, we can do.”

Baley said, “Well, then, let’s investigate your motive. What seems like an overwhelming motive to you may be nothing of the sort.”

“I doubt that. I am no fool, Mr. Baley.”

“You are also no judge, perhaps, of yourself and your motives. People sometimes are not. You may be dramatizing yourself for some reason.”

“I don’t think so.”

“Then tell me your motive. What is it? Tell me!”

“Not so quickly, Mr. Baley. It’s not easy to explain it.”

“Could you come outside with me?”

Baley looked quickly toward the window. Outside?

The sun had sunk lower in the sky and the room was the sunnier for it. He hesitated, then said, rather more loudly than was necessary, “Yes, I will!”

“Excellent,” said Fastolfe. And then, with an added note of amiability, he added, “But perhaps you would care to visit the Personal first.”

Baley thought for a moment. He felt no immediate urgency, but he did not know what might await him Outside, how long he would be expected to stay, what facilities, there might or might not be there. Most of all, he did not know Auroran customs in this respect and he could not recall anything in the book-films he had viewed on the ship that served to enlighten him in this respect. It was safest, perhaps, to acquiesce in whatever one’s host suggested.

“Thank you,” he said, “if it will be convenient for me to do so.”

Fastolfe nodded. “Daneel,” he said, “show Mr. Baley to the Visitors’ Personal.”

Daneel said, “Partner Elijah, would you come with me?”

As they stepped together into the next room, Baley said, “I am sorry, Daneel, that you were not part of I the conversation between myself and Dr. Fastolfe.”

“It would not have been fitting, Partner Elijah. When you asked me a direct question, I answered, but I was not invited to take part fully.”

“I would have issued the invitation, Daneel, if I did not feel constrained by my position as guest. I thought it might be wrong to take the initiative in this respect.”

“I understand.—This is the Visitors’ Personal, Partner Elijah. The door will open at a touch of your hand anywhere upon it if the room is unoccupied.”

Baley did not enter. He paused thoughtfully, then said, “If you had been invited to speak, Daneel, is there anything you would have said? Any comment you would have cared to make? I would value your opinion, my friend.”

Daneel said, with his usual gravity, “The one remark I care to make is that Dr. Fastolfe’s statement that he had an excellent motive for placing Jander out of operation was unexpected to me. I do not know what the motive might be. Whatever he states to be his motive, however, you might ask why he would not have the same motive to put me in mental freeze-out. If they can believe he had a motive to put Jander out of operation, why would the same motive not apply to me? I would be curious to know.”

Baley looked at the other sharply, seeking automatically for expression in a face not given to lack of control. He said, “Do you feel insecure, Daneel? Do you feel Fastolfe is a danger to you?”

Daneel said, “By the Third Law, I must protect my own existence, but I would not resist Dr. Fastolfe or any human being if it were their considered opinion that it was necessary to end my existence. That is the Second Law. However, I know that I am of great value, both in terms of investment of material, labor, and time, and in terms of scientific importance. It would therefore be necessary to explain to me carefully the reason for the necessity of ending my existence. Dr. Fastolfe has never said anything to me—never, Partner Elijah—that would sound as though such a thing were in his mind. I do not believe it is remotely in his mind to end my existence or that it ever was in his mind to end Jander’s existence. Random positronic drift must have ended Jander and may, someday, end me. There is always an element of chance in the Universe.”

Baley said, “You say so, Fastolfe says so, and I believe so—but the difficulty is to persuade people generally to accept this view of the matter.” He turned gloomily to the door of the Personal and said, “Are you coming in with me, Daneel?”

Daneel’s expression contrived to seem amused. “It is flattering, Partner Elijah, to be taken for human to this extent. I have no need, of course.”

“Of course. But you can enter anyway.”

“It would not be appropriate for me to enter. It is not the custom for robots to enter the Personal. The interior of such a room is purely human.—Besides, this is a one-person Personal.”

“One-person!” Momentarily, Baley was shocked. He rallied, however. Other worlds, other customs! And this one he did not recall being described in the book-films. He said, “That’s what you meant, then, by saying that the door would open only if it were unoccupied. What if it is occupied, as it will be in a moment?”

“Then it will not open at a touch from outside, of course, and your privacy will be protected. Naturally, it will open at a touch from the inside.”