Robots could play an instrument, but they
could not write music--and Danny wanted to do
both--even if it meant facing the psych squad!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy
December 1952
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
After the performers filed off stage the audience chattered politely
and drifted toward the exits. Danny Tocar looked up at his mother, and,
on impulse, detached his hand from hers and lingered behind. As long as
she was busy culturizing he wouldn't be missed. When the auditorium
was empty Danny made his way to the stage and stood among the
instruments. He stroked a violin, dark and shining. It was very heavy,
as if it were solid. It was solid. He touched the metallic ridges on
it. Funny. When he had sat in the audience those ridges had looked
like strings and had given out a pleasant sound. It made no sound for
him though, even when he drew the bow across it as the musician had
done.
It was the same with the drum when he pounded it. It too was silent.
He frowned and tried the trumpet. He lifted the instrument to his lips
and puffed his cheeks and blew. Nothing happened at all. He examined it
intently and then sadly laid it down. It was fake. All the instruments
were toys, imitations of something that had once been real.
The music had not been phony, though. He visualized the performance,
a harmony of motions as well as sound: bowing, plucking, striking,
blowing. Where had the music come from if not from the instruments? He
still remembered the synthony.
There was one instrument much larger than the others. It was set on
a raised platform and looked different. He wandered toward it, and
discovered the enclosure. From the audience he hadn't noticed this; the
enclosure was hardly visible though he was leaning against it.
He had experience with this sort of thing. A museum case; a guarantee
that whatever was inside was real. With practiced fingers he felt for
an invisible crevice in the transparent enclosure. A fingernail split,
but something swung open, and Danny was inside.
He looked curiously at it. A large wooden instrument with white
markings along the front of it. Danny remembered how these had been
touched during the performance.
He was good at imitation; Danny brought his fingers down the way he had
seen it done. The white things weren't markings: they were keys. The
sound rolled out into the empty auditorium. Startled, Danny jerked his
hands away. He didn't know it, but with those few notes he qualified
as the musical genius of a hundred years. The only human who, in that
time, had produced anything resembling music.
Entranced, he listened. When the last echo was lost he felt empty. He
sat down on the stool and rubbed his cheek against the old instrument.
His hands couldn't stay away from the keyboard.
* * * * *
Meanwhile his mother strolled determinedly through Culture City. "I
just love the synthony don't you, Danny?" For the first time she
realized he wasn't with her. She looked around bewilderedly.
"Don't worry," said her companion. "He can't be far. Probably in the
twentieth century section watching the electric signs."
His mother laughed nervously. "Quaint, isn't it? Let's go. We have to
find him." She angled to the left, thinking she saw him through the
crowd. When she got there it was another little boy, not Danny at all.
However she had a bit of luck. The commercial artist on the street was
temporarily vacant. She hesitated for a moment between her duty to find
Danny at once and her desire to own a real work of art. The middle aged
couple heading toward the booth decided her. Swiftly she inserted a
coin.
"Yes?" said the deep gruff voice of the mechanism.
"I'd like two pictures," she said.
"Subject matter?"
"One for a child's room. Danny Tocar, age 11. You have access to
personality records."
"I do. But if you can give me some indication--"
"Oh something by Roualt. That should be harmless."