By the time Mike had returned with the cups, he had recalled where he
had heard the name Fitzhugh before.
"It just occurred to me," he said as he sat down. "You must be Dr.
_Morris_ Fitzhugh."
Fitzhugh nodded. "That's right." He wore a perpetually worried look,
which made his face look more wrinkled than his fifty years of age would
normally have accounted for. Mike was privately of the opinion that if
Fitzhugh ever really _tried_ to look worried, his ears would meet over
the bridge of his long nose.
"I've read a couple of your articles in the _Journal_," Mike explained,
"but I didn't connect the name until I saw you. I recognized you from
your picture."
Fitzhugh smiled, which merely served to wrinkle his face even more.
Mike the Angel spent the next several minutes feeling the man out, then
he went on to explain what had happened with Snookums out in the foyer,
which launched Dr. Fitzhugh into an explanation.
"He didn't want help, of course; he was merely conducting an experiment.
There are many areas of knowledge in which he is as naive as a child."
Mike nodded. "It figures. At first I thought he was just a
remote-control tool, but I finally saw that he was a real,
honest-to-goodness robot. Who gave him the idea to make such an
experiment as that?"
"No one at all," said Dr. Fitzhugh. "He's built to make up his own
experiments."
Mike the Angel's classic face regarded the wrinkled one of Dr. Fitzhugh.
"His own experiments? But a robot--"
Fitzhugh held up a bony hand, gesturing for attention and silence. He
got it from Mike.
"Snookums," he said, "is no ordinary robot, Commander."
Mike waited for more. When none came, he said: "So I gather." He sipped
at his black coffee. "That machine I saw is actually a remote-control
tool, isn't it? Snookums' actual brain is in Cargo Hold One of the
_William Branchell_."
"That's right." Dr. Fitzhugh began reaching into various pockets about
his person. He extracted a tobacco pouch, a briar pipe, and a jet-flame
lighter. Then he began speaking as he went through the pipe smoker's
ritual of filling, tamping, and lighting.
"Snookums," he began, "is a self-activating, problem-seeking computer
with input and output sensory and action mechanisms analogous to those
of a human being." He pushed more tobacco into the bowl of his pipe with
a bony forefinger. "He's as close to being a living creature as anything
Man has yet devised."
"What about the synthecells they're making at Boston Med?" Mike asked,
looking innocent.
Fitzhugh's contour-map face wrinkled up even more. "I should have said
'living _intelligence_,'" he corrected himself. "He's a true robot, in
the old original sense of the word; an artificial entity that displays
almost every function of a living, intelligent creature. And, at the
same time, he has the accuracy and speed that is normal to a cryotron
computer."
Mike the Angel said nothing while Fitzhugh fired up his lighter and
directed the jet of flame into the bowl and puffed up great clouds of
smoke which obscured his face.
While the roboticist puffed, Mike let his gaze wander idly over the
other people in the cafeteria. He was wondering how much longer he could
talk to Fitzhugh before Captain Quill began--
And then he saw the redhead.
There is never much point in describing a really beautiful girl. Each
man has his own ideas of what it takes for a girl to be "pretty" or
"fascinating" or "lovely" or almost any other adjective that can be
applied to the noun "girl." But "beautiful" is a cultural concept, at
least as far as females are concerned, and there is no point in
describing a cultural concept. It's one of those things that everybody
knows, and descriptions merely become repetitious and monotonous.
This particular example filled, in every respect, the definition of
"beautiful" according to the culture of the white Americo-European
subclass of the human race as of anno Domini 2087. The elements and
proportions and symmetry fit almost perfectly into the ideal mold. It is
only necessary to fill in some of the minor details which are allowed to
vary without distorting the ideal.
She had red hair and blue eyes and was wearing a green zipsuit.
And she was coming toward the table where Mike and Dr. Fitzhugh were
sitting.
"... such a tremendous number of elements," Dr. Fitzhugh was saying,
"that it was possible--and necessary--to introduce a certain randomity
within the circuit choices themselves-- Ah! Hello, Leda, my dear!"
Mike and Fitzhugh rose from their seats.
"Leda, this is Commander Gabriel, the Engineering Officer of the
_Brainchild_," said Fitzhugh. "Commander, Miss Leda Crannon, our
psychologist."
Mike had been allowing his eyes to wander over the girl, inspecting her
ankles, her hair, and all vital points of interest between. But when he
heard the name "Crannon," his eyes snapped up to meet hers.
He hadn't recognized the girl without her parka and wouldn't have known
her name if the SP ensign hadn't mentioned it. Obviously, she didn't
recognize Mike at all, but there was a troubled look in her blue eyes.