completely, all the way and to the very end. It is not, then, a thing of much significance, if any dolt, weakling and good-for-nothing can do it. And if absolutely everyone can handle it (and you must admit that this is so, I at least have never heard of anyone unequal to the task), it is better to think with delight on the all-merciful nothingness that lies just beyond its threshold. Because, when one has passed away, it is impossible to think, inasmuch as death and thought are mutually exclusive, and therefore when else, if not while still in life, is it fitting to contemplate—sensibly and particularly—all those privileges, conveniences and pleasures which death will bestow so generously upon you?! Picture if you will: no struggles, no anxieties or apprehensions, no suffering of the body or the soul, no unhappy accidents, and this on what a scale! Why, even if all the world’s evil forces were to join and conspire against you, they would not reach you! Truly, nothing can compare with the sweet security of one who is no more! And if furthermore you consider that this security is not something transient, fleeting, impermanent, that nothing may repeal or intrude upon it, then with what boundless joy…”
“Drop dead,” came the weak voice of Automatthew and, accompanying those laconic words, a short but pungent oath.
“How I regret that I cannot!” Alfred instantly replied. “Not only feelings of egoistic envy (for there is nothing to compare with death, as I’ve just said), but the purest altruism inclines me to accompany you into oblivion. But alas, this is not possible, since my inventor made me indestructible, no doubt to serve his constructor’s pride. Truly, when I think of how I will remain inside your brine-encrusted, desiccated corpse, whose disintegration will go slowly, I am sure, and how I will sit there and converse with myself—it fills me with sorrow. And all the waiting there will be, afterwards, before at last that one-in-four-hundred-thousandth vessel, in keeping with the laws of probability, chances upon this little island…”
“What?! You will not waste away here?!” exclaimed Automatthew, roused from his lethargy by these words of Alfred. “Then you will go on living, while I, while I… Oh no! Not a chance! Never! Never!! Never!!!”
And with a dreadful roar he leaped to his feet and began to hop, jerk his head, dig in his ear with all his might, performing throughout the most amazing twists and tosses with his body—in vain, however. While all this went on, Alfred piped at the top of its voice:
“Now really, stop! What, have you lost your mind already? It’s too soon for that! Careful, you’ll hurt yourself! You could break or maybe sprain something! Watch out for the neck! Come, this makes no sense! It would be a different thing if you could, well, get it over with all at once … but this way you’ll only injure yourself! I told you I’m indestructible and that’s that, it’s useless for you to go to all this trouble! Even if you were to shake me out, you still couldn’t do me any harm, that is, any good—I meant to say—since in accordance with what I have already expounded at such length, death is a thing to be envied, Ow! Stop, please! How can you jump about like that?”
Automatthew however continued to hurl himself, heedless of everything, and finally took to ramming his head against the rock on which he had been sitting before. And he rammed and rammed, with sparks in his eyes and a cloud of powder in his nostrils, deafened by the force of his own blows, until Alfred popped suddenly from his ear and rolled between some stones with a faint cry of relief, that it had finally ended. Automatthew did not at first notice that his efforts had met with success. Sinking down upon a sun-scorched stone, he rested there awhile, and then, still unable to move his arms or legs, mumbled:
“Don’t worry, it’s only a momentary weakness. I’ll shake you out yet, yes, then under the heel you go, my dear friend, do you hear? Do you hear? Hey! What’s this?!”
He sat up quickly, aware of an emptiness in his ear. He looked around, his mind not altogether clear, and, getting down on his hands and knees, began feverishly hunting for Alfred in the gravel.
“Alfred! Aaaal-fred!!! Where are you? Answer me!!” he hollered all the while. But Alfred, whether out of wariness or for some other reason, didn’t make a sound. Automatthew then began to lure it with the tenderest words, assured it that he had changed his mind, that his only desire was to follow the good advice of his electrofriend and drown himself, he only wanted first to hear it say once more how wonderful death was. But this didn’t work either, Alfred said nothing. Then the castaway, cursing up and down, systematically began to search inch by inch the surrounding area. Suddenly, in the middle of throwing away a handful of gravel, Automatthew raised it to his eyes and started trembling with evil delight, for among the pebbles he spotted Alfred, a dully gleaming, serenely shining tiny grain of metal.
“Ah! There you are, my little chum! There you are, old speck! I have you now, my fine, forever-lasting friend!” he hissed, carefully squeezing between his fingers Alfred, which didn’t make so much as a peep. “And now we’ll see about that indestructibility of yours, yes, we’ll test it out right now. Take that!!!”
These words were accompanied by a powerful concussion; having placed his electrofriend on the surface of a rock, Automatthew jumped upon it with all his weight, and for good measure pivoted on his steel heel until it made a screech. Alfred said nothing, only the rock seemed to complain beneath that grinding drill; bending over, Automatthew saw that the tiny granule hadn’t been touched, only the rock under it was a trifle dented. Alfred now lay in that small depression.
“Strong, are you? We’ll find a harder stone!” he growled, and began running back and forth across the island, looking for the toughest possible flints, basalts and porphyries, in older to crush Alfred upon them. And as he pounded it with his heels, he spoke to it with affected calm, or sometimes hurled insults at it, as if in the expectation that it would reply or perhaps even burst into pleas and entreaties. Alfred however said nothing. The air carried only the echoes of heavy thuds, trampling, the crumbling of stone and the panting and swearing of Automatthew. After a long time Automatthew came to the conclusion that the most terrible blows would in fact cause Alfred no harm, and, feverish and weak, he sat once more upon the shore, his electrofriend in his hand.
“Even if I cannot smash you,” he said with seeming composure, though barely able to control his rage, “have no fear, I will take proper care of you. For that vessel of yours you will have to wait, my good friend, since I shall throw you to the bottom of the sea and there you will lie for an eternity or more. You will have abundant time for pleasant meditations in that so hermetic solitude! I will see to it you do not gain a new friend!”
“My dear fellow,” said Alfred unexpectedly. “And what will it matter to me, to live on the ocean floor? You think in the categories of an impermanent being, hence your error. Understand that either the sea must someday dry up, or else first its entire bottom will rise like a mountain and become land. Whether this happens in a hundred thousand years or in a hundred million is of no consequence to me. Not only am I indestructible, but infinitely patient, as indeed you might have observed, if only by the calm with which I endured the manifestations of your blindness. I’ll tell you more: I did not respond to your calls, but rather let you search for me, for I wished to spare you unnecessary excitement. Also I was silent while you jumped on me, so as not to increase your fury with an inadvertent word, since this could have done you further injury.”
Automatthew, upon hearing this noble-minded explanation, shook with renewed anger.
“I’ll smash you! I’ll grind you to dust, you, you bastard!!” he bellowed, and that crazy dance among the rocks, the leaps, the lunges, the stamping in place, began all over again. This time however the well-wishing squeaks of Alfred joined in:
“I don’t think you can do it, but let’s give it a try! Go ahead! And again! No, not that way, you’ll tire too quickly! Legs together! That’s right—and up! One-two, and-a-one, and-a-two! Jump higher, higher, the impact will be greater! What, you can’t? Really? Don’t have it in you? Ah yes, yes, now
Automatthew collapsed with a clatter on the rocks and gazed with burning hatred at the metal grain that lay in his open hand, and he listened—he could not choose but listen—as it spoke:
“If I were not your electrofriend, I would say that you are behaving disgracefully. The ship went down on account of the storm, you saved yourself along with me, I gave you what advice I could, but then, when I failed to come up with a means of rescue, since that was impossible, you made up your mind—for my words of simple truth and honest counsel—to destroy me, me, your only companion. It’s true that in this way you at least acquired some purpose in life, so for that alone you owe me gratitude. Strange, though, that you should find so hateful the thought of my surviving…”
“Surviving? That remains to be seen!” snarled Automatthew.
“No, really, you are too much. Here’s a thought. Why not place me on the buckle of your belt? It’s steel, and steel I think is harder than rock. Worth a try, though personally I’m convinced it’s quite useless, yet I’d like to be of help…”
