For a Breath I Tarry

not know measurement as you know it. What He would know of it, though, is a thing that you cannot know.'

'What is that?'

'That it is cold,' said Mordel and tossed it away.

''Cold' is a relative term.'

'Yes. Relative to Man.'

'But if I were aware of the point on a temperature scale below which an object is cold to a Man and above which it is not, then I, too, would know cold.'

'No,' said Mordel, 'you would possess another measurement. 'Cold' is a sensation predicated upon human physiology.'

'But given sufficient data I could obtain the conversion factor which would make me aware of the condition of matter called 'cold'.'

'Aware of its existence, but not of the thing itself.'

'I do not understand what you say.'

'I told you that Man possessed a basically incomprehensible nature. His perceptions were organic; yours are not. As a result of His perceptions He had feelings and emotions. These often gave rise to other feelings and emotions, which in turn caused others, until the state of His awareness was far removed from the objects which originally stimulated it. These paths of awareness cannot be known by that which is not-Man. Man did not feel inches or meters, pounds or gallons. He felt heat, He felt cold; He felt heaviness and lightness. He knew hatred and love, pride and despair. You cannot measure these things. You cannot know them. You can only know the things that He did not need to know: dimensions, weights, temperatures, gravities. There is no formula for a feeling. There is no conversion factor for an emotion.'

'There must be,' said Frost. 'If a thing exists, it is knowable.'

'You are speaking again of measurement. I am talking about a quality of experience. A machine is a Man turned inside-out, because it can describe all the details of a process, which a Man cannot, but it cannot experience that process itself as a Man can.'

'There must be a way,' said Frost, 'or the laws of logic, which are based upon the functions of the universe, are false.'

'There is no way,' said Mordel.

'Given sufficient data, I will find a way,' said Frost.

'All the data in the universe will not make you a Man, mighty Frost.'

'Mordel, you are wrong.'

'Why do the lines of the poems you scanned end with word-sounds which so regularly approximate the final word-sounds of other lines?'

'I do not know why.'

'Because it pleased Man to order them so. It produced a certain desirable sensation within His awareness when He read them, a sensation compounded of feeling and emotion as well as the literal meanings of the words. You did not experience this because it is immeasurable to you. That is why you do not know.'

'Given sufficient data I could formulate a process whereby I would know.'

'No, great Frost, this thing you cannot do.'

'Who are you, little machine, to tell me what I can do and what I cannot do? I am the most efficient logic- device Solcom ever made. I am Frost.'

'And I, Mordel, say it cannot be done, though I should gladly assist you in the attempt.'

'How could you assist me?'

'How? I could lay open to you the Library of Man. I could take you around the world and conduct you among the wonders of Man which still remain, hidden. I could summon up visions of times long past when Man walked the Earth. I could show you the things which delighted Him. I could obtain for you anything you desire, excepting Manhood itself.'

'Enough,' said Frost. 'How could a unit such as yourself do these things, unless it were allied with a far greater Power?'

'Then hear me, Frost, Controller of the North,' said Mordel. 'I am allied with a Power which can do these things. I serve Divcom.'

Frost relayed this information to Solcom and received no response, which meant he might act in any manner he saw fit.

'I have leave to destroy you, Mordel,' he stated, 'but it would be an illogical waste of the data which you possess. Can you really do the things you have stated?'

'Yes.'

'The lay open to me the Library of Man.'

'Very well. There is, of course, a price.'

''Price'? What is a 'price'?'

Mordel opened his turret, revealing another volume. Principles of Economics, it was called.

'I will riffle the pages. Scan this book and you will know what the word 'price' means.'

Frost scanned Principles of Economics.

'I know now,' he said. 'You desire some unit or units of exchange for this service.'

'That is correct.'

'What product or service do you want?'

'I want you, yourself, great Frost, to come away from here, far beneath the Earth, to employ all your powers in the service of Divcom.'

'For how long a period of time?'

'For so long as you shall continue to function. For so long as you can transmit and receive, coordinate, measure, compute, scan, and utilize your powers as you do in the service of Solcom.'

Frost was silent. Mordel waited.

Then Frost spoke again.

'Principles of Economics talks of contracts, bargains, agreements,' he said. 'If I accept your offer, when would you want your price?'

Then Mordel was silent. Frost waited.

Finally, Mordel spoke.

'A reasonable period of time,' he said. 'Say, a century?'

'No,' said Frost.

'Two centuries?'

'No.'

'Three? Four?'

'No, and no.'

'A millennium, then? That should be more than sufficient time for anything you may want which I can give you.'

'No,' said Frost.

'How much time do you want?'

'It is not a matter of time,' said Frost.

'What, then?'

'I will not bargain on a temporal basis.'

'On what basis will you bargain?'

'A functional one.'

'What do you mean? What function?'

'You, little machine, have told me, Frost, that I cannot be a Man,' he said, 'and I, Frost, told you, little machine, that you were wrong. I told you that given sufficient data, I could be a Man.'

'Yes?'