His thoughts weren’t pleasant.
He had a frightful hangover, ten cents in his pocket, and an overdue hotel bill. A fortnight of keeping one jump ahead of Tharn, via teleportation, had frazzled his nerves so unendurably that only liquor had kept him going. Now even that stimulus was failing. The drink died in him and left what felt like a corpse.
Kelvin groaned and blinked miserably. He took off his glasses and cleaned them, but that didn’t help.
What a fool.
He didn’t even know the name of that chemist!
There was health, wealth and fame waiting for him just around the corner, but what corner? Some day he’d find out, probably, when the news of the new protein synthesis was publicized, but when would that be? In the meantime, what about Tharn?
Moreover, the chemist couldn’t locate him, either. The man knew Kelvin only as Jim. Which had somehow seemed a good idea at the time, but not now.
Kelvin took out the rapport case and stared at it with red eyes. Quarra Vee, eh? He rather liked Quarra Vee now. Trouble was, a half hour after his rapport, at most, he would forget all the details.
This time he used the push-button almost as Tharn snapped into bodily existence a few feet away.
The teleportation angle again. He was sitting in the middle of a desert. Cactus and Joshua trees were all the scenery. There was a purple range of mountains far away.
No Tharn, though.
Kelvin began to be thirsty. Suppose the case stopped working now? Oh, this couldn’t go on. A decision hanging fire for a week finally crystallized into a conclusion so obvious he felt like kicking himself. Perfectly obvious!
Why hadn’t he thought of it at the very beginning?
He concentrated on the problem: How can I get rid of Tharn? He pushed the button. …
And, a moment later, he knew the answer. It would be simple, really.
The pressing urgency was gone suddenly. That seemed to release a fresh flow of thought. Everything became quite clear.
He waited for Tharn.
He did not have to wait long. There was a tremor in the shimmering air, and the turbaned, pallid figure sprang into tangible reality.
The rod-weapon was poised.
Taking no chances, Kelvin posed his problem again, pressed the button, and instantly reassured himself as to the method. He simply thought in a very special and peculiar way—the way Quarra Vee had indicated.
Tharn was flung back a few feet. The moustached mouth gaped open as he uttered a cry.
“Don’t!” the android cried. “I’ve been trying to—”
Kelvin focused harder on his thought. Mental energy, he felt, was pouring out toward the android.
Tharn croaked, “Trying—you didn’t—give me—chance—”
And then Tharn was lying motionless on the hot sand, staring blindly up. The seven-fingered hands twitched once and were still. The artificial life that had animated the android was gone. It would not return.
Kelvin turned his back and drew a long, shuddering breath. He was safe. He closed his mind to all thoughts but one, all problems but one.
How can I find the red-moustached man?
He pressed the button.
This is the way the story starts:
Quarra Vee sat in the temporal warp with his android Tharn, and made sure everything was under control.
“How do I look?” he asked.
“You’ll pass,” Tharn said. “Nobody will be suspicious in the era you’re going to. It didn’t take long to synthesize the equipment.”
“Not long. Clothes—they look enough like real wool and linen, I suppose. Wrist watch, money—everything in order. Wrist watch—that’s odd, isn’t it? Imagine people who need machinery to tell time!”
“Don’t forget the spectacles,” Tharn said.
Quarra Vee put them on. “Ugh. But I suppose—”
“It’ll be safer. The optical properties in the lenses are a guard you may need against dangerous mental radiations. Don’t take them off, or the robot may try some tricks.”
“He’d better not,” Quarra Vee said. “That so-and-so runaway robot! What’s he up to, anyway, I wonder? He always was a malcontent, but at least he knew his place. I’m sorry I ever had him made. No telling what he’ll do, loose in a semi-prehistoric world, if we don’t catch him and bring him home.”
“He’s in that horomancy booth,” Tharn said, leaning out of the time-warp. “Just arrived. You’ll have to catch him by surprise. And you’ll need your wits about you, too. Try not to go off into any more of those deep-thought compulsions you’ve been having. They could be dangerous. That robot will use some of his tricks if he gets the chance. I don’t know what powers he’s developed by himself, but I do know he’s an expert at hypnosis and memory erasure already. If you aren’t careful he’ll snap your memory-track and substitute a false brain-pattern. Keep those glasses on. If anything should go wrong, I’ll use the rehabilitation ray on you, eh?” And he held up a small rod-like projector.
Quarra Vee nodded.
“Don’t worry. I’ll be back before you know it. I have an appointment with that Sirian to finish our game this evening.”
It was an appointment he never kept.
Quarra Vee stepped out of the temporal warp and strolled along the boardwalk toward the booth. The clothing he wore felt tight, uncomfortable, rough. He wriggled a little in it. The booth stood before him now, with its painted sign.
He pushed aside the canvas curtain and something—a carelessly hung rope—swung down at his face, knocking the horn-rimmed glasses askew. Simultaneously a vivid bluish light blazed into his unprotected eyes. He felt a curious, sharp sensation of disorientation, a shifting motion that almost instantly was gone.
The robot said, “You are James Kelvin.”
Nicholas Martin looked up at the robot across the desk.
“I’m not going to ask what you want,” he said, in a low, restrained voice. “I already know. Just go away and tell St. Cyr I approve. Tell him I think it’s wonderful, putting a robot in the picture. We’ve had everything else by now, except the Rockettes. But clearly a quiet little play about Christmas among the Portuguese fishermen on the Florida coast must
