Juxtaposition (17 page)

“Speak to him, sir,” Sheen murmured.

“Who are you?” Stile asked.

“Sir, I am Cookie, your chef.”

“I just happen to be hungry enough to eat a bear,” Stile said. The recent action in Phaze had taken his mind from food, causing him to miss a meal.

“Immediately, sir.” Cookie disappeared.

Stile blinked. “Oh—he’s a holo too.”

“Naturally, sir. There is not room in this capsule for a kitchen. We’ll arrive in a few minutes, and he will have your meal ready.”

Another naked serf entered the spaceship. This one was an attractive older woman. Stile raised an inquiring eyebrow. “I am Henriette, your head housemistress, sir,” she said primly.

Stile wondered what a housemistress did, but decided not to inquire. Sheen would not have hired her without reason. “Carry on, Henriette,” he said, and she vanished.
 
Next was a middle-aged man not much larger than Stile himself. “I am Spade, your gardener, sir.”

“Sam Spade?” Stile inquired with a smile.
 
But the man did not catch the historical-literary allusion. Only a Game specialist would be up on such minutiae.

“Sir, only Spade, the gardener.”

“Of course. Spade.” Stile made a gesture of dismissal, and the man vanished.

Next was a voluptuously proportioned young woman with black tresses flowing across her body to her knees.
 
“Of her it is said, let the rose hang its head,” Stile murmured, conscious that the rhyme would work no magic here in Proton-frame.

The girl took this as the signal to speak. “I am Dulcimer, your entertainer, sir.”

Stile glanced at Sheen. “What kind of entertainment do you suppose I need?”

Sheen was suppressing a smile in the best human fashion. “Duke, show the Citizen your nature.” Dulcimer put both hands to her head, took hold of her ears, and turned her head sharply sidewise. There was a click; then the head lifted off her body.

“At your service, sir.”

“A robot!” Stile exclaimed. Then, more thoughtfully:

“Are you by chance one of Sheen’s friends?”

“I am, sir,” the robot head said.

“Put yourself together,” Stile told her, and the head was lowered and twisted back into place. Stile waved her away, and Dulcimer vanished.

He turned seriously to Sheen. “Do you think this is wise?”

“Sir, I can not always guard you now. A Citizen depends on no single serf. You can use Dulce when I am not available.”

“A machine concubine? Forget it. You know I have no present use for such things. Not since I married the Lady Blue.”

“I know, sir,” she agreed sadly. “Yet you need protection, for you will be making rivals and perhaps enemies among Citizens. It would not do for a Citizen to take his cook or housemaid or gardener to social functions.”

“But Dulcimer would be okay. Now I understand.” He considered briefly, then decided to get his worst chore out of the way. “Before we arrive, set up a privacy barrier. I want to talk to you.”

“It is already in place. Others must not know that self willed machines associate with you. Sir.”

“You can drop the *sir’ when privacy is guaranteed,” he said a trifle sharply. “You were never my inferior, Sheen.”

“I was never your equal, either,” she said. “What do you wish to say to me?”

Stile nerved himself and plunged in. “You know that I love only the Lady Blue. What went before is history.”

“I have no jealousy of the Lady Blue. She is your perfect wife.”

“She is my perfect woman. Before her, you were that woman; but I changed when I became the Blue Adept.
 
The marriage is only a social convention, applying to the frame of Phaze. Here in Proton I remain single.”

“Citizens do not have to marry, not even to designate an heir. I don’t see your problem.”

“Yet there are marriages of convenience, even among Citizens.”

“Especially among Citizens. They marry for leverage, or to pool estates, or to keep a favored serf on Proton beyond his or her twenty-year tenure. They hardly ever worry about love or sex or even appearance in that respect.”

‘Yet there are legal aspects,” Stile continued doggedly.
 
“The spouse of a Citizen has certain prerogatives—“

“Entirely at the pleasure of the Citizen,” she said. “The spouse may be immune to tenure termination or molestation by other Citizens, but the Citizen can divorce that spouse merely by entering a note in the computer records.
 
So it means nothing, unless the spouse is another Citizen.”

“It means the spouse is a person, for at least the duration of the marriage,” Stile said.

“A serf is already a person. Marriage to a Citizen merely enhances status for a time. The main hope of serfs who marry Citizens is that one of their children will be designated heir, since such a child shares the bloodline of the Citizen. But there is no guarantee. Each Citizen is his own law.”

“Sometimes a Citizen will designate the spouse as heir,” Stile said.

She shrugged. “All this is true. Stile. But what is the point?”

“I have it in mind to marry in Proton, and to designate my wife my heir.”

“Oh.” She pondered, her computer mind sorting through the implications. “A marriage of convenience to protect your estate. Not for love or sex or companionship.”

“For all these things, in part,” he said.

“What does the Lady Blue think of this?”

“She suggested it. Though she is able to cross the curtain, she has no affinity for this frame, and no legal status in it. You say you have no jealousy of her; neither does she have jealousy of you.”

“Of me? Of course she doesn’t! I’m a machine.”

“Yes. But she regards you as a person. Now, with this basic understanding, I—“ He hesitated.

“You want me to locate a suitable bride of convenience for you?”

“Not exactly. Sheen, I want you to be that bride.”

“Don’t be silly. Stile. I’m a robot. You know that.”

“I see I have to do it the hard way.” Stile got out of his comfortable chair. She started to rise, but he gestured her to remain seated.

Stile knelt before her, taking her hand. “Lady Sheen, I ask your hand in marriage.”

“I shouldn’t be sensitive to humor of this sort,” she said.
 
“But I must say I didn’t expect it of you.”

“Humor, hell! Will you marry me?”

Machines were not readily surprised, but she was programmed to react in human fashion. She paled. “You can’t be serious!”

“I am serious, and my knee is getting uncomfortable.
 
Will you answer me?”

“Stile, this is impossible! I’m—“

“I know what you are. You always bring it up when you’re upset. I am a Citizen. I can do as I wish. I can marry whom I choose, for what reason I choose.”

She stared at him. “You are serious! But the moment you tried to register me as—as—they would know my nature. They would destroy me.”

“They would have to destroy me first. Answer.”

“Stile, why are you doing this? The mischief—“

“I see I must answer you, since you will not answer me.
 
If I many you, you will be the wife of a Citizen. By definition, a person. By extension, others of your type may then be considered persons. It is a wedge, a lever for recognition of the self-willed machines as serfs. This is a service I can do for them.”

“It really is convenience,” she said. “Using me to help my friends forward their case for recognition as people.”

“Which would be even more potent if something put me out of the scene prematurely and thrust the onus of Citizenship on you.”

‘”True,” she said.

‘Is that my answer? Does true equate to yes?”

“No!” she snapped, jumping up. “I don’t want your title, I want your love!”

Stile got off his knee silently. His love was one thing he could not offer her.

“In fact, I don’t want your convenience,” she continued, working up some unrobotic temper. “I don’t want the appearance without the reality. I don’t want to be used.”

“I don’t propose to use you—“

“I’m not talking about sex!” she screamed. “I would be happy for that! It’s being used as a lever I object to.”

“I’m sorry. I thought it was a good idea.”

“You in your flesh-male arrogance! To set me up as a mock wife to be a lever, the simplistic machine I am! You thought because I love you I’ll do anything you want.
 
After all, what pride can a mere machine have?” What had he walked into? Stile brought out his holo receiver and called the Lady Blue.

The picture-globe formed. Stile turned it about until the Lady Blue came into view. She was brushing down Hin blue. “Lady,” he said.

She looked up. “My Lord!”

Sheen paused in her pacing. “You’re in touch with her?”

“Aye, Lady Sheen,” the Lady Blue answered, recognizing her voice. “And easy it is to understand the nature of thy concern. I confess I put my Lord up to it.”

“I should have known,” Sheen said, bemused. “But this is a cynical thing. Lady.”

“Aye, Lady. It is a cruel sacrifice for thee.”

‘That’s not the point. Lady. The sheer mischief—“

“I apologize for putting thee in an untenable position, Lady Sheen. Thou hast every right to reject it.” She gave Hinblue another stroke, then addressed Stile. “My Lord, I thought not of her feeling, only of her merit. I wanted her as my sister in that frame, and that was selfish. Let her be.
 
I love thee.” She returned to the horse, dismissing him.

Stile turned off the holo. “I guess that covers it. Sheen.” He felt embarrassed and awkward. “If it’s any comfort, I felt about the same as you, when she broached the notion.
 
I do care for you; I always did. I just can’t honestly call it love.”

“I accept,” Sheen said.

“You are generous to accept my apology. I wish I had not put you through this.”

“Not the apology. The proposal.”

“The—?”

“Remember way back when, you proposed marriage?”

Stile was amazed. “I—“

“Yes, that proposal. If you had the circuitry of a robot, you’d remember these details more readily. Perhaps if you practiced mnemonic devices—“

“But why? You made such a good case against—“

“She wants it,” she said simply.

That he could understand. He had proposed to Sheen because the Lady Blue wanted it; she had accepted for the same reason. Now they just had to hope it was a good idea.

The capsule had come to a halt, the portholes showing a landing at a spaceport. Sheen keyed the door open. Stile gaped.

Outside lay the Blue Demesnes.

No, of course it was the Proton equivalent, on (he same geographic site. Merely one of numerous examples of parallelism of frames. The castle and grounds looked the same as in Phaze, but there was no magic. Horses grazed and dogs ranged, not unicorns and werewolves. Still, it moved him.

“After the Lady Bluette died, her employer restored the property and put it on the market,” Sheen explained. “It was at a bargain price. I thought you’d like it.”

“I do.” Stile stared at it a moment longer. “But it’s strange here.”

“No Lady Blue,” she said.

“It will be yours now.”

She was silent. Had he said the wrong thing? Well, either it would work out or it wouldn’t.
 
His chef had his meal waiting: genuine imported roast of bear. Stile made a mental note not to speak figuratively; as a Citizen, he was too apt to be taken literally. He had said he could eat a bear; now he had to do it.
 
Actually, it wasn’t bad. The chef did know his business.

Sheen had hired people of genuine competence.
 
“And now for your estate adviser,” Sheen said as Stile chomped somewhat diffidently. “You have some elegant financial maneuvering ahead.”

“I’d rather master the rules of the game and lay it myself.”

“This adviser is one of my friends.”

Oh. That was a different matter.

The adviser turned out to be an old male serf, wrinkled, white-haired, and elegant. Stile would not have known him for a robot, had Sheen not informed him. It was evident that the self-willed machines had profited from what Sheen had learned in the course of her association with Stile; only time, expert observation, or direct physical examination betrayed his current associates.

Stile nodded affirmatively to the serf, and the man reported: “Sir, I am Mellon, your financial accountant.” “Mellon, eh?” Stile repeated. “As in Rockefeller, Carnegie, and DuPont?”

The serf smiled. “Yes, sir.”

“You’re that good with money?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then why are you here as a serf, instead of making your fortune elsewhere in the universe?” Stile knew the robot had no future away from Proton, but a real serf would, and the cover story had to be good.