The Iron Chancellor (3 page)

He dressed, showered and hastily depilated. It was 0730. Breakfast was ready.

Ethel and the children were already at the table when he arrived. Ethel and Myra were munching toast; Joey was peering at a bowl of milkless dry cereal, next to which stood a full glass of milk. Carmichael sat down.

“Your toast, sir,” the roboservitor murmured.

Carmichael stared at the single slice. It had already been buttered for him, and the butter had evidently been measured out with a micrometer. The robot proceeded to hand him a cup of black coffee.

He groped for the cream and sugar. They weren’t anywhere on the table. The other members of his family were regarding him strangely, and they were curiously, suspiciously silent.

“I like cream and sugar in my coffee,” he said to the hovering roboservitor. “Didn’t you find that in Jemima’s old recipe bank?”

“Of course, sir. But you must learn to drink your coffee without such things, if you wish to lose weight.”

Carmichael chuckled. Somehow he had not expected the regimen to be quite like this—quite so, well, Spartan. “Oh, yes. Of course. Ah—are the eggs ready yet?” He considered a day incomplete unless he began it with soft-boiled eggs.

“Sorry, no, sir. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, breakfast is to consist of toast and black coffee only, except for Master Joey, who gets cereal, fruit juice and milk.”

“I—see.”

Well, he had asked for it. He shrugged and took a bite of the toast. He sipped the coffee; it tasted like river mud, but he tried not to make a face.

Joey seemed to be going about the business of eating his cereal rather oddly, Carmichael noticed next. “Why don’t you pour that glass of milk
into
the cereal?” he asked. “Won’t it taste better that way?”

“Sure it will. But Bismarck says I won’t get another glass if I do, so I’m eating it this way.”

“Bismarck?”

Joey grinned. “It’s the name of a famous nineteenth-century German dictator. They called him the Iron Chancellor.” He jerked his head towards the kitchen, to which the roboservitor had silently retreated. “Pretty good name for him, eh?”

“No,” said Carmichael. “It’s silly.”

“It has a certain ring of truth, though,” Ethel remarked.

Carmichael did not reply. He finished his toast and coffee somewhat glumly and signaled Clyde to get the car out of the garage. He felt depressed—dieting didn’t seem to be so effortless after all, even with the new robot.

As he walked towards the door, the robot glided around him and handed him a small printed slip of paper. Carmichael stared at it. It said:

“What’s this thing?”

“You are the only member of this family group who will not be eating three meals a day under my personal supervision. This is your luncheon menu. Please adhere to it,” the robot said smoothly.

Repressing a sputter, Carmichael said, “Yes—yes. Of course.”

He pocketed the menu and made his way uncertainly to the waiting car.

He was faithful to the robot’s orders at lunchtime that day; even though he was beginning to develop resistance to the idea that had seemed so appealing only the night before, he was willing, at least, to give it a try.

But something prompted him to stay away from the restaurant where Normandy Trust employees usually lunched, and where there were human waiters to smirk at him and fellow executives to ask prying questions.

He ate instead at a cheap robocafeteria two blocks to the north. He slipped in surreptitiously with his collar turned up, punched out his order (it cost him less than a credit altogether) and wolfed it down. He still was hungry when he had finished, but he compelled himself to return loyally to the office.

He wondered how long he was going to be able to keep up this iron self-control. Not very long, he realized dolefully. And if anyone from the company caught him eating at a robocafeteria, he’d be a laughing stock. Someone of executive status just
didn’t
eat lunch by himself in mechanized cafeterias.

By the time he had finished his day’s work, his stomach felt knotted and pleated. His hand was shaky as he punched out his destination on the car’s autopanel, and he was thankful that it took less than an hour to get home from the office. Soon, he thought, he’d be tasting food again. Soon. Soon. He switched on the roof-mounted video, leaned back in the recliner and tried to relax as the car bore him homeward.

He was in for a surprise, though, when he stepped through the safety field into his home. Clyde was waiting as always, and, as always, took his hat and cloak. And, as always, Carmichael reached out for the cocktail that Clyde prepared nightly to welcome him home.

There was no cocktail.

“Are we out of gin, Clyde?”

“No, sir.”

“How come no drink, then?”

The robot’s rubberized metallic features seemed to droop. “Because, sir, a Martini’s caloric content is inordinately high. Gin is rated at a hundred calories per ounce and—”

“Oh, no. You too!”

“Pardon, sir. The new roboservitor has altered my responsive circuits to comply with the regulations now in force in this household.”

Carmichael felt his fingers starting to tremble. “Clyde, you’ve been my butler for almost twenty years.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You always make my drinks for me. You mix the best Martinis in the Western Hemisphere.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“And you’re going to mix one for me right now! That’s a direct order!”

“Sir! I—” The robutler staggered wildly and nearly careened into Carmichael. It seemed to have lost all control over its gyro-balance; it clutched agonizedly at its chest panel and started to sag.

Hastily, Carmichael barked, “Order countermanded! Clyde, are you all right?”

Slowly, and with a creak, the robot straightened up. It looked dangerously close to an overload. “Your direct order set up a first-level conflict in me, sir,” Clyde whispered faintly. “I—came close to burning out just then, sir. May—may I be excused?”

“Of course. Sorry, Clyde.” Carmichael balled his fists. There was such a thing as going too far! The roboservitor—Bismarck—had obviously placed on Clyde a flat prohibition against serving liquor to him. Reducing or no reducing, there were
limits
.

Carmichael strode angrily towards the kitchen.

His wife met him halfway. “I didn’t hear you come in, Sam. I want to talk to you about—”

“Later. Where’s that robot?”

“In the kitchen, I imagine. It’s almost dinnertime.”

He brushed past her and swept on into the kitchen, where Bismarck was moving efficiently from electrostove to magnetic worktable. The robot swiveled as Carmichael entered.

“Did you have a good day, sir?”

“No! I’m hungry!”

“The first days of a diet are always the most difficult, Mr. Carmichael. But your body will adjust to the reduction in food intake before long.”

“I’m sure of that. But what’s this business of tinkering with Clyde?”

“The butler insisted on preparing an alcoholic drink for you. I was forced to adjust his programming. From now on, sir, you may indulge in cocktails on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. I beg to be excused from further discussion now, sir. The meal is almost ready.”

Poor Clyde!
Carmichael thought.
And poor me!
He gnashed his teeth impotently a few times, then gave up and turned away from the glistening, overbearing roboservitor. A light gleamed on the side of the robot’s head, indicating that he had shut off his audio circuits and was totally engaged in his task.

Dinner consisted of steak and peas, followed by black coffee. The steak was rare; Carmichael preferred it well done. But Bismarck—the name was beginning to take hold—had had all the latest dietetic theories taped into him, and rare meat it was.

After the robot had cleared the table and tidied up the kitchen, it retired to its storage place in the basement, which gave the Carmichael family a chance to speak openly to each other for the first time that evening.

“Lord!” Ethel snorted. “Sam, I don’t object to losing weight, but if we’re going to be
tyrannized
in our own home—”

“Mom’s right,” Joey put in. “It doesn’t seem fair for that thing to feed us whatever it pleases. And I didn’t like the way it messed around with Clyde’s circuits.”

Carmichael spread his hands. “I’m not happy about it either. But we have to give it a try. We can always make readjustments in the programming if it turns out to be necessary.”

“But how long are we going to keep this up?” Myra wanted to know. “I had three meals in this house today and I’m starved!”

“Me, too,” Joey said. He elbowed himself from his chair and looked around. “Bismarck’s downstairs. I’m going to get a slice of lemon pie while the coast is clear.”

“No!” Carmichael thundered.

“No?”

“There’s no sense in my spending three thousand credits on a dietary robot if you’re going to cheat, Joey. I forbid you to have any pie.”

“But, Dad, I’m hungry! I’m a growing boy! I’m—”

“You’re sixteen years old, and if you grow much more, you won’t fit inside the house,” Carmichael snapped, looking up at his six-foot-one son.

“Sam, we can’t starve the boy,” Ethel protested. “If he wants pie, let him have some. You’re carrying this reducing fetish too far.”

Carmichael considered that. Perhaps, he thought, I
am
being a little oversevere. And the thought of lemon pie was a tempting one. He was pretty hungry himself.

“All right,” he said with feigned reluctance. “I guess a bit of pie won’t wreck the plan. In fact, I suppose I’ll have some myself. Joey, why don’t you—”

“Begging your pardon,” a purring voice said behind him. Carmichael jumped half an inch. It was the robot, Bismarck. “It would be most unfortunate if you were to have pie now, Mr. Carmichael. My calculations are very precise.”

Carmichael saw the angry gleam in his son’s eye, but the robot seemed extraordinarily big at that moment, and it happened to stand between him and the kitchen.

He sighed weakly. “Let’s forget the lemon pie, Joey.”

After two full days of the Bismarckian diet, Carmichael discovered that his inner resources of will power were beginning to crumble. On the third day he tossed away the printed lunchtime diet and went out irresponsibly with MacDougal and Hennessey for a six-course lunch, complete with cocktails. It seemed to him that he hadn’t tasted real food since the robot arrived.

That night, he was able to tolerate the seven-hundred-calorie dinner without any inward grumblings, being still well lined with lunch. But Ethel and Myra and Joey were increasingly irritable. It seemed that the robot had usurped Ethel’s job of handling the daily marketing and had stocked in nothing but a huge supply of healthy low-calorie foods. The larder now bulged with wheat germ, protein bread, irrigated salmon, and other hitherto unfamiliar items. Myra had taken up biting her nails; Joey’s mood was one of black sullen brooding, and Carmichael knew how that could lead to trouble quickly with a sixteen-year-old.

After the meager dinner, he ordered Bismarck to go to the basement and stay there until summoned.

The robot said, “I must advise you, sir, that I will detect indulgence in any forbidden foods in my absence and adjust for it in the next meals.”

“You have my word,” Carmichael said, thinking it was indeed queer to have to pledge on your honor to your own robot. He waited until the massive servitor had vanished below; then he turned to Joey and said, “Get the instruction manual, boy.”

Joey grinned in understanding. Ethel said, “Sam, what are you going to do?”

Carmichael patted his shrunken waistline. “I’m going to take a can opener to that creature and adjust his programming. He’s overdoing this diet business. Joey, have you found the instructions on how to reprogram the robot?”

“Page 167. I’ll get the tool kit, Dad.”

“Right.” Carmichael turned to the robutler, who was standing by dumbly, in his usual forward-stooping posture of expectancy. “Clyde, go down below and tell Bismarck we want him right away.”

Moments later, the two robots appeared. Carmichael said to the roboservitor, “I’m afraid it’s necessary for us to change your program. We’ve overestimated our capacity for losing weight.”

“I beg you to reconsider, sir. Extra weight is harmful to every vital organ in the body. I plead with you to maintain my scheduling unaltered.”

“I’d rather cut my own throat. Joey, inactivate him and do your stuff.”

Grinning fiercely, the boy stepped forward and pressed the stud that opened the robot’s ribcage. A frightening assortment of gears, cams and translucent cables became visible inside the robot. With a small wrench in one hand and the open instruction book in the other, Joey prepared to make the necessary changes, while Carmichael held his breath and a pall of silence descended on the living room. Even old Clyde leaned forward to have a better view.

Joey muttered, “Lever F, with the yellow indicia, is to be advanced one notch…umm. Now twist Dial B9 to the left, thereby opening the taping compartment and—oops!”

Carmichael heard the clang of a wrench and saw the bright flare of sparks; Joey leaped back, cursing with surprisingly mature skill. Ethel and Myra gasped simultaneously.

“What happened?” four voices—Clyde’s coming in last—demanded.

“Dropped the damn wrench,” Joey said. “I guess I shorted out something in there.”

The robot’s eyes were whirling satanically and its voice box was emitting an awesome twelve-cycle rumble. The great metal creature stood stiffly in the middle of the living room; with brusque gestures of its big hands, it slammed shut the open chest plates.

“We’d better call Mr. Robinson,” Ethel said worriedly. “A short-circuited robot is likely to explode, or worse.”

“We should have called Robinson in the first place,” Carmichael murmured bitterly. “It’s my fault for letting Joey tinker with an expensive and delicate mechanism like that. Myra, get me the card Mr. Robinson left.”

“Gee, Dad, this is the first time I’ve ever had anything like that go wrong,” Joey insisted. “I didn’t know—”