"Damned foolishness!" snorted Lexington. "The machine saw what I was trying to do the moment I sketched it out and ordered the parts. Within a week, I found out later, it had pulled some odds and ends together and built itself a standard radio receiver. Then it listened in on every radio program that was going, and had most of the vocabulary tied in with the written word by the time I was ready to start. Out of all the voices it could have chosen, it picked the one you’ve already heard as the one likely to please me most."
"It’s a very pleasant voice, sir."
"Sure, but do you know where it came from? Soap opera! It’s Lucy’s voice, from The Life and Loves of Mary Butterworth!"
Lexington glared, and Peter wasn’t sure whether he should sympathize with him or congratulate him. After a moment, the anger wore off Lexington’s face, and he shifted in his chair, staring at his now empty cup. "That’s when I realized the thing was taking on characteristics that were more than I’d bargained for. It had learned that it was my provider and existed to serve me. But it had gone further and wanted to be all that it could be: provider, protector, companion—wife, if you like. Hence the gradual trend toward characteristics that were as distinctly female as a silk negligee. Worse still, it had learned that when I was pleased, I didn’t always admit it, and simply refused to believe that I would have it any other way."
"Couldn’t you have done something to the circuitry?" asked Peter.
"I suppose I could," said Lexington, "but in asking that, you don’t realize how far the thing had gone. I had long since passed the point when I could look upon her as a machine. Business was tremendous. I had no complaints on that score. And tinkering with her personality—well, it was like committing some kind of homicide. I might as well face it, I suppose. She acts like a woman and I think of her as one.
"At first, when I recognized this trend for what it was, I tried to stop it. She’d ordered a subscription to Vogue magazine, of all things, in order to find out the latest in silverware, china, and so on. I called up the local distributor and canceled the subscription. I had no sooner hung up the telephone than her voice came over the speaker. Very softly, mind you. And her inflections by this time were superb. ‘That was mean,’ she said. Three lousy words, and I found myself phoning the guy right back, saying I was sorry, and would he please not cancel. He must have thought I was nuts."
Peter smiled, and Lexington made as if to rise from his chair, thought the better of it, and shifted his bulk to one side. "Well, there it is," he said softly. "We reached that stage eight years ago."
Peter was thunderstruck. "But—if this factory is twenty years ahead of the times now, it must have been almost thirty then!"
Lexington nodded. "I figured fifty at the time, but things are moving faster nowadays. Lex hasn’t stood still, of course. She still reads all the trade journals, from cover to cover, and we keep up with the world. If something new comes up, we’re in on it, and fast. We’re going to be ahead of the pack for a long time to come."
"If you’ll excuse me, sir," said Peter, "I don’t see where I fit in."
Peter didn’t realize Lexington was answering his question at first. "A few weeks ago," the old man murmured, "I decided to see a doctor. I’d been feeling low for quite a while, and I thought it was about time I attended to a little personal maintenance."
Lexington looked Peter squarely in the face and said, "The report was that I have a heart ailment that’s apt to knock me off any second."
"Can’t anything be done about it?" asked Peter.
"Rest is the only prescription he could give me. And he said that would only spin out my life a little. Aside from that—no hope."
"I see," said Peter. "Then you’re looking for someone to learn the business and let you retire."
"It’s not retirement that’s the problem," said Lexington. "I wouldn’t be able to go away on trips. I’ve tried that, and I always have to hurry back because something’s gone wrong she can’t fix for herself. I know the reason, and there’s nothing I can do about it. It’s the way she’s built. If nobody’s here, she gets lonely." Lexington studied the desk top silently for a moment, before finishing quietly, "Somebody’s got to stay here to look after Lex."
At six o’clock, three hours after he had entered Lexington’s plant, Peter left. Lexington did not follow him down the corridor. He seemed exhausted after the afternoon’s discussion and indicated that Peter should find his own way out. This, of course, presented no difficulty, with Lex opening the doors for him, but it gave Peter an opportunity he had been hoping for.
He stopped in the reception room before crossing the threshold of the front door, which stood open for him. He turned and spoke to the apparently empty room. "Lex?" he said.
He wanted to say that he was flattered that he was being considered for the job; it was what a job-seeker should say, at that point, to the boss’s secretary. But when the soft voice came back—"Yes, Mr. Manners?"—saying anything like that to a machine felt suddenly silly.
He said: "I wanted you to know that it was a pleasure to meet you."
"Thank you," said the voice.
If it had said more, he might have, but it didn’t. Still feeling a little embarrassed, he went home.
At four in the morning, his phone rang. It was Lexington.
"Manners!" the old man gasped.
The voice was an alarm. Manners sat bolt upright, clutching the phone. "What’s the matter, sir?"
"My chest," Lexington panted. "I can feel it, like a knife on—I just wanted to—Wait a minute."
There was a confused scratching noise, interrupted by a few mumbles, in the phone.
"What’s going on, Mr. Lexington?" Peter cried. But it was several seconds before he got an answer.
"That’s better," said Lexington, his voice stronger. He apologized: "I’m sorry. Lex must have heard me. She sent in one of the materials handlers with a hypo. It helps."
The voice on the phone paused, then said matter-of-factly: "But I doubt that anything can help very much at this point. I’m glad I saw you today. I want you to come around in the morning. If I’m—not here, Lex will give you some papers to sign."
There was another pause, with sounds of harsh breathing. Then, strained again, the old man’s voice said: "I guess I won’t—be here. Lex will take care of it. Come early. Good-bye."
The distant receiver clicked.
Peter Manners sat on the edge of his bed in momentary confusion, then made up his mind. In the short hours he had known him, he had come to have a definite fondness for the old man; and there were times when machines weren’t enough, when Lexington should have another human being by his side. Clearly this was one such time.
Peter dressed in a hurry, miraculously found a cruising cab, sped through empty streets, leaped out in front of Lex Industries’ plain concrete walls, ran to the door—
In the waiting room, the soft, distant voice of Lex said: "He wanted you to be here, Mr. Manners. Come."
A door opened, and wordlessly he walked through it—to the main room of the factory.
He stopped, staring. Four squat materials handlers were quietly, slowly carrying old Lexington—no, not the man; the lifeless body that had been Lexington—carrying the body of the old man down the center aisle between the automatic lathes.
Peter protested: "Wait! I’ll get a doctor!" But the massive handling machines didn’t respond, and the gentle voice of Lex said: