The Positronic Man

It was phrased as an order, so Andrew had no choice but to agree.

He ceased calling George Charney "Little Sir" as of that moment. But Little Miss remained Little Miss for him. It was unthinkable for Andrew to have to call her "Mrs. Charney" and even "Amanda" seemed like an improper and impertinent mode of address. She was "Little Miss" to him and nothing other than "Little Miss," even though she was a woman with graying hair now, lean and trim and as beautiful as ever but undeniably growing old. Andrew hoped that she would never give him the same sort of order that her son had; and she never did. "Little Miss" it was; "Little Miss" it would always be.

One day George and Little Miss came to the house, but neither of them made the usual stop at Andrew's place before going in to see Sir. Andrew noticed the car arrive and continue on past his own separate little driveway, and wondered why. He felt troubled when half an hour passed, and then half an hour more, and neither of them came to him. Had he given offense in some way on their last visit? No, that seemed unlikely.

But was there some problem in the main house, then?

He distracted himself by plunging into his work, but it took all his robotic powers of self-discipline to make himself concentrate, and even so nothing seemed to go as smoothly as it usually did. And then, late in the afternoon, George Charney came out back to see him-alone.

"Is anything wrong, George?" Andrew asked, a moment after George had entered.

"I'm afraid that there is, Andrew. My grandfather is dying."

"Dying?" Andrew said numbly.

Death was a concept he had long thought about, but had never really understood.

George nodded somberly. "My mother is at his bedside now. Grandfather wants you to be there too."

"He does? It isn't your mother who has sent for me, but Sir himself?"

"Sir himself, yes."

Andrew felt a faint tremor in his fingertips. It was as close as he could come to a physical expression of excitement. But there was distress mingled with the sensation.

Sir-dying!

He shut down his tools and hurried across to the main house, with George Charney trotting along beside him.

Sir was lying quietly in the bed in which he had spent most of his time in recent years. His hair had thi

"Sir-oh, Sir, Sir-"

"Come here, Andrew." Sir's voice sounded surprisingly strong: the voice of the Sir of old.

Andrew faltered, too confused to respond.

"Come here, I said. That's an order. I said once that I wasn't going to give you any more orders, but this is an exception. Just about the last one I'm ever going to give you-you can count on that."

"Yes, Sir. " Andrew came forward.

Sir pulled one hand out from under the coverlet. It seemed to be something of a struggle for him to move the blanket aside, and George rushed forward to help him.

"No," Sir said, with a trace of his familiar irascibility. "Damn it, don't try to do it for me, George! I'm only dying, not crippled." Angrily he pushed the coverlet down just far enough to raise his hand, and held it out toward the robot. "Andrew," he said. "Andrew-"

"Oh, Sir," Andrew began.

And he fell silent. He did not know what to say.

He had never before been at the side of someone who was dying, had never so much as seen a dead person. He knew that death was the human way of ceasing to function. It was an involuntary and irreversible dismantling that happened eventually to all human beings. Since it was inevitable, Andrew wanted to think that it was something that humans took for granted as a natural process and did not look upon with fear or distaste. But he was not entirely sure of that. And Sir had lived so long-he must be so accustomed to being alive, and there had always been so much life and vitality in him- "Give me your hand, Andrew."

"Of course, Sir."

Andrew took Sir's cool, pale, shriveled hand into his own: gnarled ancient flesh against smooth ageless plastic that was without flaw.

Sir said, "You're a splendid robot, do you know that, Andrew? Truly splendid. The finest robot that was ever made."

"Thank you, Sir."

"I wanted to tell you that. And one other thing. I'm glad you're free. That's all. It's important to me that I had a chance to tell you that. All right, Andrew."

It was an unmistakable dismissal. Andrew no longer had Sir's attention. He released Sir's trembling hand and stepped back from the bed, taking up a position alongside George and Little Miss. Little Miss reached forward and touched Andrew's arm just above the elbow, lightly, affectionately. But she said nothing. Nor did George.

The old man seemed to have withdrawn into some private realm, far away. The only sound in the room now was Sir's increasingly rough breathing, becoming ever more harsh, ever less regular. Sir lay motionless, staring upward at nothing at all. His face was as expressionless as any robot's.

Andrew was utterly at a loss. He could only remain standing, absolutely silent, absolutely motionless, watching what he knew must be Sir's final moments.

The old man's breathing grew rougher yet. He made an odd gargling sound, deep in his throat, that was like no sound Andrew had ever heard in his entire existence.

Then all was still. Other than the cessation of Sir's breathing, Andrew was unable to detect any change in him. He had been virtually motionless a moment ago and he was motionless now. He had stared blindly upward before and he was staring upward now. Andrew realized, though, that something profound had just happened, something that was wholly beyond his comprehension. Sir had passed across that mysterious threshold that separated death from life. There was no more Sir. Sir was gone. Only this empty husk remained.

Little Miss broke the endless silence at last with a soft cough. There were no tears in her eyes, but Andrew could see that she was deeply moved.

She said, "I'm glad you got here before he went, Andrew. You belonged here. You were one of us."

Once more Andrew did not know what to reply.

Little Miss said, " And it was wonderful to hear him say what he did to you. He may not have seemed friendly to you toward the end, Andrew, but he was old, you know. And it hurt him that you should have wanted to be free. But he forgave you for that right at the last, didn't he, Andrew?"

And then Andrew found the words to say. He said, "I never would have been free without him, Little Miss."