“No, I didn’t. ” Kresh cut the connection, his heart pounding. “Donald. Back to the Residence, full emergency speed.”
“Yes, sir. ” The aircar made a hard turn and rushed back the way it had come, gathering speed. “Sir, I could not help overhearing, and I am greatly confused,” he said, his voice steady and level. “ According to my recollection, the Governor sent a memo to all the top government officials as soon as he took office just over two years ago. He told them he was ceasing the tradition of gubernatorial birthday gifts to them effective immediately, as it tended to promote favoritism.”
“And just by chance, the memo arrived on my birthday,” Kresh said. “I didn’t feel much like a favorite that day. I remember, Donald, I remember. But why didn’t the Governor know?”
But Kresh already had the answer to that, even if it scared him to death. The aircar landed hard, and Kresh was out the hatch and running through the rain toward the front door before it had stopped moving. There should have been an SPR on duty at the front door, but instead the door was wide open. Kresh rushed inside. The SPR robots were there-but motionless, inert. And if the security robots were out-he ran upstairs to the Governor’s office, almost toppling over another security robot standing uselessly in front of the door-with a hole shot through its chest. He slapped his palm on the security panel. The damned thing was supposed to be keyed to his handprint, but was it? He had never tried it. The door slid open and he all but dove into the room, not daring to think what he would find. But the lights were off. He could not see a thing. Kresh pulled his blaster.
The lights switched themselves on as they sensed someone in the room. And the room was empty. No one was at the desk. There were no papers spread out to be worked on.
Kresh rushed back into the hall, heading for the Governor’s bedroom, dodging past two more dead security robots on the way. The bedroom door was wide open. He went inside. And stopped.
The Governor was there.
Sitting up in bed.
With a blaster hole the size of a man’s fist in his chest.
DONALD 111 ARRIVED in the Governor’s bedroom a few seconds after Alvar Kresh, and saw his master standing over the grisly tableaux. But Donald was barely aware of his master. His attention was riveted on Governor Chanto Grieg. The dead man.
It was far from the first corpse Donald had seen, and was the second one he had seen in as many hours-and yet the sight of the Governor’s dead body had a more profound effect on him than any of the others. Donald had known this man. Worse, not more that eight hours ago, Donald had told the Governor that he would be safe, that the precautions Alvar Kresh had suggested would be enough to protect him. He, Donald, had threatened to prevent this man from attending the party, but had allowed it in the end because fifty SPR security robots would be enough.
And now the man was dead. Dead. Dead. Donald’s vision began to dim. The world was growing darker.
“Donald! Stop it!” Alvar Kresh’s voice seemed to come from a long way away, far off and unimportant. “Come out of it. I order you to stop it! You had no part in Grieg’s death. You could have done nothing to stop it. You did nothing to cause it.”
Perhaps no other voice could have brought Donald back, but Kresh’s voice, his master’s voice, strong, brimming with authority, did so. His vision cleared and he came to himself with a start. “Tha-tha-thank you, sir,” he said.
“This damn planet sets First Law potential too damn high,” Kresh growled. “Donald, listen to me. There were fifty security robots on duty in this house, and Grieg died anyway. One more robot could not have done any good. ”
Donald took hold of that thought, focused on it. Yes, yes, it was true. What could he have done that they could not?
But why hadn’t the security robots prevented this disaster? Donald turned away, not wishing to look on the horrifying sight of the dead Governor anymore. And, in turning around, he got his answer. There, lined up against the wall, still in their wall niches, were three of the SPRs, the Security, Patrol, and Rescue Sapper security robots-each with a blaster shot through the chest. That is what would have happened to me, Donald thought. Had I remained, I would have been nothing more than another robot uselessly destroyed. He found a strange sort of comfort in the idea.
“Sir,” he said, “if I could call your attention to this side of the room.”
“Hmm?” Kresh turned around and saw the three destroyed robots. “Burning hells. Donald. How fast would someone have to be to get into this room, blast three specialized security robots before any of them could react, and then kill a man who would appear to have been sitting up in bed? Kill him before he could even set his book down?”
