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. Well, then, a direct order from me brings theSecond Law into play, doesn t it? True.Yet the potential set up by it is unpleasantto the robot.Ordinarily, the matter would not come up, The Naked Sun.qxd 7/7/2003 12:43 PM Page 59THE NAKED SUN59since almost never does a Solarian interfere with theday-to-day workings of a robot.For one thing, hewould not care to do a robot s work; for another, hewould feel no need to. Are you trying to tell me, Daneel, that it hurts therobot to have me do its work? As you know, Partner Elijah, pain in the humansense is not applicable to robotic reactions. Baley shrugged. Then? Nevertheless, went on Daneel, the experiencewhich the robot undergoes is as upsetting to it as painis to a human, as nearly as I can judge. And yet, said Baley, I m not a Solarian.I m anEarthman.I don t like robots doing what I want to do. Consider, too, said Daneel, that to cause dis-tress to a robot might be considered on the part of ourhosts to be an act of impoliteness since in a societysuch as this there must be a number of more or lessrigid beliefs concerning how it is proper to treat arobot and how it is not.To offend our hosts wouldscarcely make our task easier. All right, said Baley. Let the robot do its job. He settled back.The incident had not been withoutits uses.It was an educational example of howremorseless a robotic society could be.Once broughtinto existence, robots were not so easily removed, anda human who wished to dispense with them even tem-porarily found he could not.His eyes half closed, he watched the robotapproach the wall.Let the sociologists on Earth con-sider what had just occurred and draw their conclusions.He was beginning to have certain notions of his own. The Naked Sun.qxd 7/7/2003 12:43 PM Page 60ISAAC ASIMOV60Half a wall slid aside and the control panel thatwas revealed would have done justice to a City Sectionpower station.Baley longed for his pipe.He had been briefed thatsmoking on non-smoking Solaria would be a terriblebreach of decorum, so he had not even been allowed totake his fixings.He sighed.There were moments whenthe feel of pipestem between teeth and a warm bowl inhis hand would have been infinitely comforting.The robot was working quickly, adjusting variableresistances a trifle here and there and intensifyingfield-forces in proper pattern by quick finger pres-sures.Daneel said, It is necessary first to signal the indi-vidual one desires to view.A robot will, of course,receive the message.If the individual being signaled isavailable and wishes to receive the view, full contact isestablished. Are all those controls necessary? asked Baley. The robot s hardly touching most of the panel. My information on the matter is not complete,Partner Elijah.There is, however, the necessity ofarranging, upon occasion, for multiple viewings andfor mobile viewings.The latter, particularly, call forcomplicated and continuing adjustments. The robot said, Masters, contact is made andapproved.When you are ready, it will be completed. Ready, growled Baley, and as though the wordwere a signal, the far half of the room was alive withlight.Daneel said at once, I neglected to have the robotspecify that all visible openings to the outside be The Naked Sun.qxd 7/7/2003 12:43 PM Page 61THE NAKED SUN61draped.I regret that and we must arrange Never mind, said Baley, wincing. I ll manage.Don t interfere. It was a bathroom he was staring at, or he judgedit to be so from its fixtures.One end of it was, heguessed, a kind of beautician s establishment and hisimagination pictured a robot (or robots?) working withunerring swiftness on the details of a woman s coiffureand on the externals that made up the picture she pre-sented to the world.Some gadgets and fittings he simply gave up on.There was no way of judging their purpose in theabsence of experience.The walls were inlaid with anintricate pattern that all but fooled the eye into believingsome natural object was being represented before fadingaway into an abstraction.The result was soothing andalmost hypnotic in the way it monopolized attention.What might have been the shower stall, a largeone, was shielded off by nothing that seemed material,but rather by a trick of lighting that set up a wall offlickering opacity.No human was in sight.Baley s glance fell to the floor.Where did his roomend and the other begin? It was easy to tell.There wasa line where the quality of the light changed and thatmust be it.He stepped toward the line and after a moment shesitation pushed his hand beyond it.He felt nothing, any more than he would have hadhe shoved the hand into one of Earth s crude trimen-sionals.There, at least, he would have seen his ownhand still; faintly, perhaps, and overlaid by the image,but he would have seen it.Here it was lost completely.To his vision, his arm ended sharply at the wrist. The Naked Sun.qxd 7/7/2003 12:43 PM Page 62ISAAC ASIMOV62What if he stepped across the line altogether?Probably his own vision would become inoperative.He would be in a world of complete blackness.Thethought of such efficient enclosure was almostpleasant
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