“Quite true. We use ultrasonics, and also communications lasers. The sound signals are received by piezoelectric crystals set into Caliban’s skin and converted to electrical impulses. They are fed straight into his brain. The laser data rates are much higher, but we can send stronger commands through the ultrasonics.” He shrugged. “The whole system is rather primitive. Some day we will no doubt update it — perhaps with design advice from Himself. Come, my pretty one.”

Out in the aquasphere, the dark form of Caliban was approaching, slowly, from the shadow of the screens of vegetation. Despite his size, the movement was graceful and flowing.

“And how does he send messages back to you?” Rob was unable to keep his eyes off the squid as it drifted towards them.

“Through display panels set in the walls of Atlantis. His replies all go through Sycorax, of course, for processing before we get them.” Morel was looking fondly out at the approaching animal. “They are never easy to understand, which is why Regulo calls Caliban my oracle. The way that Caliban and Sycorax think together is not as we think. There are non-Aristotelian elements to it. I believe that any serious student of formal logic would find his time well-spent if he could examine Caliban’s inferential processes for a year or two. Now, do you have more questions?”

It sounded like a dismissal. Rob suspected that Morel would not leave the area as long as he remained there also. He shook his head, and began to move away from the sealed door. “I’m sure I’ll get a chance to study Caliban in more detail, the next time that I am here. He’s quite a monster, isn’t he? I’m sure you are used to him, but I didn’t like the way he was straining at the partition the other night.”

Morel smiled, his first sign of real pleasure since their conversation began. “He becomes, shall we say, excited by my presence. He is very strong, stronger than you can imagine. I would not advise you to go out into the aquasphere with him.”

“I don’t intend to. But presumably someone does. How else can you gather the food from the sea-farms?”

“Caliban is controllable. I can give him shocks from the communicator, directly into the pain or the pleasure centers of his brain. There is no danger to someone in the aquasphere when I am present to manipulate him. I am obliged to use that control sometimes for other things. For instance, when he is reluctant to offer data on problems of interest to me, I stimulate him to answer. He does so, reluctantly. But there is no doubt that he does not like it.”

No, thought Rob. But you do, my friend. I see the expression on your face when you think about it. Right now, you’re gloating over the memory. Thank God you don’t have those electrodes wired into my brain.

He started to leave, heading back to his own quarters in the living area. But his mind remained uneasy with what he had seen, and at the exit he turned. Joseph Morel remained standing by the window, gazing out at the hulking shape of Caliban glaring in from the aquasphere. If Rob was thoughtful, it appeared that Morel was no less so.

CHAPTER 9: “Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, raze out the written troubles of the brain”

“Well, at first sight it doesn’t look like we have much that’s new.” Howard Anson, lean and elegant, was draped lazily over the back of a tall chair. As usual, he appeared to have come straight from some expensive personal grooming service. “Summing it up, you like Regulo, you like Corrie even more, you don’t care at all for Morel, and you had an encounter with an overgrown oyster. I’m not sure what all that will produce from Senta.”

Rob, sitting on the sofa opposite, seemed pale and tired in the golden light of a Rome evening. His eyes were reddened, and there were dark circles under them. The journey back had been a rough one, with little sleep and much to do.

“Oyster be damned,” he said. “If you got one look at Caliban, you’d change your tune. I’ve got a lot of respect for that big squid. The brightest cephalopods are no closer to the oysters than you are to a duck-billed platypus.”

Anson grinned, unabashed. “Both mollusks, aren’t they?”

“They are, and that’s the end of the resemblance. Caliban’s big and he’s fierce. And I’m inclined to agree with Joseph Morel, much as I dislike the man. There’s intelligence inside that decapod’s head. You should have seen the way that he tried to get into the dining area and tackle Morel. I wonder what they had to do to Caliban, so that he could survive in fresh water? Nothing pleasant, that I’ll bet.”

“If you really want an answer to that question, I may be able to find out.” Anson, as usual, found it unnecessary to make any sort of notes. “It might be one reason why Caliban hates Morel. I found out a good deal more about the fellow after you left. That tie to your father looks like a weak one, though I did confirm that Joseph Morel and Gregor Merlin were students at the same time in Göttingen. They studied rejuvenation and life-prolongation techniques together for a couple of years. That’s the only personal connection, though they seem to have kept in touch professionally after Morel left Germany.”

Anson was examining Rob closely, his lazy eyes shrewd. “God, I must say you do look terrible. You’ve been pushing yourself too hard. I think we should wait another day before we try and work with Senta, so you can get back in shape.”

Rob shook his head firmly. “I can’t afford to do that. In a couple more days I have to be back in space. We’ve got the final design for the beanstalk all worked out, and the next step is fabrication plans up at L-4. There’s a tough year ahead with no time for slippages, otherwise the schedule that I promised Regulo won’t hold. I didn’t build in much slack, and what little there is we have to keep for production outages.”

“I don’t think it’s your promise to Regulo that’s doing it. You want to see the beanstalk yourself, that’s what’s driving you along. Driving you too hard, I’d say.”

Rob shrugged. He found it hard to disagree with Howard Anson. The period since they had last met had indeed been hectic, with the trip to Atlantis, then the plunge into beanstalk design. He had modified the Spider to operate in a free space environment, shipped a second version equipped for high-temperature extrusion back up to Regulo, for passage to Keino out in the Belt, and begun recruiting for the main project.

The results of his first calls had surprised him. A high percentage of his old work crews were willing to follow him off Earth and help on the beanstalk.

Then the surprise left him. Of course the others wanted in. Like Rob, they were taken with the sheer scope of the project. No one who liked to work on big construction efforts could resist the lure of a bridge hundreds of times longer than any that ever had been built on Earth. So what that it would be going straight up, rather than along the surface?

He had been able to get most of them to sign on with hardly a mention of money. And if Regulo’s plans for new asteroid mining included a role for Rob, there might be even bigger projects ahead for all of them, out in the Belt and off in the Outer System. Regulo’s enthusiasm for space projects seemed to be infectious.

“All right.” Anson stood up. “If you’re going to simply sit there and look vacant, I may as well get Senta. She’s waiting to see if we want to go ahead.”

“Sorry.” Rob shook his head and sat straighter. “I’m feeling tired, that’s all. It makes me drift off and think about other things. You were quite right in what you just said. I’ve been pushing myself. Regulo hasn’t said one word about schedules. I think I’m trying to convince myself that I’m as smart as he is. You said I like him, but you’d have been more accurate to say that I respect the man. His brain works differently from anyone else’s I ever met. You ought to listen to him when he gets going on engineering design work, it’s no wonder he got to the position he has. Did you know that he controls more than half the ships that move around the Inner and Middle Systems?”