Tale of the Troika s-2

by Arkady Strugatsky

  I took the heavy case and lugged his invention up on the demonstration table. Freed at last, the old man bowed and said in a quavering voice:

  “My respects. Edelweiss Zakharovich Mashkin, inventor.”

  “That’s not him,” Khlebovvodov said in a low voice. “That’s not him and it doesn’t even look like him. I guess it’s a completely different Babkin. Just someone with the same name, I guess.”

  “Yes, sir,” agreed the little old man, smiling. “I’ve brought this to be judged by the public. Professor Vybegallo, here, God grant him health, recommended it. I’m ready to demonstrate it, if you like, because I sure have been overstaying my welcome in your Colony.”

  Lavr Fedotovich, who was scrutinizing him attentively, laid down his opera glasses and cocked his head. The old man bustled around. He took the cover off the case, revealing a bulky, ancient typewriter, took a bundle of wiring from his pocket, stuck one end into the bowels of the machine, unwound the wiring, and plugged it in.

  “There, if you please, you have the heuristic machine,” said the old man. “A precise electromechanical apparatus for answering any questions, specifically scientific and economic ones. How does it work? Being short of funds and being held up by various amounts of red tape, I have not been able to make it fully automatic yet. The questions are posed orally, and I type them and enter them inside, bring them to its attention, so to speak. Its answers, again due to incomplete automation, are typed by me again. I’m a type of middleman here, hee hee! So, if it pleases you, let us begin.”

  He moved up to the machine and switched it on with a grand gesture. A neon light went on in its bowels.

  “Please,” repeated the old man.

  “What’s that light in there?” Farfurkis asked curiously.

  The old man immediately struck the keys, then quickly tore the paper from the roller, and raced up to Farfurkis. Farfurkis read it aloud.

  “Question: What is that … hum … that lo … lofjt. Or is it pofit? What’s this lofjt?”

  “That’s ‘light’,” said the old man, giggling and rubbing his hands together. “That’s code.” He grabbed the paper from Farfurkis and ran back to the typewriter. “That was the question,” he explained, putting the paper back in the roller. “And now let’s see what it answers.”

  The members of the Troika watched with interest. Professor Vybegallo glowed with fatherly pride and with refined and flowing movements picked litter from his beard. Eddie had settled into an apathetic gloom. Meanwhile the old man typed away. He pulled out the paper again.

  “Here’s the answer, if you please.”

  Farfurkis read it.

  “ ‘Insade, I have a neon … hum … a neonette.’ What’s a neonette?”

  “Eine Sekunde!” the inventor cried, grabbed the paper, and scurried back to the typewriter.

  The affair went on. The machine gave an illiterate explanation of a neon bulb, then answered Farfurkis by telling him it spelled “in-sade” according to the rules of grammar, and then:

  Farfurkis: “What grammar?”

  Machine: “Why our own Russian grmr.”

  Khlebowodov: “Do you know Eduard Petrovich Babkin?”

  Machine: “No how.”

  Lavr Fedotovich: “Harrrumph. What motions are there?”

  Machine: “To acknowledge me as a scientific fact.”

  The old man ran back and forth and typed with unbelievable speed. The commandant jumped up and down excitedly in his chair and kept giving us a thumbs-up sign. Eddie slowly regained his psychic balance.

  Khlebowodov (irritably): “I cannot work under these conditions. Why is he racing back and forth like a tincan in the wind?”

  Machine: “Because of my eagerness.”

  Khlebowodov: “Will you get that paper away from me? Can’t you see that I am not asking you anything?”

  Machine: “Yes, I can.”

  The Troika finally understood that if they ever wanted to end that day’s meeting they would have to stop asking questions, even rhetorical ones. Silence reigned. The old man, who was quite worn out by then, perched on the edge of a chair, and panted, mopping himself with his handkerchief. Vybegallo looked around proudly.

  “There is a motion,” said Farfurkis, carefully choosing his words. “Let the scientific consultant make an expert judgment and report on his decision.”

  Lavr Fedotovich looked at Vybegallo and regally bowed his head. Vybegallo rose. Vybegallo smiled politely. Vybegallo pressed his right hand to his heart. Vybegallo spoke.

  “C’est …” he said. “It’s not right, Lavr Fedotovich. Be it as it may, but j’ai recommended ce noble vieux. There will be talk, that this is nepotism, favoritism. And nevertheless this is a rare event and an obvious case, perfectly valuable, rationalization is called for. C’est clear from the experiment. I would not like to end a bright beginning, nip initiative in the bud. What would be better? It would be better if some other expert gave his opinion, someone impartial, it would be better. Here among the representatives from below I see Comrade Alexander Ivanovich Privalov (I shuddered). A comrade specializing in computers. And impartial. Let him. I feel that it would be of value.”

  Lavr Fedotovich raised his opera glasses and examined each of us in turn. Eddie had come to life and was whispering: “Alex, you must! Give it to them! This is our chance!”

  “There is a motion,” said Farfurkis, “to ask comrade representative from below to collaborate with the work of the Troika.”

  Lavr Fedotovich put down his opera glasses and gave his consent. Now everyone looked at me. I, of course, would not have become involved in this affair at all if it had not been for the old man. Ce noble vieux was batting his reddened lids at me so pathetically and his whole appearance screamed that he would pray for me for the rest of his life. I couldn’t resist. I reluctantly rose and went over to the typewriter. The old man smiled at me. I looked over the apparatus.

  “Well, all right. By heuristic programming we mean the attempt to imitate human thought processes in digital computer. Here we have a Remington typewriter, made in 1906, in fairly good condition. The type is prerevolutionary and also in good condition.” I caught the old man’s pleading look, sighed, and turned on the switch. “In short, the typing construction contains nothing new. Only the very old.”

  “Insade!” the old man whispered. “Look insade, where there’s an analyzer and a thinker.”

  “The analyzer,” I said. “There’s no analyzer here. There is a serial rectifier, also ancient. A plain neon bulb. A switch. A good switch, it’s new. There is also a cord, brand new. That, I guess, is that.”

  “And your conclusion?” Farfurkis inquired in a lively tone.

  Eddie was nodding at me approvingly, and I let him know that I would try.

  “My conclusion,” I said. “The described Remington typewriter, in conjunction with a rectifier, neon bulb, switch, and cord does not represent anything unexplainable.”

  “What about me?” the old man shouted.

  Eddie showed me that it was time for a left hook, but I just couldn’t.

  “Well, of course,” I mumbled. “This evinces a lot of work. (Eddie grabbed his hair.) I, of course, understand … the good intentions. (Eddie looked at me with contempt.) But really, the man tried his best, you can’t just …”

  “Have fear of God,” Eddie said clearly.

  “Why not? Let the man keep on working, if it interests him. I’m only saying that there is nothing inexplicable about this. But it’s actually quite clever.”

  “Are there any questions for our scientific consultant pro tern?” asked Lavr Fedotovich.

  Hearing an interrogative intonation, the old man made a dash for the machine, but I stopped him by grabbing him round the waist.

  “That’s right,” said Khlebovvodov. “Hold on to him. It’s hard to work otherwise. This isn’t an evening of twenty questions, you know. Why don’t you unplug it for now, anyway? I don’t like it eavesdropping.”

  I freed a h
and and clicked off the switch. The light went out and old man quieted down.

  “But I still have a question,” Khlebovvodov went on. “How does it answer?”

  I looked at him flabbergasted. Eddie was himself again and was glaring at the Troika. Vybegallo was pleased. He pulled out a long twig from his beard and stuck it between his teeth.

  “Rectorizers and switches,” said Khlebovvodov. “Comrade pro tem explained all that rather well. But he did not explain one thing: he did not explain the facts. And the incontrovertible fact is that when you ask a question, you get an answer. In written form. And even when you ask someone else a question, you get an answer. In written form. And you say, comrade pro tem, that there is nothing inexplicable here. The ends do not meet. We do not understand what science has to say on the subject.”

  Science as embodied by me had lost its power of speech. Khlebovvodov had cut me, stabbed me in the back, killed and buried me. But Vybegallo reacted in time.

  “C’est,” he said. “That’s what I said, a valuable beginning! There is an element of the unexplained, that’s why I recommended it. C’est,” he turned to the old man. “Mon cher, explain what is what to our comrades.”

  The old man exploded.

  “The highest achievements of neutron megaloplasm!” he thundered. “The rotor of the field of divergence gradates along the back and there, insade, turns the matter of the question into spiritual electrical whirlwinds, from which the synecdoche of the answering arises …”

  I was beginning to see spots before my eyes, bile was rising, and my teeth ached, and the damned noble vieux went on talking. His speech was smooth—it was a cleverly rehearsed and often repeated speech, in which every adjective, every intonation was quivering with an emotional charge. It was a true work of art. The old man was no inventor, but he was an artist, a genius of an orator, a worthy successor to Demosthenes, Cicero, and John Chrysostom. Reeling, I stepped to the side and leaned my forehead on the cool wall.

  Then Eddie quietly clapped his hands, and the old man stopped. For a second I thought that Eddie had stopped time, because everyone was still, listening to a deep medieval silence that was draped like velvet in the room. Then Lavr Fedotovich pushed back his chair and rose.

  “According to the regulations and all the rules, I should speak last,” he began. “But there are times when the regulations and rules do not apply, and they must be thrown out. I am speaking first because this is one of these times. I am speaking first because I can not wait in silence. I am speaking first because I do not expect nor will I allow any objections.”

  But there could be no thought of an objection. The rank and file members of the Troika were so impressed by this unexpected flurry of oratory that they only exchanged glances.

  “We are the guardians of science,” continued Lavr Fedotovich. “We are the portals to its temple, we are the unprejudiced filters that protect it from falsehood, from frivolity, from error. We guard the seeds of knowledge from attack by philistinism and false wisdom. And when we do this, we are not human, we do not know compassion, pity, or hypocrisy. We have but one measure: the truth. Truth distinct from good or evil, truth distinct from man and humanity, but only as long as good and evil and man and mankind exist. If there is no humanity—who needs truth? If no one is seeking knowledge, that means there is no humanity, and there is no need for truth! If there are answers to all the questions, that means there is no need to seek knowledge, that means there is no humanity, and then what need is there for truth? When the poet said: ‘And there are no answers to the questions’ he described the most horrible condition of human society—its final state.

  “Yes, this man standing before us is a genius. He embodies and expresses the final state of humanity. But he is a killer, for he kills the spirit. Moreover, he is a terrible killer, for he kills the spirit of humanity. And that is why we can no longer remain unprejudiced filters, and we must remember that we are men, and as men we must protect ourselves from a killer. And we should not be discussing it, we should be judging him! But there are no laws for such a judgment, and therefore we must not judge, but mete out punishment, the way those who are in the grip of horror punish. And I, as the senior member, breaking the regulations and the rules, I say: Death!” The rank and file shuddered and all spoke at once. “Which one?” asked Khlebovvodov, who had apparently understood only the final word.

  “Impossible!” Vybegallo whispered, clasping his hands.

  “Allow me, Lavr Fedotovich!” Farfurkis babbled.

  “All this is correct, but do we have …”

  Then Eddie clapped his hands again.

  “Harrumph!” Lavr Fedotovich said and sat, turning his neck. “There is a motion to consider the fact that the dusk has gathered, and, accordingly, to turn on the lights.”

  The commandant jumped up and turned on the lamp. Lavr Fedotovich, like an eagle looking at the sun, regarded the light without squinting and turned to the Remington.

  “Expressing the general consensus,” he said; “it has been decided: Case 42 is considered rationalized. Moving to the question of utilization, I ask Comrade Zubo to read the resolution.”

  The commandant began leafing through the case file, while Professor Vybegallo got up from his table, and emotionally shook hands with the old man and then, before I could turn away, with me. He was glowing. I did not know what to do with myself. I did not dare look at Eddie. While I was considering whether I should heave the Remington at Lavr Fedotovich, the old man grabbed me. He attached himself to my neck like a tick and kissed me three times, scratching me with his stubble. I do not remember how I got back to my seat. I do remember Eddie whispering: “Alex, Alex! Well, all right, it can happen to anyone.”

  Meanwhile the commandant had gone through the file and announced that there had been no requisitions in this case. Farfurkis immediately protested and cited the paragraph in the regulations that made it clear that rationalization without utilization was nonsense and could be acknowledged only provisionally. Khlebovvodov began shouting that these tricks would not work, that he did not wish to take money for nothing, and that he would not allow the commandant to flush four hours of work time down the tubes. Lavr Fedotovich blew into his cigarette with a look of approval, and Khlebovvodov increased his attack.

  “And what if he is a relative of my Babkin?” he yelled. “What do you mean there are no requisitions? There has to be! You just look at what a little old man he is! A unique and interesting figure he is! How can we squander little old men like that?”

  “Public opinion will not allow us to squander little old men,” Lavr Fedotovich noted. “And public opinion will be right.”

  “That’s it,” barked Vybegallo. “It’s public opinion! And it won’t allow it! How can it be, Comrade Zubo, that there are no requisitions? Why aren’t there any?” He rushed up and threw himself in a fury on the mound of papers in front of the commandant. “How can there not be any? What’s this? A common pterodactyl. Good. And this? Pandora’s Box. Why don’t you think it’s a box? All right, make it Mashkin’s Box, and not Pandora’s. We can’t stand on formality, you know. And what’s this: Talking Bedbug. Talking, writing, typing. Ah! What do you mean, there’s no requisition? Comrade Zubo, what is this, hah? Black Box! A requisition for the Black Box. And you said there was none.”

  I was stunned.

  “Wait!” I said, but no one listened to me.

  “But that’s not the Black Box!” the commandant shouted, clutching his chest. “The Black Box has a completely different requisition number.”

  “What do you mean, it’s not black?” Vybegallo shouted back, grabbing the black case of the Remington. “What color do you think this is? Green, maybe? Or white? You’re busy misinforming the people? Squandering society’s little old men?”

  The commandant was trying to justify himself, saying that this, too, was a black box, and not green and not white, obviously black, but the wrong box, that black box was under Case 907, and the requisition was signed b
y Comrade Alexander Ivanovich Privalov, he had received it just today, and that black box here was no black box, but a heuristic machine and it was Case 42, and there was no requisition for it at all. Vybegallo was shouting that there should be no juggling of figures here and no squandering little old men either; black was black, it was not white or green, and there was no point in trying Machist tricks and all sorts of empiriocriticism, and just let the comrade members of the authoritative Troika look for themselves and say whether this was a black box, or a green one. Khlebovvodov was shouting something about Babkin, Farfurkis was demanding that there be no deviations from the letter of the regulations, Eddie was joyously shouting “Out with him,” and I, like a stuck record, kept repeating: “My Black Box—it’s not a box. My Black Box—it’s not a box.”

  Finally Lavr Fedotovich became aware of a certain disorder.

  “Harrumph!” he said, and everything quieted down. “Are there difficulties? Comrade Khlebovvodov, get rid of them.”

  Khlebovvodov strode firmly over to Vybegallo, took the case in his hands, and examined it carefully.

  “Comrade Zubo,” he said. “For what is that requisition you have?”

  “For the Black Box,” the commandant said glumly. “Case 907.”

  “I am not asking you the case number. I am asking: Do you have a requisition for a Black Box?”