"Then, first, let me tell you that you have played games. You did not enter my mind to influence my decision, perhaps, but you certainly entered Janov's mind to do so, didn't you?"

"Do you think I did?"

"I think you did. At the crucial moment, Pelorat reminded me of his own vision of the Galaxy as alive and the thought drove me on to make my decision at that moment. The thought may have been his, but yours was the mind that triggered it, was it not?"

Bliss said, "The thought was in his mind, but there were many thoughts there. I smoothed the path before that reminiscence of his about the living Galaxy-and not before any other thought of his. That particular thought, therefore, slipped easily out of his consciousness and into words. Mind you, I did not create the thought. It was there."

"Nevertheless, that amounted to an indirect tampering with the perfect independence of my decision, did it not?"

"Gaia felt it necessary."

"Did it? -Well, it may make you feel better-or n.o.bler-to know that although Janov's remark persuaded me to make the decision at that moment, it was the decision I think I would have made even if he had said nothing or if he had tried to argue me into a decision of a different kind. I want you to know that."

"I am relieved," said Bliss coolly. "Is that what you wanted to tell me when you asked to see me?"

"No."

"What else is there?"

Now Trevize sat down in a chair he had drawn opposite her so that their knees nearly touched. He leaned toward her.

"When we approached Gaia, it was you on the s.p.a.ce station. It was you who trapped us; you who came out to get us; you who have remained with us ever since-except for the meal with Dom, which you did not share with us. In particular, it was you on the Far Star with us, when the decision was made. Always you."

"I am Gaia."

"That does not explain it. A rabbit is Gaia. A pebble is Gaia. Everything on the planet is Gaia, but they are not all equally Gaia. Some are more equal than others. Why you?"

"Why do you think?"

Trevize made the plunge. He said, "Because I don't think you're Gaia. I think you're more than Gaia."

Bliss made a derisive sound with her lips.

Trevize kept to his course. "At the time I was making the decision, the woman with the Speaker-"

"He called her Novi."

"This Novi, then, said that Gaia was set on its course by the robots that no longer exist and that Gaia was taught to follow a version of the Three Laws of Robotics."

"That is quite true."

"And the robots no longer exist?"

"So Novi said."

"So Novi did not say. I remember her exact words. She said: 'Gaia was formed thousands of years ago with the help of robots that once, for a brief time, served The human species and now serve them no more."

"Well, Trev, doesn't that mean they exist no more?"

"No, it means they serve no more. Might they not rule instead?"

"Ridiculous!"

"Or supervise? Why were you there at the time of the decision? You did not seem to be essential. It was Novi who conducted matters and she was Gaia. What need of you? Unless-"

"Well? Unless?"

"Unless you are the supervisor whose role it is to make certain that Gaia does not forget the Three Laws. Unless you are a robot, so cleverly made that you cannot be told from a human being."

"If I cannot be told from a human being, how is it you think that you can tell?" asked Bliss with a trace of sarcasm.

Trevize sat back. "Do you not all a.s.sure me I have the faculty of being sure; of making decisions, seeing solutions, drawing correct conclusions. I don't claim this; it is what you say of me. Well, from the moment I saw you I felt uneasy. There was something wrong with you. I am certainly as susceptible to feminine allure as Pelorat is-more so, I should think-and you are an attractive woman in appearance. Yet not for one moment did I feel the slightest attraction."

"You devastate me."

Trevize ignored that. He said, "When you first appeared on our ship, Janov and I had been discussing the possibility of a nonhuman civilization on Gaia, and when Janov saw you, he asked, in his innocence, 'Are you human?' Perhaps a robot must answer the truth, but I suppose it can be evasive. You merely said, 'Don't I look human?' Yes, you look human, Bliss, but let me ask you again. Are you human?"

Bliss said nothing and Trevize continued. "I think that even at that first moment, I felt you were not a woman. You are a robot and I could somehow tell. And because of my feeling, all the events that followed had meaning for me-particularly your absence from the dinner."

Bliss said, "Do you think I cannot eat, Trev? Have you forgotten I nibbled a shrimp dish on your ship? I a.s.sure you that I am able to eat and perform any of the other biological functions. -Including, before you ask, s.e.x. And yet that in itself, I might as well tell you, does not prove that I am not a robot. Robots had reached the pitch of perfection, even thousands of years ago, where only by their brains were they distinguishable from human beings, and then only by those able to handle mentalic fields. Speaker Gendibal might have been able to tell whether I were robot or human, if he had bothered even once to consider me. Of course, he did not."

"Yet, though I am without mentalics, I am nevertheless convinced you are a robot"

Bliss said, "But what if I am? I admit nothing, but I am curious. What if I am?"

"You have no need to admit anything. I know you are a robot If I needed a last bit of evidence, it was your calm a.s.surance that you could block off Gaia and speak to me as an individual. I don't think you could do that if you were part of Gaia-but you are not You are a robot supervisor and, therefore, outside of Gaia. I wonder, come to think of it, how many robot supervisors Gaia requires and possesses?"

"I repeat: I admit nothing, but I am curious. What if I am a robot?"

"In that case, what I want to know is: What do you want of Janov Pelorat? He is my friend and he is, in some ways, a child. He thinks he loves you; he thinks he wants only what you are willing to give and that you have already given him enough. He doesn't know -and cannot conceive-the pain of the loss of love or, for that matter, the peculiar pain of knowing that you are not human-"

"Do you know the pain of lost love?"

"I have had my moments. I have not led the sheltered life of Janov. I have not had my life consumed and anesthetized by an intellectual pursuit that swallowed up everything else, even wife and child. He has. Now suddenly, he gives it all up for you. I do not want him hurt. I will not have him hurt. If I have served Gaia, I deserve a reward-and my reward is your a.s.surance that Janov Pelorat's well-being will be preserved."

"Shall I pretend I am a robot and answer you?"

Trevize said, "Yes. And right now."

"Very well, then. Suppose I am a robot, Trev, and suppose I am in a position of supervision. Suppose there are a few, a very few, who have a similar role to myself and suppose we rarely meet. Suppose that our driving force is the need to care for human beings and suppose there are no true humans beings on Gaia, because all are part of an overall planetary being.

"Suppose that it fulfills us to care for Gaia-but not entirely. Suppose there is something primitive in us that longs for a human being in the sense that existed when robots were first formed and designed. Don't mistake me; I do not claim to be age-old (a.s.suming I am a robot). I am as old as I told you I was or, at least, (a.s.suming I am a robot) that has been the term of my existence. Still, (a.s.suming I am a robot) my fundamental design would be as it always was and I would long to care for a true human being.

"Pel is a human being. He is not part of Gaia. He is too old to ever become a true part of Gaia. He wants to stay on Gaia with me, for he does not have the feelings about me that you have. He does not think that I am a robot. Well, I want him, too. If you a.s.sume that I am a robot, you see that I would. I am capable of all human reactions and I would love him. If you were to insist I was a robot, you might not consider me capable of love in some mystic human sense, but you would not be able to distinguish my reactions from that which you would call love-so what difference would it make?"

She stopped and looked at him-intransigently proud. Trevize said, "You are telling me that you would not abandon him?"

"If you a.s.sume that I am a robot, then you can see for yourself that by First Law I could never abandon him, unless he ordered me to do so and I were, in addition, convinced that he meant it and that I would be hurting him more by staying than by leaving."

"Would not a younger man-"

"What younger man? You are a younger man, but I do not conceive you as needing me in the same sense that Pel does, and, in fact, you do not want me, so that the First Law would prevent me from attempting to cling to you."

"Not me. Another younger man-"

"There is no other. Who is there on Gaia other than Pel and yourself that would qualify as human beings in the non-Gaian sense?"

Trevize said, more softly, "And if you are not a robot?"

"Make up your mind," said Bliss.

"I say, if you are not a robot?"

"Then I say that, in that case, you have no right to say anything at all. It is for myself and for Pel to decide."

Trev said, "Then I return to my first point. I want my reward and that reward is that you will treat him well. I won't press the point of your ident.i.ty. Simply a.s.sure me, as one intelligence to another, that you will treat him well."

And Bliss said softly, "I will treat him well-not as a reward to you, but because I wish to. It is my earnest desire. I will treat him well." She called "Pel!" And again, "Pel!"

Pelorat entered from outside, "Yes, Bliss."

Bliss held out her hand to him. "I think Trev wants to say something."

Pelorat took her hand and Trevize then took the doubled hand in his two. "Janov," he said, "I am happy for both of you."

Pelorat said, "Oh, my dear fellow."

Trevize said, "I will probably be leaving Gaia. I go now to speak to Dom about that. I don't know when or if we will meet again, Janov, but, in any case, we did well together."

"We did well," said Pelorat, smiling.

"Good-bye, Bliss, and, in advance, thank you."

"Good-bye, Trev."

And Trevize, with a wave of his hand, left the house.

Dom said, "You did well, Trev. -But then, you did as I thought you would."

They were once more sitting over a meal, as unsatisfactory as the first had been, but Trevize did not mind. He might not be eating on Gaia again.

He said, "I did as I thought you would, but not, perhaps, for the reason you thought I would."

"Surely you were sure of the correctness of your decision."

"Yes, I was, but not because of any mystic grip I have on certainty. If I chose Galaxia, it was through ordinary reasoning-the sort of reasoning that anyone else might have used to come to a decision. Would you care to have me explain?"

"I most certainly would, Trev."

Trevize said, "There were three things I might have done. I might have joined the First Foundation, or joined the Second Foundation, or joined Gaia.

"If I had joined the First Foundation, Mayor Branno would have taken immediate action to establish domination over the Second Foundation and over Gaia. If I had joined the Second Foundation, Speaker Gendibal would have taken immediate action to establish domination over the First Foundation and over Gaia. In either case, what would have taken place would have been irreversible-and if either were the wrong solution, it would have been irreversibly catastrophic.

"If I joined with Gaia, however, then the First Foundation and the Second Foundation would each have been left with the conviction of having won a relatively minor victory. All would then have continued as before, since the building of Galaxia, I had already been told, would take generations, even centuries.

"Joining with Gaia was my way of temporizing, then, and of making sure that there would remain time to modify matters-or even reverse them-if my decision were wrong."

Dom raised his eyebrows. His old, almost cadaverous face remained otherwise expressionless. He said in his piping voice, "And is it your opinion that your decision may turn out wrong?"

Trevize shrugged. "I don't think so, but there is one thing I must do in order that I might know. It is my intention to visit Earth, if I can find that world."

"We will certainly not stop you if you wish to leave us, Trev-"

"I do not fit on your world."

"No more than Pel does, yet you are as welcome to remain as he is. Still, we will not hold you. -But tell me, why do you wish to visit Earth?"

Trevize said, "I rather think you understand."

"I do not."

"There is a piece of information you withheld from me, Dom. Perhaps you had your reasons, but I wish you had not."

Dom said, "I do not follow you."

"Look, Dom, in order to make my decision, I used my computer and for a brief moment I found myself in touch with the minds of those about me-Mayor Branno, Speaker Gendibal, Novi. I caught glimpses of a number of matters that, in isolation, meant little to me, as, for example, the various effects Gaia, through Novi, had produced on Trantor-effects that were intended to maneuver the Speaker into going to Gaia."

"Yes?"

"And one of those things was the clearing from Trantor's library of all references to Earth."

"The clearing of references to Earth?"

"Exactly. So Earth must be important-and not only does it appear that the Second Foundation must know nothing about it, but that I must not, either. And if I am to take the responsibility for the direction of Galactic development, I do not willingly accept ignorance. Would you consider telling me why it was so important to keep knowledge of Earth hidden?"

Dom said solemnly, "Trev, Gaia knows nothing about such clearance. Nothing!"

"Are you telling me that Gaia is not responsible?"

"It is not responsible."

Trevize thought for a while, the tip of his tongue moving slowly and meditatively over his lips. "Who was responsible, then?"

"I don't know. I can see no purpose in it."

The two men stared at each other and then Dom said, "You are right. We had seemed to have reached a most satisfactory conclusion, but while this point remains unsettled, we dare not rest. -Stay a while with us and let us see what we can reason out. Then you can leave, with our full help."

"Thank you," said Trevize.