What broke loose is popularly and succinctly described as hell.
It was what the Fundamentalists were waiting for. They were not a political party; they made pretense to no formal religion. Essentially they were those who had not adapted themselves to what had once been called the Atomic Age, in the days when atoms were a novelty. Actually, they were the Simple-Lifers, hungering after a life, which to those who lived it had probably appeared not so Simple, and who had been, therefore, Simple-Lifers themselves.
The Fundamentalists required no new reason to detest robots and robot manufacturers; but a new reason such as the Quinn accusation and the Calvin analysis was sufficient to make such detestation audible.
The huge plants of the U. S. Robot amp; Mechanical Men Corporation was a hive that spawned armed guards. It prepared for war.
Within the city the house of Stephen Byerley bristled with police.
The political campaign, of course, lost all other issues, and resembled a campaign only in that it was something filling the hiatus between nomination and election.
Stephen Byerley did not allow the fussy little man to distract him. He remained comfortably unperturbed by the uniforms in the background. Outside the house, past the line of grim guards, reporters and photographers waited according to the tradition of the caste. One enterprising 'visor station even had a scanner focused on the blank entrance to the prosecutor's unpretentious home, while a synthetically excited announcer filled in with inflated commentary.
The fussy little man advanced. He held forward a rich, complicated sheet. "This, Mr. Byerley, is a court order authorizing me to search these premises for the presence of illegal... uh... mechanical men or robots of any description."
Byerley half rose, and took the paper. He glanced at it indifferently, and smiled as he handed it back. "All in order. Go ahead. Do your job. Mrs. Hoppen" - to his housekeeper, who appeared reluctantly from the next room -" please go with them, and help out if you can."
The little man, whose name was Harroway, hesitated, produced an unmistakable blush, failed completely to catch Byerley's eyes, and muttered, "Come on," to the two policemen.
He was back in ten minutes.
"Through?" questioned Byerley, in just the tone of a person who is not particularly interested in the question, or its answer.
Harroway cleared his throat, made a bad start in falsetto, and began again, angrily, "Look here, Mr. Byerley, our special instructions were to search the house very thoroughly."
"And haven't you?"
"We were told exactly what to look for."
"Yes?"
"In short, Mr. Byerley, and not to put too fine a point on it, we were told to search you."
"Me?" said the prosecutor with a broadening smile. "And how do you intend to do that?"
"We have a Penet-radiation unit-"
"Then I'm to have my X-ray photograph taken, hey? You have the authority?"
"You saw my warrant."
"May I see it again?"
Harroway, his forehead shining with considerably more than mere enthusiasm, passed it over a second time.
Byerley said evenly, "I read here as the description of what you are to search; I quote: 'the dwelling place belonging to Stephen Allen Byerley, located at 355 Willow Grove, Evanstron, together, with any garage, storehouse or other structures or buildings thereto appertaining, together with all grounds thereto appertaining'... um... and so on. Quite in order. But, my good man, it doesn't say anything about searching my interior. I am not part of the premises. You may search my clothes if you think I've got a robot hidden in my pocket."
Harroway had no doubt on the point of to whom he owed his job. He did not propose to be backward, given a chance to earn a much better - i.e., more highly paid - job.
He said, in a faint echo of bluster, "Look here. I'm allowed to search the furniture in your house, and anything else I find in it. You are in it, aren't you?"
"A remarkable observation. I am in it. But I'm not a piece of furniture. As a citizen of adult responsibility - I have the psychiatric certificate proving that - I have certain rights under the Regional Articles. Searching me would come under the heading of violating my Right of Privacy. That paper isn't sufficient."
"Sure, but if you're a robot, you don't have Right of Privacy."
"True enough but that paper still isn't sufficient. It recognizes me implicitly as a human being."
"Where?" Harroway snatched at it.
"Where it says 'the dwelling place belonging to' and so on. A robot cannot own property. And you may tell your employer, Mr. Harroway, that if he tries to issue a similar paper which does not implicitly recognize me as a human being, he will be immediately faced with a restraining injunction and a civil suit which will make it necessary for him to prove me a robot by means of information now in his possession, or else to pay a whopping penalty for an attempt to deprive me unduly of my Rights under the Regional Articles. You'll tell him that, won't you?"
Harroway marched to the door. He turned.. "You're a slick lawyer-" His hand was in his pocket. For a short moment, he stood there. Then he left, smiled in the direction of the 'visor scanner, still playing away - waved to the reporters, and shouted, "We'll have something for you tomorrow, boys. No kidding."
In his ground car, he settled back, removed the tiny mechanism from his pocket and carefully inspected it. It was the first time he had ever taken a photograph by X-ray reflection. He hoped he had done it correctly.
Quinn and Byerley had never met face-to-face alone. But visorphone was pretty close to it. In fact, accepted literally, perhaps the phrase was accurate, even if to each, the other were merely the light and dark pattern of a bank of photocells.