"I assure you, Sir, I did nothing more than study the raw material for a time until I came to understand how best to carve it into some shape that would be pleasing to Little Miss. And then I carved it."
"Using what sort of tools, may I ask?"
"A small knife from the kitchen, Sir, which Little Miss kindly provided for me."
"A knife from the kitchen," Sir repeated, in an oddly flat tone. Slowly shaking his head, he hefted the carving in his hand as though he found its beauty almost incomprehensible. " A knife from the kitchen. She gave you a piece of driftwood and an ordinary little kitchen knife and with no other tool than that you were able to make this. "
"Yes, Sir."
The next day Sir brought Andrew another piece of wood from the beach, a larger one that was bent and weathered and stained from its long immersion in the sea. He gave Andrew an electric vibro-knife, and showed him how to use it.
He said, "Make something out of this chunk of wood, Andrew. Anything you want to. I simply want to watch you while you're doing it."
"Certainly, Sir."
Andrew pondered the driftwood for a time, and then he switched on the vibro-knife and watched the movements of its blade edge, using his very finest optical focus, until he understood what sort of results the knife would be able to produce, and then finally he began to work. Sir sat right next to him, but as Andrew set about the task of carving he became barely aware of the human being adjacent to him. He was wholly focused on his task. All that mattered to him at that moment was the piece of wood, and the vibro-knife, and the vision of the thing that he intended to bring forth from the wood.
When he was done, he handed the carving to Sir, and went to fetch the dust-pan so that he could sweep up the shavings. Upon his return to the room he found Sir sitting motionless, staring at the carving in a kind of numb, stunned way.
"I asked for a household robot of the NDR series," Sir said softly. "I don't remember specifying anything about special craftsman adaptations."
"Indeed, Sir. I am an NDR household robot. I have no specialized implants having to do with craft skills."
"Yet you made this. I saw you do it with my own eyes."
"That is so, Sir."
"Could you make other things out of wood, do you think? Cabinets, let's say? Desks? Lamps? Large-scale sculptures?"
"I am unable to tell you, Sir. I have never attempted such things."
"Well, you will now."
After that, Andrew spent very little time preparing meals and waiting at the table, or doing the other minor jobs around the house that had become part of his daily routine. He was ordered to read books on woodcarving and design, with a special emphasis on furniture-making, and one of the empty attic rooms was set aside as a workshop for him.
Although he continued to carve small wooden trinkets for Miss and Little Miss and occasionally for Ma'am as well-bracelets, earrings, necklaces, pendants-Andrew devoted much of his time, at Sir's suggestion, to such things as cabinets and desks. His designs were striking and unusual. He employed rare and exotic woods which Sir provided, and decorated them with inlays of the most intricate and ingenious patterns.
Sir went upstairs to the workshop every day or two to inspect the latest creations.
"These are amazing productions, Andrew," he would say again and again. "Utterly amazing. You aren't just an artisan, do you realize that? You're a true artist. And the things you've been turning out are works of art."
Andrew said, "I enjoy making them, Sir."
"Enjoy?"
"Should I not be using that word?"
"It's a little unusual to hear a robot speaking of 'enjoying' something, that's all. I didn't realize that robots had the capacity for feelings of that sort."
"Perhaps I use the concept loosely."
"Perhaps you do," Sir said. "But I'm not so sure. You say that you enjoy making this furniture. What exactly do you mean by that?"
"When I do the work, it makes the circuits of my brain somehow flow more easily. That seems to me to be the equivalent of the human feeling known as 'enjoyment.' I have heard you use the word 'enjoy' and I think I understand its significance. The way you use it fits the way I feel. So it seems appropriate for me to say that I enjoy making these things, Sir."
"Ah. Yes."
Sir was quiet for a time.
"You are a very unusual robot, do you know that, Andrew?"
"I am entirely standard, Sir. My circuitry is modular NDR, nothing more, nothing less."
"Indeed."
"Does my doing this cabinetwork trouble you, Sir?"
"Not at all, Andrew. Quite the contrary."
"Yet I sense some uneasiness in your vocal tones. There is a quality in them of-how shall I express it?-a quality of surprise? No, 'surprise' is inaccurate. A quality of uncertainty? Of doubt?-What I mean is that you appear to be thinking, Sir, that I am working beyond the programmed levels of my capacities."
"Yes," said Sir. "That's exactly what I do think, Andrew. Well beyond your programmed levels, as a matter of fact. Not that I'm troubled that you've unexpectedly turned out to have this little streak of artistic ability in you, you understand. But I'd like to know just why it's there."
Chapter Four
A FEW DAYS LATER Gerald Martin telephoned the managing director of the regional headquarters of the United States Robots and Mechanical Men Corporation and said, "I'm having a little problem with the NDR household robot that you assigned to me."
The managing director's name was Elliot Smythe. Like many of the high executives of U.S.R.M.M., Smythe was a member of the extensive and powerful Robertson family, descended from the original Lawrence Robertson who had founded the U. S. Robots Corporation in the latter part of the Twentieth Century.