"What the hell do you think you are?" ground out Baley. "You're not a detective. You're a cerebroanalysis machine like the electroencephalographs we have in this building. You've got arms, legs, a head, and can talk, but you're not one inch more than that machine. Putting a lousy circuit into you doesn't make you a detective, so what do you know? You keep your mouth shut, and let me do the figuring out."
The robot said quietly, "I think it would be better if you lowered your voice, Elijah. Granted that I am not a detective in the sense that you are, I would still like to bring one small item to your attention."
"I'm not interested in listening."
"Please do. If I am wrong, you will tell me so, and it will do no harm. It is only this. Last night you left our room to call Jessie by corridor phone. I suggested that your son go in your place. You told me it was not the custom among Earthmen for a father to send his son into danger. Is it then the custom for a mother to do so?"
"No, of cour - " began Baley, and stopped.
"You see my point," said R. Daneel. "Ordinarily, if Jessie feared for your safety and wished to warn you, she would risk her own life, not send her son. The fact that she did send Bentley could only mean that she felt that he would be safe while she herself would not. If the conspiracy consisted of people unknown to Jessie, that would not be the case, or at least she would have no reason to think it to be the case. On the other hand, if she were a member of the conspiracy, she would know, she would know, Elijah, that she would be watched for and recognized, whereas Bentley might get through unnoticed."
"Wait now," said Baley, sick at heart, "that's feather-fine reasoning."
There was no need to wait. The signal on the Commissioner's desk was flickering madly. R. Daneel waited for Baley to answer, but the latter could only stare at it helplessly. The robot closed contact.
"What is it?"
R. Sammy's slurring voice said, "There is a lady here who wishes to see Lije. I told her he was busy, but she will not go away. She says her name is Jessie."
"Let her in," said R. Daneel calmly, and his brown eyes rose unemotionally to meet the panicky glare of Baley's.
Chapter 14. POWER OF A NAME
Baley remained standing in a tetany of shock, as Jessie ran to him, seizing his shoulders, huddling close.
His pale lips formed the word, "Bentley?"
She looked at him and shook her head, her brown hair flying with the force of her motion. "He's all right."
"Well, then..."
Jessie said through a sudden torrent of sobs, in a low voice that could scarcely be made out, "I can't go on, Lije. I can't. I can't sleep or eat. I've got to tell you."
"Don't say anything," Baley said in anguish. "For God's sake, Jessie, not now."
"I must. I've done a terrible thing. Such a terrible thing. Oh, Lije..." She lapsed into incoherence.
Baley said, hopelessly, "We're not alone, Jessie."
She looked up and stared at R. Daneel with no signs of recognition. The tears in which her eyes were swimming might easily be refracting the robot into a featureless blur.
R. Daneel said in a low murmur, "Good afternoon, Jessie."
She gasped. "Is it the - the robot?"
She dashed the back of her hand across her eyes and stepped out of Baley's encircling right arm. She breathed deeply and, for a moment, a tremulous smile wavered on her lips. "It is you, isn't it?"
"Yes, Jessie."
"You don't mind being called a robot?"
"No, Jessie. It is what I am."
"And I don't mind being called a fool and an idiot and a - a subversive agent, because it's what I am."
"Jessie!" groaned Baley.
"It's no use, Lije," she said. "He might as well know if he's your partner. I can't live with it any more. I've had such a time since yesterday. I don't care if I go to jail. I don't care if they send me down to the lowest levels and make me live on raw yeast and water. I don't care if... You won't let them, will you, Lije? Don't let them do anything to me. I'm fuh - frightened."
Baley patted her shoulder and let her cry.
He said to R. Daneel. "She isn't well. We can't keep her here. What time is it?"
R. Daneel said without any visible signs of consulting a timepiece, "Fourteen-forty-five."
"The Commissioner could be back any minute. Look, commandeer a squad car and we can talk about this in the motorway."
Jessie's head jerked upright. "The motorway? Oh, no, Lije."
He said, in as soothing a tone as he could manage, "Now, Jessie, don't be superstitious. You can't go on the expressway the way you are. Be a good girl and calm down or we won't even be able to go through the common room. I'll get you some water."
She wiped her face with a damp handkerchief and said drearily, "Oh, look at my makeup."
"Don't worry about your makeup," said Baley. "Daneel, what about the squad car?"
"It's waiting for us now, partner Elijah."
"Come on, Jessie."
"Wait. Wait just a minute, Lije. I've got to do something to my face."
"It doesn't matter now."
But she twisted away. "Please. I can't go through the common room like this. I won't take a second."
The man and the robot waited, the man with little jerky clenchings of his fists, the robot impassively.
Jessie rummaged through her purse for the necessary equipment. (If there were one thing, Baley had once said solemnly, that had resisted mechanical improvement since Medieval times, it was a woman's purse. Even the substitution of magnetic clotures for metal clasps had not proven successful.) Jessie pulled out a small mirror and the silver-cased cosmetokit that Baley had bought her on the occasion of three birthdays before.