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Show waving a hand in dismissal. He laughed good naturedly while they continued walking down the aisle, their steps echoing hollowly on the stone floor. "But, see ye, this place here is utterly safe-dust proof, sound proof, moisture proof, earthquake proof, flood proof, explosion proof. Full Secure in every way. Such a catastrophe would ne'er happen." The Visitor looked dazed. "So you don't know where anything i s , " he murmured. "Well..." The assistant put it to the Visitor frankly. "Hark ye, good sir, why should we? We give the Governor all the data any system could wish for and t h e n . . . i t does things." He ticked some of these things off on his fingers. "Sends out payroll checks, runs utilities, collects taxes, solves supply problems, settles labor disputes, predicts the weather. . . ." "And it does all these things. . .accurately?" broke in the Visitor. "Yea, verily! As accurately as a full army of clerks and managers!" The Visitor raised his eyes to the vaulted ceiling. "As an example..-" the young man went on. He stepped to a monitoring console stuck in a curve made by the tubing and pulled out the chair in front of it. " . . . t h e weather this afternoon." He turned his bright blond head to the Visitor- "Ye will be shuttling to Portage this afternoon, will ye not?" The Visitor nodded. The young man sat down before the console, typed in the appropriate coding, and asked for a weather report. The display winked immediately to life and gave the answer. "Quick today," murmured the young assistant, watching the flickering screen. "Full quick." Visitor Householder hung 288 |
