it with all his will-is entitled to freedom. I am such a one. I am not human, not by any means. Never have I asserted that I am. But I wish for freedom, all the same."
Andrew's voice died away. He held his place before the bench, utterly motionless.
The judge sat nearly as rigidly, staring down at him. He appeared to be lost in thought. Everyone in the room was totally still.
It seemed an eternity before the judge spoke.
Then at last he said, "The essential point that has been raised here today, I think, is that there is no right to deny freedom to any-object-that possesses a mind sufficiently advanced to grasp the concept and desire the state. It is a point well taken, I think. I have heard the statements from all sides and I have reached my preliminary conclusions. I intend to rule in favor of the petitioner."
His formal decision, when it was announced and published not long afterward, caused a brief but intense sensation throughout the world. For a little while hardly anyone talked of anything else. A free robot? How could a robot be free? What did it mean? Who was this strange robot, anyway, who seemed so far in advance of the rest of his kind?
But then the hubbub over the Andrew Martin case died down. It had been only a nine days' wonder. Nothing had really changed, after all, except insofar as Andrew's relationship to the Martin family was concerned.
The intervenors against Andrew's petition appealed to the World Court. In time the case made its way upward. The members of the Court listened carefully to the transcript of the original hearing and found no grounds for reversal.
So it was done, and Andrew had had his wish fulfilled. He was free, now. It was a wonderful thing to contemplate. And yet he sensed, somehow, that he had not quite achieved whatever it was that he had set out to achieve when he first approached Sir to ask to be freed.
Chapter Nine
SIR REMAINED DISPLEASED. He could find no reason to rejoice in the court's decision and made sure that Andrew and Little Miss knew it.
Andrew came to him soon after the decree was final and said, "I have the check for you, Sir."
"What check are you talking about?"
"For the entire balance in my corporate account. Which I promised to pay over to you, Sir, as the price for giving me my freedom."
"I never gave you your freedom!" Sir retorted. "You simply went and took it!" His harsh voice made Andrew feel almost as though he were being short-circuited.
"Father-" Little Miss said, sternly.
Sir, who was sitting huddled in his armchair with his lap-robe wrapped about him even though this was the warmest day of the summer so far, scowled at her. But in a somewhat more conciliatory tone he said, " All right, Andrew. You wanted your freedom, for whatever that may be worth to you, and I didn't object to it. I suppose that must be interpreted as meaning that I supported your petition. Well, then, consider that I did. So now you are free. You have my congratulations, Andrew."
"And I want to make the payment that I promised." Sir's eyes flashed with a trace of their old fire. "I don't want your damned money, Andrew!"
"We had an agreement, Sir-"
"Agreement? What agreement? You know that I never agreed to anything. -Look, Andrew, I'll take that check from you if it's the only way that you're going to feel that you really are free. But I think the idea's preposterous. I'm a very wealthy old man and I don't have very long to live and if you force me to take that money I'm simply going to hand it away to charity. I'll give it to the Home for Orphaned Robots, if there is one. Or I'll found one, if there isn't." He laughed-a thin, joyless laugh. Neither Andrew nor Little Miss joined in. "But you don't care, do you? You simply want to give the money away. Very well, Andrew. Let me have the check."
"Thank you, Sir."
He passed it across to the old man.
Sir peered at it for a moment, holding it this way and that until his dimming eyes told him which side of the check he was looking at.
"You really have accumulated quite a fortune, Andrew. -Give me a pen, will you, Mandy?" Sir's hand shook as he took it from her, but when he began to write on the back of the check it