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"Mammoth's milk?" asked ENIAC thickly. "What year is this?"
Martin drew a long breath. Ivan's capacious memory had served him very well so
far. Voltage, he recalled, increased the frequency of the robot's
thought-patterns and disorganized ENIAC's memory-
which was being proved before his eyes. But the crux of his plan was yet to
come... .
"The year of the Great Hairy One, of course," Martin said briskly. "Don't you
remember?"
"Then you-" ENIAC strove to focus upon his drink-ing-companion. "You must be
Mammoth-Slayer."
"That's it!" Martin cried. "Have another jolt. What about giving me the
treatment now?"
"What treatment?"
Martin looked impatient. "You said you were going to impose the
character-matrix of Mammoth-Slayer on my mind. You said that would insure my
optimum ecological adjustment in this temporal phase, and nothing else would."
"Did I? But you're not Mammoth-Slayer," ENIAC said confusedly. "Mammoth-Slayer
was the son of the
Great Hairy One. What's your mother's name?"
"The Great Hairy One," Martin replied, at which the robot grated its hand
across its gleaming forehead.
"Have one more jolt," Martin suggested. "Now take out the ecologizer and put
it on my head."
"Like this?" ENIAC asked, obeying. "I keep feeling I've forgotten something
important. F (t)."
Martin adjusted the crystal helmet on his skull. "Now,"
he commanded. "Give me the character-matrix of Mammoth-Slayer, son of the
Great Hairy One."
"Well-all right," ENIAC said dizzily. The red ribbons swirled. There was a,-,
flash from the helmet. "There," the robot said. "It's done. It may take a few
minutes to begin functioning, but then fof twelve hours you'll-wait! Where are
you going?" *. f
But Martin had already departed.
The robot stuffed the helmet and the quarter-mile of red ribbon back for the
last tune. He lurched to the floor-lamp, muttering something about one for the
road. Afterward, the room lay empty. A
fading murmur said, "F (t)."
"Nick!" Erika gasped, staring at the figure in the doorway. "Don't stand like
that! You frighten me!"
Everyone in the room looked up abruptly at her cry, and so were just in time
to see a horrifying change take place hi Martin's shape. It was an illusion,
of course, but an alarming one. His knees slowly bent until he was
half-crouching, his shoulders slumped as though bowed by the weight of
enormous back and shoulder muscles, and his arms swung forward until their
knuckles hung perilously near the floor.
Nicholas Martin had at last achieved a personality whose ecological norm would
put him on a level with Raoul St. Cyr.
"Nick!" Erika quavered.
Slowly Martin's jaw protruded till his lower teeth were hideously visible.
Gradually his eyelids dropped until he was peering up out of tiny, wicked
sockets. Then, slowly, a perfectly shocking grin broadened Mr. Martin's mouth.
"Erika," he said throatily. "Mine!"
And with that, he shambled forward, seized the horrified girl in his arms, and
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bit her on the ear.
"Oh, Nick," Erika murmured, closing her eyes. "Why didn't you ever-no, no, no!
Nick! Stop it! The contract release. We've got to-Nick, what are you doing?"
She snatched at Martin's departing form, but too late.
For all his ungainly and unpleasant gait, Martin covered ground fast. Almost
instantly he was clambering over Watt's desk as the most direct route to that
startled tycoon. DeeDee looked on, a little surprised, St. Cyr lunged forward.
"In Mixo-Lydia-" he began. "Ha! So!" He picked up Martin and threw him across
the room.
"Oh, you beast," Erika cried, and flung herself upon the director, beating at
his brawny chest. On second thought, she used her shoes on his shins with more
effect. St. Cyr, no gentleman, turned her around, pinioned her arms behind
her, and glanced up at Watt's alarmed cry.
"Martin! What are you doing?"
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There was reason for his inquiry. Apparently unhurt by St. Cyr's toss, Martin
had hit the floor, rofied over and over like- a ball, knocked down a
floor-lamp with a crash, and uncurled, with an unpleasant expression on his
face. He rose crouching, bandy-legged, his arms swinging low, a snarl curling
his lips.
"You take my mate?" the pithecanthropic Mr. Martin inquired throatily, rapidly
losing all touch with the twentieth century. It was a rhetorical question. He
picked up the lamp-standard-he did'not have to bend to do it- tore off the
silk shade as he would have peeled foliage from a tree-
limb, and balanced the weapon in his hand. Then he moved forward, carrying the
lamp-standard like a spear.
"I," said Martin, "kill."
He then endeavored, with the most admirable single-heartedness, to carry out
his expressed intention. The first thrust of the blunt, improvised spear
rammed into St. Cyr's solar plexus and drove him back against the wall with a
booming thud. This seemed to be what Martin wanted. Keeping one end of his
spear pressed into the director's belly, he crouched lower, dug his toes into
the rug, and did his very best to drill a hole in St. Cyr.
"Stop it!" cried Watt, flinging himself into the conflict. Ancient reflexes
took over. Martin's arm shot out. Watt shot off in the opposite direction.
The lamp broke.
Martin looked pensively at the pieces, tentatively began to bite one, changed
his mind, and looked at St. Cyr instead. The gasping director, mouthing
threats, curses and objections, drew himself up, and shook a huge fist at
Martin.
"I," he announced, "shall kill you with my bare hands. Then I go over to MGM
with DeeDee. In Mixo-
Lydia-"
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