Henry Kuttner

“ It is true that I could take your money and assure secrecy by killing you, but I am not permitted to kill humans. The alternative is to engage in the barter system. I can offer you something valuable in return for a small amount of gold. Let me see.” The faceted gaze swept around the tent, dwelt piercingly for a moment on Kelvin. “A horoscope,” the robot said. “It is supposed to help you achieve health, fame and fortune. Astrology, however, is out of my line. I can merely offer a logical scientific method of attaining the same results.” ”

“ Tharn was very thin, but he looked active. He looked quite active enough to spring right into the hotel room. His skin was whiter than his turban, and his hands had seven fingers each, all right.
Kelvin abruptly turned away, but Tharn was resourceful. The dark window made enough of a reflecting surface to show a lean, loin-clothed figure. The feet showed bare, and they were less normal than Tharn’s hands. And the polished brass of a lamp-base gave back the picture of a small, distorted face not Kelvin’s own. ”

“ But Kelvin didn’t answer. He had suddenly remembered the other thing the robot had told him about that gadget which established rapport when he pressed the button. He pressed it now—and nothing happened. The gadget had gone dead. Its task was finished, which obviously meant he had at last achieved health, fame and fortune. The robot had warned him, of course. The thing was set to do one specialized job. Once he got what he wanted, it would work no more. ”

“ Kelvin said simply. “And shut up and listen.” He began to explain, as to a small, stupid child. (The man before him was one of America’s foremost chemists.) “Proteins are made of amino acids. There are about thirty-three amino acids—”
“There aren’t.”
“There are. Shut up. Their molecules can be arranged in lots of ways. So we get an almost infinite variety of proteins. And all living things are forms of protein. The absolute synthesis involves a chain of amino acids long enough to recognize clearly as a protein molecule. ”

“ The artificial life that had animated the android was gone. It would not return.
Kelvin turned his back and drew a long, shuddering breath. He was safe. He closed his mind to all thoughts but one, all problems but one.
How can I find the red-moustached man?
He pressed the button.
This is the way the story starts:
Quarra Vee sat in the temporal warp with his android Tharn, and made sure everything was under control.
“How do I look?” he asked.
“You’ll pass,” Tharn said. “Nobody will be suspicious in the era you’re going to. It didn’t take long to synthesize the equipment.” ”

“ Kelvin cried.
“If you use the rapport device, your health, fame and fortune will be assured,” the robot said rapidly. “You will be as happy as any man of this era can be. It will solve all your problems—including Tharn. Wait a minute.” The creature took a backward step and disappeared behind a hanging Oriental rug that had never been east of Peoria.
There was silence.
Kelvin looked from his altered watch to the flat, enigmatic object in his palm. It was about two inches by two inches, and no thicker than a woman’s vanity-case, and there was a sunken push-button on its side. ”

“ So he came back inside the booth and looked around. A fat man in a swami’s costume was unconscious behind the carved chest the robot had indicated. His breath, plus a process of deduction, told Kelvin that the man had been drinking.
Not knowing what else to do, Kelvin called on the Deity again. He found suddenly that he was thinking about someone or something called Tharn, who was an android.
Horomancy ... time ... rapport ... no! Protective disbelief slid like plate armor around his mind. A practical robot couldn’t be made. ”

“ Kelvin clapped a hand to his eyes and spun away. In about fifteen seconds he spread his fingers enough to peep through them at the glass. He kept his palm pressed desperately to his upper lip, in some wild hope of inhibiting the sudden sprouting of a moustache. What peeped back at him from the mirror looked like himself. At least, it had no turban, and it did not wear horn-rimmed glasses. He risked snatching his hand away for a quick look, and clapped it in place again just in time to prevent Tharn from taking shape in the glass. ”

“ But meanwhile you can use it to solve all your problems by tapping the brain of the more intelligent specimen in the future. The important point is to concentrate on your problems before you press the button. Otherwise you may get more than Tharn on your track.”
“Tharn? What—”
“I think an—an android,” the robot said, looking at nothing. “An artificial human ... However, let us consider my own problem. I need a small amount of gold.”
“So that’s the kicker,” Kelvin said, feeling oddly relieved. ”

“ The future man’s name was Quarra Vee. Odd he had never realized that before, but how often does a man think of his own name? Quarra Vee was playing some sort of game vaguely reminiscent of chess, but his opponent was on a planet of Sirius, some distance away. The chessmen were all unfamiliar. Complicated, dizzying space-time gambits flashed through Quarra Vee’s mind as Kelvin listened in. Then Kelvin’s problem thrust through, the compulsion hit Quarra Vee, and ”

“ The man with the red moustache seemed quite interested. “Fischer assembled a chain of eighteen,” he said, blinking. “Abderhalden got up to nineteen, and Woodward, of course, has made chains ten thousand units long. But as for testing—”
“The complete protein molecule consists of complete sets of sequences. But if you can test only one or two sections of an analogue you can’t be sure of the others. Wait a minute.” Kelvin used the rapport case again. “Now I know. Well, you can make almost anything out of synthesized protein. ”

“ The senses get synthesized in the brain into a sort of common language, a master-tongue. Part of it was auditory, part pictorial, and there were smells and tastes and tactile sensations that were sometimes familiar and sometimes spiced with the absolutely alien. ”

“ But, most important, the man in the future had had—or would have—a compulsion to think about the teleportation method, and as Kelvin snapped back into his own mind and time, he instantly used that method.... ”