The top of the head was fashioned into a square cap as though this were the emblem of the thing's vocation. A similar device was moulded into its convex chest plate. And under the chest emblem was a row of tiny buttons, a dozen or more. I stared at them, fascinated. Were they controls? Some seemed higher, more protruding, than others. Had they been set into some combination to give this monster its orders? Had some human master set these controls? And I saw what seemed a closed door in the side of the huge metal body. A door which could be opened to make adjustments of the mechanisms within? What strange mechanisms were in there? I stared at the broad, corrugated forehead. What was in that head? Mechanisms? What mechanisms could make this thing think? Were thoughts lurking in that metal skull? From the head abruptly came a voice--a deep, hollow, queerly toneless voice, utterly, unmistakably mechanical. Yet it was sufficiently life-like to be the recreated, mechanically reproduced voice of a human. The thing was speaking to me! A machine was speaking its thoughts! Gruesome! The iron lips were unmoving. There were no muscles to give expression to the face: the lens eyes stared inscrutably unblinking. * * * * * It spoke: "You will know me again? Is that not true?" My head whirled. The thing reiterated, "Is that not true?" A mockery of a human man--but in the toneless voice there seemed irony! I felt Mary clutching at me. "Why--why, yes," I stammered. "I did not realize you could talk." "I can talk. And you can talk my language. That is very good." It turned away. I saw the small red beams from its eyes go to where the cage bars were less blurred, less luminous, as though there was a rectangle of window there, and the Robot was staring out. "Did it speak to you like that, Mary?" I asked. "Yes," she whispered. "A little. But pray do not anger it." "No." For a time--a nameless time in which I felt my thoughts floating off upon the hum of the room--I lay with my fingers gripping Mary's arm. Then I roused myself. Time had passed; or had it? I was not sure. I whispered against her ear, "Those are controls on its chest. If only I knew--" The thing turned the red beams of its eyes upon me. Had it heard my words? Or were my thoughts intangible vibrations registering upon some infinitely sensitive mechanism within that metal head? Had it become aware of my thoughts? It said with slow measured syllables, "Do not try to control me. I am beyond control." * * * * * It turned away again; but I mastered the gruesome terror which was upon me. "Talk," I said. "Tell me why you abducted this girl from the year 1777." "I was ordered to." "By whom?" There was a pause. "By whom?" I demanded again. "That I will not tell." Will not? That implied volition. I felt that Mary shuddered. "George, please--" "Quiet, Mary." Again I asked the Robot, "Who commands you?" "I will not tell."