For that matter, what was the purpose of Travelers Aid Bureau? It was a
front for another kind of activity. Philanthropy had nothing to do with
it.
If he still had possession of Dimanche, he'd be able to find out.
Everything seemed to hinge on that. With it, he was nearly a superman,
able to hold his own in practically all situations--anything that
didn't involve a Huntner woman, that is.
Without it--well, Tunney 21 was still far away. Even if he should
manage to get there without it, his mission on the planet was certain
to fail.
He dismissed the idea of trying to recover it immediately from Murra
Foray. She was an audio-sensitive. At twenty feet, unaided, she could
hear a heartbeat, the internal noise muscles made in sliding over
each other. With Dimanche, she could hear electrons rustling. As an
antagonist she was altogether too formidable.
* * * * *
He began pulling on his clothing, wincing as he did so. The alternative
was to make another Dimanche. _If_ he could. It would be a tough job
even for a neuronic expert familiar with the process. He wasn't that
expert, but it still had to be done.
The new instrument would have to be better than the original. Maybe not
such a slick machine, but more comprehensive. More wallop. He grinned
as he thought hopefully about giving Murra Foray a surprise.
Ignoring his aches and pains, he went right to work. With money not a
factor, it was an easy matter to line up the best electronic and neuron
concerns on Godolph. Two were put on a standby basis. When he gave them
plans, they were to rush construction at all possible speed.
Each concern was to build a part of the new instrument. Neither part
was of value without the other. The slow-thinking Godolphians weren't
likely to make the necessary mental connection between the seemingly
unrelated projects.
He retired to his suite and began to draw diagrams. It was harder than
he thought. He knew the principles, but the actual details were far
more complicated than he remembered.
Functionally, the Dimanche instrument was divided into three main
phases. There was a brain and memory unit that operated much as the
human counterpart did. Unlike the human brain, however, it had no body
to control, hence more of it was available for thought processes.
Entirely neuronic in construction, it was far smaller than an
electronic brain of the same capacity.
The second function was electronic, akin to radar. Instead of material
objects, it traced and recorded distant nerve impulses. It could count
the heartbeat, measure the rate of respiration, was even capable of
approximate analysis of the contents of the bloodstream. Properly
focused on the nerves of tongue, lips or larynx, it transmitted that
data back to the neuronic brain, which then reconstructed it into
speech. Lip reading, after a fashion, carried to the ultimate.
Finally, there was the voice of Dimanche, a speaker under the control
of the neuronic brain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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