"No." Kesley crossed his legs and stared broodingly at his boots for a moment. The entire City a vast sentient machine, then! No wonder the Dukes left it alone; they knew they would never have the strength to destroy Wiener, and so they preferred that the machine-hating populace never learned of the City's existence. He found himself greatly curious about the City. His imagination was engaged by the implications of a city-sized mechanical mind; he who had never dealt with any machine more complex than a pistol, who had had only fleeting acquaintance with the remnants of the Old Days, was fascinated by this mightiest machine of all. "What can you tell me about Dale Kesley?" he asked on a sudden impulse. Again silence--silence while photon-tracers raced over cryotronic circuits searching for information. Then: "Dale Kesley, farmer, entered Iowa Province June 21, 2521, no previous record, left Iowa Province undetermined time in spring of this year. Entered City of Wiener unaccompanied except by one mutant horse Type VX-1342 on October 8 of this year. Further information is lacking." "Thanks," Kesley said hoarsely. His first twenty years were blank to the City, too. "Mind if I look around the place a little?" "Limited examination of City of Wiener is permitted," the metal voice said. "Your animal has been removed for care and will be returned to you upon request." He glanced through the thick glass window of the cubicle and saw that it was indeed so. While he had talked, unseen hands--_hands?_--had taken the horse away. Led it to pasture, Kesley wondered? * * * * * He wandered through the silent halls of the complex city, observing with a sort of quiet horror the chill efficiency with which the robot mind carried out its daily routine. The City _was_ populated. Kesley came across the inhabitants immediately after leaving the glass-walled cubicle. They were man-sized robots of blue metal, rolling on noiseless treads, equipped with opposable-thumbed hands and filament-ended tentacles and wiry grippers, seeing out of bright electrophotic eyes and gazing evenly ahead with expressionless, shiny faces. One of them was squatting over an immense heap of coiled tape which was growing almost as fast as he could scoop it up and feed it into the chittering maw of some glossy data-eater in one wall. Another was repairing a mass of tangled circuits in an exposed ganglion behind a section of wall. Still another of the mechanical men stood at some distance away, holding a segmented tube to the mouth of Kesley's horse. The horse had its jointed scaly lips pressed tight against the tube, and was eating or drinking with evident contentment. Air-conditioners hummed gently in the background, keeping the atmosphere pure and dustless. From the floor came the throbbing of some mighty engines far below. Kesley wondered just how deep in the ground the City penetrated.