Dr. Glassman's eyes crinkled goodnaturedly. He tightened his arm around her waist. "I'll protect you, Ethel," he said. She looked up at the giant structure that dwarfed them to insignificance. "Against that?" she snorted. "What with? A lance and prancing nag of leather and bones like Don Quixote of old?" She slipped her arm around his shoulders, her expression softening. "But I know what you mean. Only ... it's...." "And I know what you mean, too. Sometimes even I'm afraid of it. But once we activate it, it will take years for it to build up a self-integrated mind even equal to a child's. And we'll both be long dead before its intelligence starts climbing above that of man. You know, I'm hungry." Together, arm in arm, they departed, closing the door. And once again the echoes died away, leaving only the silence. And the Brain. * * * * * "How about being quiet for a minute so I won't get these mixed up?" Earl Frye said, a mask of tolerant good nature concealing his irritation. "By the way, what's wrong with p. n. 9? Bottleneck?" Irene Conner clapped her hand over her mouth and spoke from between her fingers. "Go ahead and pour," she mumbled. "I'll keep quiet for five minutes." "Okay," Earl said, unaffected by the twinkle in Irene's clear blue eyes, the smooth wave of her blonde hair, the quiet unscientific curves under her lab apron. He picked the first vial off the tray, read the number on its label and carefully jotted it down on the lab card. He emptied the vial into the small opening on top the pump and flicked the toggle switch. With a smooth whir the pump started. The pressure gauge needle broke from zero and started upward, finally hovering near the seven ton per square inch mark. He watched as the fluid he had poured emerged into glass tubing no thicker than a human hair, and, under the tons per square inch pressure, stretched into fine fluid columns less than half a dozen molecules thick. He repeated the performance with another vial and another pump, and another, until all ten pumps were working. He went back to the first one. The fluid had reached the slightly enlarged bubble several inches up the thread-like glass tubes. He shut off the pump, then went through the same routine with the other ten. "That show I want to see is on at the Rialto, Earl," Irene said. "Just tonight and tomorrow night." "Good," Earl grunted, starting to recheck the charts. "Let me know if you liked it. If it's any good I might go see it." "Why don't you come see it with me?" Irene said. "Uh," Earl hesitated, not looking up from a chart he was studying. He was saved by the hall door opening. "Hi, Basil," he said, taking in Basil Nelson's expression of mild haste, and the empty test tube in his hand. Irene frowned in annoyance.