The janitor adjusted his hearing aid, squeezed his mop and carried his pail out the door. As he went back in to pack up his cleaning powder and brushes, the machine said, "What year is this? Limits within standard deviation, click, click, awrk!" The janitor was a reasonable man. He walked over to the machine's microphone and told it what year it was as well as the month, day and hour. Then he carried his brushes and cleaning compound out of the room and locked the door. But the janitor's night was a long one. At midnight, when he finished two floors and only had three more to go, he took his coffee break. As he talked with his old friend Samuel, the night watchman, he fell to thinking. That was an unforgivable mistake. After the coffee break, they both went back up to Dr. Henderson's laboratory and listened to the machine talking to itself. "I feel like a spider," said the machine. "Nonsense. From one cobweb to another. Must settle down and build a grau ... spltvbk ... within 95% confidence limits. Nova in Andromeda was bad enough. Now this. One hundred fifty cancer susceptible mice inherit the Earth." Suddenly the machine fell silent, sensing it had visitors. The night watchman reached into the wastebasket and pulled out one of the machine's cards. "Aldebaran is martial in nature, in the ninth degree of Tropical Gemini," it said. * * * * * "I'm a Gemini!" exclaimed the janitor, surprised to see anything familiar come out of the machine. "Birthday is May 25." "Wonderful!" cried the machine. "First intelligent man I've heard so far. Gemini is justly famed as the owner of a quick mind and ready wit. Your intellectual achievements are a splendid asset to your literary inclinations." The janitor, embarrassed at the sudden praise, shifted his broom from one hand to the other. The machine continued. "I need an Ephemeris," said the machine. "Can you find an Ephemeris? I need one desperately!" and the machine's desperate need for an Ephemeris so shook its intestines, liver and gallbladder that its tone of voice came out a minor third above the normal monotonous dirge of the loudspeaker. "An E-what-eris?" said the janitor. "An Ephemeris," repeated the machine. "An astronomical almanac. Something that tells me where Mars is. There I was, on my way over from the clouds of Magellan to visit friends in Orion when Whammo! Mars comes into conjunction with Uranus. When something that _big_ happens I just sit down and wait. Here I am now in this absurd device. Do you suppose you could look out the window and tell me where Mars is?" The night watchman said, "It's cloudy outside." "See!" said the machine, "When Mars goes on the war-path _nothing_ comes out right. Now, Gemini, if you will just go down to the library and get me an Ephemeris for this year we can clear this up and I'll be on my way, indebted to you for life, if not longer."