Caves of Steel - Isaac Asimov [55]
“I’m just wondering, Daneel. Can you smile?” He spoke in a casual whisper.
R. Daneel smiled. The gesture was sudden and surprising. His lips curled back and the skin about either end folded. Only the mouth smiled, however. The rest of the robot’s face was untouched.
Baley shook his head. “Don’t bother, R. Daneel. It doesn’t do a thing for you.”
They were at the entrance. Person after person thrust his metal food tag through the appropriate slot and had it scanned. Click—click—click—
Someone once calculated that a smoothly running kitchen could allow the entrance of two hundred persons a minute, the tags of each one being fully scanned to prevent kitchen-jumping, meal-jumping, and ration-stretching. They had also calculated how long a waiting line was necessary for maximum efficiency and how much time was lost when any one person required special treatment.
It was therefore always a calamity to interrupt that smooth click—click by stepping to the manual window, as Baley and R. Daneel did, in order to thrust a special-permit pass at the official in charge.
Jessie, filled with the knowledge of an assistant dietitian, had explained it once to Baley
“It upsets things completely,” she said. “It throws off consumption figures and inventory estimates. It means special checks. You have to match slips with all the different Section kitchens to make sure the balance isn’t too unbalanced, if you know what I mean. There’s a separate balance sheet to be made out each week. Then if anything goes wrong and you’re overdrawn, it’s always your fault. It’s never the fault of the City Government for passing out special tickets to everybody and his kid sister. Oh, no. And when we have to say that free choice is suspended for the meal, don’t the people in line make a fuss. It’s always the fault of the people behind the counter.…”
Baley had the story in the fullest detail and so he quite understood the dry and poisonous look he received from the woman behind the window. She made a few hurried notes. Home Section, occupation, reason for meal displacement (“official business,” a very irritating reason indeed, but quite irrefutable). Then she folded the slip with firm motions of her fingers and pushed it into a slot. A computer seized it, devoured the contents, and digested the information.
She turned to R. Daneel.
Baley let her have the worst. He said, “My friend is out-of-City.”
The woman looked finally and completely outraged. She said, “Home City, please.”
Baley intercepted the ball for Daneel once again. “All records are to be credited to the Police Department. No details necessary. Official business.”
The woman brought down a pad of slips with a jerk of her arm and filled in the necessary matter in dark-light code with practiced pressings of the first two fingers of her right hand.
She said, “How long will you be eating here?”
“Till further notice,” said Baley.
“Press fingers here,” she said, inverting the information blank.
Baley had a short qualm as R. Daneel’s even fingers with their glistening nails pressed downward. Surely, they wouldn’t have forgotten to supply him with fingerprints.
The woman took the blank away and fed it into the all-consuming machine at her elbow. It belched nothing back and Baley breathed more easily.
She gave them little metal tags that were in the bright red that meant “temporary.”
She said, “No free choices. We’re short this week. Take table DF.”
They made their way toward DF.
R. Daneel said, “I am under the impression that most of your people eat in kitchens such as these regularly.”
“Yes. Of course, it’s rather gruesome eating in a strange kitchen. There’s no one about whom you know. In your own kitchen, it’s quite different. You have your own seat which you occupy all the time. You’re with your family, your friends. Especially when you’re young, mealtimes are the bright spot of the day.” Baley smiled in brief reminiscence.
Table DF was apparently among those reserved for transients. Those already seated watched their plates uneasily and did not talk with one another.