Vanessa Carlton was looking up at the control panel. Remo saw that her nostrils were pinched, her lips set in a thin straight line, her bosom rising and falling like boiling pudding.
"Look at it," she said. "A city-block-sized cretin. An imbecile."
"Send it back to the manufacturer," said Remo.
"I am the manufacturer," she said. "I've put into this goddam thing everything I know."
"Maybe you don't know enough," said Remo.
"No, Browneyes. I know plenty. A grade-A, certifiable, Mensa-type, high-level genius."
"If she is so smart, surely she would know what a synapse is," whispered Chiun.
Vanessa Carlton did not hear him. She went on, talking more to the computer than to either man. "You know what a genius is? A genius knows when something is impossible. My greatest act of creative genius is to know that it's impossible to create creativity."
"Come again?" said Remo.
"That's something else," she said. "Not again but just once. I'd love to. But get sex off your mind. God, why are you men always interested in nothing but sex. Jugs. Butts. That's all you ever think about. I'm trying to talk sense to you and all you can think of is female orgasm."
"Do not worry yourself with him," said Chiun. "He is untrained and couthless."
Vanessa Carlton nodded in agreement. "Anyway," she said, "I've given up. I've programmed my machines for everything. For speech. For movement. For strength. For adaptability. For analysis. For survival. I've gone further than anyone else ever has gone. But I just can't build creativity into them."
"So what?" asked Remo.
She shook her head at what she regarded as rampant stupidity. "You must be good in the sack, Browneyes, 'cause you ain't too shiny any other way."
"Call me Remo," said Remo.
"Fine. And you can call me Dr. Carlton. If we could have designed creativity into a spaceship computer, three unmanned probes that we lost would still be working. A computer, you see, works fine when everything is predictable."
"Weather changes. Malfunctions. Meteor showers, all those things that knock out spaceships. They don't seem very predictable," said Remo.
"But they are. Variables are the most predictable things of all. You just program in different possibilities and teach the computer what to do in response to them. But what you can't do is teach a machine to respond to something unique, something that wasn't programmed in. Or to do anything unique, for that matter. You can't find a computer that's going to paint a Gioconda smile on the Mona Lisa."
In Remo's ear, Chiun whispered, "That is a picture of a fat Italian woman with a silly smirk."
"Thanks, Chiun," said Remo.
"You've seen computers play chess," the woman said. "You can program them with a million different games played by a thousand different masters. And the first time they run up against a player who makes a move that's got brilliance in it, a move that's not in their program, they start to babble like idiots. They not only can't create, they can't function in the face of creativity. What a drag."
They were interrupted by the cart called Mr. Seagrams rolling in silently and taking Dr. Carlton's martini glass from her hand. It mixed a fresh martini and extended it to her. She took it wordlessly and the cart went into reverse and rolled back toward the door. Dr. Carlton took a vicious sip.
"What a drag," she repeated. "My contribution to scientific history is going to be to say that there's a limit to man's creativity. He cannot create its duplicate. An interesting paradox, don't you think? Man is so unlimited that he meets his limit when he tries to duplicate himself. The Carlton Paradox."
"What is she talking about?" asked Remo.
"Quiet," hissed Chiun. "She is teaching us how to combat Mr. Gordons."
"Well, if you can't create creativity, what was this creativity program you put together for NASA a little while ago?" asked Remo.
"It was the best I could do," she said. "A five-year-old's creativity. It's kind of creativity at random. A five-year-old can't focus. Neither could my creativity program. You couldn't put it to use to solve any specific problem because you never knew when it was going to be creative."
"Then why'd the government take it?" asked Remo.
"Why not? They might get lucky. Suppose it decided to get creative at just the right time, at just the moment some unforeseen problem arises on a mission? Whammo, it could save a flight. It couldn't hurt and it might help."
"And that's the program they gave Mr. Gordons," Remo said.
The martini glass dropped from Vanessa Carlton's hand and shattered on the stone floor, splashing the liquor upon her mini-skirted legs, but she was oblivious to it.
"What did you say?" She stared hard at Remo.
"That was the program Mr. Gordons got his hands on," said Remo.
"No," she said in disbelief. "No. They weren't stupid enough to…"
"Sure were," said Remo cheerily.
"Do they know what they've done? Do they have any idea?"
"No," said Remo. "Neither do we. That's why we're here. To talk to you about Mr. Gordons. Just who is he anyway?"
"Mr. Gordons is the most dangerous… man in the world."
"He used to work here?" Remo asked.
"You might say that. And if they give him creativity, even a little of it, he could run amok. Creativity might just tell him to kill everybody because everybody's a threat to him."
"And then what?"
"And then a lot of people will die. Who are you anyway? You're not from NASA, are you?"
"Let me handle this, Remo," said Chiun. He turned to Dr. Carlton. "No, dear lady, we are just two humble people attracted by your brilliance and who have come to learn at your feet."
"You know, old fella, I don't think I trust you anymore."
Chiun nodded. "It is best to be cautious. I myself never trust anyone under seventy. But you can trust us."
"Not until you tell me who you are," said Dr. Carlton.
Remo interrupted Chiun. "We're from the government. We've got to track down Gordons and put him out of commission before he floods the country with counterfeits. Now we need your help." He stopped. Dr. Carlton was laughing.
"What's so funny?" Remo asked.
"You can't put Mr. Gordons out of commission," she said.