" Erika said tartly. "For a moment I thought you'd acquired a
backbone."

"If I were somebody like Hemingway--" Martin began in a miserable voice.

"Did you say Hemingway?" the robot inquired. "Is this the
Kinsey-Hemingway era? Then I must be right. You're Nicholas Martin, the
next subject. Martin, Martin? Let me see--oh yes, the Disraeli type,
that's it." He rubbed his forehead with a grating sound. "Oh, my poor
neuron thresholds! Now I remember."

* * * * *

"Nick, can you hear me?" Erika's voice inquired. "I'm coming over there
right away. Brace yourself. We're going to beard St. Cyr in his den and
convince Watt you'll never make a good screen-writer. Now--"

"But St. Cyr won't _ever_ admit that," Martin cried. "He doesn't know
the meaning of the word failure. He says so. He's going to make me into
a screen-writer or kill me."

"Remember what happened to Ed Cassidy?" Erika reminded him grimly. "St.
Cyr didn't make him into a screen-writer."

"True. Poor old Ed," Martin said, with a shiver.

"All right, then. I'm on my way. Anything else?"

"Yes!" Martin cried, drawing a deep breath. "Yes, there is! I love you
madly!"

But the words never got past his glottis. Opening and closing his mouth
noiselessly, the cowardly playwright finally clenched his teeth and
tried again. A faint, hopeless squeak vibrated the telephone's disk.
Martin let his shoulders slump hopelessly. It was clear he could never
propose to anybody, not even a harmless telephone.

"Did you say something?" Erika asked. "Well, good-bye then."

"Wait a minute," Martin said, his eyes suddenly falling once more upon
the robot. Speechless on one subject only, he went on rapidly, "I forgot
to tell you. Watt and the nest-fouling St. Cyr have just hired a mock-up
phony robot to play in _Angelina Noel_!"

But the line was dead.

"I'm not a phony," the robot said, hurt.

Martin fell back in his chair and stared at his guest with dull,
hopeless eyes. "Neither was King Kong," he remarked. "Don't start
feeding me some line St. Cyr's told you to pull. I know he's trying to
break my nerve. He'll probably do it, too. Look what he's done to my
play already. Why Fred Waring? I don't mind Fred Waring in his proper
place. There he's fine. But not in _Angelina Noel_. Not as the
Portuguese captain of a fishing boat manned by his entire band,
accompanied by Dan Dailey singing _Napoli_ to DeeDee Fleming in a
mermaid's tail--"