off the wall
in a random pattern. Stanton would retrieve the ball before it hit the
ground, bounce it off the wall again to strike the target on the moving
robot. Stanton had to work against a machine; no ordinary human being
could have given him any competition.

_Pok! Pok! Ping!_

_Pok! Pok! Ping!_

_Pok! Pok! PLUNK._

"One miss," Stanton said to himself. But he fielded the next one nicely
and slammed it home.

_Pok! Pok! Ping!_

The physical therapist who was standing by glanced at his watch. It was
almost time.

_Pok! Pok! Ping!_

The machine, having delivered its last ball, shut itself off with a smug
click. Stanton turned away from the handball court and walked toward the
physical therapist, who held out a robe for him.

"That was good, Bart," he said, "real good."

"One miss," Stanton said as he shrugged into the robe.

"Yeah. Your timing was a shade off there, I guess. But you ran a full
minute over your previous record."

Stanton looked at him. "You re-set the timer again," he said accusingly.
But there was a grin on his face.

The P.T. man grinned back. "Yup. Come on, step into the mummy case." He
waved toward the narrow niche in the wall of the court, a niche just big
enough to hold a standing man. Stanton stepped in, and various instrument
pick-ups came out of the walls and touched his body. Hidden machines
recorded his heartbeat, blood pressure, brain activity, muscular tension,
and several other factors.

After a minute, the P.T. man said, "O.K., Bart; let's hit the steam box."

Stanton stepped out of the niche and accompanied the therapist to another
room, where he took off the robe again and sat down on the small stool
inside an ordinary steam box. The box closed, leaving his head free, and
the box began to fill with steam.

"Did I ever tell you what I don't like about that machine?" Bart asked as
the therapist draped a heavy towel around his head.

"Nope. Didn't know you had any gripe. What is it?"

"You can't gloat after you beat it. You can't walk over and pat it on the
shoulder and say, 'Well, better luck next time, old man.' It isn't a good
loser, and it isn't a bad loser. The damn thing doesn't even know it lost,
and if it did, it wouldn't care."

"I see what you mean," said the P.T. man, chuckling. "You beat the pants
off it and what d'you get? Not even a case of the sulks out of it."

"Exactly. And what's worse, I know perfectly good and well that it's only
half trying