"Of course I have ground lights!" shrilled Marcia-Joan. "I'll show you—not that I care if you trip or not."
A moment later, lights concealed among the trees glowed into life. Robert walked outside and turned toward the cottage.
I should have asked her what the colors of my robots had to do with it, he thought, and turned back to re-enter.
He walked right into the closed door, which failed to open before him, though it had operated smoothly a moment ago.
"Robots not admitted after dark," a mechanical voice informed him. "Return to your stall in the shed."
"Whom do you think you're talking to?" demanded Robert. "I'm not one of your robots!"
There was a pause.
"Is it Marcia-Joan?" asked the voice-box, after considerable buzzing and whirring.
"No, I'm Robert."
There was another pause while the mechanism laboriously shifted back to its other speech tape. Then: "Robots not admitted after dark. Return to your stall in the shed."