"Why, no," said Lindsay, surprised. "It's entirely up to the individual—or the parents."
"And Doc Craven asked no questions that would lead to the truth?" the girl asked, blinking. When Lindsay shook his head she suddenly grabbed him and kissed him and did a little dance of sheer joy. "It's simply too good to be true! Two computers fouled in one day through missing information!"
"You're right, of course," he admitted. "But I'm damned if I see how it does us any good."
"You idiot!" she shook him. "It clears the whole situation. It means that the computers cannot give accurate answers according to the symbolic logic tables unless they get full information. And you have proved two breakdowns in the inescapable human element—the information feeding—just like that!" She snapped her fingers. "It means we've got the whole computer-cult on the hip. I could kiss you again, you big goon." She did so.
"Cut it out," he said. "I'm not made of brass."
She said, "Night soil," amiably. What he might have done he was never to know, for a buzzer sounded and Nina moved quickly to a wall-talkie. She said, "All right, Bob, you say he's clean?" Then, a moment later, "Better let him in and say his piece." And, to Lindsay, "We've got company. Dmitri Alenkov—met him?"
Lindsay frowned. "You mean the Soviet chargé d'affaires? I met him at the reception last week. Dreadful little lizard."
"Dmitri might surprise you," she said enigmatically.
Lindsay almost said night soil himself in exasperation. Instead and peevishly he asked, "Is there anybody you don't know—intimately?"
She laughed. "Of course," she said, "I don't know many women."