Mostly Harmless by Douglas Adams Read Free Book Online Page B

happy when a tiny electrical charge from a point just to the left of the chip reached another point just to the right of the chip. The chip determined whether the charge got there or not.

Ford pulled out a small length of wire that had been threaded into the towel. He dug one end of it into the top left hole of the chip socket and the other into the bottom right hole.

That was all it took. Now the robot would be happy whatever happened.

Ford quickly stood up and whisked the towel away. The robot rose ecstatically into the air, pursuing a kind of wriggly path.

It turned and saw Ford.

`Mr Prefect, sir! I'm so happy to see you!'

`Good to see you, little fella,' said Ford.

The robot rapidly reported back to its central control that everything was now for the best in this best of all possible worlds, the alarms rapidly quelled themselves, and life returned to normal.

At least, almost to normal.

There was something odd about the place.

The little robot was gurgling with electric delight. Ford hurried on down the corridor, letting the thing bob along in his wake telling him how delicious everything was, and how happy it was to be able to tell him that.

Ford, however , was not happy.

He passed faces of people he didn't know. They didn't look like his sort of people. They were too well groomed. Their eyes were too dead. Every time he thought he saw someone he recognised in the distance, and hurried along to say hello, it would turn out to be someone else, with an altogether neater hairstyle and a much more thrusting, purposeful look than, well, than anybody Ford knew.

A staircase had been moved a few inches to the left. A ceiling had been lowered slightly. A Lobby had been remodelled. All these things were not worrying in themselves, though they were a little disorienting. The thing that was worrying was the decor. It used to be brash and glitzy. Expensive - because the Guide sold so well through the civilised and post-civilised Galaxy - but expensive and fun. Wild games machines lined the corridors. Insanely painted grand pianos hung from ceilings, vicious sea creatures from the planet Viv reared up out of pools in tree-filled atria, robot butlers in stupid shirts roamed the corridors seeking whose hands they might press frothing drinks into. People used to have pet vastdragons on leads and pterospondes on perches in their offices. People knew how to have a good time, and if they didn't there were courses they could sign up for which would put that right.

There was none of that now.

Somebody had been through the place doing some iniquitous kind of taste job on it.

Ford turned sharply into a small alcove, cupped his hand and yanked the flying robot in with him. He squatted down and peered at the burbling cybernaut.

`What's been happening here?' he demanded.

`Oh just the nicest things, sir, just the nicest possible things. Can I sit on your lap, please?'

`No,' said Ford, brushing the thing away. It was overjoyed to be spurned in this way and started to bob and burble and swoon. Ford grabbed it again and stuck it firmly in the air a foot in front of his face. It tried to stay where it was put but couldn't help quivering slightly.

`Something's changed, hasn't it?' Ford hissed.

`Oh yes,' squealed the little robot, `in the most fabulous and wonderful way. I feel so good about it.'

`Well what was it like before, then?'

`Scrumptious.'

`But you like the way it's changed?' demanded Ford.

`I like everything,' moaned the robot. `Especially when you shout at me like that. Do it again, please.'

`Just tell me what's happened!'

`Oh thank you, thank you!'

Ford sighed.

`OK, OK,' panted the robot. `The Guide has been taken over. There's a new management. It's all so gorgeous I could just melt. The old management was also fabulous of course, though I'm not sure if I thought so at the time.'

`That was before you had a bit of wire stuck in your head.'

`How true. How wonderfully true. How wonderfully, bub- blingly, frothingly,