Moxon's Master

“But in my spiritual exaltation, discretion and civility were alike forgotten, and I opened the door.”

Read at: http://www.eastoftheweb.com/short-stories/UBooks/MoxoMast.shtml

Made me think of The Mechanical Turk, also known as the Automaton Chess Player https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechanical_Turk#:~:text=The%20Mechanical%20Turk%2C%20also%20known,chess%20against%20a%20human%20opponent.