Potshelter nodded wonderingly. "I only read as far as where they were planning to blow up Grand Central Spaceport and all the guides in it."
"Judas Priest, I think I have it!" Krumbine shot up. "It's a pilot advertisement — Boy Next Door or — that kind of thing — printed to look like hand-writing, which would make all the difference. And the pilot copy got mailed by accident — which would mean there is no real Richard Rowe."
At that instant, the door dilated and two blue detective engines hustled a struggling young man into the office. He was slim, rather handsome, had a bushy head of hair that had somehow survived evolution and radioactive fallout, and across the chest and back of his paper singlet was neatly stamped: "Richard Rowe."
When he saw the two men, he stopped struggling and straightened up. "Excuse me, gentlemen," he said, "but these police machines must have made a mistake. I've committed no crime."
Then his gaze fell on the hand addressed envelope on Krumbine's desk and he turned pale.
Krumbine laughed harshly. "No crime! No, not at all. Merely using the mails to communicate. Ha!"
The young man shrank back. "I'm sorry, sir."
"Sorry, he says! Do you realize that your insane prank has resulted in the destruction of perhaps a half-billion pieces of first-class advertising? — in the strangulation of a postal station and the paralysis of Lower Manhattan? — in the mobilization of SBI reserves, the de-mothballing of two divisions of G. I. machines and the redeployment of the Solar Battle Fleet? Good Lord, boy, why did you do it?"
Richard Rowe continued to shrink but he squared his shoulders. "I'm sorry, sir, but I just had to. I just had to get in touch with Jane Dough."
"A girl from another hive? A girl you'd merely gazed at because a guide happened to blow a fuse?" Krumbine stood up, shaking an angry finger. "Great Scott, boy, where was Your Girl Next Door?"
Richard Rowe stared bravely at the finger, which made him look a trifle cross-eyed. "She died, sir, both of them."
"But there should be at least six."
"I know, sir, but of the other four, two have been shipped to the Adirondacks on vacation and two recently got married and haven't been replaced."
Potshelter, a faraway look in his eyes, said softly, "I think I'm beginning to understand—"
But Krumbine thundered on at Richard Rowe with, "Good Lord, I can see you've had your troubles, boy. It isn't often we have these shortages of Girls Next Door, so that temporarily a boy can't marry the Girl Next Door, as he always should. But, Judas Priest, why didn't you take your troubles to your psychiatrist, your groupmaster, your socializer, your Queen Mother?"
"My psychiatrist is being overhauled, sir, and his replacement short-circuits every time he hears the word 'trouble.' My groupmaster and socializer are on vacation duty in the Adirondacks. My Queen Mother is busy replacing Girls Next Door."
"Yes, it all fits," Potshelter proclaimed excitedly. "Don't you see, Krumbine? Except for a set of mischances that would only occur once in a billion billion times, the letter would never have been conceived or sent."
"You may have something there," Krumbine concurred. "But in any case, boy, why did you — er — written this letter to this particular girl? What is there about Jane Dough that made you do it?"
"Well, you see, sir, she's—"
Just then, the door re-dilated and a blue matron machine conducted a young woman into the office. She was slim and she had a head of hair that would have graced a museum beauty, while across the back and — well, "chest" is an inadequate word — of her paper chemise, "Jane Dough" was silk-screened in the palest pink.
Krumbine did not repeat his last question. He had to admit to himself that it had been answered fully. Potshelter whistled respectfully. The blue detective engines gave hard-boiled grunts. Even the blue matron machine seemed awed by the girl's beauty.
But she had eyes only for Richard Rowe. "My Grand Central man," she breathed in amazement. "The man I've dreamed of ever since. My man with hair." She noticed the way he was looking at her and she breathed harder. "Oh, darling, what have you done?"
"I tried to send you a letter."
"A letter? For me? Oh, darling!"
Krumbine cleared his throat "Potshelter, I'm going to wind this up fast. Miss Dough, could you transfer to this young man's hive?"
"Oh, yes, sir! Mine has an over- plus of Girls Next Door."
"Good. Mr. Rowe, there's a sky- pilot two levels up — look for the usual white collar just below the photocells. Marry this girl and take her home to your hive. If your Queen Mother objects refer her to — er — Potshelter here."
He cut short the young people's thanks. "Just one thing," he said, wagging a finger at Rowe. "Don't written any more letters."
"Why ever would I?" Richard answered. "Already my action is beginning to seem like a mad dream."
"Not to me, dear," Jane corrected him. "Oh, sir, could I have the letter he sent me? Not to do anything with. Not to show anyone. Just to keep."
"Well, I don't know-" Krumbine began.
"Oh, please, sir!"
"Well, I don't know why not, I was going to say. Here you are, miss. Just see that this husband of yours never writes another."
He turned back as the contracting door shut the young couple from view.
"You were right, Potshelter," he said briskly. "It was one of those combinations of mischances that come up only once in a billion billion times. But we're going to have to issue recommendations for new procedures and safeguards that will reduce the possibilities to one in a trillion trillion. It will undoubtedly up the Terran income tax a healthy percentage, but we can't have something like this happening again. Every boy must marry the Girl Next Door! And the first-class mails must not be interfered with! The advertising must go through!"
"I'd almost like to see it happen again," Potshelter murmured dreamily, "if there were another Jane Dough in it."
Krumbine, Richard and Jane had halted to allow a small cortege of machines to pass. First came a squad of police machines with Black Sorter in their midst, unmuzzled and docile enough, though still gnashing his teeth softly. Then — stretched out horizontally and borne on the shoulders of Gray Psychiatrist, Black Coroner, White Nursemaid Seven and Greasy Joe — there passed the slim form of Pink Wastebasket, snow-white in death. The machines were keening softly, mournfully.
Round about the black pillars, little mecho-mops were scurrying like mice, cleaning up the last of the first-class-mail bits of confetti.
Richard winced at this evidence of his aberration, but Jane squeezed his hand comfortingly, which produced in him a truly amazing sensation that changed his whole appearance.
"I know how you feel, darling," she told him. "But don't worry about it. Just think, dear, I'll al- ways be able to tell your friends' wives something no other woman in the world can boast of: that my husband once wrote me a letter!"
The End
About the Author
Fritz Reuter Leiber Jr. (1910-1992) was an American author of Science Fiction, Horror and Fantasy. He also wrote under the pseudonyms of Fritz Leiber, Jr. and Maurice Breçon. He was also an expert Chess player and a champion fencer.
Other works by Fritz Leiber
Try and Change the Past
A Deskful of Girls
The Number of the Beast
Damnation Morning
The Haunted Future
The Mind Spider
The Oldest Soldier
No Great Magic
Knight to Move
Black Corridor
The Change War
The Big Time
Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser
Two Sought Adventure
The Bleak Shore
The Howling Tower
The Sunken Land (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Thieves' House
Adept's Gambit (Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Claws from the Night
The Seven Black Priests
Two Sought Adventure
Induct
ion
Lean Times in Lankhmar (by Maurice Breçon)
When the Sea-King's Away
Scylla's Daughter
The Unholy Grail
The Cloud of Hate
Bazaar of the Bizarre
The Lords of Quarmall (with Harry Fischer)
The Lords of Quarmall (with Harry Fischer)
Their Mistress, the Sea
The Wrong Branch
In the Witch's Tent
The Two Best Thieves in Lankhmar
The Circle Curse
The Snow Women
The Price of Pain-Ease
The Sadness of the Executioner
Trapped in the Shadowland
The Bait
Beauty and the Beasts
Under the Thumbs of the Gods
Trapped in the Sea of Stars
The Frost Monstreme
Rime Isle
Sea Magic
Bazaar of the Bizarre
The Mer She
The Curse of the Smalls and the Stars
Slack Lankhmar Afternoon Featuring Hisvet
The Mouser Goes Below
Tarzan
Tarzan and the Valley of Gold
Destiny Times Three
Gather, Darkness!
Conjure Wife
The Green Millennium
You're All Alone
The Silver Eggheads
The Wanderer
A Specter is Haunting Texas
Our Lady of Darkness
Night's Black Agents
Shadows With Eyes
Ships to the Stars
A Pail of Air
The Night of the Wolf
The Secret Songs
Night Monsters
You're All Alone
Heroes and Horrors
Le Grand Jeu du Temps
Ship of Shadows
Les Racines du Passé
Smoke Ghost & Other Apparitions
Day Dark, Night Bright
Horrible Imaginings
The Pale Brown Thing
Chapterbooks
Sonnets to Jonquil and All
The Mystery of the Japanese Clock
Quicks Around the Zodiac: A Farce
In the Beginning
The Dealings of Daniel Kesserich
Gonna Roll the Bones (with Sarah L. Thomson)
Adventures of a Balloon
Further Adventures of a Balloon
Riches and Power
Children of Jerusalem
The Road to Jordan
After the Darkness
The Automatic Pistol (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
They Never Come Back (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Smoke Ghost (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Power of the Puppets
The Phantom Slayer
The Hill and the Hole (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Spider Mansion
The Hound (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Mutant's Brother
To Make a Roman Holiday
Taboo
Sanity
Thought
Business of Killing (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Dreams of Albert Moreland (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Wanted - An Enemy
Mr. Bauer and the Atoms (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Alice and the Allergy
The Man Who Never Grew Young (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Diary in the Snow (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Girl with the Hungry Eyes
In the X-Ray (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Let Freedom Ring
The Black Ewe
Martians, Keep Out! (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Lion and the Lamb
The Ship Sails at Midnight
The Enchanted Forest
Later Than You Think
Coming Attraction
The Dead Man (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
Cry Witch!
Nice Girl with Five Husbands
Appointment in Tomorrow
A Pail of Air
When the Last Gods Die
Dr. Kometevsky's Day
The Moon Is Green
The Foxholes of Mars
Yesterday House
I'm Looking for "Jeff"
The Big Holiday
The Night He Cried
A Bad Day for Sales
The Mechanical Bride
The Silence Game
Last
Time Fighter
Friends and Enemies
Time in the Round
Femmequin 973
The Big Trek
What's He Doing in There?
Bread Overhead
The Last Letter
Bullet With His Name
Little Old Miss Macbeth (by Fritz Leiber, Jr.)
The Silver Eggheads
M.S. Found in a Maelstrom
Psychosis from Space
The House of Mrs. Delgato
The Improper Authorities
The Reward
Our Saucer Vacation
The Night of the Long Knives
Mariana
Schizo Jimmie
Rats of LImbo
Deadly Moon
When Set Fled
While Set Fled
All the Weed in the World
Scream Wolf
The Beat Cluster
Hatchery of Dreams
A Visitor from Back East
The Thirteenth Step
The Big Engine
A Bit of the Dark World
The Man Who Made Friends with Electricity
The 64-Square Madhouse
The Secret Songs
The Snowbank Orbit
The Creature from Cleveland Depths
Myths My Great-Granddaughter Taught Me
The Spider
Dr. Adams' Garden of Evil
Game for Motel Room
X Marks the Pedwalk
Kindergarten
Success
Crimes Against Passion
A Hitch in Space
The Bazaar of the Bizarre
237 Talking Statues, Etc.
The Black Gondolier
Lie Still, Snow White
When the Change-Winds Blow
Be of Good Cheer
Midnight in the Mirror World
Mirror
Four Ghosts in Hamlet
Moon Duel
Cyclops
The Good New Days
To Arkham and the Stars
Sunk Without Trace
The Crystal Prison
Gonna Roll the Bones (by Sarah L. Thomson and Fritz Leiber)
The Winter Flies
Answering Service
The Turned-off Heads
When Brahma Wakes
Crazy Annaoj
The Square Root of Brain
One Station of the Way
Richmond, Late September, 1849
Endfray of the Ofay
Ship of Shadows
When They Openly Walk
America the Beautiful
Gold, Black, and Silver
The Lotus Eaters
Another Cask of Wine
Day Dark, Night Bright
The Bump
Cat Three
Waif
Do You Know Dave Wenzel?
Cat's Cradle
Midnight by the Morphy Watch
Mysterious Doings in the Metropolitan Museum
Catch That Zeppelin!
The Glove
Night Passage
Belsen Express
Dark Wings
The Death of Princes
The Eeriest Ruined Dawn World
The Terror from the Depths
The Princess in the Tower 250,000 Miles High
A Rite of Spring
Black Glass
The Man Who Was Married to Space and Time
The Button Molder
The Repair People
The Great San Francisco Glacie
r
The Moon Porthole
Horrible Imaginings
Quicks Around the Zodiac: A Farce
Black Has Its Charms
The Ghost Light
The Mouser Goes Below: An Excerpt
Replacement for Wilmer: A Ghost Story
Thrice the Brinded Cat
The Dealings of Daniel Kesserich
The Enormous Bedroom
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