The Science Fiction anthology. Andre Norton

      Richard Rowe

      Krumbine slumped back in his chair, which braced itself manfully against him, and looked long and thoughtfully at Potshelter. “Well, if that’s a code, it’s certainly a fiendishly subtle one. You’d think he was talking to his Girl Next Door.”

      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-writtening, 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 writtens 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.”

      Outside, 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 always 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 Stuff, by Henry Slesar

      “No