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Sincerely,

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.”