"No foolin'? What's a watt ... aw, you're pullin' my leg again, Freddy, talkin' riddles. Where'd ya ever learn to talk that way anyhow!" "Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Oxford, Georgia Tech, Oklahoma. Picked up a little here, a little there," Freddy said, reflecting on his indiscriminate past. "Aw, cut it out, Freddy! C'mon, read it to me. Betcha can't! Where'd ya say it was from? Cygnus?" "Not Cygnus. Ganymede." Freddy cleared his throat and rattled the newspaper authoritatively. "Washington: White House sources declared today that intelligent beings on a Jupiter moon have contacted the United States government. While the contents of the message have been made secret, the White House emphasized the message was friendly." Freddy continued, "The signals, which were intercepted yesterday, were decoded this morning by a team of government scientists and cryptographers who had been at the task all night. While officials were noncommittal about the nature of the message contained in the signals, they declared, 'We are authorized to state that the received message was friendly and appears to represent a sincere attempt by another race of intelligent beings to contact the people of Earth. A reply message is being formulated.' Officials further explained that the possibility of the signal's being a hoax has been thoroughly investigated and that there is no doubt whatsoever that the message is a genuine interspatial communication from intelligent beings on Ganymede. Ganymede is one of twelve moons of the planet Jupiter, and is larger than the planet Mercury." Freddy stopped. "Ain't there any more?" Willy whined. "The rest of it is about how far away Ganymede is, and its relative density and mass and stuff. You wouldn't be interested, Willy." "Oh. I guess not." Willy helped himself to a peanut. "What's it mean, Freddy?" "Nothing much, Willy. Just that there's people somewhere besides here on Earth, and they called us on the phone." "Whadd'ya know about that!" Willy gasped. "I didn't even know they was other people!" He stared with disbelief at the paper. "I don't suppose anyone knew." "How d'ya suppose they knew?" Willy asked. "I mean, that we was here, if we didn't know they was there?" "I've been wondering about that, Willy. You know that last rocket we shot?" "From Cape Carnival you mean?" "Yeh. It was supposed to go into orbit around Jupiter. I wouldn't be surprised if maybe it didn't land on Ganymede; the people there could have examined it, figured out where it came from, and then radioed us on the same frequency the rocket transmitter used. Paper doesn't say that, of course, but it's a reasonable hypothesis." "Freddy, I think you must be a genius or sumpin'." Freddy smiled and stretched out to sleep again as Willy wandered off, staring blankly at the newspaper. * * * * * Carlton Jones, America's Number One personnel specialist, scowled at the pamphlet on his desk.