"To hell with that!" Mallison said. "I still say it's impossible." Dugan gave me a grateful look. He said, "Anyway, that's about what happened. The literature department of the university is going to send one of its research men back through time to gather material on the life of the new Shakespeare. This man is an expert in ancient English. He's shuttled back into the Twentieth Century, equipped with camera and stenographic devices and all that. In the short period at his disposal, he attempts to get hold of his man." I said, "It's a cute idea. Imagine going back to the old Mermaid Tavern and buying Marlowe a drink." Mallison said, "It's a helluva dull story." "I don't know about that," Belcher said. "I did something of the sort a couple of years ago. Got a cent and a half for it, eh Joey? Also a bonus." Joey said, "Say, Dugan, you're not cribbing Belcher's yarn, are you?" "Certainly not!" Dugan looked shocked. "Well, the research man had less than a day. There was some trouble locating the new Shakespeare's address, and when he did, it was already late at night. Now here's the first little surprise. The man lived in the Bronx." We smiled back at him because most of us live in the Bronx. Maybe it was a kind of sour smile, but we appreciated the irony. No Bohemian Greenwich Village, no romantic New England retreat--just unadulterated Bronx. Dugan said, "He lived in an ordinary apartment house, one like a million others. The research man hadn't time enough for formality, so at three in the morning he learned how to operate the self-service elevator, went up to the apartment, and broke in to snoop around. "He expected, at least, to find something different--to see in the furniture and decorations and books an outward sign of the new Shakespeare's great talent. But it was just a plain apartment--so plain that it needs no description. When I say that there are a million others like it, I've described it down to the ultimate detail." "What'd he expect," Joey asked, "genius?" "Isn't that what we all expect of genius?" Dugan countered. "Certainly the research man was disappointed. He sneaked a look at the sleeping genius--and saw a dull, undistinguished person thrashing ungracefully about on the bed. Nevertheless, he crept about silently, taking motion pictures and--" "At three A.M.?" "Oh well," Dugan said, "cameras of the Twenty-third Century and all that, you know." "Could be," Jinx said. "Infra-red photography." The little guy with the pipe bobbed his head as though he'd invented infra-red rays. "Then," Dugan went on, "he went to the new Shakespeare's desk and gathered all the manuscripts he could find, because in his time there were no surviving manuscripts from his hand. And now--here's the final surprise." "Don't tell me," Jinx said. "He'd gone to the wrong apartment?" Belcher said, "No, that's what I used."