have already covered that ground with the other parties I spoke to
before you," the voice said. "Please hurry and bring Adolf and Benito
to the phone. This connection is getting progressively worse. It can't
last much longer. We spent several years getting it through, you
know."

"Did you now?" I asked politely.

"Yes we did," the voice answered stiffly. Then, annoyed: "_Must_ you
waste this precious time? Please bring Hitler and Mussolini to the
telephone as quickly as possible."

* * * * *

There was a fuzzy crackling over the wire. Like a ship-to-shore
connection.

"Listen, pal," I said. "This joke is costing a couple of guys some
lucrative trade. You are tying up a telephone they need badly in their
business, or didn't you know that?"

"That can't be helped," the voice said stiffly.

"Be a good sport and get off the wire," I said.

"I have no intention of doing that until my boss has talked to Hitler
and Mussolini," the voice said coldly. I knew a positive statement
when I heard one. I hung up, clambered out of the booth, spread my
hands expressively to Mike and Mort who stood there eagerly waiting
for some good word.

"No soap," I said. "I don't think you got a joker on there, and I'd
swear you haven't got a drunk."

"What have we got, then," Mike demanded. "A smart copper waiting to
trap us?"

I shook my head. "I think you got a loony," I said. "But don't quote
me." I started toward the door. "I got work to do, gents, but I'll
look in again a little later. Hope you get rid of your pest."

"We'd better," Mike moaned dismally.

"Brother," Mort declared, pulling his hair and making a sincerely
distraught face, "you're not kidding!"

I looked at the telephone booth and shook my head. "Somebody is," I
told them....

* * * * *

For perhaps three hours I was able to concentrate on my work, with the
telephone booth distraction cropping up only about every fifteen
minutes or so to give me the fidgets.

At the end of that time, a little before two o'clock, I finally
covered up my reproachful typewriter and, on the excuse that I wanted
a coke, left the office to go down and see how the boys were doing
with the determined loony on their telephone.

The "cigar store" was crowded with the usual early-afternoon
hang-arounders when I walked in. Mort and Mike, each behind a dice
board, were accommodating trusting suckers who had somehow gotten t