"Let's see your credentials again," I demanded as my mind raced: Oh, where's Tessie? What was it Fitz had said? Brownie, maybe Brownie, can explain—
The census taker pulled papers from his pocket, then reeled as though drunk. He staggered backward against and out of the door, the autoclose slamming it behind him.
I jerked open the door and jumped out on the stoop.
In those few seconds the man had vanished—
No! There he was fifty feet away ringing Mike Kozulak's bell. And he was erect, completely steady!
But nobody could move that fast!
I turned back and picked up the papers he'd dropped. There was a little sheaf of them, printed on incredibly thin paper. The printing resembled the wave-forms I had seen upon the 'scope. It was like some twisted Arabic script. And this strange script was overprinted on a star-chart which I thought I recognized.
I plumbed my mind, I had it! In a star identification course at M. I. T. they had given us star-charts showing us the galaxy as seen from another star which we were asked to identify. One of those charts at M. I. T. had been almost exactly the same as this: the galaxy as viewed from Alpha Centauri!
I was stunned. I staggered a bit as I went back out on the stoop and looked down the street. I welcomed the sight of Ed Fitzgerald hurrying up across the neighbors' forelawns, uprooting some of the burbanked tropical plants en route.