Light bathed my bench. I looked at the scattered parts of the computer, and grunted with relief. Of course! I had come back to the lab after dinner to work some more.
I started to take off my coat. Sudden doubt made me pause. I went slowly over to the corner medicine cabinet and looked at my reflection. My face looked back at me. I needed a shave. But my face was familiar. It was undoubtedly mine. Still....
I groped in my coat pocket and found it empty. I patted my hip pocket, and took out my wallet. I flipped it open and searched the driver's license for my name.
The name written there was Orville Snyder.
In that moment a strange emotion of detachment settled upon me. Almost disinterestedly I looked at other identifications. Each bore the signature of Orville Snyder.
Yet I was not Orville Snyder. I was Fred Martin....
"Now look here, Fred," I said aloud. "Something's wrong." I grinned, but I knew it wasn't funny.
I went to the mirror again and studied my face. It was the same face I had seen there a minute before. I tried to detach myself, to make it seem a strange face. I couldn't. It was my own face.
I went back to my bench and frowned down at the scattered parts. Tube banks, condensors, resistors, switches. I had laid them out myself before going out to eat, so they would be ready when I returned.
"Now let's see," I said aloud. "I distinctly remember laying them out. Thordsen was talking to me at the time. We were discussing the feedback principle in this circuit. Then he left. I went to the supply room to get that extra tube tank. Then I went out to ... to...."