He bought a Times and read it while he ate breakfast. The big news story was, of course, the visit of Mekky to New York, and the reception that had been given him. There was a picture splashed over a quarter of the front page of the sphere poised in midair outside the open window and Betty Hadley leaning out of the window, bowing to the crowd below.
A boxed item of ten-point boldface type gave the words Mekky had spoken to the crowd, just as Keith had heard them there, inside his head. «Friends, I leave you now to bear a message from my master Dopelle to—»
Yes, word for word. And apparently that had been the only public statement from the mechanical brain. An hour later it had returned to «somewhere in space» as the news story put it.
He skimmed the rest of the paper. There was no news of the war—no mention of the crisis Mekky had said (privately to Keith) was impending in the war. If things were going badly, apparently it was being kept from the public. If Mekky had told him a military secret it must have been because Mekky realized that he was in no spot to spread it farther, even if he wished to.
An item on an inside page about a man being fined two thousand credits and costs for possession of a coin interested him. He read it carefully but didn’t find any answer to the problem of why possession of coins was illegal. He made a mental note to look it up as soon as he had time. Not today—he had too much to do today.
First thing was to rent a typewriter. By taking a chance on using the name Keith Winton, for which he still had identification in his wallet, he got one without having to leave a deposit and took it to his room in the hotel.
He put in the hardest day’s work he’d ever done in his life. At the end of it—he was dead tired by seven o’clock and had to quit then—he’d finished seven thousand words. A four thousand word story and a three thousand worder.
True, they were both rewrites of stories he’d written before, long ago, but he’d done a better job on them this time. One was a straight action story in a Civil War setting, the other a light romance set against the background of early pioneer days in Kansas.
He fell into bed, too sleepy to phone down to the desk and leave a call for in the morning.
But he awoke early, just after five o’clock. Back in his room after coffee and doughnuts, he read over the two stories and was more than satisfied with them. They were good. What had been wrong with them before hadn’t been the plots—it had been the writing and the treatment and five years as an editor had taught him something after all.
He could make a living writing—he was sure of that now. Oh, he couldn’t bat out two stories a day except while he was rewriting his old stuff from memory but he wouldn’t have to. Once he’d rewritten the dozen or so stories he’d picked out he’d have a backlog. Two shorts or a novelet a week would be plenty once he’d used up his available old plots and had to think up new ones.
One more, he decided, and he’d start out to peddle them—And start, of course, with Borden Publications. They were good for quick checks if they liked the stories.
For his third rewrite job, he picked a science-fiction, remembering that Marion Blake had told him they were in the market for stuff for a new book in that field. He had one that wouldn’t require any revamping at all—a time-travel story about a man who goes back to prehistoric times.
It was told from the point of view of the cave man who encounters the time-traveler and none of it was in a modern setting—so he couldn’t go wrong.
He started batting the typewriter again and had it finished by nine o’clock.
Half an hour later he was smiling down at Marion Blake across the reception desk. She smiled back. «Yes, Mr. Winston?»
«Brought in three stories,» he said proudly. «One I want to leave with Miss Hadley for her book and—who’s running this new science-fiction book you told me was starting?»
«Keith Winton. Temporarily anyway. After it’s really on the stands they may put someone else on it.»
«Good, I’ll want to see him too, then. And—I had a copy but I forgot to notice—who’s running War Adventure Stories?»
«Keith Winton edits that, too. That and Surprising Stories are his regular books. I think he’s free now. I’ll see if he can talk to you. Miss Hadley’s busy but maybe she’ll be free by the time you’ve talked to Mr. Winton, Mr. Winston. Uh—your names are a lot alike, aren’t they?»
«Almost a coincidence—same initial, too.» He laughed. «Maybe he’ll want me to use a different by-line if he buys the stories. He may figure some of his readers will think Karl Winston is a nom de plume of Keith Winton.»
Marion Blake had pushed a plug into the switchboard and was talking into the mouthpiece. She pulled the plug. «He’ll see you now,» she said. «I—uh—told him you were a friend of mine.»
«Thanks a lot.»
After he’d started for Keith Winton’s office he realized that he wasn’t supposed to know the way until he was shown, but it was too late then, so he kept on going.
A moment later, Keith Winton sat down opposite Keith Winton, reached across the desk to shake hands and said, «I’m Karl Winston, Mr. Winton. Have a couple of stories to leave with you. Could have mailed them, of course but I thought I’d like to meet you while I was in New York.»
Keith was studying Winton as he spoke. He wasn’t a bad-looking guy, about Keith’s age, an inch or so taller but a few pounds lighter.
His hair was darker and a little curlier. Facially, there wasn’t any particular resemblance.
«You don’t live in New York?»
«Yes and no,» Keith said. «I mean, I haven’t been, but I may be from now on. Been working on a paper in Boston—and doing a lot of free-lance feature writing on the side.» He’d thought out his story and didn’t have to hesitate. «Got a leave of absence for a while and—if I can make a go of things free-lancing here—I probably won’t go back.
«I brought in two shorts I’d like you to consider—one for War Adventure and one for the new science-fiction book Miss Blake tells me you’re starting. I’d appreciate a decision as quickly as I can get it—because I want to write some more I have planned along these lines and don’t want to start until I know your reaction to these.»
Keith Winton smiled. «I’ll keep them out of the slushpile.» He glanced at the upper right corners of the two manuscripts Keith had put on the desk.
«Three and four thousand. Those are lengths we need and both books you mentioned are wide open.»
«Fine,» Keith said. He decided to crowd his luck a little. «I happen to have an appointment in the building here on Friday, the day after tomorrow. Since I’ll be so close, would that be too soon for me to drop in to see if you’ve made a decision?»
Keith Winton frowned a little. «Can’t promise for sure that soon but I’ll try. If you’ll be in the building anyway drop in.»
«Thanks a lot.» Keith didn’t crowd his luck any farther than that. He stood up. «I’ll be in Friday then about this time. Goodbye, Mr. Winton.»
He went back to Marion Blake’s desk.
«Yes,» she said, «Miss Hadley is free now. You may go in her office.» This time Keith remembered to wait until she pointed out the proper door to him.
He felt as though he were walking through thick molasses on the way to the door. He thought, «I shouldn’t do this. It’s crazy. I should have my head examined. I should leave the story for her—or take it to some other love story magazine editor.»