Harry Warner

“ Mr. Hawkins' eyes widened. He bent, reached painfully over his potbelly and picked up the order form.
"This thing has never been processed!" Raising his voice, he shouted jovially, "Hey, people! You're all fired! Here's an order that Hartshorne-Logan never filled! We can't have such carelessness. This poor woman has waited eighty years for her merchandise!"
Milly was reading aloud the scrawled words on the order form:
"Best electric doorbell. Junior detective kit. Disposable sacks for vacuum cleaner. Dress for three-year-old girl." ”

“ Ann mused, her mind distracted from Sally for a moment. "It looks terribly expensive. Maybe they sent door chimes instead of the doorbell."
The bottom of the carton contained the detective outfit that they had ordered for their son. Ann glanced at its glaringly lithographed cover and said: "Les, about Sally. Put her down a minute and watch what she does."
Les stared at his wife and put the child onto the rug. Sally began to walk, then rose and again floated, this time toward the hassock on which the manky lay. ”

“ Ann carried her up the stairs, keeping her balance with difficulty, as Sally threatened to pop upward out of her arms.
The whole family decided that bed might be a good idea, soon after dinner. When the lights went out, the house seemed to be nearly normal. Les put on a pair of gloves and threw a pillowcase over the eyeball. Bob rigged up trestles to warn visitors from the front porch. Ann put small wads of cotton into her ears, because she didn't like the rhythmic rattle, soft but persistent, that emerged from the hall closet where the manky sat. Sally was whining occasionally in her sleep. ”

“ Hawkins firmly replied, "that I was not enjoying myself at the party. Definitely not. I must engage in the painful duty of assuming a pose of gaiety on special occasions, such as the annual office party."
Milly shot him a withering look, but didn't argue that particular point. She continued: "So I've been thinking. We might have done a terrible thing. Sending that dress to a kid without the right underclothing could be real dangerous. Maybe even fatal."
"We cannot harm people in the long ago, any more than the past could conceivably harm us." ”

“ Hawkins assured her. "I checked way back on the old records. I see that your great-grandmother paid her bill, right after the date when all this trouble came up. But she never bought another thing from Hartshorne-Logan."
"Well, it's a good thing that time travel can't cause trouble both ways," Milly reflected. "I don't think I'll even go to next year's Christmas party."
"No danger of time travel bothering us. Nothing could come from the past into the present that could possibly hurt us." ”

“ The policeman whirled when he heard footsteps behind him. "What do you want?"
"I'm afraid that I'm to blame for the whole thing," Milly told the officer. "I represent Hartshorne-Logan. We've just discovered that we made several mistakes when we filled an order for this family. I've come to pick up the wrong merchandise."
The doorbell made ominous clucking sounds, as Milly reached the threshold.
She looked up at the box and told Ann: "I'm afraid that I can't get in while that defective doorbell is working. Will you cut off the house current for a minute, while I disconnect it?" ”

“ I put some white stuff from the detective kit into that sugar we lent Mrs. Burnett last night. I just wanted to see what would happen. I don't know exactly what effect—"
"He put stuff in the sugar?" A deep, booming voice came from the front of the house. Mother and son looked through the hall. A policeman stood on the threshold of the front door. "I heard that! The woman next door claims that her husband is poisoned. Young man, I'm going to put you under arrest."
The policeman stepped over the threshold. A blue flash darted from the doorbell box, striking him squarely on the chest. ”

“ I can barely remember her as a real old woman. But I remember that my grandmother never bought anything from Hartshorne-Logan because of some trouble her mother had once with the firm. My mother didn't want me to come to work here because of that."
Mr. Hawkins put his arm around Milly in a way that he intended to look fatherly. It didn't. "Well, now. Since it's your relative, let's thrill the old girl. We wouldn't have vacuum sacks any more. So we'll substitute a manky!"
Ann Hartley was returning from mailing the letter when she found the large parcel on her doorstep. ”

“ The farm machinery manager had already collapsed. When he slid under the table containing the drinks, Miss Pringle, who sold millinery, had screamed: "He'll drown!"
One out of every three dirty stories started by party attendees had remained unfinished, because each had reminded someone else of another story. ”

“ And I'm sorry for Bob. I mean I'm sorry for the girls, and for the boys, too. I'm sorry for—for everything. Good-by."
Just as she hung up the telephone, the doorbell rang. It rang with a normal buzz, then began to play soft music. Ann opened the door without difficulty, to admit Dr. Schwartz.
"You aren't going to believe me, Doctor," Ann said while he took the child's temperature, "but we can't get that dress off Sally."
"Kids are stubborn sometimes." Dr. Schwartz whistled softly when he looked at the thermometer. "She's pretty sick. I want a blood count before I try to move her. ”

“ The doctor looked closely at the fingertips. "Every human has natural oil on the skin. That's how detectives get results with their fingerprint powder. But I've never heard of nigrification, in this sense. Better not try to commit any crimes until you've seen a skin specialist."
Ann was peering through the window, curious about the ambulance despite her own troubles. She saw two attendants carry Mr. Burnett, motionless and white, on a stretcher from the house next door into the ambulance. A third member of the crew was struggling with a disheveled Mrs. Burnett at the door. ”

“ For obvious reasons, the manky will not operate today."
The mailman brought a letter from Hartshorne-Logan. Ann stared stupidly at the envelope, until she realized that this wasn't an impossibly quick answer to the letter she had written yesterday. It must have crossed in the mail her complaint about the non-arrival of the order. ”