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  saw the vague, indistinct shape of the straw-haired, blue-eyed young man standing exactly where I had seen him the first time. But the effect was so uncertain and shadowy that I was hardly able to trust my eyes.

The young man seemed to blend into the background, which happened to be a desk, water cooler and wall, so evenly and completely that it was impossible to see him at all.

But even so, seeing him, however fuzzily, was a relief.

"It's a good trick," I said cautiously.

"It's not a trick," the young man said, aggrieved. "It's something I can't help."

"Oh yeah? Well how does it happen that I was able to see you when you came in?"

"I was exerting my will power," the young man said. "But that's awfully tiring. I had to relax a moment or so and when I did you weren't able to see me quite so distinctly."

I found my curiosity stirring. Maybe the guy was a crackpot or phony, but it wouldn't hurt to hear his story. In my line, with things as lean as they are, you can't afford to miss any bets.

"What makes you pop on and off like an electric light?" I asked. "Must be a tiring way to go through life."

"You don't know the half of it," the young man said mournfully. "I've only been this way for a few months, but it seems like it's been years."

"Well, go on," I said. "Spill your troubles. Why should Mr. Anthony have all the fun?"

"What?"

"Never mind. Shoot."

"I'm not sure what causes me to fade-out like this. I've been to a half dozen doctors and psychiatrists and they aren't sure either. But it has something to do with personality development, they think. The last psychiatrist I visited told me that I had a very colorless personality and abnormal inhibitions and frustrations. He said that my present condition was a physical manifestation of my colorless personality."

I shook my head disgustedly.

"That sounds about as asinine as the droolings of the average psychiatrist," I muttered. "He didn't know and spent an hour saying so, I'll bet."

"It's awful," the young man sighed disconsolately. "I can make myself visible for a little while but it's awfully tiring. The rest of the time I go around like a ghost. I blend into the background so completely that people just don't notice me at all. It's just like not being alive."[1]