floor, still gabbling into the phone, stood a lumpy, pallid woman about his own age, naked except for a pillow which she hugged fiercely to her navel. Her bleached hair was a frayed bird's-nest.

In bed, decently clad in a pair of blue and white striped pajamas, was a rather distinguished, gray-haired gentleman of about fifty, leaning on one elbow and watching the woman with an expression of mild astonishment and interest. To Sextus' practiced eye, the man was guilty of nothing.

The house detective arrived at that moment, but Sextus dismissed him with a wave of his hand. He went in alone.

"I'm the manager, madam," he assured her. He noted that despite her excited wails, her eyes drooped half shut. A bottle of sleeping pills on the table was uncapped.

"Thizz man, thizz man, thizz man!" she kept repeating and pointing her elbow at the bed. The man in question raised his eyebrows and shook his head.

"Damndest sensation I ever felt," he said. "I'm Johnathan P. Turner, attorney. Before I tell you my story, please check with the desk and verify that I was assigned this room."

Sextus took the phone from the woman's pudgy hand which darted to rescue the sagging pillow. The room-clerk reported that Mr. J. P. Turner was registered to room 408, but in "J" vector, not "H".

Sextus' eyes swept the room. It was an unexplainable mess. Two sets of luggage were jumbled on and around the baggage rack at the foot of the bed. Rinsed out nylons hung from the shower rod, but a man's shaving kit occupied the shelf over the lavatory. Despairing of ever arriving at a sensible explanation, Sextus went to work.

Although hampered somewhat without his shirt, coat and tie, Sextus managed to get Turner and his belongings transferred peaceably to another room and the woman quieted down in bed with another sleeping pill.

Then Turner was allowed to tell his story. "I had turned in early and was lying there on my back reading the paper when suddenly I got the most messy feeling all through me. It was like—oh, hell, I can't say it. Anyhow, in just about a second, something went thub!—and there she was in bed with me—naked!" he added with a shiver.

Sextus grasped at a straw. "How many did you have to drink this evening, Mr. Turner?"

The attorney squirmed uncomfortably. "Well, quite a few, maybe, but not enough to—"

Sextus shrugged one shoulder and turned to leave. "Understand, we don't blame you a bit, sir. You know how these middle-aged women can carry on when they get out on the town. You must have dozed off before she slipped in."

"But my door was locked! I think," he added uncertainly.

"We won't breathe a word of it, Mr. Turner. Rest well!"

Sextus padded silently back to his room in his stocking feet and took a long pull at the whiskey. Funny thing, this. People often got into the wrong hotel beds, but rarely with such impalpable excuses. He sighed and picked up the letter from his predecessor again. It read:

Welcome to the Phony-Plaza. (That name again.) You will be the fifth manager in 30 days. If you need the job as much as I thought I did you will probably ignore my advice, but here goes, anyway: RESIGN! BAIL OUT! SKIDOO! (The man was emphatic.) I can't tell you where they've got the 2600 rooms in this haunted ant-hill, but believe me, they are there, and you'll be sorry if you hang around long enough to prove it.

My predecessor left a garbled note about some hyperspace system that the owner, Dr. Bradford, has figured out. Actually, there are only 260 rooms, as you've probably surmised. But this Bradford, who is a nuclear physicist, by the way, has installed some sort of field generator in each elevator shaft that gives entry to these rooms at ten different locations in time. Room 500, for instance, in Vector A is 10 years from Vector B. So when you run to capacity with, say, two people to the room, you have 5200 guests in 260 rooms! They all live by the same