THE THIRD THUMB-PRINT
by Mortimer Levitan
THE persistent ringing of the doorbell angered Professor Sanders; it brought to his lips words unscholarly and almost profane; it worried, disgusted, and sickened him. Still, he let the bell ring, ring, ring. ... In his study, littered with papers of infinite variety and darkened by drawn blinds, he tramped to and fro. In a frenzied effort to defeat the clamoring bell, he held his hands tightly to his ears ; but the odious sounds went around the hands, went through them, ignored them. The batteries were suffering, too; already the vehement clangor had degenerated into buzzes and tinkles. Soon, very soon, the benevolent laws of physics would disarm the batteries, and the bell would thenceforth be silent.
The ringing stopped. Professor Sanders fell into a chair, exhausted, desperately in need of calm reflection. The batteries, he meditated, would cost twenty-five cents apiece; two of them would cost fifty cents—quite a sum; an electrician would have to install them. The inconsiderate reporters should be compelled to pay for them. Three short feeble buzzes. . . . The professor arose automatically. He could not understand why his reflections had ended so abruptly. He fumbled around for a reason. Somehow or other, that weak convulsion of the bell reminded him of something—something he had promised, something he must do, some engagement he must fulfil. Unconsciously he strolled to the front door, opened it absent-mindedly, and admitted a dapper young man of twenty-two. Then he closed and locked the door.
“I’ll appreciate this very much, Professor,” said the visitor.
“There’s something I ought to do,” confided the professor, “but I can’t think what it is. The cursed bell rang three times, and that reminded me of something, but I can’t think what.”
“You promised to let me in when I gave that signal.”
“That’s so!” The professor was ingenuously surprized. “I knew it was something. But you’re in already! I opened the door without being aware of it. One of those barbaric reporters might have slipped in, and then—they’re mischief-makers, they are; there ought to be a law against them.”
The gray-haired, bespectacled, full-bearded man would have forgotten the presence of the other, would have declaimed long and bitterly, had not
