Paul Stoutenberg walked into his office, and froze.

Something wasn't right, but what?

He looked around.

Stoutenberg worked as a patent lawyer for the highest profile piece of technology in the world in 1946, the Atomic Ball.

All the details of its construction, all the blueprints, were right there in his office.

It was the highest concentration of atomic secrets in the world.

Which, of course, would make his office a prime target for stealing atomic secrets.

And the pressure of keeping those secrets was eating at Stoutenberg.

Right now, for instance, he swore something was wrong.

But what?

He examined every item on his desk.

You can imagine him thinking,

is that where I left my stapler yesterday?

Did someone move it?

Next thing he's holding things up to the light, or peeking under his desk,

looking for fingerprints or footprints or other signs of a break-in.

Then he saw it.

He picked up some files, and found a folder he had been looking for yesterday.

He'd searched his whole office then and couldn't find it.

Now here it was.

Had he simply overlooked it?

Or had someone taken it and put it back?

...