At exactly 3:00 a.m., Jeff was fast asleep in his comfortable bed when the telephone suddenly began ringing.

RING! RING! RING!

The sound echoed through the silent house like a fire alarm.

Jeff groaned, rolled over, and pulled the pillow over his head.

“Who on earth calls someone at three in the morning?” he muttered.

But the phone kept ringing.

Finally, he reached toward the nightstand, accidentally knocked over a glass of water, and nearly fell out of bed trying to grab the receiver.

“HELLO?!” he answered, sounding like a man who had just been dragged out of the best dream of his life.

A polite woman’s voice came through the line.

“Oh, hello! I’m terribly sorry to bother you, but is this 555-1111?”

Jeff rubbed his eyes and tried to make sense of the question.

“No, ma’am,” he replied sleepily. “You’ve got the wrong number. This is 555-1112.”

There was a brief silence.

Then the woman gasped.

“Oh, goodness! I’m so sorry! I must have dialed the last digit incorrectly!”

Jeff sighed and glanced at the clock.

3:02 a.m.

The woman continued apologetically.

“I feel absolutely terrible! Calling a stranger at this hour! I hope I haven’t caused you too much trouble.”

Jeff yawned so widely that his jaw nearly cracked.

“Don’t worry about it, ma’am.”

But the woman still sounded embarrassed.

“Are you sure? I mean, it’s the middle of the night! I probably woke you up, didn’t I?”

Jeff pulled the blanket over his shoulders, closed his eyes, and replied in a perfectly calm voice:

“That’s alright. I had to get up to answer the phone anyway.”