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days I went back to Paris to see if I could do something personally because nobody wanted to answer my questions any more when I telephoned to ask about the matter. The famous designer, Courréges, who had contacted me after the television show because he was interested, agreed to come with me to see the publisher in order to find out what exactly had become of the manuscript. Marcel Jullian told us that the reader who had the manuscript had taken it with him on holiday, but they did not know where he was or how to reach him. The situation was becoming stranger and stranger. In the end the manuscript was retrieved by Monsieur Courréges, and he returned it to me personally. I still wonder if it had really been lost or just put away to prevent it from being published. If that publishing house really mislaid the manuscript so easily, then I would discourage other authors from sending their originals to them. Alarmed by the mishap and by the growing pile of letters from people interested in buying the book containing the message as soon as it was published, Marie-Paule offered to leave her nursing job to help me with the publishing and distribution of this exceptional document. I accepted because I was sure that this way, I would have permanent control over the use of these writings. Since it was incompatible with the seriousness of the mission that I had been given, I immediately stopped working for the sports magazine, and in the autumn of 1974, the book finally rolled off the printing press. The shock to my nervous system caused by this unforeseen upset in my life had given me stomach pains and almost brought on an ulcer. All winter I suffered from a serious case of gastritis. No medication was effective, and it was only after I decided to take it easy by doing some meditation and breathing exercises that the pains vanished, as if by magic. In June, I had been on a television show hosted by Philippe Bouvard. It was called Saturday Evening, and sarcastic as always, Monsieur Bouvard disguised his co-host as a Martian with pink 138 INTELLIGENT DESIGN: MESSAGE FROM THE DESIGNERS