Cult sci-fi writer Neil Gaiman and his wife Amanda Palmer set out a real-life scavenger hunt, then stopped by for a visit

It started with a tweet. Well, it actually started with a drawing on a New York restaurant tablecloth, scrawled by the cult sci-fi writer Neil Gaiman.

But instead of just leaving it to be thrown out with the trash, his wife, musician and artist Amanda Palmer, suggested that they hide it on the street outside, tell their Twitter followers what they had done, and wait for someone to pick it up.

the drawing that neilhimself drawed is stashed under a rock. corner of Crosby & Spring. go find it.… instagram.com/p/X-r4cpwW9c/ — Amanda Palmer (@amandapalmer) April 11, 2013

An experiment in guerrilla art in the age of social media, you might say.

But Gaiman and Palmer were unaware that the street in question was seconds away from the side door of the Guardian's US office.

We were in the perfect place to retrieve the drawing. In less than two minutes, we located the hiding place, tweeted at the couple, and invited them to visit our New York headquarters. They kindly accepted the offer and on Friday Gaiman took over our Twitter feed, writing fake news stories at the request of readers and Palmer promised us a future ukulele performance.

Here's Gaiman to explain what happened: