“I’m sorry,” Deirdre said.

“She was… a wonderful woman. Friendly by nature. A joy. Of course, death isn’t final… we all go on, I believe, each in his own way…”

There was more of this—enough that I regretted stopping by—but I couldn’t doubt Ziegler’s sincerity. Despite his intimidating appearance there was something almost wilfully childlike about him, a kind of embalmed innocence, if that makes any sense.

He asked how I had been and what I had been doing. I answered as cheerfully as I could and refrained from asking after his own health. His cheeks reddened as he stood, and I wondered if he shouldn’t be sitting down. But he seemed to be enjoying himself. He eyed the five slender books I’d brought to the cash desk.

“Science fiction!” he said. “I wouldn’t have taken you for a science fiction reader, Mr. Keller.”

(Deirdre glanced at me: Told you so!)

“I haven’t been a steady reader for a long time,” I said. “But I found some interesting items.”

“The good old stuff,” Ziegler gushed. “The pure quill. Does it strike you, Mr. Keller, that we live every day in the science fiction of our youth?”

“I hadn’t noticed.”

“There was a time when science seemed so sterile. It didn’t yield up the wonders we had been led to expect. Only a bleak, lifeless solar system… half dozen desert worlds, baked or frozen, take your pick, and the gas giants… great roaring seas of methane and ammonia…”

I nodded politely.

“But now!” Ziegler exclaimed. “Life on Mars! Oceans under Europa! Comets plunging into Jupiter—!”

“I see what you mean.”

“And here on Earth—the human genome, cloned animals, mind-altering drugs! Computer networks! Computer viruses!” He slapped his thigh. “I have a Teflon hip, if you can imagine such a thing!”

“Pretty amazing,” I agreed, though I hadn’t thought much about any of this.