I hesitated, all the dire official warnings fast-forwarding through my brain. Even professional time observers shied away from personal contact with the locals, and I was anything but a professional. Add that to Weldon's already demonstrated ability to read the human psyche, and staying where I was definitely seemed like the smart thing to do.

But then, I'd never been very good at doing the smart thing. Besides, I was already playing one major off-edge hunch here. What could it hurt to add another one to the hopper?

And so I picked up my glass and strolled over to an empty table near the back corner of the piano.

"My name's Weldon," he said as I sat down. "What's yours?"

"Call me Sigmund," I said. "I like your piano playing."

"Thank you," he said, his fingers adding a little trill into his current tune that somehow sounded like a musical version of his thanks. "Is that Sigmund as in Sigmund Freud? Or Sigmund as in the tragic hero of the Volsung Saga?"

"Neither," I said, grimacing. The concept of the tragic hero was not one I liked to dwell on. "It means 'victorious protector.' I see you're an educated man."

He shrugged. "I've got a lot of time to read. You seemed to like that last piece."

"Indeed I did," I agreed. "I wasn't the only one, either."

Beneath his thin shirt, I could see his shoulders tense up. "What do you mean?" he asked cautiously.

So he was one of those who didn't like taking credit for his successes. Not that I would have pegged him as anything else. "You play all your own material?" I asked instead.

For a second he looked like he was going to insist that I answer his question. But then he apparently thought better of it. "Mostly," he said, his fingers sliding into a melody that sounded distant and aloof. I wondered if he was echoing someone else in the bar or merely