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“Phil what?”

Phil smiled craftily. “Just Phil. I think that’s all you need, considering we’re not going to be together long.”

“All right, Just Phil. Give me a sec to wind this sucker up. And I see you’re wearing your own timepiece, looks like a very fine Bulova, so if you care to check it against mine, feel free.”

“Oh, I will,” Phil said. “I intend to get my money’s worth.”

“And so you shall.” The Answer Man wound his oversized stopwatch with a clackety-clack sound very similar to the clock Phil had kept by his bedside during his undergraduate years. “Are you ready?”

“Yes.” Phil sat down in the client’s chair. “But if you can’t answer my first question, I’ll have my money back double-quick. You’ll either give it to me willingly, or I’ll take it by force.”

“That sounds positively brutal!” the Answer Man said… but he laughed when he said it. “I’ll ask again: are you ready?”

“Yes.”

“So we begin.” The Answer Man clicked a lever on the back of his clock, and it began to tick.

“Your suggestion: what’s my mother’s maiden name?”

The Answer Man didn’t hesitate. “Sporan.”

Phil’s mouth dropped open. “How in the hell do you know that?”

“I don’t want to waste time you’ve paid for, Phil, but I have to point out that you’ve asked another question to which you know the answer. I know because I am, ta-da, the Answer Man.”

Phil felt like he had been tagged by a right hook. He actually shook his head to clear it. The ticking of the Answer Man’s big stopwatch was very loud. The hand was approaching the 4.

“What’s my girl’s name?”

“Sally Ann Allburton.” No hesitation at all.

Phil began to be afraid. He told himself not to be, it was a fine October day, and he was both younger and no doubt stronger than the man on the other side of the table. It must be a trick, had to be, but that didn’t make it any less eerie.

“Tempus is fugiting, Phil.”

He shook his head again. “Okay. I’m trying to decide if I should—”

The Answer Man wagged a finger at him. “What did I tell you about that word?”

Phil tried to put his thoughts in order. Mock court, he thought. Think of it as mock court. He’s the judge. There’s been an objection to your line of questioning. How do you get around it?

“Can you answer questions about future events?”

The Answer Man rolled his eyes. “We’ve already established that, have we not? I said you’d know if my answers were true and correct in the course of time. Such an answer presupposes knowledge of the future. For me there is no future and no past. Everything is happening now.”

What old-lady-séance bullshit, Phil thought. Meanwhile, the black hand on the big stopwatch was almost to 3.

“Will Sally Ann agree to marry me when I propose?”

“Yes.”

“Will we live in Curry? The town down the road?”

“Yes.”

The big black hand on the stopwatch reached 3, then passed it.

“Will we be happy?”