Sarah Fish separated me from the crowd with her eyes, then came toward
me. There seemed to be concern, a mixture of pity, and something else
in her expression. When she reached me she said in a low voice, "Please
come with me, Mr. Smith."
No one was paying attention to us. The conversational murmur was
on again. I followed her into the front room and around to a door
underneath the stairs that arched up to a balcony.
* * * * *
She opened the door and stood aside for me to go in. There was still
that strange something in her expression. I tried to place it, then
went past her into the room.
The little man was there, standing across the room against a back-drop
of shelves filled with books. His piercing eyes flicked at me. Then he
lifted his arm and examined his wristwatch.
"Right on the second," he said, a shade of disappointment in his tone.
"I'd hoped this time you'd be off a few seconds." He lowered his arm
and advanced toward me, hand outstretched politely. "I'm Sam Golfin,"
he said. "I want to ask you some questions, Benny. And this time I hope
I get the right answers."
I ignored his hand. "How'd you know my name?" I demanded. "How'd you
know I came here?"
"Oh dear," Sarah Fish said. "I _don't_ know how to tell him, Sam.
You'll have to."
Sam Golfin gave her a sympathetic glance, then looked grim. "This
time," he said, fixing me with a stare, "I'm not going to try to spare
your feelings. In--" He studied his watch again. "--exactly one hour
and seventeen minutes you are going to be murdered. A man doesn't just
get murdered without knowing who might have done it, who his enemies
are. Someone in this house is going to kill you. _Who is it?_"
"You see," Sarah Fish said, her bosom expanding in an anxious breath,
"you _must_ tell us who did it."
I stared at them both, then gave what I intended to be a derisive
laugh, but it sounded thin. "What makes you think I'm going to be
murdered?" I said.
"For one thing," Sam Golfin said cautiously, "it's in tomorrow's
papers."
"Oh, I see," I said sarcastically.
"I know you must think I'm joking...." Golfin said.
"Hardly," I said. And it was the truth. I thought he was crazy.
"I'm glad you don't," Sam Golfin said with relief. "Every minute counts
if we are to save you."
"Save me?" I mocked. "But I thought you said it was in the papers. So
it must be true."
"I'm not so sure," Golfin said with an important frown. "I'm not so
sure the future can't be altered. That's why I'm here. I want to see if
I can change the future. If I can...." He left whatever thought he was
toying with unspoken.
A sudden thought shattered my amused point of view. That three dollar
bill. It had been a _Series of 1964_, something utterly absurd by
itself. But coupled with Sam Golfin's obvious conviction that I was
going to be murdered, and his talk of changing the future, it made a
pattern that made me suddenly uneasy.
"Why would anyone here kill me?" I asked with a defiance that covered
my unease. "I don't even know anyone here. As a matter of fact, the
reason I came here was to--"
"But someone here knows you," Golfin said. "And that someone knew you
were going to be here. The murder was--will be--carefully planned."
"Just how am I going to be murdered?" I asked, not grinning.
"The coroner's report says that you were--will be--poisoned," Golfin
said.