the next it would just be part of my
general historical knowledge; I'd know it as positively as I know that
Columbus discovered America in. 1492. The only difference is that I
can usually remember where I've read something in past history, but my
future history I know without knowing how I know it."

"Ah, that's the question!" Weill pounced. "You don't know how you know
it. Look, Ed, we've both studied psychology, elementary psychology at
least. Anybody who has to work with people, these days, has to know
some psychology. What makes you sure that these prophetic impressions
of yours aren't manufactured in your own subconscious mind?"

"That's what I thought, at first. I thought my subconscious was just
building up this stuff to fill the gaps in what I'd produced from
logical extrapolation. I've always been a stickler for detail," he
added, parenthetically. "It would be natural for me to supply details
for the future. But, as I said, a lot of this stuff is based on
unpredictable and arbitrary factors that can't be inferred from
anything in the present. That left me with the alternatives of
delusion or precognition, and if I ever came near going crazy, it was
before the _Kilroy_ landed and the news was released. After that, I
knew which it was."

"And yet, you can't explain how you can have real knowledge of a
thing before it happens. Before it exists," Weill said.

"I really don't need to. I'm satisfied with knowing that I know. But
if you want me to furnish a theory, let's say that all these things
really do exist, in the past or in the future, and that the present is
just a moving knife-edge that separates the two. You can't even
indicate the present. By the time you make up your mind to say, 'Now!'
and transmit the impulse to your vocal organs, and utter the word, the
original present moment is part of the past. The knife-edge has gone
over it. Most people think they know only the present; what they know
is the past, which they have already experienced, or read about. The
difference with me is that I can see what's on both sides of the
knife-edge."

Weill put another cigarette in his mouth and bent his head to the
flame of his lighter. For a moment, he sat motionless, his thin face
rigid.

"What do you want me to do?" he asked. "I'm a lawyer, not a
psychiatrist."

"I want a lawyer. This is a legal matter. Whitburn's talking about
voiding my tenure contract. You helped draw it; I have a right to
expect you to