The joint had been called “Six Left Feet” last time Zeno had been on station, presumably in homage to the pre-industrial aborigines living on the world below, enough limbs to keep every cobbler in the alliance happy. Now it was renamed “Samuel Happy Samuel”. Under new ownership. He felt a tug of worry. What if she wasn’t there? Zeno wasn’t in the mood for searching every hotel, bawdyhouse and nightclub on the lower level until he found her, but he would if he had to. It was busier inside than Zeno had thought it would be at this time of day. Clients lounging around seats moulded into the podiums where dancers gyrated. The music in the background sounded like a bad take of Frank Sinatra’s All I Need is the Girl. Against the wall was the bar, a stretch of cold blue uplit steel, and if the man serving behind it was Samuel, he sure didn’t look too happy about it. The man was fiddling with one of the barrels below the counter. So much had changed over the centuries, but places like Samuel Happy Samuel were timeless.
