To be Hitchcockian about it, the story deals with the relationship between [Umberto] Umber, a professor of comparative literature, and a Dr. Jamshid Kloster, an experimental physicist whom Umber meets on a Laguna Beach bench as Diane Keaton, a long-time Laguna Beach resident, strolls by. Umber's other obsession or, perhaps, his deepest regret is that ... he will never be able to know any of "the characters of future novels." In Hitchcockian terms, that's the McGuffin and as Kloster tells Umber, "If you're interested in future novels, we must travel to the libraries of the future." And that's where the story becomes both Borgesian and Contesque as Umber asks Kloster what he will need for that to happen and Kloster replies: "We need a library, four mirrors, and a beautiful sunset."{Mark Axelrod}