   == Zelazny ==  You're very welcome. )  You may also be interested in my theory, closely-held but fragile, that the Belle Epoque references while scribing the Second Pattern, taken in context of Merlin's proxy encounter with Deirdre some books later, mean that the main subject Corwin was actually thinking about during his act of cosmogony was Deirdre, though he's too shy to tell us outright, allusive creature that he is. That means that there's a huge amount about Corwin's history on Earth that no one's telling us, of course (big surprise), but the Deirdre encounter means that regardless. (This is one of the things that pleases and amazes me most about Zelazny: that momentary events can have implications that change everything.  Like Dworkin's one-line off-hand mention that, by the by, he already destroyed and recreated the Pattern once.) —  