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Liddell asked.
    Muggsy nodded.
    “How about trying the casino?”
    “Love it,” Muggsy whispered.
    Liddell flagged down the waiter, dropped a bill on his tray, pushed back the table, led the way to the game room. Stack stood outside the door, smelling the carnation in his lapel.
    “Mr. Stanley isn’t in yet,” he told Liddell sadly. “He’s a little late tonight. You’re not leaving?”
    “Thought we’d try our luck while we’re waiting. Okay?”
    “Of course. I’ll have you notified the minute he arrives.” He stepped aside and signaled an okay to the man on the door.
    The game room advertised itself by a low, tense murmur of conversation, spiced by the chatter of roulette balls. At the far end of the room was a small portable bar. There were three craps tables, two roulette setups, and along the wall a line of one-armed bandits stood with one metal arm raised in salute.
    The hum of conversation, which had been low and polite in the dining-room, had a shrill feverish note in here, almost as if everyone had determined that this was The Night and they must savor it to the hilt.
    Liddell and Muggsy walked over to the roulette setupnearest the door. He slid a fifty-dollar bill over to the croupier, accepted three reds and four whites in return.
    He stacked two whites on the red diamond.
    “Make your bets, ladies and gentlemen,” the croupier intoned monotonously. He watched with cold, disinterested eyes as others in the crowd around the wheel placed their chips on the various squares. Then he spun the wheel and sent the ball flicking in the groove with a light flip of his left wrist.
    The buzz of conversation died to a breathless silence as the ball skimmed around the groove, slid down the flank of the wheel, chattered along the tines between the numbers. Suddenly it fell dead, dropped into red seventeen with a click. The wheel stopped.
    With no show of emotion, the croupier stacked a pile of chips alongside the winners, raked in the chips on the losing numbers.
    In twenty minutes, Liddell had run his stack into twelve reds, fourteen whites. In thirty-five minutes he had to buy more chips. When that pile was gone, he stepped back, watched the others play. After a moment, a man in a tuxedo tapped him on the arm.
    “Were you waiting to see Mr. Stanley, sir?” he asked.
    Liddell nodded.
    “He’s in now. Come this way, please.”
    They followed him through drapes into a short corridor. At the far end was a large metal door painted a dull brown. The guard knocked, then opened the door. As Liddell passed him, the man stumbled, catching at Liddell for support. He apologized, brushed Liddell’s coat of some imaginary wrinkles he had caused.
    “Waste of time.” Liddell grinned bleakly. “I never make social calls with a gun.”
    The guard nodded and closed the door behind them. Yale Stanley sat on the corner of a desk that looked as if it had cost a lot of money, his feet swinging lightly against the side. He didn’t look up from the absorbing task of cleaning his nails with a small pocketknife.
    “Wanted to see me?” he asked.
    He was smaller than Johnny Liddell had expected, and dapper. His hair, carefully slicked back, was a deep black that seemed almost blue in the indirect lighting.
    “That was the general idea,” Liddell told him coolly. “That is, unless we’re interrupting something more important.”
    The gambler stopped digging at his nails, looked up. He grinned suddenly, digging curving white trenches into the mahogany tan of his cheeks. He closed the knife, dropped it into his jacket pocket, nodded to Muggsy. “I’m sorry.” He looked over to Liddell. “It was about Shad Reilly, I think you said?”
    “Understand he owes you some money.”
    Stanley raised his eyebrows, pursed his lips. “Yeah, you could say he owes me some money.” He fumbled with the points of the fine linen handkerchief in his breast pocket. “You ready to buy his paper back?”
    Liddell shrugged. “That’s the