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before showtime Tina left the stage and went into the noisy showroom. She headed toward the center booth in the VIP row, where Charles Mainway, general manager and principal stockholder of the Golden Pyramid Hotel, waited for her.
    She stopped first at the booth next to Mainway’s. Joel Bandiri was with Eva, his wife of eight years, and two of their friends. Eva was twenty-nine, seventeen years younger than Joel, and at five foot eight, she was also four inches taller than he was. She was an ex-showgirl, blond, willowy, delicately beautiful. She gently squeezed Tina’s hand. “Don’t worry. You’re too good to fail.”
    “We got a hit, kid,” Joel assured Tina once more.
    In the next semicircular booth, Charles Mainway greeted Tina with a warm smile. Mainway carried and held himself as if he were an aristocrat, and his mane of silver hair and his clear blue eyes contributed to the image he wished to project. However, his features were large, square, and utterly without evidence of patrician blood, and even after the mellowing influences of elocution teachers, his naturally low, gravelly voice belied his origins in a rough Brooklyn neighborhood.
    As Tina slid into the booth beside Mainway, a tuxedoed captain appeared and filled her glass with Dom Pérignon.
    Helen Mainway, Charlie’s wife, sat at his left side. Helen was by nature everything that poor Charlie struggled to be: impeccably well-mannered, sophisticated, graceful, at ease and confident in any situation. She was tall, slender, striking, fifty-five years old but able to pass for a well-preserved forty.
    “Tina, my dear, I want you to meet a friend of ours,” Helen said, indicating the fourth person in the booth. “This is Elliot Stryker. Elliot, this lovely young lady is Christina Evans, the guiding hand behind Magyck!”
    “One of two guiding hands,” Tina said. “Joel Bandiri is more responsible for the show than I am—especially if it’s a flop.”
    Stryker laughed. “I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs. Evans.”
    “Just plain Tina,” she said.
    “And I’m just plain Elliot.”
    He was a rugged, good-looking man, neither big nor small, about forty. His dark eyes were deeply set, quick, marked by intelligence and amusement.
    “Elliot’s my attorney,” Charlie Mainway said.
    “Oh,” Tina said, “I thought Harry Simpson—”
    “Harry’s a hotel attorney. Elliot handles my private affairs.”
    “And handles them very well,” Helen said. “Tina, if you need an attorney, this is the best in Las Vegas.”
    To Tina, Stryker said, “But if it’s flattery you need—and I’m sure you already get a lot of it, lovely as you are—no one in Vegas can flatter with more charm and style than Helen.”
    “You see what he just did?” Helen asked Tina, clapping her hands with delight. “In one sentence he managed to flatter you, flatter me, and impress all of us with his modesty. You see what a wonderful attorney he is?”
    “Imagine him arguing a point in court,” Charlie said.
    “A very smooth character indeed,” Helen said.
    Stryker winked at Tina. “Smooth as I might be, I’m no match for these two.”
    They made pleasant small talk for the next fifteen minutes, and none of it had to do with Magyck! Tina was aware that they were trying to take her mind off the show, and she appreciated their effort.
    Of course no amount of amusing talk, no quantity of icy Dom Pérignon could render her unaware of the excitement that was building in the showroom as curtain time drew near. Minute by minute the cloud of cigarette smoke overhead thickened. Waitresses, waiters, and captains rushed back and forth to fill the drink orders before the show began. The roar of conversation grew louder as the sounds ticked away, and the quality of the roar became more frenetic, gayer, and more often punctuated with laughter.
    Somehow, even though her attention was partly on the mood of the crowd, partly on Helen and Charlie Mainway, Tina was nevertheless aware of