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noticed he was being watched himself.
    Even if Sonderberg had noticed, being under surveillance in a Nevada casino would not have surprised him. Like everyone else,
     he knew that both players and dealers were under constant surveillance in the big casinos. It kept everybody honest. In fact,
     it was said that the observers had other people watching
them
.
    The man watching him had been tailing him fromSanta Barbara and had caught the same plane as he to Vegas. He was a big man with close-cropped fair hair, not unlike Sonderberg
     himself in appearance. After Sonderberg had turned over his hired car to a parking attendant and followed a porter with his
     luggage inside the front door of the Tropicana, the man with fair hair ran his own hired car from beneath the concrete entrance
     canopy and parked it in an unattended section, next to a Chrysler New Yorker. He found the right key on his ring, then got
     out of the car and inserted the key in the Chrysler door lock. No trouble. Inside, he opened the glove compartment. All it
     contained were some road maps, a pair of sunglasses and an air pressure gauge.
    Two cars over was a new Honda Acura. He selected a key for it before leaving the Chrysler. In the Honda’s glove compartment,
     he found what he had been looking for, more or less. The gun was light, semiautomatic, only .22 caliber, a cheap Japanese
     make, probably not too reliable, what used to be called a lady’s gun. In the right hands, it was just as deadly at close quarters
     as any other.
    He slowly played the slots near the elevators while waiting for Sonderberg to show. It didn’t take long. Most of the hotel
     guests were probably like that—didn’t stay in their room long enough to unpack their bags before they hit the casino. While
     Sonderberg played craps, he played roulette. When Sonderberg switched to blackjack, he went back to the slots, all the time
     keeping his distance, aware of ceiling cameras and housedetectives. There was no way he could hit Sonderbeg in the casino. The event would be recorded by at least half a dozen cameras.
     He might as well do it on national television. He would bide his time.
    Dockrell was uneasy. Sonderberg must have been informed by now that he was on a hit list. Why hadn’t he gone to his sister’s
     family like he was supposed to? Had he suspected someone might be waiting there? Was coming to Las Vegas suddenly his pathetic
     idea of hiding himself? If that was so, why wasn’t he glancing nervously around him and jumping at every sudden noise? Sonderberg
     wasn’t, that was for sure. He looked more bored than anything.
    When he headed for the elevators, the man with fair hair was not far behind him. He did not rush to get in the same elevator
     as Sonderberg, who was alone in it; he merely watched the floor indicator until it lit on twelve. Then he quickly stepped
     into a waiting elevator and pressed the button for the twelfth floor. He stepped out of the elevator in time to see Sonderberg
     opening his room door down a long corridor. Sonderberg went in the room without glancing around to see who had stepped out
     of the elevator. He seemed to think he had dropped into a sea of anonymity here in Las Vegas.
    A used tray from room service lay outside one room door. The fair-haired man stooped over it, arranging the metal cover over
     the plate, straightening the cutlery and tapping on the cap of an empty Heineken bottle. He then picked up the tray, walked
     briskly down the corridor and rapped on Sonderberg’s door.
    There was a pause. Finally a voice asked, “Who is it?”
    “Room service, sir. A snack, compliments of the management.”
    “I’m tired. I don’t want anything.”
    “You don’t want it, sir? Is something wrong?”
    “No, nothing’s wrong.” Sonderberg peered through the peephole and saw the tray.
    “Compliments of the management, sir. Leave it on your side table. Perhaps later—”
    “Oh, very well.”
    Gary Sonderberg unlocked the door