The Art of Disappearing by Ivy Pochoda (popular romance novels .txt) 📕

jump. Even though my glass hadn’t been on the felt, it was returned to my hand. “Can’t put anything on the tables. Against the rules.”

I looked around and saw Greta in one of the cocktail costumes. The bodice drooped. She’d frosted her hair and pulled it back in a tight bun. Her nails were long and bright pink. If it weren’t for her voice, I might have mistaken her for one of the Winter Palace’s trainees I’d used as a model for the outfit she was wearing. “I didn’t put my drink on the felt,” I replied. “And can you bring me another?”

“Close enough,” Greta replied, ruffling the skirt for my benefit. “The edge is close to the felt. And on the felt is against the rules.”

“I know,” I said. “I make the rules.”

“Then you should know how to follow them. I’m circulating over there next,” she said, gesturing toward the ice sculpture. “So I wouldn’t wait around for that drink.”

“How did you get a job here?” I asked.

“You think I’m gonna work in that dumpy diner my whole life?”

“I don’t know.”

Greta took a step back and reconsidered me from top to toe. “You said you work here?”

“Yes.”

She lowered her voice. “I’m only hired for the night. If I do good, I get to stay on. Not that I’m gonna be a waitress forever.”

“I’m sure,” I said, trying to get away.

“It’s a shame that magician didn’t give me a chance.”

“It’s too late. He found his own assistant,” I muttered, finishing my drink.

“Who?” Greta’s voice rose above the polite cocktail party murmur.

“The Winter Palace found her for him,” I said quietly.

“So, he does keep secrets from you.”

“I guess so.”

“Should have been me.”

“Shh,” I said, lowering my voice and hoping that Greta would do the same. “It wasn’t supposed to be anyone. Toby is not supposed to use people in his tricks.”

“You keep telling yourself that. But it looks like you’re wrong.”

“It must be a mistake,” I repeated, talking more to myself than to Greta.

“The only mistake your magician made is not choosing me.” Greta’s voice carried over the crowd.

Several partygoers looked our way. One of the floor managers started to head in our direction.

“He’s made a mistake,” Greta repeated. She was nearly yelling now. “Your magician has made a real mistake. I was meant to be in that show.”

The manager approached our table.

Greta turned and faced her. “I was just telling this lady to keep her drink off the felt,” she said, gracing me with her mocking smile. “But I guess she didn’t listen.” Then she raised her tray to shoulder height and left.

I was about to follow her when the ladies’ magician entered from the Empress Buffet. He walked swiftly, so that his jacket blew open, showing its multicolored lining.

The women pushed forward. They ran their hands along Toby’s sleeves, slipped money into his pockets, and tried to whisper in his ear.

The husbands bowed their heads and muttered. “Don’t much like magic myself,” a man standing next to me said. “In fact, I used to think that it was a dangerous waste of time. But this guy’s done wonders for my wife. Turned her back into the little dynamo I married fifteen years back.”

I looked at the impromptu stage of backgammon tables. The question of whether the felt would survive the magic was eclipsed by my fear for the assistant Toby had invited onto his stage.

When Toby’s assistant appeared, the crowd of women dispersed. As Sandra promised, she was captivating. She wore a black velvet burlesque costume with red satin ribbons that trailed behind her as she walked. Her black hair was sculpted into an impossibly high tower on the top of her head. Her lips sparkled with vibrant, iridescent red gloss. Her heels looked poised to kill. She towered over the magician, and it seemed to me that she could certainly do him more harm than the other way around.

Toby walked to the gambling floor and hopped onto one of the tables. His assistant stood below him. Standing on the tabletop, he produced a bottle in each hand and began to fill the glasses she held. He poured pink champagne, regular champagne, and even a sparkling Italian red. The assistant passed the drinks while Toby made the table’s chips rise from the felt into his hands.

Toby had refined his Castaway routine. No more wicked winks and naughty smiles—he was all turn-of-the-century elegance. He did not speak, and his silence doubled the distance between him and his assistant. Once the drinks were distributed, the assistant held up a cue card that read MANUAL MAGIC: THE DEXTEROUS DANCE.

Toby shook his cuffs to show that there was nothing concealed in his shirt. Then he fanned his fingers and shot a stream of small sparks from his right thumb. When he touched his right thumb to his index finger, that, too, lit up with a stream of sparklers. He continued using his thumb to ignite one finger after another until the tip of each finger was alight with a small fountain of fireworks. Then, starting with his right thumb again, he touched his index finger and extinguished the sparks until all the fires died down. Fanning his fingers one more time, he shot a single, strong stream of sparks from his index finger, held it aloft, and traced it through the air, describing the word WELCOME.

The audience applauded politely, shifted their weight from one foot to another, and sipped their drinks. The assistant held up a card that read FROZEN FOUNTAIN, then handed Toby a red-and-gold brocade cloth that I had selected. He displayed both sides of the cloth. Waving it with the challenging grace of a bullfighter, he lowered the fabric until the bottom edge touched the blackjack table. He whisked it away, revealing a porcelain fountain filled with porcelain lily pads and birds. Toby lowered the cloth over the fountain. The gold fabric seemed to bulge. He withdrew it, and water poured over the fountain’s sides. With one more whisk of