Abruptly the auditorium lights came on!

What must have been a stage electrician sprang up to a balcony platform and got a spotlight going. He threw it onto Heller and turned it blue and red and yellow and white. Then he must have heard a signal from Mamie for he swivelled it over onto her on the stage. She was holding her hands up to command attention. They lifted Heller up over the footlights and turned their faces to Mamie.

In a voice that would have made a Greek orator roll in his grave with envy, Mamie roared out, "Now, ladeeees and gentlemen, you proud employees of the newly named Lucky Bonanza Casino Corporation! Get the paddles chunking, the yachts flying! Get the Boardwalk swept and the dice and wheels rolling in the dough. Tote that barge and lift that roll! In short, as your president and general manager, I advise you to get back to work! What do you say?"

The crowd cheered! It rushed out of the auditorium, on its way.

Heller looked around at the deserted hall. He looked at Mamie and Tom-Tom and the Countess. He asked them, wonderingly, "What did I approve?"

The others had their minds on different things. Nobody answered.

Heller asked, "How did the lights come on?"

Tom-Tom stopped tightening a drumhead and looked at Heller timidly. He said, "I couldn't go to the utility company offices myself. I know as treasurer I should handle them, but I wouldn't know if I was paying the right bank notes out, so I sent the band leader. The lights, phone, water and furnaces should all be on shortly, as he keeps good time."

Heller looked around. "But they can't start gambling in the casinos or even make change in the stores. There isn't any cash."

The Countess Krak was at his elbow. "I didn't tell you, dear, as you seemed so busy. But I put three sacks of that money in a ventilator shaft. It's about a million and a half, they guess. I gave it to Mamie so she could get your corporation going."

Mamie said, "And it is really appreciated, honey. It's enough to pay utilities, get money in the cashier's cages and fill up the slot machines so we can start pulling in some dough."

Heller asked them, "What did I approve?"

But he was being pushed out of the auditorium by Mamie. They got to the lobby.

It was jammed with newly arriving people! MOBS! There were four long lines at the desk where clerks were swiftly checking them in.

Heller looked out a side window. The parking lot was jammed with newly arrived cars. And more were strung out down the road, honking their way forward inch by inch. He said to Mamie, "Why are all those people coming in?"

She said, as she pushed him up some steps, "I guess it's to see the scene of the battle. It's all over national TV. Burning tanks, exploding landing craft, shot-down planes. The wrecks are all out there, real and authentic, too! The PR people did a great job on press-agenting your taking Atlantic City by storm. They even used some film clips of the Normandy D-day landing in World War II. It's been on every network since midmorn­ing. But Atlantic City press agents have always been tops."

I snorted. Atlantic City press agents be (bleeped). That was Madison!

The Countess Krak said, "Was there a battle, dear? I was in the laundry room and corridors. I did hear shoot­ing. But I didn't know you'd been down on the beach."

They had reached the former office of capo Gobbo Piegare. Mamie inspected the place; she picked a beautifully sculpted black hand off the desk and dropped it in the wastebasket and dusted off her fingers. She then removed Heller's coat and sat down in the elegant, yellow desk chair. From it she had a view of the Boardwalk, which was getting noisier.

She tossed the jacket to Heller. "You sure are clever, sailor. Having a stand-in doing autographs for you. It can be pretty tiring, as stars like me know only too well. But listen, sailor: when you choose a double, pick one that looks more like you. I can't abide buckteeth."

"Double?" said Heller. "Where is the double?"

Oh, my Gods. I certainly smelled Madison here in his relentless search for front page.

"Why," said Mamie, "he's out there now on the Boardwalk, autographing like mad. Clever idea. Wears one out posing for TV crews. But the double is handling it well."

The Countess said, "So you don't have to go out, dear."

Heller peeked through the window down at the

Boardwalk. It was SWARMING with public and vendors and reporters and cameramen. The double, Madison's phony "Whiz Kid"-glasses, big jaw, buckteeth and all-was standing on a wrecked army-surplus tank while some effects man rekindled the flames within it.

"I sure won't," said Heller, flinching. He turned back into the room. "Will somebody please, please tell me what I approved?"

Mamie sat up in the sumptuous desk chair. "Well, you see, none of the staff has been paid for ages. And they know the corporation can't pay them and it's winter and there are no jobs open." She looked at him questioningly as if to say, did he really want to know?

"Please tell me," begged Heller.

"Well, in short, sailor, I told them that if you approved it, they could have 100 percent of the profits of the whole corporation and all its holdings, after expenses, until all their back wages, withholding tax and pension fund was caught up. After that, you said they could only have 60 percent. However, that won't be for a long, long time."

Heller sat down suddenly in a chair. And well he might! For, to all intents and purposes, so far as income for an owner was concerned, Atlantic City again had just changed hands!

THE WHOLE ENTERPRISE HAD BEEN TAKEN OVER BY THE STAFF!

Mamie went on. "But I need an opinion from you on something very important."

Breathlessly, he said, "What?"

Mamie said, persuasively, "Don't you think I should order my name put up in lights on each casino-hotel? Real big: 'Mamie Boomp, President and General Man­ager.' How do you think that would go over?"

Very faintly, Heller said, "Wonderful." Then after a little he turned to Countess Krak, "Dear, I think it's time we went back to New York."

Oh, did I guffaw! Heller's venture to get Izzy out of debt had made exactly no progress at all! It had only brought more trouble. Moreover, he was now discouraged and of very low morale.

I decided then and there to stop worrying about him and let him sink. There was no slightest sign that he would do anything productive or active, and when the word came from Lombar, he and the Countess Krak would still be in the U. S. floundering around. They didn't have a prayer of completing before I could get the word and kill them both!

My euphoria revved right up to top-peak. It was I who was winning. Me, me, me!

The next morning my beauty sleep was shattered by a shrieking sizzle at my bedside. It interrupted a beautiful dream: Heller and Krak were in a bread line in New York and a Manco Devil was standing there with a soup ladle, not only refusing them food but also banging them expertly over the head with the sharp edge.

The shrieking sizzle was the intercom. It was quite unusual for it to buzz, for Faht Bey never wanted any help from me if he could possibly escape it. So it must be an emergency.

I pushed the button.

It was!

Faht Bey said, "Come to the hangar quick! They're killing Doctor Crobe!"

I would have said, so what, why are you calling me? But he had closed the line.

It occurred to me that I should not be careless. Life is full of chances. I had learned from Bury to always have an alternate solution in case something went wrong. I might need Crobe in the event that Heller and Krak muddled through.

I got into some clothes. I armed myself very heavily. I went down the tunnel to the hangar to give Faht a piece of my mind. Things had changed and he had better find out about it.