I present myself to the concierge at the establishment mentioned on the invitation. I give him my name and am escorted through a maze of hallways to an unmarked and unremarkable door. The door opens to a small foyer piled high with silk cushions. A woman in Moroccan robes, refashioned to allow for an improbable amount of décolletage, takes my hand and leads me through another set of doors to a dimly lit room decorated in a grab bag of oriental and Middle Eastern styles. Chinese lanterns hang from a ceiling that’s tented in Arabian Nights fabric, barely illuminating hookahs and Japanese tatami mats. Eight pointed Moroccan stars hang next to stencils of Hindu deities. Ostrich feathers fill ceramic vases while ornate shrines are set up to revere nothing in particular.
About thirty people are scattered through the room, reclining, drawing on hookahs, sipping green drinks. I recognize the Hollywood star, the hostess for the evening. She’s in a silky red dress buttoned up to the throat. She’s sprawled over cushions, extending her bare feet into a small crowd of admirers who silently consider their cocktails and suck on bubbling pipes.
Belly dancers, masseurs, tarot readers, and a hypnotist move around the room, whispering their offerings into the ears of the guests. It seem as if drugs and alcohol are not sufficient to charm the revelers’ minds into submission. They require another type of out-of-body experience and need their futures to be laid out in vivid pictures. Behind a DJ booth, a man in a fez spins slow hypnotic grooves. After a couple of days back in Las Vegas, I realize how tired I am of these false enchantments.
I didn’t see Toby enter. But he’s at my side, wearing a black silk shirt with black embroidery.
He loops his arm through mine. “Would you indulge me before I make my rounds?”
“With what?” I let him kiss my cheek.
“A quick trick.” Toby passes his hand over mine. I look down and see my green drink—absinthe and citrus—turn the color of the ranch house. He winks and is off.
I settle into a pile of cushions, not really caring that I have no one to speak to. I’m happy to watch Toby work, stretching out his elegant frame alongside revelers on Thai meditation pillows. I can’t hear him, but I can imagine his voice as he asks if they would like to see his magic. I know the looks of surprise as cocktails are transformed into smoke, which then curls upward, taking the shape of Far East dragons.
Toby’s routine is similar to the one he performed at the Castaway, but now it’s tinged with Eastern mysticism. He transforms money into prayer papers, makes animal shapes appear inside the Chinese lanterns, causes the hookahs to billow multicolored plumes of smoke. Toby charms with updated classics, making an orange tree grow from an empty vase, plucking enamel carp from the air, transforming napkins into doves and then back again.
In this dark chamber, hidden away in the bowels of Vegas, it’s easy to submit to the magician’s charms. If we could lead our lives sealed in such boxes, staying with Toby, even in this world of his conjuring might be possible. But eventually the door will open and reality will leak in. Something will go wrong and the magician will resort to magic to repair the damage. I can’t blame him, I think, as I watch him turn a woman’s cuff bracelet into a iridescent lizard, before restoring it to a cuff.
Toby takes his time with the actress. He sits close to her and whispers in her ear. He holds one of her hands in his own, using the other to conjure an array of objects that might amuse her. She has an ostrich feather in her free hand and is using it to trace lazy circles in the air, keeping half an eye on the magic appearing next to her. Coins and tarot cards, birds of paradise, and hammered silver jewels arrive in her lap. Her drink turns to smoke, which then coils around her neck and solidifies into a silk wrap. Toby removes the wrap from the actress’s shoulders and crumples it in his hands. He unfurls it, then he claps, folding the fabric together. As he does so, the silk vanishes, replaced by a tall green-and-orange flame, leaping upward from the magician’s palm.
Toby’s on his feet, making room for the hypnotist, who’s been waiting to enchant one of the actress’s companions. Soon the man leaps from the group, swirling and bobbing, sinks to floor, and, with a word from the hypnotist, is released from his spell.
I follow the magician to a corner of the room, where a four-paneled Moorish screen leans against the wall. He brings the screen into the center of the room and arranges it into a diamond shape with a small opening between the two end panels. He returns to the actress and her friends and extends an arm. The hostess allows herself to be lifted to her feet and led to the screen. Toby whispers something in her ear and escorts her into the space inside the panels. She vanishes from sight.
When she emerges, she swears she’s been away for hours, transported to another world. Her friends line up for this new enchantment, each one emerging with a fantastic tale of a landscape far away. My heart leaps as another partygoer steps into this trick. Toby’s success at the Winter Palace has clearly emboldened him, and he invites the entire crowd to be part of his magic.
Then it’s my turn. Toby beckons to me, drawing me to his side. He passes an arm around my waist, and we stand in front of the screen.
“Wait.” I step away from the magician.
“What is it?”
I take a deep breath, willing the words to come out. “I can’t stay.”
“The party isn’t going to last forever.”
“I can’t stay in Vegas. My time here is up.”
I see Toby’s eyes cloud. “I don’t understand.”
“I don’t expect you
