AtDTDA: (12) whatever has happened to my brain? 350

[mikebailey at speakeasy.net]

>
> (or maybe the gem-drinker isn't Zombini, maybe it's
> Nookshaft - Crowley lived in New York, for awhile)
>

there's next to nothing in the text to promote that,
of course
(Occam's razor: true, Vibe could've invited more than
one magician to his party, but the whole party passage
segues into the family reunion so why think that? 

The way Erlys rescues Dally almost is enough to
think that a non-Zombini plot was afoot that Erlys foiled,
in which case a case might be made for a "2nd magician",
but when the mischievousness of the Zombini kids 
is revealed, they're the likeliest suspects - still,
would they stoop to Mickey Finning her?  They would've
had to enlist the "smooth gent with blindingly pomaded
grey hair and a gigantic emerald ring on his pinky" - 
who is that dude?  She's already met RW Vibe, so she'd
have recognized him.  Zombini appeared at the top of
the page --  
come to think of it, he's not the Cohen either (no bowl haircut)
Why does she accept all those drinks from him?



it is interesting, though, to consider Cohen/Zombini's 
parts in the story side-by-side -

Cohen bumping Lew Basnight's consciousness up to the next 
valence shell 

Zombini dissolving Merle Rideout's
marriage, changing his Signifier from the Lovers
to the Hermit