text: [Themes: Flimflam, cards, magician]
  
  > Go downward
  You open the trapdoor and slip down undetected.
  
  You'll never forget the first time you explored down here. Even with your compass, you were totally lost for hours. Just darkness and garbage and steel columns bracing the ceiling in every direction.
  
  At the moment, you know where you are because the trapdoor's overhead, but it's easy to get turned around (read: inevitable). Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the south, west, north, and east.
  
  Threadbare tuxedoes are mounded around you waist-high.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, west, and east.
  
  Moldy satin bouquets carpet the floor.
  
  > Go inside
  Okay, you're headed in the right direction. You recognize the two skeletons on the ground here from the last time you came through. Not that you thought you would really lose your way again, but
  it's still reassuring to find a landmark.
  
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the east, south, north, and west.
  
  You have to kick your way through woven baskets packed with ropes.
  
  > Enter
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Wands, wands, wands. Who uses wands? No one. That's why they're dumped here.
  
  > go inside
  Finally you reach the center. There's more junk piled here than anywhere else. Swords designed for swallowing, and saws designed to cut ladies in half, and handkerchiefs and pointy hats and cloaks patterned with stars, and cups and balls, and chains and guillotines, and boxes with mirrors in them, and padlocks and lockpicks. Enough miscellaneous garbage to orchestrate a thousand magic tricks.
  
  But what's this? Oho, something new: a steamer trunk sitting
  right out in the open. Definitely wasn't there before. Definitely stamped with the initials I.I.
  
  > examine the trunk
  Enormous, leather, bound in buckled straps. This is the sort of trunk that people imagine when they think about trunks, not the sort of trunk that anyone actually owns. Except for Ivan. The man
  must not know the meaning of the word discretion.
  
  > open the trunk
  You open the trunk using Ivan's filched key. It's a cinch. No additional security. No extra obstacles. Like the fool never even expected that he would be robbed. Oiled hinges slide back with a pleasant smoothness as the lid rises, and then you're looking down at the interior.
  
  > examine the trunk
  This is what you knew you'd find.
  
  > Continue
  This is what you knew you'd find. Even still, it takes you
  somewhat by surprise.
  
  > continue
  Sitting there in the trunk is a pale glistening slab like a raw chicken breast. Maybe calling it a chicken breast doesn't quite paint the picture. It's got arms and legs but they're no more than stubs, and its head is as big as its body. So it's more like two raw chicken breasts that have been slapped together. Its eyes are sunk way back into its head and it's got an itty-bitty toothless mouth. All gums, that toothless mouth. Its stubby arms are wiggling and it's mumbling words that sound more like lip-smacks: "... three of spades...  nine of hearts...  king of clubs... "
  
  > talk to the trunk
  Not much conversation there.
  
  > examine the trunk
  Enormous, leather, bound in buckled straps. This is the sort of trunk that people imagine when they think about trunks, not the sort of trunk that anyone actually owns. Except for Ivan. The man
  must not know the meaning of the word discretion.
  
  Right now the trunk is open, and Ivan's grandmother is sitting inside mumbling: "... five of hearts...  four of spades...  king of clubs... "
  
  > talk to the grandmother
  So you're Ivan's grandmother, huh? What a pleasure to meet.
  You must be so proud of your grandson's success, unless you're aware he's a slimeball and a cheater. But of course you're aware, since he put you down here, made you what you are now. You can't cop to it, though, can't say anything except card ranks and suits, which is why actually interrogating you like this would be pointless.
  
  But it doesn't matter, because you know what Ivan did to his grandmother, whether she has the voice to admit it or not. Just look at her. This is your jurisdiction he's trying to muscle into,
  and when his career is over, you'll still reign supreme.
  
  > take the grandmother
  Now everything makes sense. Of course Ivan can perform a three-card trick, because he upped the ante by using his grandmother as
  a ritual anchor. That's definitely what this is: a grandmother. You wonder why you never considered such a possibility. In retrospect, it's bloody obvious.
  
  What's less obvious is how someone as lunkheaded as Ivan even figured out how to do it. Must've stumbled across a grimoire. He sure as hell didn't struggle like you to personally chart the leylines. You refuse to believe that he's got enough talent. Which is why you feel no compunction whatsoever about taking his grandmother for yourself, and promptly scoop her up. She's slimy and gross but what can you expect.
  
  > Go inside
  As you hold her in your arms, she groans. She wants to go back inside the trunk, but she's going to go into your chest instead,
  which you've hidden beneath the surrounding debris.
  
  > look
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Miscellaneous magical artifacts clutter the area, but separated from them is a distinctly out-of-place steamer trunk.
  
  > examine the artifacts
  Unlike Ivan, you hid your chest well, and it takes some digging before you unearth it from the junk. You can tell that it hasn't been touched since you were here last season. All the locks are still intact. Now you've just got to pull your key out of your top hat to open it.
  
  > search debris
  you've just got to pull your key out of your top hat to open it.Suddenly you hear a commotion. It's coming through the ceiling from the exposition. Voices rising in surprise. Exclamations. Shuffling and confusion.
  
  > Open chest
  You've got to pull your key out of your top hat first.
  
  Now you can hear Ivan's voice. You'd recognize that caster-oil tenor anywhere. You can't make out the words but his tone is unmistakably, deliciously desperate. Defensive. Imploring. If only you could see his face!
  
  > take the key
  You already have Ivan's key.
  
  ... and now you hear footsteps overhead. Footsteps in a stampede. In an exodus. Eventually they diminish, moving outward, away, until there's only silence left behind.
  
  > Search hat
  In this racket, all it takes is one mistake. So much for Ivan's popularity.
  
  > take the key from the hat
  As though pulling it from the thinnest air, you reach into your top hat and pull out a key. Presto!
  
  > Unlock chest
  It takes some finesse to unlock your chest and disengage the booby-traps, which is no problem because you've got finesse in your genetics. Also, you're the one who placed the traps. You'd better know how to deactivate them.
  
  The lid pops open, and inside the chest is your mother right where you left her.
  
  > look at the mother
  Oh mother dearest, the voice in your ear, the ace up your sleeve, whose whispered words are never wrong. At least, not when it comes to two-card tricks. But three-card tricks? Forget it. She's not operating on the right wavelength, and there's no way to recalibrate her lode. What's done is done. You made that call and there's no going back.
  
  Nowadays she might be outmoded, but she's still crawling around inside your chest like a good little pork tenderloin. Which is what she looks like. Fleshless, flexible, and wet. Wheezing out her predictions: "... three of diamonds...  king of diamonds... " When you sit upstairs
  inside
  your booth, you just have to listen and her forecast slips
  into your brain like a drug down a drip.
  
  > put the grandmother in the chest
  You lower Ivan's grandmother into your chest, and she takes to it rather nicely, chirping and slapping her stubs around to feel her new environment. She's just happy to be back inside a container.
  
  Your own mother doesn't pay too much notice. Keeps slithering in circles. When she bumps into her housemate, she keeps bumping until she's bumped herself around the obstacle, and Ivan's grandmother hardly registers the contact. The two might as well exist on separate planes. Which, now that you consider it, they probably do to a certain degree.
  
  > Close chest
  You wipe your hands. Your job is done. All you have to do now is sit on your chair in your booth and listen, and when you deal
  three cards out for a trick (which you most certainly will) then you'll hear Ivan's grandmother mumbling predictions in your head, just like she's mumbling now: "... ten of diamonds...  three of diamonds... 
  nine of
  diamonds... "
  
  > put the key in the hat
  (your key in your top hat)
  You drop your key into your top hat and...  hey, where did it go? Observe, ladies and gentlemen, as you upend your hat and shake it. Why, nothing comes out! It's as though the key has vanished.
  What mystique!
  
  > Go outside
  Leave without closing your chest? You don't think so.
  
  > Close chest
  After resetting its booby-traps, you close your chest and lock it. Then you bury it back underneath the accumulated garbage in the area where nobody but you will ever find it.
  
  > Leave
  Identical passageways open to the east, west, north, and south.
  
  You almost trip over a bunch of handcuffs and manacles tangled together.
  
  > leave
  Identical passageways open to the east, north, west, and south.
  
  Your footsteps crunch. No wonder. All these shattered crystal balls.
  
  > go outside
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Two skeletons lie on the ground.
  
  > examine the skeletons
  They're still wearing tuxedoes and top hats, with their boney arms stretched out like they were hoping they could crawl to salvation. Which is probably what they did hope. Thought they could sneak into the exposition without an invite. Got lost down here in the underground instead. Never got out. You'd pity them if you didn't think they had it coming.
  
  > Go outside
  Identical passageways open to the west, south, north, and east.
  
  Dice and marbles litter the ground like pebbles.
  
  > leave
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Overhead you can see your old friend, the trapdoor.
  
  > Up
  You climb back through the trapdoor.
  
  Guardsman are patrolling the barricade outside, and there's a trapdoor behind a derelict penny arcade at the exposition's fringe.
  
  Inward are stalls lining row after row.
  
  > go inside
  You wander back into the exposition.
  
  Stalls and stalls and stalls in rows and rows and rows. Sightseers bustle between them.
  
  Outward the exposition eventually ends; inward lies its center.
  
  > Go inside
  Here at the exposition's center are your booth and Ivan's tent.
  
  Outward are more magicians at more stations.
  
  > Enter
  You could enter your booth or Ivan's tent.
  
  > Continue
  You turn to enter your booth but then you stop in your tracks when you see what's there.
  
  > Continue
  Not a crowd like Ivan had around his tent. No, this is different.
  
  > Continue
  This is an entourage.
  
  > Continue
  More ladies in more pastel dresses twirling more parasols, but
  higher class ladies with higher class dresses and
  parasols whiter than snow. All their noses upturned. All their hats decked with ribbons. And yet despite their cosmopolitan polish they're nothing next to the one woman they follow and imitate like
  second-rate mirrors.
  
  > Keep going
  That would be Lady Gascogne.
  
  > continue
  That would be Lady Gascogne. At your booth.
  
  > Continue
  That would be Lady Gascogne. At your booth. Waiting for you.
  
  > continue
  At the Exposition (in your booth)
  Lady Gascogne is standing beside your table. Unlike everyone else, she doesn't carry her parasol open. She's holding it like a cane with both palms planted on its handle, but not like a cane that anyone would use to hobble around. Instead it's more like a gavel. One strike from its tip to the ground would make the whole world quake. Hyperbole, of course, but not by much.
  
  "Good, here you are," she says when you enter. "Normally I never wait, but when I saw this 'Out to Lunch' sign, I decided to give
  you five minutes. How many are left?"
  
  "Just twenty-nine seconds," her assistant reports next to her.
  
  "Under the wire," says Lady Gascogne.
  
  > take the sign
  "Lady Gascogne! Mademoiselles!" you say, sweeping the notice away from your table and settling back into your chair. "What a pleasure to see you all here at this season's exposition! I must apologize. When lunch calls, lunch calls, but I'm honored, enraptured, delighted that you stuck around to see my three-card trick."
  
  > talk to Lady
  stuck around to see my three-card trick."Something in the air shifts when you speak those magic words. Voices drop. Heads turn. Every lady is staring as though you're a steak that's been thrown for them to devour. You know this sensation. You've felt it before, last season, when you dealt two cards and Lady Gascogne reached for one. They were ready to swallow you whole if you couldn't guess right. Spit out your bones. Leave you disgraced.
  
  > Keep going
  "Nobody's performed a three-card trick," says Lady Gascogne. "The man in the tent over there tried to do it and failed. He was a liar. Everyone who said that he could do it, they were liars too. I have no tolerance for lies."
  
  "I'm an honest magician," you tell her. "Only genuine tricks from Morgan the Magnificent!"
  
  > do the trick
  What's it take to perform a three-card trick? Six simple steps:
  
  1. Shuffle the deck.
  2. Deal a card.
  3. Deal a card.
  4. Deal a card.
  5. Listen.
  6. Name the correct card.
  
  Steps two through four are what make it a three-card trick.
  Step five is more important than the rest. But step six is what will impress your spectators the most. Easy as pie.
  
  > Shuffle deck
  Before you shuffle or deal any cards, you've got to talk to Lady Gascogne and offer her the chance to search your belongings. Standard practice.
  
  > Shuffle deck
  "Of course," you say, "it wouldn't be right to conduct a card trick without a shuffle, whether that's a one-card trick, a two-card trick, or even the marvelous three-card trick you're about to
  witness."
  
  Shuffling cards is second nature. You hold the deck in one palm, split its cards, riffle them with your thumbs. Their edges flutter and blend. They bend upward, dovetailing in your hands, and then cascade into a stack when your fingers release. Less than one second. No thought required.
  
  Lady Gascogne doesn't look impressed. Neither does her entourage.
  
  > Deal card
  Now the stage is set. You can feel motivations and emotions flowing around you. Expectations. Judgements. Hopes. Everything in the exposition gravitating toward your booth, pouring into your cards. They want to be dealt. They are waiting for you to deal them.
  
  > Deal card
  You take the top card from the deck and place it face-down on the table.
  
  > Deal card
  You're still in safe territory. Lady Gascogne doesn't react. Her entourage looks indifferent. But the fact is that you've taken the first step and now they're on their toes. They just don't show it yet.
  
  > Deal card
  When you reach for your deck a second time, you can actually
  see attentions sharpening. Bodies drawing closer. Necks
  craning to gain a better view. Even Lady Gascogne's gaze is locked onto the cards.
  
  > Deal card
  Two.
  
  > Deal card
  Now this trick has gotten serious.
  
  > Deal card
  Ladies gasp, hands fly to cover mouths, teeth chomp down to bite fingernails when you reach for your deck a third time. You've had no practice, but this has to work. You don't want to imagine
  what will happen if it doesn't.
  
  > Deal card
  what will happen if it doesn't.So you don't imagine it.
  
  > Deal card
  You put one last card face-down on the table.
  
  > Continue
  Three.
  
  > Continue
  That's it. There's no going back. Lady Gascogne's looming over you, hands clamped onto her parasol's handle, weight bearing on that parasol as she leans forward to look at the spread. Her eyes are counting them: one, two, three cards.
  
  But you aren't nervous. You're assured, confident, in control.
  
  > listen
  ... deuce of clubs...  eight of spades... 
  ... nine of clubs...  queen of spades...  five of hearts... 
  
  > talk to Lady
  "Pick a card," you tell Lady Gascogne.
  
  > Keep going
  She stares at you.
  
  > Continue
  She stares at you. She says nothing.
  
  > continue
  She picks a card.
  
  > Keep going
  The middle card, to be precise. That's important. After she's
  done glancing at it, she holds the card where no one else can see, and then she stares at you again.
  
  > Continue
  "Amaze me," she commands. "What card is this?"
  
  > listen
  ... queen of hearts...  nine of clubs... 
  ... nine of clubs...  queen of spades...  five of hearts... 
  
  > Queen of spades
  "I hear...  I hear...  a voice," you say, cupping your ear in the most melodramatic posture that you can manage. "It's whispering...  from very far away...  across the gaps that yawn between what we call space and time. It's saying something...  about royalty...  about a queen... "
  
  Everyone else strains to listen, but they can't hear anything.
  
  > talk to her
  Everyone else strains to listen, but they can't hear anything. They never will.
  
  > Continue
  "... I can hear something... 
  
  > keep going
  "... I can hear something...  digging... 
  
  > Keep going
  "... I can hear something...  digging...  digging in the darkness... 
  
  > continue
  "... I can hear something...  digging...  digging in the darkness...  in
  the
  blackness... 
  
  > Continue
  blackness... yes, a black suit... 
  
  > Keep going
  blackness... yes, a black suit...  it's a spade... "
  
  > Continue
  No one breathes. No one moves.
  
  > Continue
  "You've drawn the queen of spades."
  
  > keep going
  Lady Gascogne lays a queen of spades on the table.
  
  > continue
  No, these things are obvious. They don't need to be said.
  
  > Continue
  Now you've got a second platinum medal on your jacket. Lady Gascogne pinned it there after her assistant handed it over. They have a million different medals to distribute, but this one is
  yours. No one deserves it more.
  
  "What's next?" asks Lady Gascogne.
  
  "Another exposition," says her assistant. "Jugglers."
  
  "Let's hope that they've improved this season. Two-ball jugglers are so tedious."
  
  > keep going
  And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how to successfully perform a... 
  
  > Continue
  THREE## -CARD ## TRICK.
  
  > Diversions
  Did you try...
  
  ...listening while sitting in your booth at the beginning?
  ...playing solitaire while sitting in your booth?
  ...examining the penny arcade?
  ...examining the barricade?
  ...climbing the barricade?
  ...examining the skeletons underground?
  ...talking to Ivan's grandmother?
  ...talking to your mother?
  ...revisiting Ivan after stealing his grandmother?
  ...guessing Lady Gascogne's card incorrectly?
  ...pulling a rabbit out of your hat?
  
  Would you like to RESTART, RESTORE a saved game, QUIT, UNDO the last command, or view a few potential DIVERSIONS?
  
  > Go inside
  Identical passageways open to the east, north, west, and south.
  
  Dice and marbles litter the ground like pebbles.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the south, west, north, and east.
  
  Stacked caskets skewered with machetes line the shadows.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the south, north, east, and west.
  
  Moldy satin bouquets carpet the floor.
  
  > go inside
  Identical passageways open to the south, east, west, and north.
  
  You can hear people walking on the exposition floor above.
  
  > Continue
  Sitting there in the trunk is a pale glistening slab like a raw chicken breast. Maybe calling it a chicken breast doesn't quite paint the picture. It's got arms and legs but they're no more than stubs, and its head is as big as its body. So it's more like two raw chicken breasts that have been slapped together. Its eyes are sunk way back into its head and it's got an itty-bitty toothless mouth. All gums, that toothless mouth. Its stubby arms are wiggling and it's mumbling words that sound more like lip-smacks: "... ace of clubs...  ten of
  spades... 
  four of hearts... "
  
  > Lock trunk
  You close Ivan's steamer trunk and lock it again.
  
  > leave
  You're not about to walk away without putting Ivan's grandmother where she belongs: in your chest.
  
  > examine the chest
  she belongs: in your chest.Suddenly you hear a commotion. It's coming through the ceiling from the exposition. Voices rising in surprise. Exclamations. Shuffling and confusion.
  
  > get the key from the hat
  As though pulling it from the thinnest air, you reach into your top hat and pull out a key. Presto!
  
  Now you can hear Ivan's voice. You'd recognize that caster-oil tenor anywhere. You can't make out the words but his tone is unmistakably, deliciously desperate. Defensive. Imploring. If only you could see his face!
  
  > talk to the grandma
  So you're Ivan's grandmother, huh? What a pleasure to meet.
  You must be so proud of your grandson's success, unless you're aware he's a slimeball and a cheater. But of course you're aware, since he put you down here, made you what you are now. You can't cop to it, though, can't say anything except card ranks and suits, which is why actually interrogating you like this would be pointless.
  
  But it doesn't matter, because you know what Ivan did to his grandmother, whether she has the voice to admit it or not. Just look at her. This is your jurisdiction he's trying to muscle into,
  and when his career is over, you'll still reign supreme.
  
  ... and now you hear footsteps overhead. Footsteps in a stampede. In an exodus. Eventually they diminish, moving outward, away, until there's only silence left behind.
  
  > examine the rubbish
  In this racket, all it takes is one mistake. So much for Ivan's popularity.
  
  > look
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Miscellaneous magical artifacts clutter the area, but separated from them is a distinctly out-of-place steamer trunk.
  
  > examine the artifacts
  Unlike Ivan, you hid your chest well, and it takes some digging before you unearth it from the junk. You can tell that it hasn't been touched since you were here last season. All the locks are still intact.
  
  > examine the chest
  A modest chest. Small enough to carry in two hands without hassle. Locked and booby-trapped for good measure.
  
  > Open chest
  It takes some finesse to unlock your chest and disengage the booby-traps, which is no problem because you've got finesse in your genetics. Also, you're the one who placed the traps. You'd better know how to deactivate them.
  
  The lid pops open, and inside the chest is your mother right where you left her.
  
  > talk to the mother
  Hello, mother. Life treating you well? How about these accommodations? Met anyone new recently? We ought to catch up more. We don't see each other as often as we used to. That's because you're locked down in this chest, which is why really asking you these questions
  and having a chat would be as useless as talking to a wall.
  
  Yeah, your mother's here, all right, but she's also not. There's a reason that nobody else can perform a two-card trick. There's a reason that Lady Gascogne pinned a platinum medal to your jacket.
  There's a reason you deserve it more than anyone. And it's called sacrifice.
  
  > put the grandmother in the chest
  You lower Ivan's grandmother into your chest, and she takes to it rather nicely, chirping and slapping her stubs around to feel her new environment. She's just happy to be back inside a container.
  
  Your own mother doesn't pay too much notice. Keeps slithering in circles. When she bumps into her housemate, she keeps bumping until she's bumped herself around the obstacle, and Ivan's grandmother hardly registers the contact. The two might as well exist on separate planes. Which, now that you consider it, they probably do to a certain degree.
  
  > Close chest
  You wipe your hands. Your job is done. All you have to do now is sit on your chair in your booth and listen, and when you deal
  three cards out for a trick (which you most certainly will) then you'll hear Ivan's grandmother mumbling predictions in your head, just like she's mumbling now: "... eight of diamonds...  nine of diamonds... 
  eight
  of diamonds... "
  
  > take the rabbit from the hat
  As if you'd ever resort to such a tasteless trick. Cards are in right now; rabbits are out.
  
  > go outside
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  You have to kick your way through woven baskets packed with ropes.
  
  > Go outside
  Identical passageways open to the west, north, east, and south.
  
  Wands, wands, wands. Who uses wands? No one. That's why they're dumped here.
  
  > go outside
  Identical passageways open to the north, south, east, and west.
  
  Two skeletons lie on the ground.
  
  > go outside
  Identical passageways open to the west, south, north, and east.
  
  Threadbare tuxedoes are mounded around you waist-high.
  
  > climb the barricade
  You begin to approach the barricade and... suddenly there's a red bead on your jacket. Another. Another. More beads trained on you as the guards atop the wall pivot in your direction. When they see that you've stopped advancing, they resume their patrol and the red beads disperse.
  
  > examine the penny arcade
  You stop holding your breath. Were you holding your breath? What nonsense. The guards only shoot people climbing the wall from
  outside. You were never in any danger. Still, you don't know
  what put the idea into your head. It's not something you'll try again.
  
  > examine the barricade
  There's probably a mob outside that barricade. All the rejected magicians. Protesting. Fighting for entrance. You've seen the mayhem before. People brandishing silk scarves and doves like that'll convince anyone to let them inside. Every season at least a few hundred get shot trying to climb the wall. Good riddance is all you can say.
  
  > examine the penny arcade
  Back in the day, a machine was actually the first 'person' to successfully perform a one-card trick. That led to penny arcades like this being churned out en masse, each equipped with its own
  robotic card-dealing magician. But the first machine's success was a fluke. All the penny arcades were useless. Which is why human magicians like you are still around.
  
  > go inside
  You wander back into the exposition.
  
  Stalls and stalls and stalls in rows and rows and rows. Sightseers bustle between them.
  
  Outward the exposition eventually ends; inward lies its center.
  
  > Go inside
  Here at the exposition's center are your booth and Ivan's tent.
  
  Outward are more magicians at more stations.
  
  > Enter
  You could enter your booth or Ivan's tent.
  
  > enter ivan's tent
  At the Exposition (in Ivan's tent)
  What a difference since you were last here. Where once there were adoring throngs, now there's nobody. Only Ivan sitting slumped at his table with his head in his hands and his career as a magician lying in shambles at his feet.
  
  incredible one.
  
  > talk to Ivan
  Ivan doesn't react when he sees you. He's too distraught to play his charming smarmy role as the 'great three-card magician' anymore. Hunched over like some dejected maiden in a cheap romance, weeping with a handkerchief for his lost love. Except it's not a romance. It's a tragedy, and this dejected maiden has been jilted and won't recover until the grave takes him.
  
  "I'd ask what happened here," you say, "but I already know. You're Ivan the Imposter like I always said. A conman. Hustler. Ne'er-do-well. And now you're exposed. Everyone ran for the hills just like they should've from the start."
  
  "Oh, you don't even know the half," Ivan sniffles. "Lady Gascogne herself...  she was here...  and when I said she had a seven of hearts,
  she
  had a deuce of diamonds!"
  
  His wailing overwhelms him. He's a poor worthless blubbering wreck.
  
  > Continue
  Glorious.
  
  > Keep going
  At the Exposition (in your booth)
  Lady Gascogne is standing beside your table. Unlike everyone else, she doesn't carry her parasol open. She's holding it like a cane with both palms planted on its handle, but not like a cane that anyone would use to hobble around. Instead it's more like a gavel. One strike from its tip to the ground would make the whole world quake. Hyperbole, of course, but not by much.
  
  "Good, here you are," she says when you enter. "Normally I never wait, but when I saw this 'Out to Lunch' sign, I decided to give
  you five minutes. How many are left?"
  
  "Just fourteen seconds," her assistant reports next to her.
  
  "Under the wire," says Lady Gascogne.
  
  > take the sign
  "Lady Gascogne! Mademoiselles!" you say, sweeping the notice away from your table and settling back into your chair. "What a pleasure to see you all here at this season's exposition! I must apologize. When lunch calls, lunch calls, but I'm honored, enraptured, delighted that you stuck around to see my three-card trick."
  
  > Continue
  stuck around to see my three-card trick."Something in the air shifts when you speak those magic words. Voices drop. Heads turn. Every lady is staring as though you're a steak that's been thrown for them to devour. You know this sensation. You've felt it before, last season, when you dealt two cards and Lady Gascogne reached for one. They were ready to swallow you whole if you couldn't guess right. Spit out your bones. Leave you disgraced.
  
  > Keep going
  "Nobody's performed a three-card trick," says Lady Gascogne. "The man in the tent over there tried to do it and failed. He was a liar. Everyone who said that he could do it, they were liars too. I have no tolerance for lies."
  
  "I'm an honest magician," you tell her. "Only genuine tricks from Morgan the Magnificent!"
  
  > examine the deck
  A standard deck. Thirteen ranks. Four suits. Fifty-two cards total.
  
  > do the trick
  What's it take to perform a three-card trick? Six simple steps:
  
  1. Shuffle the deck.
  2. Deal a card.
  3. Deal a card.
  4. Deal a card.
  5. Listen.
  6. Name the correct card.
  
  Steps two through four are what make it a three-card trick.
  Step five is more important than the rest. But step six is what will impress your spectators the most. Easy as pie.
  
  > Deal card
  Now the stage is set. You can feel motivations and emotions flowing around you. Expectations. Judgements. Hopes. Everything in the exposition gravitating toward your booth, pouring into your cards. They want to be dealt. They are waiting for you to deal them.
  
  > Deal card
  You take the top card from the deck and place it face-down on the table.
  
  > listen
  ... ace of clubs...  six of clubs... 
  ... nine of clubs...  queen of spades...  five of hearts... 
  
  > Nine of the clubs
  "I hear...  I hear...  a voice," you say, cupping your ear and continuing
  on
  with your usual rigamarole. You've got it down to a science. How long to drag something out. When to drop hints or reveal specifics.
  
  > Continue
  Unfortunately all your showmanship is wasted when, after blathering on for some time about the spiritual whispers that have unveiled Lady Gascogne's card to you, the card that you name isn't the card that she's holding. Really, did you just say nine of clubs?
  
  > continue
  Whoops! Too bad! You've blown your chance!
  
  Lady Gascogne throws her card down in disgust, and her assistant strips your platinum medal from last season, and you're a laughingstock for years and years to come. You'll never live this down... 
  
  > Continue
  down... if you go through with it.
  
  > Continue
  But you won't go through with it, because you caught yourself in time. That's the wrong card you just said. Try again.
  
  > Y.
  cheapglulxe quit with exit status: 0