Top-of-the-line designer couture collections are displayed like artwork against stark white walls edged in black marble. The ceiling is at least twenty feet high. Track lighting shines down from industrial steel beams highlighting mannequins casually draped with layers of exquisitely expensive Italian sportswear. An espresso bar with an enormous copper coffee machine sits in the middle of the room.

Long-legged salesgirls floated across the black marble floor with sultry deadpan expressions, eyes fixed at a spot slightly above my head as though they were on runways. A woman who was vaguely familiar to me from television was sitting at the bar having a glass of champagne while her bill was being totaled. The paparazzi hover outside the door of Crystal’s when the lunch crowd has broken up at the Bistro Garden to catch those half-candid, half-contrived photos that appear on three color tabloids at the checkout stand of the market. The bored and besotted stagger into the bright sunlit afternoon with their purchases.

“Something I might show you?” purred a tall, slim redhead who appeared silently at my elbow.

“I’d like to see Monica Fullbright.”

The redhead looked puzzled. “Is she New York? We don’t carry her. How about one of these fabulous Leonardo shirts? We just got them in. We’re the only one in town who has them.” She dangled the shirt in front of me. “Sensational, isn’t it?”

“Monica Fullbright, the manager.”

Quizzically she looked around the room. Her cheekbones were high, her cheeks dramatically sunken. It takes at least a hundred and fifty dollars of cocaine a week to maintain that sculptured look.

“You want to see the manager? Have a seat over there.” She pointed at the bar and disappeared.

Two more gorgeous salesgirls on a break were draped over the end of the bar. The one closer to me had her back turned and a mane of long, rich brown hair thrown over one shoulder. She was leaning forward, a thin white cotton skirt pulled tight against her perfect ass.

“Come on down and see me tonight,” she was coaxing. “It’s a lot of fun. Then we’ll go get a drink or something to eat.”

I sat there for a good five minutes listening to her describe her job moonlighting as a mud wrestler over on Western. I realized I had sidled practically into the middle of their conversation when a smoky voice with an English accent brought me back to the purpose of my visit.

“I am the manager. May I help you?”