Then you invite any gentleman in the audience to think of a number. Let us suppose he thinks of 38. In that case you ask any lady in the audience to think of an odd number, and she suggests (shall we say?) 29. Then, asking the company to watch you carefully, you--you--
To tell the truth, I have forgotten just what it is you _do_ do, but I know that it is a very good trick, and never fails to create laughter and bewilderment. It is distinctly an illusion worth trying, and, if you begin it in the manner I have described, quite possibly some way of finishing it up will occur to you on the spur of the moment. By multiplying the two numbers together and pa.s.sing the hard-boiled egg through the sponge and then taking the ... or is it the--Anyway, I"m certain you have to have a piece of elastic up the sleeve ... and I know one of the florins has to--No, it"s no good, I can"t remember it.
But mention of the two numbers reminds me of a trick which I haven"t forgotten. It is a thought-reading illusion, and always creates the _maximum_ of wonderment amongst the audience. It is called
THE THREE QUESTIONS
As before, you ask a gentleman in the company to write down a number on a piece of paper, and a lady to write down another number. These numbers they show to the other guests. You then inform the company that you will ask any one of them three questions, and by the way they are answered you will guess what the product of the two numbers is. (For instance, if the numbers were 13 and 17, then 13 multiplied by 17 is--let"s see, thirteen sevens are--thirteen sevens--seven threes are twenty-one, seven times one is--well, look here, let"s suppose the numbers are 10 and 17. Then the product is 170, and 170 is the number you have got to guess.)
Well, the company selects a lady to answer your questions, and the first thing you ask her is: "When was Magna Charta signed?" Probably she says that she doesn"t know. Then you say, "What is the capital of Persia?" She answers Timbuctoo, or Omar Khayyam, according to how well informed she is. Then comes your last question: "What makes lightning?" She is practically certain to say, "Oh, the thunder." Then you tell her that the two numbers multiplied together come to 170.
How is this remarkable trick performed? It is quite simple. The two people whom you asked to think of the numbers are confederates, and you arranged with them beforehand that they should write down 10 and 17. Of course it would be a much better trick if they weren"t confederates; but in that case I don"t quite know how you would do it.
I shall end up this interesting and instructive article with a rather more difficult illusion. For the tricks I have already explained it was sufficient that the amateur prestidigitator (I shall only say this once more) should know how it was done; for my last trick he will also require a certain apt.i.tude for legerdemain in order to do it. But a week"s quiet practice at home will give him all the skill that is necessary.
THE MYSTERIOUS PUDDING
is one of the oldest and most popular illusions. You begin by borrowing a gold watch from one of your audience. Having removed the works, you wrap the empty case up in a handkerchief and hand it back to him, asking him to put it in his waistcoat pocket. The works you place in an ordinary pudding basin and proceed to pound up with a hammer. Having reduced them to powder, you cover the basin with another handkerchief, which you borrow from a member of the company, and announce that you are about to make a plum-pudding. Cutting a small hole in the top of the handkerchief, you drop a lighted match through the aperture; whereupon the handkerchief flares up. When the flames have died down you exhibit the basin, wherein (to the surprise of all) is to be seen an excellent Christmas pudding, which you may ask your audience to sample. At the same time you tell the owner of the watch that if he feels in his pockets he will find his property restored to him intact; and to his amazement he discovers that the works in some mysterious way have got back into his watch, and that the handkerchief in which it was wrapped up has gone!
Now for the explanation of this ingenious illusion. The secret of it is that you have a second basin, with a pudding in it, concealed in the palm of your right hand. At the critical moment, when the handkerchief flares up, you take advantage of the excitement produced to subst.i.tute the one basin for the other. The watch from which you extract the works is not the borrowed one, but one which you have had concealed between the third and fourth fingers of the left hand. You show the empty case of this watch to the company, before wrapping the watch in the handkerchief and handing it back to its owner. Meanwhile with the aid of a little wax you have attached an invisible hair to the handkerchief, the other end of it being fastened to the palm of your left hand. With a little practice it is not difficult to withdraw the handkerchief, by a series of trifling jerks, from, the pocket of your fellow-guest to its resting place between the first and second finger of your left hand.
One word more. I am afraid that the borrowed handkerchief to which you applied the match really did get burnt, and you will probably have to offer the owner one of your own instead. That is the only weak spot in one of the most baffling tricks ever practised by the amateur prestidigitator (to use the word for the last time). It will make a fitting climax to your evening"s entertainment--an entertainment which will ensure you another warm invitation next year when the "festive season" (_copyright_) comes upon us once again.
VII. AND OTHERS
MY FILM SCENARIO
[Specially written for Economic Pictures, Limited, whose Manager has had the good fortune to pick up for a mere song (or, to be more accurate, for a few notes) several thousand miles of discarded cinema films from a bankrupt company. The films comprise the well-known "Baresark Basil, the Pride of the Ranch" (two miles long), "The Foiler Foiled" (one mile, three furlongs, two rods, poles or perches), "The Blood-stained Vest" (fragment--eighteen inches), "A Maniac"s Revenge"
(5,000 feet), "The Life of the Common Mosquito" (six legs), and so forth.]
Twenty-five years before our film opens, Andrew Bellingham, a young man just about to enter his father"s business, was spending a holiday in a little fishing village in Cornwall. The daughter of the sheep-farmer with whom he lodged was a girl of singular beauty, and Andrew"s youthful blood was quickly stirred to admiration. Carried away by his pa.s.sion for her, he--
[MANAGER. _Just a reminder that Mr. T.P. O"Connor has to pa.s.s this before it can be produced_.]--he married her--
[MANAGER. _Oh, I beg pardon_.]--and for some weeks they lived happily together. One day he informed Jessie that he would have to go back to his work in London, and that it might be a year or more before he could acknowledge her openly as his wife to his rich and proud parents. Jessie was prostrated with grief; and late that afternoon her hat and fringe-net were discovered by the edge of the waters. Realizing at once that she must have drowned herself in her distress, Andrew took an affecting farewell of her father and the sheep, and returned to London. A year later he married a distant cousin, and soon rose to a condition of prosperity. At the time our film begins to unwind, he was respected by everybody in the City, a widower, and the father of a beautiful girl of eighteen called Hyacinth.
[MANAGER. _Now we"re off. What do we start with?_]
I
On the sunny side of Fenchurch Street--
[MANAGER. _Ah, then I suppose we"d better keep back the Rescue from the Alligator and the Plunge down Niagara in a Barrel_.]
--Andrew Bellingham was dozing in his office. Suddenly he awoke to find a strange man standing over him.
"Who are you?" asked Mr. Bellingham. "What do you want?"
"My name is Jasper," was the answer, "and I have some information to give you." He bent down and hissed, "_Your first wife is still alive_!"
Andrew started up in obvious horror. "My daughter," he gasped, "my little Hyacinth! She must never know."
"Listen. Your wife is in Spain--
[MANAGER. _Don"t waste her. Make it somewhere where there are sharks_.
AUTHOR. _It"s all right, she"s dead really_.]--and she will not trouble you. Give me a thousand pounds and you shall have these; and he held out a packet containing the marriage certificate, a photograph of Jessie"s father dipping a sheep, a receipted bill for a pair of white gloves, size 9-1/2, two letters signed "Your own loving little Andy Pandy," and a peppermint with "Jess" on it in pink. Once these are locked up in your safe, no one need ever know that you were married in Cornwall twenty-five years ago."
Without a moment"s hesitation Mr. Bellingham took a handful of bank notes from his pocketbook, and the exchange was made. At all costs he must preserve his little Hyacinth from shame. Now she need never know. With a forced smile he bowed Jasper out, placed the packet in his safe and returned to his desk.
But his mysterious visitor was not done with yet. As soon as the door had closed behind him Jasper re-entered softly, drugged Andrew hastily, and took possession again of the compromising doc.u.ments. By the time Mr.
Bellingham had regained his senses the thief was away. A hue-and-cry was raised, police whistles were blown, and Richard Harrington, Mr.
Bellingham"s private secretary, was smartly arrested.
At the trial things looked black against Richard. He was poor and he was in love with Hyacinth; the chain of evidence was complete. In spite of his impa.s.sioned protest from the dock, in spite of Hyacinth"s dramatic swoon in front of the solicitor"s table, the judge with great solemnity pa.s.sed sentence of twenty years" penal servitude. A loud "Hear, hear"
from the gallery rang through the court, and, looking up, Mr. Bellingham caught the sardonic eye of the mysterious Jasper.
II
Richard had been in prison a month before the opportunity for his escape occurred. For a month he had been hewing stone in Portland, black despair at his heart. Then, like lightning, he saw his chance and took it. The warders were off guard for a moment. Hastily lifting his pickaxe--
[MANAGER. _Sorry, but it"s a spade in the only prison film we"ve got_.]
Hastily borrowing a spade from a comrade who was digging potatoes, he struck several of his gaolers down, and, dodging the shots of others who hurried to the scene, he climbed the prison wall and dashed for freedom.
Reaching Weymouth at nightfall, he made his way to the house which Hyacinth had taken in order to be near him, and, suitably disguised, travelled up to London with her in the powerful motor which she had kept ready. "At last, my love, we are together," he murmured as they neared Wimbledon. But he had spoken a moment too soon. An aeroplane swooped down upon them, and Hyacinth was s.n.a.t.c.hed from his arms and disappeared with her captors into the clouds.
III
Richard"s first act on arriving in London was to go to Mr. Bellingham"s house. Andrew was out, but a note lying on his study carpet, "_Meet me at the Old Windmill to-night,"_ gave him a clue. On receipt of this note Andrew had gone to the rendezvous, and it was no surprise to him when Jasper stepped out and offered to sell him a packet containing a marriage certificate, a photograph of an old gentleman dipping a sheep, a peppermint lozenge with "Jess" on it, and various other doc.u.ments for a thousand pounds.
"You villain," cried Andrew, "even at the trial I suspected you," and he rushed at him fiercely.