The Magician's Lie

“I hired you a manager,” said Adelaide. “A sharp young man. You’re great onstage, but you’re ignorant of the business.”

 

I couldn’t disagree.

 

“He’ll protect my investment, keep an eye on you, book your circuits. Cut the checks and all that.”

 

“Experienced?”

 

“Not as much as some. But he knows what he’s doing.”

 

And just like that, there was a knock on the door.

 

“How did you do that?” I asked.

 

“Magic.” She smiled, going to open it.

 

I heard a low voice, a man’s voice, in the darkness. His tone was light and teasing. Adelaide laughed and said, “Yes, perfect, right on time.”

 

The low voice rumbled again, but I was seated too far from the door and couldn’t hear his words. I sipped at the last of my brandy.

 

“Well, come on in then,” she said. “Come and meet my protégée. Or should I say, meet her again.”

 

He stepped up into the railcar, and my world tilted on its axis.

 

The first thing I noticed was his dark hair. It looked like it was wet. And though I would never have been able to describe him to a stranger, once I saw him again, I recognized everything. The familiar slant of his shoulders. Thick fingers and forearms that showed his ability to dig. The way he leaned forward a little, even at rest, as if something interesting were always right in front of him. The intensity.

 

And that smile. I knew that smile.

 

“It’s good to see you, Ada.”

 

“It is not good to see you, Clyde.”

 

“You jackass,” Madame said to him. “You said she liked you.”

 

“She did,” he said, a familiar softness in his voice. “Very much.”

 

“Once upon a time,” I said frostily. “Madame, this man doesn’t keep his word. He can’t be trusted.”

 

“Addie,” he said, “have I ever steered you wrong?”

 

She looked back and forth between our faces, reading us both. “You haven’t,” she told him.

 

“But he was—he once—” I searched for the right words. “He broke my heart.”

 

“Did I?”

 

I said, “He told me he would be honest, and then he deceived me. On an important matter. How could I trust him to have my best interests in mind?”

 

Adelaide replied, “Well, that’s very odd to hear, considering…”

 

“Considering what?”

 

Clyde said to me, “I told her who you were and where to find you. Back when you were in the chorus. It’s why she hired you, and why you’re here.”

 

I turned to Madame for confirmation, and she nodded. “He did. He suggested you, insisted I go to watch you dance, said you were perfect for the company. When your predecessor had to leave the business.”

 

“The pregnant girl?” I asked, suspicious, eyeing Clyde.

 

“Yes.”

 

He caught my look. “Good God, Ada, it wasn’t me.”

 

I shrugged.

 

Adelaide said, “Here’s the trick to it, Vivi. The deal’s already done. You take the company, I take my cut, he’s your manager. It’s a solid deal. If the two of you can’t work together, fine. It would be a tragedy, of course.”

 

“Because?”

 

She said, “I would be very sad that you’d decided to leave a business that suits you so very well.”

 

I knew what she meant. I was still reeling from all this—Clyde Garber not only in my present, but also more involved than I’d known in my past and with a proposed role in my future—but I wasn’t slow, despite the brandy. If the deal was done, it was done. And just because it wasn’t what I expected didn’t mean it wasn’t good for me. Rushing to say yes and rushing to say no were mistakes in equal measure. I needed to think it through.

 

At length, I said, “All right.”

 

“You two will have a lot to talk about.” She stood. “I’m going to go for a walk.”

 

“A walk? Are you sure? In the dark?” I asked.

 

“Aren’t you sweet,” said Adelaide. “I am walking as far as the next tavern, because I am going to get good and drunk just once more in New York City before I leave it forever.”

 

“Thank you,” I told her as she left, and she did the most typical thing she possibly could have done: she pretended not to hear me at all.

 

Then Clyde and I were alone again, together, for the first time in years. He smiled at me the same, the shape of his body under his clothes was the same, the warm look in his eyes was the same. It was so familiar that it hurt.

 

“So,” I said. “You again.”

 

“You again,” he echoed, grinning.

 

“I don’t see why you think I should be happy about this.”

 

“Because your life is coming up roses?”

 

“An interesting way to put it. So you’re not a gardener anymore, I see.”

 

“A lot has happened to both of us,” he said. “Look. I understand why you were angry, why you ran away. It took me a while to figure out. I hurt you. I didn’t mean to, but I did, and I’m sorry.”

 

He sounded sincere. Of course, he’d sounded just as sincere, years before.

 

“But we were kids then,” he said. “Weren’t we? Just stupid kids.”

 

“Speak for yourself.”

 

“Okay. Two of us were kids and one of us was stupid. Me. You can let it go now. Water under the bridge. You have to find a way to trust me.”

 

His insistence made me push back. It was a reflex. “No, I don’t.”

 

“Ada,” he said. “Please. For once. Don’t resist.”

 

“The hell I won’t. What’s to stop me from firing you?”

 

“Addie says you have to work with me.”

 

“Addie knows how good I am at what I do.” My confidence was bolstered by the brandy, and I let myself be bold. “I’m not replaceable. But I bet you are. And I bet I can convince her of that.”

 

He extended his hands, palms up. “Maybe you could. Or maybe not. Why take the risk? Wouldn’t it be easier just to work with me? And let the past be past?”

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“This is a good opportunity, Ada. No, an amazing one. Addie thinks you’re incredible, and I’m inclined to agree with her. If you don’t do it this way, you’ll have to build your own company from the ground up. Are you prepared for that?”

 

“Sure,” I lied.

 

“But this would be better. So much better. And you’d be willing to let that go because of a teenage grudge?”

 

“You make it sound like it was nothing,” I said hotly. “It was not nothing.” His argument was solid and logical, but the history between us was beyond logic, and I wanted to be sure he wasn’t taking me lightly.

 

“I know,” he said, “I know. But think about what good sense it makes to do it this way. Forget our history. Pretend we’re meeting new, and we’re just colleagues. Professionals. Can we do that?”

 

Finally I had to admit it was the right choice, at least for the present. I lifted my chin. “I can, anyway. I don’t know about you.”

 

“That’ll do for now, I suppose. Would you like to have some supper?”

 

“No,” I said. “I’m not hungry.”

 

“All right. You want to be businesslike?” he said, sounding resigned. “Then let’s do some business. Come on.”

 

We walked out into the night, and as we walked, he told me his story in an unending stream of patter. Mr. Olmsted, who had once promised him a job, wasn’t in the city when we arrived, but he had provided an introduction to a Mr. Hastings, who was key in the design for a new library building, replacing the Croton Reservoir. Clyde worked for Hastings & Cutter as a general errand boy, delivering plans and managing supplies in support of every kind of construction from churches to theaters. He met the managers of the best theaters in New York, charming a few of them, and saw an opportunity. He announced his availability as a talent scout to agents who managed acts in the city, charging each one well under market rate but making ends meet by attaching himself to half a dozen. When the time was right, he chose one agent to assist full-time, who happened to be Adelaide’s agent, for whom he scouted talent all up and down Broadway. That was when he’d spotted me in the chorus of The Belle of New York, and when Adelaide needed a new Odalisque, he suggested my name. In the years since, he’d become a full-time talent manager himself, booking acts onto vaudeville circuits all throughout the East, having some solid success. And although Adelaide was too loyal to abandon the agent who’d been with her and Alexander since the beginning, her retirement opened up this new possibility, and for me, she wanted a younger and savvier man.

 

Listening to his familiar voice and walking next to him made me feel fifteen years old again, young and foolish. By many standards, I was still young, but I hadn’t felt that way since the day the train took me away from New York the very first time and Adelaide told me to write down my address for the boy. I’d felt like a grown-up then, like someone with the world waiting on her. I’d felt old when I was young. Now it was all reversed. I was only angry because he’d fooled me, once upon a time. He was right that it would be easier to work with him than to force him out. In this case, perhaps the devil I knew was better than a devil I didn’t. Now all I had to figure out was whether my professionalism was stronger than my pride.

 

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