The Last Illusion

“Don’t be such a stuffed shirt, Daniel,” I said. “Plenty of eminent men have married chorus girls before now. Even English dukes, so you’re in good company.”


I was trying to lighten the mood with flippancy. When he didn’t smile I touched his arm. “You can also let them know that I was working undercover, as a detective,” I said. “They’ll admire my enterprise, I expect. And if it makes you feel any better, I would have been quite happy to have observed from the wings. But I was persuaded to take Bess’s part after she was almost killed. Believe me, I haven’t exactly relished the role, although I do believe I mastered the mind reading rather quickly.” I couldn’t resist a grin. “Including what was in your pocket.”

“Yes, that was quite impressive,” he agreed.

I saw his expression soften, then change. “My God, you look so alluring I could almost ravish you right here on this desk,” he said.

“As tempting as that might be, I think you’d find it hard to explain your methods of interrogation to your junior officers if we were surprised,” I said.

He laughed and let his arms slide down around my waist. “Damn it, Molly, how do you get yourself into these things?”

“The same way you do. It’s my profession.”

He sighed. “So what has the great private investigator managed to find out so far?” he asked. “Have you solved the case and can I send all my men home?”

“I have to confess I am completely at a loss,” I said. “I tried questioning Houdini but he revealed almost nothing to me, except that whatever was bothering him would be settled after tomorrow. He told me he was planning to take a trip and then he would have done his part. That’s what he said.”

“And do you have any idea what that meant?”

“No idea at all. My hunch was maybe he had run afoul of somebody—some gang maybe, and that the episode in the trunk the other night had been a warning, but I don’t see how a gang would have the expertise to pull off a trick like tonight’s. And I don’t see what that young man would have to do with it. I’ve seen gang members. They don’t dress like that.”

Daniel nodded. “After tomorrow,” he said. “Somebody knew that something was going to be settled tomorrow so they had to act swiftly. But if they wanted to stop Houdini from doing something, why kill somebody else?”

“Houdini’s missing,” I said. “It’s possible he’s also dead. Or kidnapped.”

“Or he has just committed a murder and fled the scene. That is the obvious conclusion, isn’t it? It was his act, his trunk. He was inside it and somehow switched places with a dead man. I was watching. Nobody else came onstage.”

“I know,” I said.

“And that trunk was not big enough to hold two men, was it?”

“I saw it before they put Houdini inside. It was empty. And I helped carry it onto the stage, remember?”

“Damn these illusionists,” he said. “They can make you believe anything they want to. It has to be one of their fraternity, doesn’t it? Those other men on the bill, if you’ve been guarding Houdini, what do you know about them?”

“Marvo and Robinson didn’t seem to pose any threat to me. They seemed like pleasant enough men and Marvo had gone home tonight before Harry started his act. Abdullah the sword swallower comes from Coney Island. I thought he might have been sent to settle an old score for a man called Risey.”

“Risey? That’s right. Houdini made a fool of him—but that was years ago and Risey no longer holds the power he once did.”

“I went to Coney Island today and talked to Abdullah—whose real name is Mike, by the way and he’s Irish like us. I didn’t sense that he had anything to hide. In fact the only indication I got was that he was interested in me. He wanted to take me to supper after the show—don’t scowl, Daniel.”

“It all comes down to what the motive was behind this,” Daniel said.

“Until now I was wondering whether it was to discredit famous illusionists and wreck their acts. First Scarpelli’s act goes horribly wrong, then Bess is trapped in a trunk and has to be rescued. So I would have said at that time that we might be looking for a disgruntled magician who felt he had been denied the limelight.”

“If you feel you’ve been denied the limelight, do you go around killing people?” Daniel said quietly. “I suppose these entertainers are more highly strung than most, but it would have to be some kind of personal grudge or affront wouldn’t it? Was Houdini not well liked and respected?”

“Bess Houdini told me that other illusionists were jealous of Harry, also that he dealt his own brand of justice to anyone who challenged him or copied him or called him a fraud.”

“Meaning what?”