The Last Illusion

“Nobody should have known, except for a couple of my own men—and the president, of course. He takes a keen interest in what we are doing.”


The carriage was warm and smelled of stale cigar smoke but I knew better than to open the window and have the smoke from the locomotive blow in on us. I fought to stay alert, trying to digest everything I had been told.

“I wonder if Bess knew?” I said.

“I’m sure she didn’t. Houdini once told me, on a train journey similar to this one, that he would never confide matters of importance to his wife. He said she had too fragile a nature to bear the strain of worry.”

“He babied her,” I said. “She’s in an awful state at this moment. I really shouldn’t have left her side, but I felt I had to speak with Houdini’s brother, who has left New York to perform at a theater in Atlantic City.”

“Hardeen, you mean?”

“Yes. Was he working for you too?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then could it be possible that he is working for the other side? He was also performing in Germany, wasn’t he?”

“You think he’d murder his own brother?” He shook his head. “I very much doubt that, Miss Murphy. They are a devoted family from what I’ve heard. Very close. No, I don’t think that Hardeen is our man. In fact I rather suspect that our man is working for both sides.”

“What makes you think that?”

“This,” he said, and handed me a cutting from a magazine. I started to read. It seemed innocuous enough, reporting on the various acts currently performing in Berlin.

“Illusionists are always popular with the crowd and there seems to be a crop of good ones at the moment, including the amazing Mr. Harry Houdini—” I looked up and Mr. Wilkie smiled.

“He was never particularly modest about himself when reporting as a supposed third person. Read on.”

The article went on to describe Harry’s act, and then that of other magicians. Then came the words, “The interesting thing about illusionists is that they can make you believe anything. You think they are working on one side of the stage, when really they are on the other. It’s all done with mirrors—that’s what they say, don’t they?”

I looked up and handed him back the piece of paper. “Do you think that’s what those last words mean—that someone in Germany was working for both sides?”

“I’m sure of it,” he said.

The train lurched as it went around a bend, throwing me off balance. Mr. Wilkie put out a hand to steady me.

“Why have you told me all this?” I asked.

“Because you struck me as a particularly intelligent young woman and because you’re a detective, and you were already working with Houdini,” he said. “A most useful combination for our purposes.”

“Your purposes? You want to hire me to work for you?”

“I want you to work for your country, Miss Murphy.”

I had to smile at the irony of this. “I’m not even a citizen here, and an outcast from my own country.”

He returned the smile. “All the more reason to repay the debt to the country that has taken you in, wouldn’t you say?”

I was about to say that the country hadn’t exactly done much for me yet. There had been times when I had been close to starvation and had only survived through my own wits, but Wilkie went on. “It is essential that we find out what Harry Houdini had discovered and was about to hand over to me. I want you to go back to New York and see what you can find.”

I considered this. “Why me? Don’t you have a host of men you could send to search Houdini’s residence?”

“I do, but at this moment I’d rather work with the element of surprise. I don’t want the enemy to know what we’re doing. I gather you’re well in with Houdini’s wife. He may have let slip something to her—something she’d confide to you but not to me. I want you to go through his things and bring anything suspicious to me.”

“Harry Houdini was trying to bring something to you and he wound up missing or dead,” I said. “I’d rather like to stay alive, thank you.”

A brief smile crossed his otherwise expressionless face. “Then shall we say ‘bring it to my attention?’ If you find anything you think I should know about, you will send me a wire saying ‘Thank you for birthday present,’ and sign it ‘Your niece.’ I will arrange to meet with you directly.”

“I see,” I said.

“I’ll post one of my men to keep an eye on you.”

“Not the one with the stiletto,” I said quickly.