by John Blaine
Mysto had given the silkworm shape by running his hand underneath the fabric, from one end to the other. Rick would bet that what seemed to be a quick movement had also placed a magnet-responsive snap-out frame that gave the silk its shape, with a snap-back for quick palming when Mysto ran the silk through his fingers at the end. Rick would also bet that the silkworm’s little ball of a head had not been empty.
No matter. It had been a convincing and completely charming illusion, even if April’s commands might have been obeyed from the wings with the help of a joystick control.
Diz was getting a bit impatient, and chilly. He scratched at the door, and Rick let him in, then glanced at his watch. It was getting late, and he was also a bit impatient, and more than a little bit tense and uncertain.
In the library, he knew, Scotty was also in a state of confusion and uncertainty. As the Millers left for home, Barby and Jan started upstairs to Barby’s room, then, as Scotty started to follow, heading for his own room, Barby stopped him.
As Rick looked on, his sister took Scotty firmly by the suit lapels, looked squarely into his eyes, and said Page 103
in a tone that left no room for argument, “You wait here for me, in the library. Rick will be waiting for Jan on the front porch. And while you are waiting, I want you to think about two great big negatives. First, you are not my brother. Second, I am not your sister.” With that she turned and hurried upstairs.
For Rick, the confusions of the day started much earlier with the morning mail and a letter for Mysto which Rick took to the Mirella estate. He founds trucks in the driveway and men unloading lumber, wall board, and other equipment.
Mysto was not a person to delay when a decision was made. The Camerons had agreed to move in, and already the third floor was being converted to fine, large apartments for Karen and David, and for Derek. Another apartment and guest rooms were to be created on the second floor for Mysto. The downstairs recreation room and other spaces were to be made into offices. Lounges and restrooms for the public were to be added to the left of the stairway.
The complete rebuilding of the second floor to create an apartment for Mysto, plus several guest rooms, would result in destruction of the hidden passageways and the magician’s hideaway. Mysto promised a tour before the secret places were torn out. The hidden chamber and passages in the North wing, though, would remain. Their original purpose was not secrecy, but to provide a convenient and safe place from which lights and equipment high above the stage could be changed.
Mysto already had taken the Camerons to the main room which, as Rick had guessed, was above the Phantom Caravan room ceiling.
The old master of magic was a happy man. The Brant attorneys had assured him his affairs would be straightened out very soon, and already they were negotiating a deal with theNew YorkState ’s Attorney under which all charges against Mysto would be dropped and some compensation paid if he would refrain from suits againstNew York institutions. He could, if he chose, continue to sue the accusing psychiatrist. As for Carl Cleary and company, Bill Ewing was certain they would be guests of the Federal Prison Service for a long, long time.
Seeing the master’s good humor, Rick sought the answer to a bothersome question. He hoped very much that his suspicions were correct. “Sir, what happens when two people touch the Talisman?”
“If you and I were to touch the stone together now, feelings from any other source would be blocked out simply because of the strength of the signal. You would feel strongly my emotions of the moment. If my attention were directed to you, it would be mostly what I felt about you. In the same way, I would feel strongly your feelings about me.”
Rick swallowed hard. “Thank you, Mr. Wayland.”
“My pleasure, Rick.”The magician’s eyes twinkled. “Give my love to Jan.”
The second jolt of the day came when Rick was tying his tie, almost ready to go to the Mysto opening.
He saw motion from the corner of his eye and turned to see in his doorway a strikingly beautiful, poised young woman. For a half-heartbeat he stood with mouth open, almost thinking it was a stranger. Then he moved to the doorway to greet his sister.
She was dressed in a lovely deep blue dinner gown that matched her eyes and looked sleek and elegant on her slim, feminine figure. Her hair was in a sophisticated but very appealing arrangement totally unlike her usual casual hair-do. For makeup, she needed only a bit of blue eye shadow and a soft tone of lipstick. Her only jewelry was earrings and a cartouche like those he had given Jan, except that hers was Page 104
a gift from Scotty, and carried her name.
Rick shook his head in disbelief. “Barby, darling, you are simply gorgeous! But what became of my little sister?”
“She grew up.” Barby smiled her pleasure at his reaction. “Big brother, I want you to do two things for me, please. First, go downstairs ahead of me. Scotty’s in the library, waiting. Be sure he’s where he can see me when I come down the stairs.”
“Oh?” He looked at her in surprise. “Going to make a real dramatic entrance? You know he’ll get a knockout jolt when he sees you!”
“That’s the idea.”
Rick laughed. “That’s catching the same rabbit twice, Barb. Or don’t you know? I mean, Scotty carries a picture of you all the time. I asked him once, joking, why he didn’t have any pictures of other girls. He asked, ‘Are there other girls? I’ve never noticed any.”
“He’s never given me the slightest hint,” Barby said, eyes wide.
“He thinks you consider him a brother.”
“Believe me, I’ll let him know I already have a great brother.Now, the other thing. Walk home with Jan tonight. I’ll keep her here until her folks go, then the two of you can be together.”
“Why tonight, especially?”
“Because today we grew up.”
His next shock was Jan herself. She, too, had metamorphosed into a poised, elegant young woman with different hair style, makeup, and a high fashion white gown that was perfect on her slender figure. For a long moment he could only stare. She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. She asked, “Rick, whatis it ?”
He admitted, “You took my breath away.”
“Good. I wanted to.”
It was time for Jan to be coming down from Barby’s room. Rick had the feeling that he was waiting for an explosion, or for the moon to drop out of the sky, or a volcanic eruption. It was clear that the girls-no, they were young women now-had a plan they were executing to perfection, leaving Scotty and him in a considerable spin. He had the feeling that he was an observer, and maybe a participant, in an important rite of passage.
Jan came through the door and greeted him with a warm smile. “Where are we walking?”
“With those heels, it has to be the seawall path, along the runway to the Sky Wagon, turn right on the orchard path, and so to the Miller establishment.”
“You named it, my handsome detective. Give a lady a hand.”
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He took her gloved hand and they walked down to the seawall path. He wanted to ask quickly, “Why?
And what’s going on?” But Jan spoke first.
“Ever since we went to the opening of the House of Illusion you’ve had something on your mind, Rick.
Not the hunt for Mysto, or anything connected with that. Something different, and I had a feeling that it somehow involved me.”
“It did.” Rick doubted he would ever get fully used to Jan’s deep perception. “I’ll give you a quick summary, then we can leave it for exploration later. Okay?”
At her nod, “I graduate next June. Normally, I’d go on to the university in the Fall, but I thought I’d change that and spend a year taking day courses at colleges close by, choosing some engineering, math and language. Then go to the university a year later.”
“Waiting for me to catch up?”
“Yes. We can talk about it tomorrow. Right now, I’ve got a different problem. I’m as mixed up as a pasta salad, or maybe a Chi
nese fire drill. You and Barby have thrown Scotty and me into dizzy tailspins, as you well know. Why, Jan?”
“We decided it was time that, now and then, you two stopped treating us like two of the boys. Not that we don’t enjoy being treated as buddies. We love it. But not all the time, and it’s not enough now that we’ve grown up. Rick, I’ll be seventeen in a month. Barby will be seventeen in three months. My grandmother was married at that age, and my mother only a year older. I won’t bore you with all the heroines or famous women who changed the world at our age. The point is, we’re women now. Young women, true, but not girls any longer.”
“I’ve been jolted into agreement, Jan, but why tonight?”
“Because we just finished another adventure, and everything is working out beautifully. Also, we understand each other even better now. We’ve been a solid foursome ever since we Millers moved to Spindrift, and we don’t want that to change, but we want to be solid twosomes, too. Going to Mysto’s return tonight gave us a chance to shock you into realizing that we’ve grown up.”
“You succeeded.”
“Good. Rick, what made you think about taking a year of day courses instead of going on to school in theFall ?”
He laughed.“A phony but smart Buddhist monk. He prophesied that we would make our dreams come true together, and in my brilliant and incisive way I suddenly realized, for that, we needed to be together and we wouldn’t be unless I changed the schedule, if being together is what you want.”
“That’s my Rick,” Jan said approvingly.
“Now let’s talk about this twosome. Is it true my emotions have always been an open book to you?”
“You’ll never be able to hide your feelings from me. Do you mind?”
“I’ve thought about it. No, I don’t mind, so long as you accept that some not-so-nice feelings, like irritation and anger, are transient.”
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“I accepted that long ago. Remember, I’ve been feeling other people’s emotions all my life. I probably have a better working knowledge of the way emotions shift with events and the weather than most psychologists. Underlying emotions, though, do not change so fast or often.”
“All right.What this means is that you’ve always known exactly how I feel about you.”
“I’ve known.” Jan smiled. “I’ve loved it.” Under the smile he sensed that she was both serious and tense. He went on, “But I’ve known only that you liked me very much as a friend, just as I’ve liked you as a friend and not only as a bright and very appealing, very lovely girl.”
“To me, that’s the best part, that we’re truly very good and trusting friends. My mother told me, and it makes sense, that people have the most successful and fun marriages when they’re best friends as well as lovers, and eighteen months until I graduate isn’t too long an engagement.”
Rick stopped short. “Do I hear what you’re saying?”
“Yes, Rick. Not long after I came, Barby and I got together with our two mothers, and they told us what could happen when kids start romancing too young, including probably breaking up for good. So Barby and I made a pact. No romance until we were seventeen. It wasn’t easy.”
“And that’s why you kept me at arm’s length.” “Yes, even though I didn’t want to. Do you know what we felt when we touched the Talisman together?”
“I suspected, and Mysto confirmed it today.” “Then each of us knows how the other feels, with no doubt or question, so we can be completely with no doubt or question, so we can be completely open with each open. I’ll tell you a secret I’ve never told anyone, not even Barby, if you tell me your reaction instantly.”
“I promise.” His plane was only a few yards away. Tonight he could fly without it.
Jan lifted her face to his. “You remember in the car when I first told you about my strange talent? I told my folks that, in Barby, I had a friend who would be closer than a sister, and I was right, wasn’t I? In Scotty, I had a big brother, and I was right about that, too...”
“And in me, also right, someone you could beat at chess.”
“What really happened is that mother asked, ‘What about Rick?’ and I didn’t even hesitate. I said,
‘He’s the one I’m going to marry,’ and that’s what I’ve been dreaming about ever since.”
“Jan, beloved...” Rick took a deep breath, “...what’s best of all is to find out that we two dreamers have been dreaming the same wonderful dream!”
It was impossible to say who moved first. Jan was in his arms in something less than a microsecond.
THE END
THE MAGIC TALISMAN
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A RICK BRANT SCIENCE ADVENTURE, No. 24, the final book in the series By JOHN BLAINE
AFTERWORD
This Rick Brant story was written as the 1960’s came to a close. At that time the publisher, Grosset and Dunlap, lost interest in the series, indeed, in any series except those of the Stratemeyer Syndicate. They did not publish The Magic Talisman, but allowed the series to break off with Volume 23, Danger Below, in 1968, after sales of close to two million copies.
A decade and a half later, series book readers and collectors who are now grown to maturity revived interest in several series and authors, sparked by Fred Woodworth’s Mystery and Adventure Series Review, and Gil O’Gara’s Yellowback Library. It was in the Review that the existence of the unpublished manuscript for The Magic Talisman was first disclosed, and the result was continuing nudges from Rick Brant readers with whom I corresponded and some I met, to get busy and publish.
It took several years to become convinced that publishing the story would be a good and final finish to the Rick Brant Science Adventure tales after so long a time, and conviction came only after strong and continuing pushes from fan letters, and personal pushes from those established series mavens, Ernie Kelly, Bill Gresens, Fred Woodworth, and, finally Rick Norwood, who became the publisher at his Manuscript Press.
My thanks go to them and to my wife, Libby, who added her own encouragement. Credit for turning a sometimes unreadable manuscript into a clean word-processed tale suitable for publication belongs to Carolanne Watson. And thanks, too, to those, who in their day, enjoyed some of Rick’s adventures as much as I enjoyed writing them.
Hal Goodwin aka John Blaine,Bethesda,Maryland
THE RICK BRANT SCIENCE ADVENTURE SERIES
By John Blaine (The pseudonym of Harold L. Goodwin)
Title Copyright year
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*1. THE ROCKET’S SHADOW 1947
*2. THE LOST CITY 1947
*3. SEA GOLD 1947
4. 100 FATHOMS UNDER 1947
5. THE WHISPERING BOX MYSTERY 1948
6. THE PHANTOM SHARK 1949
7. SMUGGLER’S REEF 1950
8. THE CAVES OF FEAR 1951
9. STAIRWAY TO DANGER 1952
10.THE GOLDEN SKULL 1954
11.THE WAILING OCTOPUS 1956
12.THE ELECTRONIC MIND READER 1957
13.THE SCARLETLAKEMYSTERY 1958
14.THE PIRATES OF SHAN 1958
15.THE BLUE GHOST MYSTERY 1960
16.THE EGYPTIAN CAT MYSTERY 1961
17.THE FLAMING MOUNTAIN 1962
18.THE FLYING STINGAREE 1963
19.THE RUBY RAY MYSTERY 1964
20.THE VEILED RAIDERS 1965
21.ROCKET JUMPER 1966
#22. THE DEADLY DUTCHMAN 1967
23.DANGER BELOW 1968
24.THE MAGIC TALISMAN 1989
RICK BRANT’S SCIENCE PROJECTS, a factual how-to-do-it companion book 1960
*These three were written in collaboration with Peter J. Harkins.
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#THE DEADLY DUTCHMAN was reprinted in 1986 by the Mystery and Adventure Review Press, and is available. Write to THE REVIEW. P.O. Box 3488, Tucson, Arizona 85722.
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