The Lightness of Hands

by Jeff Garvin

  “Go to bed,” I said. “I’ll text you if I find something.” But he insisted on staying with me—so he wrapped himself in his hoodie, reclined the lounge chair, and fell asleep.

  My mind was still crackling, now with anxiety instead of optimism. Four days left, and I was no closer to having the props. I started Googling aimlessly, looking for anything that might help.

  It was almost five a.m. when I found what I was looking for.

  The blog was a blinking, pastel nightmare called The-Magic-Ring.com, a hideous relic of the early World Wide Web. The article’s date stamp read November 2, 2002, two years after Devereaux’s debut at the Tangiers. A photo showed a blond woman in her twenties with a downturned mouth and choppy, shoulder-length layers. The headline read:

  FORMER DEVEREAUX EMPLOYEE CLAIMS CREDIT FOR HIS ACT

  The production manager on his show at the time, a woman by the name of Renée Turner, had contacted The-Magic-Ring.com to complain about Devereaux after he fired her. Turner told the writer she had been let go because she “knew too much” about Devereaux’s best-guarded secrets—including his flying illusion.

  My heart rate raced as I scrolled deeper into the article.

  Turner claimed it had been her ideas that had made the flying illusion possible, and that Devereaux could never have conceived or performed that part of his act if it weren’t for her. She also claimed that, when Devereaux landed his multimillion-dollar contract with the Tangiers, she asked for a raise but was denied. Then, when he renewed the contract, he denied her again.

  “I lost it, I admit it,” Turner said in a phone interview last Thursday. “I said some things I shouldn’t have, things I didn’t mean. But Devereaux took them seriously and fired me on the spot. I’d worked for him for almost ten years, but he had me escorted out of the building like a criminal. After I cooled down, I tried to apologize, but he wouldn’t take my calls. Then he blacklisted me. I’ll never work in magic again.”

  Turner went on, making more cryptic statements about what she knew and veiled threats about what she could do to Devereaux’s career if she told. The writer of the story—I couldn’t in good conscience call him a reporter—claimed that Turner’s comments hadn’t been corroborated because “no one from Devereaux’s organization could be reached for comment.”

  I searched for other articles on the subject, anything that might verify Turner’s claims, but I found nothing. Literally nothing. It seemed impossible that a scandal involving the highest-paid solo performer in history wouldn’t yield more results—until I remembered that it had happened in 2002, years before Twitter or Facebook even existed. On top of that, the major magic publications—MAGIC, Genii, The Linking Ring—hadn’t been online back then. If the story had burned out quickly, it might not have made it to the mainstream media; after all, this was magic, not Major League Baseball. It was possible that the Turner/Devereaux story had been a big scandal in the magic world but had left almost no residue on the internet.

  But none of that mattered. What did matter was that Turner seemed to believe what she’d said. And she might still hold a grudge. I looked over at Ripley. He was completely unconscious. Probably, I should’ve let him sleep. But my brain was on fire, lit by a rapid series of tiny explosions, neurons going off like superheated kernels in a pan of Jiffy Pop. Images flashed and ideas raced, inflating that foil spiral into a dome.

  “Ripley,” I whispered. He didn’t stir. I put a hand on his arm and shook him. “Ripley!”

  He sat bolt upright. “What is it? What happened?”

  “I found something.”

  CHAPTER 21

  RIPLEY SIPPED LUKEWARM MOUNTAIN DEW, trying to wake up. I filled him in on Renée Turner and her beef with Devereaux.

  “So, after sixteen years of banishment from the Wizarding World or whatever, you think she’s still in Vegas?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And if she is, what makes you think she can help?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, irritated. We finally had a lead, and now Ripley was giving me the third degree.

  “All right,” he said, sensing my frustration. “Give me that.”

  He took the laptop and started pecking away at it; apparently, his fingers were more awake than the rest of him.

  Two minutes later he said, “Elias Dante Jr., you are the luckiest person I know.”

  “Why? What is it?”

  “She’s still here. And I’ve got her address.”

  Dad’s alarm went off at six a.m., and before I could crawl into bed and pretend to be asleep, he was sitting up, rubbing the back of his neck.

  “What an awful pillow,” he said, and then saw me at the desk. “You didn’t sleep.”

  I considered lying, but I could tell by the look on his face that he wouldn’t buy it.

  “No,” I admitted.

  Dad looked grim. “Do you think you’re starting a cycle?”

  “Might just be the meds kicking in. Hard to say.” It wasn’t hard to say; I was exhibiting every symptom in the books.

  “You should sleep.”

  “I don’t think I could if I tried.”

  Dad sighed through his nose like he always did when he was exasperated. “Well, at least try to rest. Watch some free motel cable. And stick with this one.” He jabbed a thumb at Ripley, who rolled over and yawned. Dad stood, moved toward the bathroom, and took out his razor.

  “Why are you awake early?” I asked.

  “I have my meeting with Alan at the Four Jacks. But first I’m going to get the paper and go through the want ads. It’s time I found a plan B.”

  He forced a smile, but he looked as if he were preparing to serve a life sentence. As he closed the bathroom door behind him, I tried to imagine how he would feel onstage, playing to a row of senior citizens at the Four Jacks, or to empty bar stools at the Tack & Saddle. Or working retail again, wearing a blue vest and scanning items to a constant chorus of beeps and chimes. I didn’t think it could get worse than birthday parties and backyard weddings—but he did. He found the idea of a “day job” demoralizing. I wondered how he would adjust once we finally settled down, or whether he would adjust at all. He seemed more put together when he came out of the bathroom, his face shaved and his hair combed. As he pulled on his suit jacket, he looked at me. “Stay in the motel,” he said. “You’ve got food here, and I don’t want you wandering off into the city.”

  I nodded, but I couldn’t meet his eye.

  Thirty minutes later, Ripley and I got into Heather’s Hyundai and headed east on Tropicana toward Renée Turner’s apartment.

  Ripley glanced at me from the driver’s seat. “How long have you been up?” he asked.

  “Forty-eight hours? I’m not sure.”

  “And you’re not tired?”

  “I feel like I could sprint from one end of the Strip to the other.”

  “I guess I didn’t realize it was that intense.” He sounded concerned.

  I shrugged. “Hypomania. It’s the gift that keeps on giving. Until it doesn’t.”

  “Do you think it’ll last until the show?”

  “I don’t need it to. Once we’ve got the props, Dad will take it from there.”

  We pulled into a McDonald’s adjacent to Turner’s complex, and Ripley killed the engine.

  “Okay, what’s the plan?”

  I looked at the apartments: foil in the windows, laundry hanging from the balconies. It made me nostalgic for the luxury of the Cedarwood Mobile Estates.

  “I’m going to pretend to be a journalist. See if she’ll open up about the Devereaux thing.”

  “Will that work?”

  “You got any other ideas?”

  Ripley smirked. “I’m glad you asked.”

  A shriveled succulent stood on Turner’s small porch, a lipstick-stained cigarette butt jutting up from the potting soil. I took a deep breath and knocked twice on her door. No answer. It was only 8:17 a.m.; she was probably still asleep. I was considering going back to the car
to wait until a more reasonable hour when I heard footsteps approaching.

  “Who is it?” The voice coming through the door was low and gravelly, but I was pretty sure it was a woman’s.

  “My name is Purcilla Ripley. I’m a contributor to MAGIC Magazine.” It wasn’t a complete lie; they’d printed an essay I wrote when I was in eighth grade. “Could we talk for a minute?”

  The door opened a crack, and the woman who peered over the chain at me was definitely Renée Turner. The shoulder-length layers from the blog photo had been replaced by a gray-flecked bun, but the downturned mouth was the same.

  “What do you want?”

  I hesitated. If I mentioned Devereaux too soon, she might get gun-shy and slam the door. On the other hand, I’d have to bring him up sooner or later.

  “I don’t think you ever got a chance to tell your side of the story,” I said.

  Turner frowned.

  “Your interview should have made the Review-Journal at least. It wasn’t fair.”

  “What are you talking about?” she said, but I sensed recognition in her voice.

  “I’m talking about how Daniel Devereaux ruined your career.”

  Turner blinked, then closed the door. For a moment, I thought I’d blown my chance. Then I heard the scrape of the chain being drawn back, and the door reopened.

  “That was a hundred years ago,” she said, still suspicious. “Why ask about it now?”

  “Rumor has it he’s retiring soon.” I hoped she couldn’t tell I was making it up on the spot. “Maybe there’s a story here.”

  She hesitated. I could feel my pulse surge in my wrists and neck.

  “All right, then,” she said, and stood aside to let me in.

  Turner’s apartment smelled like Pine-Sol and cigarettes and would have fit right in with some of the trailers back at Cedarwood: battered carpet, scarred linoleum, broken venetian blinds. I saw an ancient desktop computer in the corner of the front room, and then I spotted what Ripley had told me to look for: her Wi-Fi router.

  “How’d you find me?” Turner asked.

  “Google.”

  “Everything’s on the goddamned internet now. Coffee?” She reached for a carafe on the counter.

  “That would be great,” I said, though my nerves were already twitching. I accepted a steaming mug and we sat down at her kitchen table. She took out a pack of Virginia Slims and lit one with a pink disposable lighter.

  “How long have you lived in Las Vegas?” I thought a warm-up question was in order, but Turner got right to the point.

  “Did you really come here to talk about Devereaux?”

  “Yes.”

  She frowned and tapped her cigarette over an old Sam’s Town ashtray. “You want to trash him on his way out?”

  “I just want the truth.” I shrugged. “I was hoping you could tell me what happened.”

  Turner laughed. “You read the thing. You already know.”

  “He fired you because you knew too much.”

  She took a drag, stood up, and extracted a bottle of Jim Beam from her pantry.

  “That ’92 special was huge. It made him.” She poured a shot into her coffee cup, took a sip, and closed her eyes.

  It was working; she was talking. “Do you mind if I take notes?”

  “Knock yourself out.”

  She came back to the table, and I fired up my laptop. I was in a tender situation. I had to revive her anger at Devereaux so she’d spill some of his secrets—namely, where he kept his props—but if I pushed her too far, she might get offended and shut down completely. I started with an easy question.

  “In the article, you said the flying illusion was Devereaux’s idea, but that you came up with the method?”

  She gave me a knowing shrug.

  “How could he afford to let you go? Wasn’t he afraid you’d talk?”

  She laughed, a bitter bark accompanied by a rush of smoke. “Sweetheart, he has enough lawyers to fill T-Mobile Arena. If I’d said two words about it, he’d have sued the skirt off my ass.”

  I nodded, but I detected some playacting on her part. If he was so sue-happy, why hadn’t he gone after the blog that published her interview? I needed to rile her up more.

  “Do you have any proof that it was your idea? Notes, sketches, emails? Anything?”

  Turner set her cigarette in the tray and leaned toward me. Her mouth was a thin line.

  “You don’t know what it was like being a woman in magic back then.” She sat back and absently wiped a smear of lipstick off her mug with a thumb. “We were all glorified Vanna Whites. Look pretty in spandex and smile at the big magician. He thought I was lucky to have a job, let alone a job working for the greatest illusionist who ever lived.”

  “Devereaux actually said that?”

  “What does it matter who said it? It was true. I was a girl in tights, and he was the best in the world.”

  I watched her pick up her cigarette again. I wasn’t sure she was telling the truth, but her emotions seemed genuine.

  “That would have pissed me off.”

  She made a dismissive gesture. “It was a long time ago.”

  “So he blacklisted you from magic. What do you do now?”

  “Real estate,” she said, deflating. “And I waitress a couple of nights a week at Boulder Station. The market’s been pretty dry since the crisis.”

  I’d read about the crash of ’08 in my online econ class—but that had been over a decade ago. Renée Turner was living in the past.

  She took another sip of spiked coffee. “You want to see something?”

  She got up and walked to a bookshelf in her living room, reaching out once to steady herself on a ratty armchair along the way; I guessed this wasn’t her first cup. She returned with a photo album and flipped through it until she found what she was looking for.

  “This was taken at his production office. Spring of 1990, maybe ’91.” She laughed. “You can tell the date by my perm.”

  There she was in a faded snapshot, her hand on Devereaux’s shoulder. She looked to be in her midtwenties.

  My computer had finished booting up, so I tapped out a few random keystrokes to make a show of taking notes, then clicked on the Wi-Fi icon as Ripley had instructed.

  “His production office,” I said. “That’s the place in Summerlin?”

  She frowned. “No, that’s his house. The production office was downtown.”

  On-screen, the list of local Wi-Fi networks was still populating.

  “It was Downtown, but it’s not anymore?”

  “Nope. He sold it.”

  I had her talking about his property now; I was getting closer, but I needed to tread lightly. Forcing my voice into a disinterested monotone, I asked, “What about that warehouse?”

  “The one on Twain?”

  “Right,” I said, trying to sound casual.

  “He sold that, too.” She stubbed out her cigarette and lit another. “Bought a new one just off the Strip, right after the market took a dive. Good timing.”

  I tried to conceal my excitement. “Why would he need a warehouse, anyway?”

  Turner looked at me like I was an idiot. “He does the biggest illusions in the world. Where do you think he workshops them?”

  “Right,” I said. “That makes sense.”

  “Plus he has to store all that equipment. The guy’s a hoarder. Never throws anything away.”

  Never throws anything away. His flying rig had to be in that warehouse.

  “You don’t happen to have the address?” I tried to sound casual, but my voice quavered.

  Her eyebrows drew tighter. “You’d have to call his PR people.”

  I’d pressed too hard. She was clamming up.

  Turner looked down at the old photo and ran a finger over its plastic sleeve, apparently lost in memories.

  I took the opportunity to glance at my laptop. It had detected seven Wi-Fi networks—but, per Ripley’s instructions, I only cared about the one with the str
ongest signal. It was called D-LINK, and there was a little padlock icon next to the name—it was password protected. Ripley would have to take it from here.

  I looked up to check on Turner. She was still staring at the old photo, her cigarette burning forgotten in the ashtray. I shut my laptop and stood.

  “I think I’ve got what I need,” I said, giving her my best smile.

  She licked her lips, glancing at my laptop bag. “You gonna print all that?”

  “Would that be all right?”

  She hesitated. “Maybe . . . maybe run it by me first?” She gave me a guilty smile.

  “Of course.”

  Her shoulders relaxed.

  I made for the door, then turned back. “Can I ask you one more thing?”

  “Shoot.”

  “Were you really going to expose Devereaux’s method?”

  “No,” she said, shaking her head. “And anyway, it doesn’t really matter how it’s done. It matters who’s doing it.”

  Her eyes drifted back to the photo album, and I left the apartment.

  CHAPTER 22

  AS I WAS ON MY way down Turner’s apartment steps, Liam called.

  My stomach clenched as I stared at his name on the screen. Just when I had managed to push away my spiraling thoughts, he had to call and start up the whirlwind again.

  Was it possible he was telling the truth—that I had somehow misunderstood the whole situation? I didn’t think so. That girl on the phone had been genuinely pissed. Liam was probably calling in an attempt to relieve his guilt. Either way, I couldn’t afford to let him distract me right now. I declined the call and kept walking.

  I was about to exit the complex when my phone dinged with a new voice mail. My thumb hovered over the Delete button. Did I really want this drama right now? Was I really this weak?

  Apparently, the answer to both questions was yes. I clicked Play.

  “Ellie, it’s Liam. Please don’t delete this.” He sighed. “I’m an idiot, okay? I owe you an apology. And I can explain everything.” A long pause. “I just need you to call me back.”