The Ambitious Card

by John Gaspard

  “It’s not as difficult as you might think. It’s commonly used to clean precious metals, and also frequently used to kill rodents and other pests.”

  She looked up at me, to see if I had any comments to offer. Recognizing I had none, she continued.

  “We suspect,” she said, “that Bitterman used the machine every night, which means that the poison capsule would likely have been introduced into the water reservoir at some point yesterday. Perhaps during the reception.”

  She took off her reading glasses, closed the folder, and leaned back in her chair.

  The three of them looked at me for what seemed like a long time. I got the impression that it was my turn to talk.

  “So, let me see if I understand,” I said, choosing my words with care. “You think someone at the reception snuck up to Bitterman’s bedroom and slipped a poison capsule into his CPAP machine.”

  They looked at me without expression. Deidre gave me the slightest of nods.

  “Given that there were at least a hundred people at that party, and that I had never even met Bitterman before yesterday,” I continued, “I’m not entirely certain why you feel I am linked…directly or otherwise…to this crime.”

  “You make a good point,” Deirdre said. “And with only those facts, you wouldn’t be. However, as part of the investigation, the police bagged the CPAP machine and were preparing to send it down to the lab for fingerprint analysis and other tests. When they picked it up, guess what they found attached to the bottom of the machine?”

  I shrugged. I literally had no idea.

  Deirdre turned to Homicide Detective Fred Hutton, who turned to Miles. Very slowly and deliberately, Miles opened the manila folder on the table in front of him and picked up a clear plastic evidence envelope. He held it up. Despite the indecipherable writing on the front of the packet, I could see the contents quite clearly.

  It was a playing card.

  The King of Diamonds.

  “This playing card directly connects this homicide to the murder of Grey,” Deirdre said dryly. “A crime to which you are…to some degree or another…still inexorably linked.” She paused for a long moment. “Do you care to posit any idea on how the card got there?” she finally asked.

  I shook my head.

  “All right,” Deirdre said, starting to wrap things up. “There is a certain degree of disagreement between the District Attorney’s office and the Homicide division as to the next best step to take with you. Our position is that there is not enough evidence to hold you or to charge you with a crime.”

  “Currently,” Homicide Detective Fred Hutton added, speaking the only word he said thus far.

  “Yes, currently,” Deirdre agreed. “When that changes, we will certainly be in touch.”

  “So I’m free to go?” I asked.

  “Eli, you’ve always been free to go,” She answered. “Try to keep it that way.”

  I gave the trio one last look. They stared back at me like three-quarters of Mount Rushmore, but without the sense of madcap fun the monument provides. I stood up and headed toward the door.

  And then I had a thought.

  “I’m sure this has occurred to all of you,” I said as I reached the door and turned back to face them, “but don’t you find it interesting that the psychic who made his living with his second sight was murdered by being stabbed through the eyes, and now the psychic who’s a hypnotherapist has been murdered in his sleep? That’s sort of an odd coincidence, isn’t it?”

  Judging by the way they stared back it me, it became immediately clear that this idea had, in fact, not yet occurred to them.

  Someday, perhaps when I’m very old, I’ll learn to keep my big mouth shut.

  The interview, which five seconds earlier had been officially concluded, instantly resumed. They didn’t have many more questions, but for some reason they felt the need to ask the same ones over and over again.

  Nearly ninety minutes later I left Deirdre’s office and was halfway through the building’s exit door when I heard a muffled voice calling my name. I looked over and saw Clive Albans on the other side of the revolving door, on his way into the building. He gave me a wave and a big smile.

  I waved back, continued pushing the door and stepped out of the building. Clive revolved with the door and a moment later joined me on the front steps.

  “Are they done with you?” he asked breathlessly.

  “For now,” I said. “How did you know they were talking to me?”

  “The walls have ears,” he said, waving his hands in what I guessed was supposed to be a spooky manner. “Two murders, both psychics, very bizarre, don’t you think?”

  “Sure,” I said, trying not to stare at his outfit, which today consisted of a pale blue leisure suit from the late seventies. He wore shiny black boots that made him even taller than usual.

  “This has taken my writing project in an entirely different direction,” he continued. “Fake psychics is one thing, but fake dead psychics can put one on the bestseller lists.”

  “So you’re no longer just writing a newspaper article?”

  “I think this is a book now. It feels like a book. This will be big.” He cocked his head toward the building. “I’ve got to run. I’ve come here to see what I can find out from the local constabulary. But promise me this, Eli.”

  “What?”

  “If you’re the killer, be a dear and give me an exclusive.”

  He was so off the charts that I couldn’t help but smile. “Clive, you can count on it.”

  “That’s a good fellow.” And with that he stepped back into the revolving door and disappeared into the building.

  I parked my car in my spot behind Chicago Magic and entered via the back door. As I closed the door behind me, I could hear Uncle Harry out front with a customer, in the midst of a familiar diatribe.

  “Yes,” I could hear him saying in an exasperated tone, “I’ll happily sell you this illusion. But not until you demonstrate mastery, or at the very least proficiency, in the most recent item you bought. Which I believe was just two days ago, if I’m not mistaken.”

  I quickly stepped into the store to find Harry behind the counter and Pete in front of it, at a retail impasse.

  “Hi guys, what’s going on?” I asked nonchalantly. Harry, upon hearing my voice, immediately abandoned his discussion with Pete and headed over to me.

  “Buster, where have you been? The police were here. They wouldn’t tell me why.”

  “Not a big deal,” I said reassuringly. “Just my ex-wife’s new husband with his undies in a bunch.”

  Harry was instantly relieved. “Oh, thank God. This morning, when I saw that you hadn’t come back from that memorial service, I started to fear the worst.”

  “That I was the next victim?”

  “No, that you had a chance to get laid and you blew it.”

  Harry might not believe in psychics, but he was oddly clairvoyant at times.

  I decided to change the subject. “Hey, have you had lunch yet?”

  He shook his head, his mind now completely off his conversation with Pete. “No, not yet.”

  I gently took him by the shoulder and steered him toward the stairs. “Why don’t you go up and get lunch started and I’ll finish up down here and then come join you?”

  “That’s fine,” he said, starting up the steep stairs, grasping onto the handrail for support. Then he turned and stated emphatically, “But I better not hear the ring of the cash register while I’m up there.” He very pointedly did not look at Pete as he returned to his climb.

  “When it comes to not making sales, Uncle Harry, I’m your man,” I called after him.

  He responded to this with a grunt and a harrumph and then disappeared from sight.

  I turned back to Pete. “Sorry about that. Harry can be something of a hard-ass when it comes to learning magic.”

  “So I discovered,” Pete said. “All I asked for was a Rubik’s Cube illusion that I saw this morning on YouTub
e and thought was kind of cool…”

  I put my hand up, signaling that he should lower his voice. “Oh, Lord, you didn’t use the word ‘YouTube,’ did you?”

  “No,” he answered, matching my whispered tone.

  “Good.” I gently steered Pete down to the end of the counter.

  “You have to understand that in Harry’s day…hell, even when I was a kid…you’d never show anyone an illusion, particularly another magician, until you had completely mastered it. I made the mistake of showing him a clip of something on YouTube, a guy in Japan who’s got this amazing act. When the clip was done, he started clicking around, seeing all those videos uploaded by goofs who get a trick in the mail one day and then next day are broadcasting it on the Internet. He was apoplectic…I thought he was going to have a stroke.”

  “I don’t know how you deal with him,” Pete confided. “He scares the hell out of me. It’s like he can see into my head and knows what I’m thinking.”

  I smiled. “Well, if it’s any consolation, you’re not alone in that. He once made Uri Geller break out in hives.”

  “So let me see if I understand this…I have to be one hundred percent perfect with one trick before he’ll sell me another one?”

  I shrugged. “It’s not a hard and fast rule. He does it on a case-by-case basis. If you’re a kid looking to change a nickel into a quarter, he’ll give you a pass, but he’ll probably also sell you a book on magic. But once you begin playing with the higher-end stuff, new rules start to apply.”

  “Eli, I’m a realtor, just looking for something I can impress my clients with. Something to make me memorable.”

  “Isn’t selling their house enough?”

  He shrugged and leaned on the counter. “Depends on the market. Anything that gives me an edge, I have to pursue it. Plus, it’s fun. I did that cut-and-restored rope thing to a client a week ago, and two days later his brother called to give me his business. Was it the magic trick? Who knows? But I bet it didn’t hurt.”

  “And now you want the magic Rubik’s Cube?”

  “Yeah, the little one. You know, so I can carry it around in my pocket.”

  I glanced upstairs, where I could hear Harry banging around in the kitchen. Assured that he wasn’t on his way back down, I slid open the back panel on one of the display cases and pulled out the cube—a neat little gimmick that goes from a normal-looking Rubik’s Cube to a completely solved one in the blink of an eye. Again making sure that we weren’t about to be interrupted, I handed it to Pete, who took it happily.

  “Cool.” While he examined it with one hand, he reached into his coat and pulled out his wallet with the other. “How much do I owe you?”

  I held up my hand quickly to quiet him.

  “Sorry,” he whispered. “How much do I owe you?”

  I shook my head. “Let’s not push our luck. Pay me some other time.” I headed toward the front door, hoping that he would follow me. He did, but not nearly at the speed I would have preferred. He kept eyeing different items on the walls and the shelves and in the display cases. I stood by the front door, waiting for him. My phone beeped, and I pulled it out of my pocket.

  “You know what’s weird,” he said as he finally made it to the front door.

  “What?” I asked as I looked at the text that had come in.

  It was from Megan. It said, simply, “Lunch? 2day? MayB now? M.” I read it twice and didn’t hear Pete’s next comment. I looked up at him, tilting the phone so that he couldn’t see the screen.

  “I’m sorry, what did you say?” I said.

  “I said, it’s weird that I feel so guilty.”

  All I heard was the word ‘guilty.’ I was instantly afraid he had somehow read that look on my face. “Excuse me?”

  “When I do a trick for someone,” he continued, “and I fool them, I start to feel guilty, like I’m lying or something.”

  I quickly transformed my sigh of relief into a feigned sigh of compassion. “That’s the bane of the magician’s existence,” I agreed as I opened the shop door. “In order to master our craft, we have to master lying. But it’s in pursuit of a higher cause. As Harry always taught me, ‘Don’t sweat it…just pull the rug out from under them.’”

  Pete considered this for a moment.

  “I suppose you’re right,” he said. He stepped into the doorway. “I’ve got an open house to get to. That will give me some time to work on this.” He patted the pocket where he’d put his new Rubik’s Cube trick. “And I promise I won’t show it to anyone until I’ve mastered it. Or until tomorrow…whichever comes first.”

  We laughed and as he headed toward his car, I locked the door and turned the open sign around. I re-read Megan’s text and quickly sent a reply, choosing my words carefully.

  Then I went upstairs to break the news to Harry that I wouldn’t be joining him for lunch.

  “I’m so upset about Dr. Bitterman,” Megan said after we had placed our order and the waitress had disappeared.

  We were in a back corner of Pepito’s, the very fine Mexican restaurant two doors down from Chicago Magic. It was the end of the lunch rush and the crowd was beginning to thin out.

  “He was still so young, so vibrant. Do you know if they have any idea what the cause of death was?”

  “They’re considering a number of different scenarios,” I said tactfully. There was an awkward pause, one of those moments when you realize how little you know about the other person and aren’t sure where to head conversationally. We were saved, temporarily, by the quick return of the waitress who delivered Megan’s glass of red wine. She set it on the table and, being an excellent waitress, disappeared without a word.

  “Are you sure you don’t want something to drink?” Megan asked again as she unclasped a bracelet from around her wrist.

  I shook my head. “Too early in the day for me,” I said.

  “It would be too early for me, too, if I hadn’t discovered amethyst.” She took her bracelet and dipped it into the glass of wine, as if it were a teabag that happened to be made out of silver and crystals. She looked up and smiled at my expression, which I imagine was on a spectrum somewhere between amused and confused. “Amethyst detoxifies alcohol, so that you don’t get drunk. In Greek, the word amethyst means ‘not drunken.’”

  “That actually works?” I asked.

  “I don’t know, but after a couple of glasses you tend to stop caring.”

  She used her napkin to dry off the bracelet and then took a sip of wine, smiling contentedly. “So, everybody seems to know you here,” she said with a touch of amazement. “The hostess, the waitress…even cooks were waving at you from the kitchen when we walked in. Do you come here a lot?”

  I shrugged. “On and off. Not so much anymore. But I spent a lot of time here in my late teens and early twenties. I worked here.”

  “Were you a waiter?”

  “No, I did magic. Table to table.”

  “You were the house magician? That is adorable,” she said, smiling broadly. “What sorts of things did you do?”

  “Oh, the typical stuff. Some card work, some coin work. Cut and restored a rope. Make your watch disappear. Perfectly timed to cover the duration between when the order was placed and the food arrived.”

  She leaned forward, excited. “Do something for me now.”

  “What, right now?”

  “Please. Please, please.”

  I patted my pockets, which may have looked like a show business move, but was actually designed to see what I might have on my person to create a spontaneous performance. “I can’t believe that I’ve violated the one rule I religiously tell my students… Always travel with a pack of cards.”

  I looked around the table to see what might be handy. “Well, it’s sort of a stupid trick,” I said as I grabbed the saltshaker, “but it will have to do in a pinch.”

  I slid the saltshaker back and forth smoothly across the top of the table a few times, and then deftly covered it with my napkin. Megan watche
d closely, her eyes following the movement of the covered shaker as I danced it around the tabletop a couple more times.

  “These restaurant tables may seem solid,” I said, improvising some patter, “but they all have a weak spot…a point that isn’t nearly as strong as the rest. With a little testing, and practice, you can actually locate that spot. In fact, I think I’ve found it, right here.”

  With that, I suddenly slammed my hand down, hard, on the covered saltshaker, flattening the napkin against the table. At that same instant, there was the distinct sound of something hitting the carpet beneath the table. I lifted up the napkin off the tabletop to reveal that the saltshaker was now gone.

  Megan’s hand had flown to her mouth, her eyes wide. Then, almost in unison, we both leaned over and peered under the table. There, sitting on the floor, was the saltshaker. I reached under the table and picked it up.

  “Holy crap,” Megan exclaimed, barely squelching a yelp. “I love it. Don’t tell me how you did that. I don’t want to know.”

  “It’s magic,” I said, replacing the saltshaker and putting my napkin back in my lap. “So, if your grandmother owned this block, how come I never saw you around here when I was younger?”

  “We lived in Michigan,” she said, taking another sip of wine. “Sometimes we’d visit, but we didn’t hang around here so much. She had property in St. Paul where we’d go play and stuff, but we didn’t hang out in Minneapolis much at all.”

  “And now you’re in charge of all that property?”

  “Well, it’s not all that much, really. She sold a few things before she died. Pete’s helping me get rid of the rest. With the exception of this block, of course. I wanted to stay here. There’s just something special about it.”

  “Well, I agree,” I said, taking a couple of the tortilla chips from the basket on the table. “I’ve had the chance to travel quite a bit, both as a kid with my uncle and as a working magician myself, but I am always drawn back to this particular spot.”

  “Speaking of your uncle, here’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you… Why does he call you Buster?”