The Glass Magician

by Caroline Stevermer

  “Oof—” Ryker stumbled backward. “Wait!”

  Thalia stormed her way into the foyer. The butler loomed up, Thalia’s umbrella in hand. “Here you are, miss.”

  “Rogers, stop her!” Ryker ordered.

  “I said.” Thalia took the umbrella and whirled to place its point against Ryker’s top waistcoat button. “Get off.”

  From the other side of the foyer, a girl called out joyously. “The Lady of the Lake!” Nell Ryker, all shining black ringlets, rosy cheeks, and merry laughter, came dancing forward with a little handclap of appreciation. “Oh, Nat! You are the best brother in the world.”

  Thalia held the umbrella steady as she turned to address the brat. The brat paid no attention. She tossed her curls fetchingly as she came to a halt so close that Thalia could see her every eyelash.

  “Just play along,” the girl murmured, scarcely moving her lips. Thalia was startled by the gleam of malice beneath the brat’s sunniness as she addressed her brother. “You’ve brought me the Lady of the Lake for my birthday!”

  All frank friendliness, the girl held out her hand to Thalia. “I am Eleanor Ryker. You must call me Nell. I am sure we shall become great friends.”

  “No, you won’t.” Ryker made a fizzing sound of pure disapproval. “That is not why she is here. Nell, don’t do this.”

  Anything that made Ryker make a noise like that was fine with Thalia. She had to lower her umbrella and shift it to her left hand to accept Miss Ryker’s offered handshake. To her surprise, Miss Ryker’s grip was firm enough to make her hand twinge painfully. “I am Thalia Cutler. I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”

  “Delighted to meet you, Miss Cutler.” Nell Ryker turned to her brother. “Go away, Nat. I want to speak with Miss Cutler in private. Just us modern women.”

  “Nell, please behave yourself.” Ryker adjusted his spectacles. “Miss Cutler, however low your opinion of me might be, while you are under this roof, I trust you will behave responsibly.”

  “Mr. Ryker.” Thalia searched for words sharp enough to cut him down to size. In the end, she had to settle for a feeble “Never speak to me again.”

  Ryker bowed stiffly and left them. A moment later, entirely impassive, Rogers followed in his wake. Thalia was alone with Miss Eleanor Ryker.

  Chapter Seven

  Nell Ryker bounced with glee as she seized Thalia’s umbrella. “Let me take this. Come up to my workroom so we can have some privacy. If we stay down here, Rogers will listen at the keyhole. Won’t you, Rogers?”

  Thalia followed her hostess. Nell Ryker was quick and graceful. They climbed flight after flight of stairs. Thalia marveled at the size and splendor of the house, but she said nothing to Miss Ryker.

  At the top of the house, Nell Ryker stopped, her hand on the ornate handle of a door with a pointed arch like something from an illustrated storybook. Thalia had never seen such a door in her life.

  “My inner sanctum,” Nell Ryker told Thalia solemnly. “We will be safe here.”

  Thalia let her hostess lead her into the slant-ceilinged room beyond. At one time, it had clearly been a playroom or nursery. There were toys still on the shelves, and a rocking horse of unusual beauty in the corner. Now it was a workroom. The table by the window was littered with stacks of coins, decks of cards, and handcrafted tricks of the sort the Ostrova Magic Company sold to children. Alongside lay sheets of paper covered with notes and diagrams.

  Nell Ryker showed Thalia everything, her pride and ambition unmistakable. Thalia felt her throat growing a bit tight with emotion. Despite her years, however many they might be, Nell was little more than an enthusiastic child. No wonder her odious brother wished to protect her, however clumsily he went about it. Thalia considered what the theater folk she knew would make of Nell Ryker’s artless Trader charm. Not everyone found such vivacity appealing, and some would make it their business to address Miss Ryker with such blunt honesty that she would be reduced to tears. It didn’t bear thinking of.

  “Nat tells everyone I’ve gone mad, of course,” Nell Ryker said, ushering Thalia to a slightly battered yet surprisingly comfortable chair. “He doesn’t understand. If one is given a gift, one must use it.”

  Thalia thought about trying to explain the difference between a voice like Caruso’s and an ability to use an Ostrova Magic Company trick. She chose to refrain from comparisons, at least for now. “You believe you have a gift for stage magic?”

  “Believe? I know I have!” Nell Ryker’s sweeping gesture offered herself as evidence. “Look at me!”

  “You’re a Trader.”

  “Yes, thanks.” Nell Ryker dropped into a chair across the table from Thalia’s. Her dark eyes were like her brother’s, their expression even more intense. “I know that.”

  “With all your advantages,” Thalia asked, as diplomatically as she could, “why do you care about stage magic?”

  The answer came promptly. “Why do you?”

  “It’s my family business.” Thalia didn’t waste any breath trying to remind Miss Eleanor Ryker that frivolous young Traders were ordinarily much too busy being rich to go in for hard work. They both knew that much. “Your brother says the Rykers have a family business too. Don’t you care about that?”

  “We have ships.” Nell Ryker wrinkled her nose. “I’m not interested in ships anymore. I used to be, when I was just a young girl. Then I realized they’d never let me sail one by myself. Do you mean to tell me that the only reason you do stage magic is that you were brought up to do it? That’s disappointing.”

  Thalia thought about the joy of performance, of taking her place in the spotlight, of using her powers of mind and body to their fullest extent to make an audience see what she wanted them to see. “I trained for it all my life. It’s what I do best. I love it, I’ll admit. But I still trained for it.”

  “I understand about training and hard work.” Nell Ryker had her brother’s smile too, and no flickering. It was a pure beam of happiness. “I can work hard.”

  Thalia smiled back. “Why? Money’s no object to you. You have no need to go on the stage.”

  “No financial need,” Nell Ryker conceded. “There are other needs. Pressing needs. Artistic needs.”

  “Artistic needs, eh?” Maybe the kid had it worse than Thalia had thought. “Name one.”

  “The need to improve.” Nell Ryker held up a deck of cards. “I know the stage magicians’ code forbids you to give away your professional secrets. I don’t expect you to share your tricks with me. I just want you to critique my work and help me polish what I’ve learned so far. Let me show you a simple card pass.”

  Before Thalia could protest, Nell shuffled the deck and began methodically to move cards from the top of the deck to the bottom, using only one hand. It wasn’t smooth enough for the stage, but it was approximately three hundred times better than Thalia had expected. “Okay. Where did you learn that?”

  Nell Ryker kept doggedly on with the card pass. “Promise me you won’t tell Nat.”

  “I don’t plan ever to speak to your brother again in my life, so yes. I promise.” Thalia took the deck of cards away from Nell. “You didn’t pick that up playing solitaire. Tell me.”

  “Rogers wasn’t always a butler. He’s gone straight, truly. He’s been on the staff here ever since I was a baby and we’ve never had so much as a teaspoon go missing.”

  “What was he before, a cardsharp?” Thalia took off her gloves and began to shuffle the deck herself.

  “A burglar too.” Nell Ryker confided, “I can pick every lock in this house.”

  “Dear me.” Thalia moved the freshly shuffled deck into a card-pass drill. “Why waste your time in show business? If your family trust ever runs out of money, you could crack safes for a living.”

  “Oh, don’t keep harping on about how to make a living. There’s more to life than money. I want to express myself.”

  “Oh, yes. Artistic needs. I’d forgotten.” Thalia, still absently drilling herself with the
cards, spoke honestly. “If you think you need to get up in front of people onstage to have everyone’s attention, you’re wrong. You’re a debutante, aren’t you? You’ll have plenty of attention. The good kind. In show business sometimes it’s the bad kind.”

  “Fine!” Nell Ryker rummaged among the stacks of coins and decks of cards on the table. “Save your breath. Nat has told me a thousand times about how I’ll be ruined if I go onstage.”

  Thalia finished her card pass. “I don’t think you have any idea how much I hate to say this, but you should listen to your brother.”

  “Oh, please don’t say things like that.” Nell Ryker found what she was looking for, another deck of cards. “I want lessons. Cut you for it.”

  Thalia couldn’t help laughing. “Don’t be silly.”

  “You win, I’ll do as Nat tells me. I win, you teach me what I need to know to go on the stage. As a magician, mind you. No featherheaded-assistant jobs for me.”

  “You have no idea what those so-called featherheaded assistants really do. Don’t sell them short.”

  “Teach me what they do, then,” Nell Ryker begged. “That’s all I want. Someone to teach me. You said yourself that money is no object for me. I’ll pay you.”

  “Oh, really? Your brother said he’d pay me twenty dollars,” Thalia said. “Although I’ll admit he only expected there to be one lesson.”

  Nell Ryker beamed. “That’s fair. I’ll pay you twenty dollars for each lesson, as many lessons as you’re willing to give me.”

  “Your brother wouldn’t permit it,” Thalia reminded her. “I’m not interested in making a business agreement just to have your brother cancel it.”

  Nell Ryker’s smile faded slightly but it did not vanish completely. “Cut for it. Aces high. You win and we’re done here. I win, and I’ll talk Nat round.”

  “Suppose you got your way. What would you want me to teach you first? Coin passes?”

  “When I get my way,” said Nell Ryker cheerfully, “I want your honest opinion of my card pass. I want a lesson from you right now, and for you to come back here tomorrow and as many days after as you need to until I’m perfect.”

  Thalia kept her face straight, but not without difficulty. The Trader girl was better than she’d expected, but she wasn’t days or weeks away from the professional level. More like years. Nell Ryker was sure to lose interest long before she was truly proficient. Thalia took her time and thought it over. “It’s a deal.”

  In her delight, Nell Ryker bounced up and down in her chair twice as they shook hands on the agreement. “We’ll use this deck. I’ll shuffle, Miss Cutler. You cut.”

  Thalia laughed aloud. “Nerve like that will take you far, Miss Ryker.”

  “Please, call me Nell.”

  “All right, Nell. You may call me Thalia. Now, I’ll shuffle. You cut.”

  They both drew the ace of spades. Thalia’s opinion of Nell went up a notch, but she didn’t let it show. “Look at that. A draw.”

  “Flip a coin?” Nell offered hopefully.

  “Sure.” Thalia brought out her pet silver dollar. “My coin. Heads we start with coin passes today. Tails we talk about your card pass.”

  Nell’s smile blazed forth. “You’re on.”

  Thalia made certain that the silver dollar came up heads.

  Nell clapped her hands together in delight. “Splendid. Let’s start at once.”

  “Payment in advance,” Thalia countered.

  Nell produced a twenty-dollar gold piece from what she plainly considered to be thin air. She held it up triumphantly, turning it this way and that. “Voilà!”

  Thalia stowed the coin safely away in her purse. “Next time, turn your wrist a little more when you switch, and keep your hand steady on the reveal. It’s gold. We can see it fine without you waving it around the room.”

  Nell bounced in her chair. “Oh, this is exactly what I wanted! Nat said he was going to invite you for tea. Do you mind having it up here?”

  Thalia thought about Ryker’s probable reaction to his sister’s business deal. “I’d prefer it, actually.”

  Nell rang for a maid and ordered tea be served on her worktable. “Indian tea, not China. Cake if it’s chocolate. Salmon sandwiches, if there’s any salmon left. Lots of sandwiches, no matter what.”

  While they waited for tea to be brought up, Thalia began lesson one. “You have a beginner’s grasp of palming and stealing. How are you at ditching and loading?”

  Nell was intrigued. “I’ve never heard of them, so I think I’m probably dreadful. Do show me!”

  Thalia left the twenty-dollar gold piece safely in her purse and brought out a silver dollar instead. “Palming.” Thalia made the coin disappear and then turned her hand to show Nell where she’d hidden it with her fingers. “Stealing.” With a smooth gesture, she produced her original silver dollar from a fold in the cuff of her left sleeve. “Ditching.” She tucked it into her right cuff. “Loading.” A silver dollar returned, doubled itself, and disappeared again.

  Nell’s eyes had gone wide and bright. “Show me again.”

  Thalia held out her purse. “Take two pennies and run through it with me. Ready?”

  They worked on hand positions. “No, lift your hand more. Show the marks what they’re supposed to be looking for. If you can get the coin to catch the light that’s great, but don’t wave it around. You have to look completely natural on the outside while you’re completely artificial on the inside.”

  “This is natural,” Nell protested.

  The lesson was suspended when the tea tray arrived, a glorious array of cake and sandwiches on a tiered stand, a silver teapot, two china cups, and two saucers. Nell poured out tea and offered Thalia a plate of finger sandwiches and slices of two kinds of chocolate cake.

  Watching Nell, Thalia concluded that the Trader girl’s every gesture was indeed naturally theatrical, as if she’d been raised by an actress. Thalia wondered if had something to do with being a Trader. “If you scale it back a little, you’ll have better luck. Right now, the marks will be watching you instead of what you’re doing.”

  * * *

  By the time the last of the tea had gone cold, all the cake and most of the sandwiches were gone, and Nell was losing her ability to concentrate.

  Thalia wondered how the Great Cutler had ever had the patience to teach her. She couldn’t remember a time when these elementary moves hadn’t been second nature. It frayed her patience, trying to find simpler ways to explain technique to Nell. Better to stop now and resume fresh the next day. That would give Nell time to practice and Thalia time to think up new explanations. “That’s enough for today.”

  With visible relief, Nell put her coins away. “Let’s go find Nat. I need to tell him about our agreement.”

  “Good idea.”

  “I’ll also need to tell Rogers to let you in from now on, no matter what silly orders Nat issues.”

  “Right. Good. Remember ditching and loading. Practice it more tonight.”

  * * *

  “Magic lessons?” Ryker brought both hands crashing down discordantly on the piano keyboard. “Out of the question!”

  “Oh, Nat!” Nell clapped her hands in delight. “You sounded just like Mama then. Do it again!”

  Ryker looked as if he’d bitten a lemon. “I said no.”

  Nell shook her head. “Close, but not quite as good.”

  Ryker ignored his sister in favor of giving Thalia an absolutely baleful stare. “Miss Cutler. I don’t care what kind of arrangement you think you’ve made with my sister. It’s off. Do you understand me?”

  Silent, Thalia stared right back. This was between brother and sister.

  “Nell, you are making yourself ridiculous. You haven’t passed your ordeal, therefore you are not a full member of society. You cannot enter into a legally binding contract until you are.”

  Nell laughed merrily. “Just listen to yourself!”

  Thalia found the most comfortable chair in the music r
oom and seated herself. Ryker’s true opinion of women in show business had been a blow. Watching his sister win an argument with him seemed like fine entertainment to her.

  “Don’t let this woman’s refined looks fool you. She had her piano lessons from a circus strongman,” said Ryker. “She’s spent her entire life at the circus. You don’t want to end up like her.”

  Nell gave him both dimples. “Yes, I do.”

  Thalia was happy she hadn’t told Ryker more about her music lessons. When the pit orchestra had been busy rehearsing, Milo had given her lessons at the piano in the nearest whorehouse instead. It had never occurred to Thalia to wonder, although now she could make a shrewd guess, exactly how Milo had accessed the piano for a lesson. None of that was any business of Ryker’s. “Vaudeville, not circus,” she called, but Ryker paid her no attention.

  Nell retorted, “I don’t care what you think of her. I’ve paid her in advance and had my first lesson. So there. She’s coming back tomorrow for the next one.”

  “No, she is not.”

  “She is.”

  It went on that way. Ryker lasted ten minutes, then left the room growling under his breath.

  When he was gone, Nell took his place at the piano and began to pick out a wandering little tune on the keys with only the tip of her left index finger. “Any minute now, it will occur to Nat that spending time with you is a sure way for me to learn how terrible a career in show business really is. He’ll change his mind about you tutoring me in about two hours.”

  Thalia concealed an inward sigh. “Should I stay until then?”

  “No need. I’ll tell Rogers to get the car for you.”

  Before Nell could leave the piano, the door opened and Ryker rejoined them, looking uncomfortable. He came to stand directly before Thalia. “Miss Cutler.”

  “Mr. Ryker.” Thalia looked up at him with distaste. “Don’t you know it is rude to loom?”