The Glass Magician

by Caroline Stevermer

  “Then may I rent it?” Thalia held Madame Ostrova’s gaze. “It would help me prove Nutall’s innocence—and Anton’s.”

  Madame Ostrova’s eyes narrowed. “Under such circumstances, I think yes. A short-term rental could be arranged.”

  “I would like one modification made to the trick. There needs to be a concealed trapdoor in the base.”

  Madame Ostrova gave a little shrug. “It could be arranged. Given time. And money.”

  “May I also rent your theater?” Thalia asked. “Only for a few hours once everything is ready. I have in mind a command performance.”

  “Rent the Ostrova Palace of Mystery?” Madame Ostrova gave Thalia an approving look, the first since she had received Thalia as a known Trader. It was a pleasant change. “When do you want it?”

  “The sooner the better. As soon as the box has been modified. I also need to work out a guest list. Would a matinee work? The day after tomorrow.”

  “I will reserve it for you.” Madame Ostrova asked, “Tell me, what else do you have in mind?”

  Thalia said, “Anton is familiar with the rifle Von Faber used. I want one of mine made to look as much like the murder weapon as possible. I plan to tell the audience it is the very weapon that killed Von Faber. I will use it to seek his murderer out.”

  “Very well. What else will you need?”

  “Your help, and Anton’s, and maybe Freddie’s as well. I’ll let you know the details as soon as I figure them out.”

  Madame Ostrova produced a small brown notebook and a tiny pencil. “What else?”

  “I want two leaden musket balls, each engraved with the word ‘Murderer.’”

  Madame Ostrova didn’t even glance up from the list she was making in her little notebook. “What else?”

  “A gong, something suitable for the Bullet Catch,” said Thalia.

  Anton knocked at the workroom door politely. “Your Trader wants to know how much longer you are going to be here,” he told Thalia. “He says—”

  From behind Anton, Ryker himself called, “I said, it’s not that I’m impatient, but the Skinner is.”

  “I’m coming,” Thalia told Ryker. To Madame Ostrova, she added, “Make that two gongs.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  What set the Ostrova Magic Company’s building apart from the buildings beside it along Sixth Avenue was not to be seen from the outside. It had the same kind of red brick facade as the buildings on either side, stood at much the same height, and had windows like any other building of its kind, only cleaner.

  If one crossed the neatly swept threshold of the main entrance, one entered the shop that sold Ostrova-made magic tricks and other gaudy items intended to appeal to the novice magician. The privileged could enter through the professional entrance, as Thalia had done, and admire the reception area or do serious business in Madame Ostrova’s office.

  The top floor of the Ostrova Magic Company’s building held living quarters for Madame Ostrova and her extended family. These were entirely off-limits to outsiders. Visitors who came on business were generally kept to the storage area in the cellar, the construction workshop on the ground level, or its adjacent space, the Ostrova Magic Company’s Palace of Mystery.

  This grand name belonged to a scaled-down version of a true theatrical stage, complete with a stage curtain of heavy red plush velvet trimmed in gold braid, twenty-four seats for the audience, proper flies above the stage for simple backdrops, and a small but effective set of ultramodern electrical stage lights.

  As a show business venue, the Palace of Mystery was tiny. As a space in which to perform stage magic, it was perfection. Its chief drawback was a lack of room for an orchestra, but the acoustics of the place were so good, the gramophone provided by the management could fill the tiny theater with music.

  The little theater allowed select clients to try out the tricks and stage props they had commissioned from the Ostrova Magic Company. Testing the new equipment before a discerning audience led to satisfied customers.

  The centerpiece that dominated the stage the day Thalia had booked the Palace of Mystery for her matinee performance was the mirror box originally commissioned by Von Faber. Mrs. Von Faber had refused to pay the outstanding balance due for the mirror box out of the money left in her husband’s estate, so Thalia had paid Madame Ostrova for it with the money she’d earned tutoring Nell. It was her trick now.

  Like the building that held the Palace of Mystery, the exterior of the mirror box was deceptively simple in appearance. It was lacquered shiny black, with a set of bright brass hinges on the front double doors as its only ornament. Its interior was a compartment completely lined with mirrors, dazzling in the focused brilliance of the stage lighting. The mirrors distracted the eye from the precise dimensions of the box interior. Behind the mirrors an inner compartment could conceal a stage assistant.

  Thalia had made one modification to Von Faber’s original commission. She had insisted that a trapdoor be added to the base, and the whole box be positioned so it could rest over the stage trapdoor. Ordinarily a mirror box would be entirely self-contained—but Thalia had plans for that trapdoor.

  Once every seat in the audience was occupied, Thalia took her place onstage. The general lights in the theater went out, leaving only the glow of the footlights and the glare of the spotlights that blazed down on Thalia and the mirror box. The audience stopped talking and stared at her.

  Under the circumstances, Nutall couldn’t introduce her, so Thalia did her best to capture his mixture of perfect diction and friendly impudence as she introduced herself. “Ladies and gentlemen, Sylvestri and Solitaires, Traders and Manticores, welcome to the Ostrova Magic Company’s Palace of Mystery. I am Miss Thalia Cutler.”

  She paused for applause, but there wasn’t any. In ordinary circumstances, standing in front of a stoically silent crowd would be an uncomfortable sensation, but Thalia welcomed a pause in the proceedings, no matter how awkward. It had been much too long since she had performed on a stage. The blaze of stage lighting in her eyes and the rising warmth of it on her skin felt wonderful. It felt like coming home.

  Thalia went on. “This afternoon you are privileged to witness a command performance. Today you will see how all roads lead to the truth. Today the truth will be revealed. I refer, of course, to the true identity of the murderer of Johan Von Faber.”

  There. The audience had responded to that, a wordless rustle of anticipation. Time seemed to slow down as Thalia stared out at them. The audience stared back at her, although Thalia was careful not to meet anyone’s eyes for more than an instant. Ryker was in the best seat, with Madame Ostrova impassive at his left hand and Tycho Aristides, as heavily armed as ever, on his right. In the back two rows Inspector Ottokar, Officer Kelly, and five policemen, all of whom glared suspiciously at Thalia, sat with half a dozen journalists Madame Ostrova had invited at Thalia’s insistence. The seats closest to the stage were filled with the Ryker family’s legal representatives, Mr. Tewksbury and Mrs. Hopkins; slender Miss Nora Uberti, dressed in black; and the original Mrs. Von Faber, who looked like a plump grandmother wearing her granddaughter’s Dresden shepherdess costume. Right where she’d expected to find them, in the seats closest to the exit door, David Nutall sat with Mrs. Dorcas Viridian on one side and Ambassador Peter Viridian on the other. In the next row back, Mrs. Morris was sitting right behind Nutall, her cheeks bright pink with excitement.

  As Nutall had taught her long ago, Thalia pitched her voice for the benefit of the last row of seats. “There is more in this world, my friends, than we can understand. Hamlet said, ‘There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.’ There are more things afoot at this moment than any poet ever told. If you value the truth, help me. Lend me your thoughts, lend me your vibrations. Together we will solve this mystery.”

  Thalia put her hands on the shiny black mirror box, turning it this way and that for the benefit of the audience. When her ritual concluded, she
opened the double doors on the front of the box and let the stage lights show the mirrored lining. Brightness drew every eye. Once she had displayed the open box, she ceremoniously withdrew the props she’d placed inside: a mop, a broom, a bucket, a muzzle-loading rifle, and the sword she called Excalibur. All the while, Thalia reeled off a yard or two of standard stage patter about revealing the hidden truth. She hadn’t used any of her recent wild ideas in this routine. Sending someone through the looking glass wouldn’t suit Thalia’s purpose today.

  As she worked, Anton, Thalia’s onstage assistant for the performance, accepted these trophies as she handed them out. He carefully arranged them in a semicircle around the mirror box.

  “If we put away the distractions of the world, the truth becomes more clear.” Thalia slowly spun the box, noiseless on the ball bearings set into the base, opened the less conspicuous double doors on the back panel, and gestured for Anton to enter the box and walk through it. Obediently, Anton demonstrated the mirror box’s utter lack of mystery.

  Once it was empty, Thalia slowly spun the box again, this time with both sets of double doors open. Now it appeared to be nothing but an unusually shiny armoire, mirrored within. Anton closed the back doors as Thalia closed the doors at the front.

  Thalia waved Anton away for the moment and turned her attention to the audience. “Ladies and gentlemen, I require a volunteer from the audience.” Thalia dropped her words into the silence as she locked her gaze to Nutall’s and let it burn there.

  Nutall was dressed with his usual attention to detail, dapper in a dark suit with a diamond stickpin in his dark blue silk cravat. Thalia thought he looked tired.

  Mrs. Viridian put her hand on Nutall’s arm and tried to keep him from rising from his seat. Thalia could have told her that was futile, but Mrs. Viridian found it out for herself.

  Nutall was prompt to respond to his cue. Thalia felt her eyes fill with tears as she watched him approach. She blinked her vision clear.

  It seemed to take a great effort for Nutall to clamber across the Ostrovas’ miniature footlights, and take his place beside Thalia on the stage. “I volunteer,” he said softly, but the acoustics of the tiny theater took his murmur to every corner of the room.

  “You can’t. You can’t volunteer.” Mrs. Viridian’s voice did not carry as well from the audience as Nutall’s had from the stage, but she wasn’t murmuring. “You shouldn’t even be here.”

  “You must,” Thalia announced. “We cannot find the truth without you, David Nutall.” To Mrs. Viridian, Thalia said, “I will return him unscathed.”

  That was an outright thumping lie, but Thalia did not hesitate to tell it. She used every advantage her position onstage gave her to influence Mrs. Viridian, who subsided with obvious reluctance. Her husband patted her hand consolingly.

  “Thank you,” Thalia whispered to Nutall, and the back row probably heard that too, so she said nothing more. Instead, she gestured to the mirror box and offered Nutall her arm to help him inside. As she did, she gazed at the floor of the mirrored compartment, willing Nutall to take her hint. Long before Thalia had opened the doors and spun the mirror box to demonstrate its emptiness, she and Anton had taken pains to position the box exactly over an unobtrusive trapdoor built into the stage itself.

  “Thank you, my dear.” Nutall was as well versed in concealed trapdoors as he was in the need for discretion. The warmth in his voice and the emphasis he put on the word “thank” told Thalia he’d caught her meaning. “I can manage.”

  With Nutall in the mirror box, Thalia shut all the doors.

  The gramophone was ready. At Thalia’s signal, Freddie Ostrova dropped the needle, and a Viennese waltz began to play.

  Thalia used her movements, the tilt of her head, the sweep of her arms, to tell the audience what was happening. There was the mirror box; there was Nutall. Now Nutall had gone into the mirror box. Now the double doors were shut.

  There really should have been a drumroll, but without an orchestra, all Thalia could do was time her move for the moment the scratchy music stopped. “Hey, presto!”

  Thalia spread her arms wide to signal her reveal. As Anton opened the doors at the back, she opened those on the front of the box. Together they spun the box slowly for the benefit of every pair of eyes in the audience. The mirrored compartment was empty.

  Mrs. Viridian leaned forward, glaring. “Where is he? Where did he go?”

  Thalia read her intention in the stiff lines of her body. She held up her hand to gesture stop. “Please remain in your seat, or this performance ends now.”

  “What an excellent suggestion,” Mrs. Viridian snarled. “Police! I demand you arrest this woman.”

  From the row behind, Mrs. Morris stretched forward to put her hand on Mrs. Viridian’s shoulder, keeping her in her seat. “Oh, do hush up. I’ve never seen one of Miss Cutler’s stage performances before, and she was just beginning. Go on, dear.”

  Bristling but silent, Mrs. Viridian settled down.

  Thalia couldn’t help smiling gratefully at her landlady as she resumed her patter. “You have lent me your thoughts. You have lent me your vibrations. We work together here to reveal the truth.”

  Thalia rapped twice on the rear door, spun the box back into its original position, and opened the front door. “Behold. I give you Innocence itself.”

  There stood Nell Ryker, elegant in a rose-pink silk ball gown made in the latest narrow French fashion. Thalia handed her down from the box, and Nell, jubilant, curtsied in response to a scattered round of applause from the audience. Thalia hadn’t arranged for any paid enthusiasm, so the response delighted her. Scattered the applause might be, but it was genuine.

  Squarely in the spotlight, Nell waved to her brother. “Hello, it’s me!”

  “Where is David Muir?” Mrs. Viridian shook off Mrs. Morris and sprang to her feet. “Where has he gone?”

  At the same time, Nathaniel Ryker vaulted onto the stage. He caught his sister by one slender opera-gloved wrist. “What do you think you are doing here?”

  Thalia picked up the gleaming sword she had used in the Siege Perilous trick, struck a noble pose, and watched the distraction play out from her position just outside the range of the brightest spotlight. She was still well lit, but, for the moment, not at the center of the audience’s attention.

  “Don’t worry.” Nell pulled away from her brother’s grip. “Everything is fine.”

  “It is not fine,” Ryker snarled. “What if a manticore decides to pay a call? What do you do then, you silly girl?”

  “Haven’t you noticed?” Nell glared at him and pointed at Aristides. “The Skinner of New York is right there in the seat next to yours. If a manticore somehow blunders in here, it will soon regret it. Go sit down. We’re not finished.”

  “You,” Mrs. Viridian said to the police officers in the audience. “Do your jobs. Get David—I mean Nutall—back.”

  Inspector Ottokar, Officer Kelly, and the other police officers, who had been about to take the stage, stopped where they were. If they continued, they would seem to be taking orders from a Sylvestri—and a Sylvestri woman at that. They didn’t want to do that.

  Thalia said imperiously, “Quiet, all of you. We are in the presence of the mystical. I cannot reveal the truth until you stop your squabbling.”

  Somehow, despite the racket of indignant denials that followed, Thalia distinctly heard Mrs. Morris say, “That’s right. You tell them.”

  “Poppycock!” Clearly Mrs. Viridian was not impressed with Thalia’s stage patter.

  Thalia spoke to the audience at large but she focused her gaze entirely on Mrs. Viridian. “Kindly return to your seats, ladies and gentlemen, and the demonstration will continue.” In truth, she didn’t blame Mrs. Viridian for her reaction. She was spouting poppycock. But the longer her stage act lasted, the more time Nutall had to make good his getaway.

  Mrs. Viridian approached the stage and halted only when Thalia raised the sword. “You’re a fraud.”
>
  “You’re mistaken. What I am, madame, is a stage magician. Once you cease your interference, I will prove it.” Thalia made a sweeping gesture with the sword and held her Lady of the Lake pose until everyone, even the visibly fuming Mrs. Viridian, had returned to their seats.

  Thalia caught Nell’s eye and nodded toward the now-silent gramophone. As Freddie wound it up, Nell sprang to drop the needle on the wax cylinder. The music resumed in the wrong spot, but Thalia didn’t let that worry her.

  First Thalia swung her sword high, sweeping the air above the mirror box. “No wires, as you see.”

  Then Thalia set her sword down next to the muzzle-loading rifle, and moved around the mirror box, closing the doors front and back. Mrs. Viridian was still making disagreement noises, but they were small sounds and Thalia drowned them out without a qualm.

  This time when Thalia spoke, she used her voice to command, letting the perfect acoustics of the place aid her as she spun out the patter.

  “You all know who I am. I have the power to reveal the truth about Von Faber’s death.”

  Thalia couldn’t resist a pause to let those words sink in, but went on before she gave her audience a chance to think. “I can call Justice herself to witness. The police have accused David Nutall of this crime. Mr. Nutall is innocent. Now I shall prove it.”

  Thalia picked up the muzzle-loading rifle. The audience didn’t move. They didn’t make a sound. Yet Thalia felt their interest and anticipation rising. She reveled in it. “Some of you were there the night Von Faber died. I was. I can tell you exactly what happened.”

  Thalia showed them the rifle. “Here we have the very rifle that took Von Faber’s life.” This was a lie. The true murder weapon had been safely filed away in some police evidence locker since the murder investigation had begun. “It has two firing chambers, not one.”

  Thalia knew that the rifle she held, the one she’d used in her own Bullet Catch, was now so similar in appearance to the murder weapon that even an expert would be hard-pressed to tell them apart. “Someone meddled with this firearm so that a spark from the flint ignited the gunpowder in the wrong firing chamber.”