Great Magnifico, The

Stage magic died out with vaudeville and the barbershop quartet,
thought Barry Carter as he waited nervously in the wings. How could he
expect people to be amazed when he cut a woman in half when movie
special effects could take it one step further and show both halves of
said woman climb out of the box and chase each other around the
stage?

It didn't help that the redcoats were on before him. Their song and
dance routine made a suitably rousing finale to the evening's
entertainment. Afterwards people would be ready to leave. Even Barry
himself knew a few conjuring tricks would be an anti-climax after that.
He considered faking diarrhoea again, but by now it was too late. The
redcoats were getting their standing ovation.

It was ironic, he thought as he strode out into his spotlight a few
moments later, he was a magician wishing magic was real, wishing he
could just cast an invisibility spell and flee. Yet as soon as the
audience had reluctantly returned to their seats, he had ceased to be
worrysome Barry Carter in a purple tie-dye bedsheet, and had become the
Great Magnifico in his magical cloak.

Barry had performed the same illusions every Saturday and Sunday this
summer. He didn't even have to think about it as he swept across the
stage, pulling streamers from the ears of the front row and showering
the row behind with glitter that appeared from nowhere. Then it came to
the finale, and his two nubile assistants wheeled a cabinet onto the
stage.

"In ancient Carthage," he boomed - it was not his normal voice. "There
was once a powerful sorcerer known in legend only as Uswald Eo. He had
many enemies, and was known to frequently invite them to banquets at
his castle in the mountains. There, he would lure them into a cabinet
and seal them within, never to be seen again. The cabinet, he claimed,
was his own personal gateway to Hell.

"Ladies, gents, children and fellow magicfolk, I present&;#8230;
Uswald's Cabinet."

The audience applauded. It was just a normal wardrobe painted a glossy
black with white gilding that looked like bone in the right light. With
the dry ice rolling about his feet and a subdued spotlight shining over
his painted face, he had the people under his spell - no magic
required.

"All I need," he said, "is a volunteer."

Several were forthcoming. Barry prolonged the choosing, walking up and
down the aisle twice before picking one man out of the third row. His
ladyfriend had volunteered him on his behalf.

"I am legally required to offer you the chance to reconsider now,"
Barry announced when he got back to the stage. This was enough to
create a little tension, which just made it more exciting for the
spectators. When the volunteer shook his head, they applauded
again.

The man was grinning as he stooped to step into the cabinet. Then Barry
whipped it shut with a flourish. He hoped the guy would read the
instructions written in inch high letters and luminous paint on the
inside of the wardrobe. Now came his part in the illusion - to create
enough noise to conceal the man's escape.

"I need you all to generate a little magical charge with me," Barry
declared. "Clap in time with me. One, two, one two three. One, two, one
two three."

The audience wilfully obliged. Once they'd got a hang of the rhythm he
stopped clapping and lifted his hands toward the ceiling. He closed his
eyes, chanted under his breath. The audience was transfixed. It was a
rush when that happened.

The clapping reached a crescendo as they got carried away. Barry let
them, but then he swept his arms akimbo to silence them. He let the
hush prevail for a moment, glaring at the audience. Then he returned to
the cabinet door, flipped the latch, pulled the door open and stepped
aside.

There was only one scream, but it took Barry entirely by surprise. The
fa?ade of the Great Magnifico slipped for only a second, though, then
he was back in character again.

He peered into the cabinet. At first he thought it was a malicious
prank. Then he realised the man inside the cabinet wasn't the one he'd
shut in. This one was shorter, thinner - emaciated, even - and
shaven-headed.

He was also naked.

The audience was horrified. Some had begun to walk out in disgust.
There were, after all, many families present. Someone somewhere near
the back, however, gave Barry the standing ovation he'd always desired.
But Barry barely noticed. He was just about to grab the fellow when he
jabbered something Barry didn't understand and then charged down the
aisle and out of the hall.

Barry stood stunned for almost a minute.

"We've received more complaints about this little stunt of yours than
we ever did over that whole strip-o-gram scandal," spat Mr Plum the
next morning. Barry was squirming in the seat opposite his desk, his
mind blank of excuses.

"I-I don't know what I can say," Barry stammered. "I don't know what
happened. The guy was supposed to sneak behind the curtain. I don't
even know who that flasher was."

Mr Plum cleared his throat. "The maniac was terrorising guests all
evening," he said. "Ranting in some nonsense-talk language."

"Oh, have they caught him, then?"

"No. Not yet. But they will. The police think he's hiding in the sports
park somewhere. They're closing in right now. And if you are in cahoots
with the guy, we'll find out then."

"I'm not," said Barry. "Honestly."

"Hmm, we'll see," growled Mr Plum. "As for tonight, no funny business.
Do some card tricks. Pull a rabbit out of a hat. Anymore risque
material and you can go back to McDonalds for the rest of the
season."

Funnily enough, however, that night's performance was the first
sell-out in a month. Barry watched from his dressing window as
disgruntled guests were told that there were no tickets left. There
were less children tonight, Barry noted, but a lot of twentysomethings
that rarely came to these kinds of variety shows anymore.

"They've all come to see you, y'know," said Irvine the Drag Queen, who
shared Barry's dressing room, and was taking tissues out of his bra.
"Your little performance has caused quite the stir, hon. Oh, yes, quite
the stir."

Barry frowned. "Well, they're going to be disappointed, then."

"Oh, don't listen to Herr Plum," cried Irvine, goosestepping to the bin
with his tissues. "You'll never make your name as a magician doing the
same old sleight of hand as my Uncle George, Barry dear."

"It's not just Plum," said Barry. "I don't know what happened last
time. I didn't plan that at all. Somebody must have interfered. Nothing
to do with me. I can't do it again, simply because it wasn't me who did
it the first time."

"Are you sure about that?" said Irvine with a wink. "Blow em away,
baby."

Irvine finished changing back into his normal clothes and then left
Barry to sit in the dressing room thinking over what he had said. If
indeed all these people had turned up to see him repeat last night's
magic trick, then he could hardly go on stage with the intent to
disappoint them.

Someone knocked on his door when the redcoats were just starting their
act. This was the cue to check his costume and touch up his stage
make-up. As he was about to leave the room, however, there was another
knock on the door. Barry opened it and felt a chill at the back of his
neck.

"The police? How can I be of help?" He hoped the flasher hadn't been
caught and implicated him in last night's shenanigans.

The two officers accepted his invitation into the dressing room and
removed their caps. The first one introduced himself as Detective
Sergeant Neptugne.

"Do you know a Mr Thomas Scruton, sir?" asked D.S. Neptugne.

Barry stuck out his bottom lip and slowly shook his head.

"He was the man who volunteered to participate in your magic show last
night, Mr Carter," said the constable beside Neptugne.

"Oh. Him. I never met him before last night," said Barry.

"Do you know where he is?"

"No. I only met him last night." He paused. "Why?"

The two men exchanged glances. "Mr Thomas' girlfriend contacted us a
couple of hours ago to say he had gone missing," D.S. Neptugne
explained.

Barry blinked. In all the confusion he'd forgotten all about making the
volunteer reappear. "Wasn't&;#8230; H-he should have been behind the
curtain the whole time. That's how the thing works."

D.S. Neptugne nodded, but dismissively. "Yet he still hasn't contacted
his girlfriend, even now, some twenty four hours later."

Barry felt hot. He eased the stress from around his collar. "Well, I
don't know. Maybe he ran off."

"Mr Thomas had recently proposed to his girlfriend, sir," the constable
added.

"Maybe he changed his mind, then."

"Could we see the apparatus please, Mr Carter?" asked D.S.
Neptugne.

"You mean Uswald's Cabinet?"

"Uh, yes."

Barry took them to the wings of the stage, where the cabinet stayed
since last night. They opened it up and poked around whilst Barry stood
back indignantly. The redcoats were midsong on the stage. They were
only three songs from the end of their set, he realised.

"Have you finished yet?" he asked. "I have to be on in a few
minutes."

D.S. Neptugne didn't look like he was finished. "Can you show me how
you would get out of this thing, Mr Carter?"

"You want me to get in the box," he said slowly.

"Please."

Barry sighed. "Sure."

He opened the door of the wardrobe. It had no back wall. This had been
taken out and replaced by a black curtain. The curtain was tacked down
when the volunteer entered so that the audience would think it solid.
The luminous instructions daubed on the side wall told the volunteer to
untack it to get out, and then tack it back up from the other side. As
Barry got in, he didn't think it looked like the curtain had been
untacked at all.

"Do you mind if I shut the door?" asked D.S. Neptugne. "You can show us
how it all works."

"Sure, go ahead."

Once the door was closed, Barry just stood there until his eyes grew
accustomed to the darkness. It was darker than he'd imagined. Not a
spot of light got in. The instructions written on the wall in luminous
paint weren't showing up, so that volunteer couldn't have got out after
all, thought Barry. And the singing of the redcoats wasn't so much
muffled now, as gone completely.

Barry felt disorientated and unbalanced. He reached for the door. His
hand went straight past where he had thought it to be. He staggered
forward, groped again. What his fingers touched this time wasn't wood,
but human skin. A small cry. Barry flinched. But when he lurched back,
there were others in the way. Though he couldn't see where he was, he
knew he wasn't in the cabinet any more. He cried out.

Then he heard the whisper of gas.