The Confabulist

by Steven Galloway

  Houdini said nothing—it was clear that Zubatov had an agenda.

  “It is all an act, yes?”

  “Yes and no. I can escape from any restraints placed upon me. I use natural means to do so, and what’s seen in my act is real enough.”

  Zubatov shook his head. “No, that won’t do. I cannot have men believing that the locks in Russia, both real and symbolic, can be opened.”

  Houdini shrugged. “I’m no ordinary man. I can’t help what people take from my show.”

  Zubatov stood and motioned for him to follow. The six other Okhrana officers smiled, just a little, and Houdini knew something was up. He cursed Wilkie and Melville for forcing him to come to Russia. What did they care if he spent the rest of his life in some Russian prison or ended up dead?

  He was led down a narrow corridor, Zubatov in front of him and the six officers behind. At regular intervals there was a heavy metal door with a small window in it. From one of them a harried man peered out, his eyes bloodshot and beard ragged. He called out to Houdini in Russian, his voice high and pleading. One of the officers shut the window casually, the way a person might close a window to a disturbance on the street so as to not interrupt a conversation.

  At the end of the corridor a door opened onto a large enclosed courtyard. There was a gate on the far wall. Between Houdini and the gate was a small wagon. Zubatov motioned at the wagon and, for the first time, seemed excited.

  “This is the Black Maria.”

  It was a box made of some sort of heavily tarnished metal, with a small barred window in the door. On the door was a rudimentary lock. He opened the door. The floor was lined with zinc sheeting. There was some straw on it, but aside from that the cell was empty.

  Houdini bent down to tie his shoelace, considering how to proceed, then stood and faced Zubatov.

  “No one stays long at Butyrskaya. This wagon transports those exiled to Siberia. Many do not survive the journey. No one has ever escaped.”

  “It is a formidable construction.”

  “Can you escape from it?”

  Houdini paused. He did not doubt he could, assuming all was aboveboard. But there was something about the way Zubatov was looking at him that made him suspicious. Still, he could hardly refuse. His reputation depended on it.

  “Of course. I will return tomorrow and show you. The conditions are these. The wagon will not be modified from how it appears now, and no additional locks will be used. You may search me as you would any prisoner, but the wagon will be left over there, in the corner, and the courtyard will be empty while I make my escape. My methods are my own, and I will not allow them to be observed. Is this agreeable to you?”

  Zubatov smiled. He looked to Houdini like a man whose trap had just been sprung.

  “I will see you tomorrow, then.”

  That night at the Yar there were more Okhrana agents than usual, or so it seemed to Houdini. Something was amiss.

  At the end of the show there was a knock on his dressing room door. Houdini was tempted to ignore it—he was busy assembling the tools he’d need for the escape. But the knock had a tone to it that compelled him to open the door.

  A tall, blond, bearded man dressed entirely in black stood in the hall. He held his hands behind his back. He motioned with his head and Houdini nodded. The man stepped into the room, his footsteps nearly silent, and Houdini closed the door.

  The man’s eyes swept the room, pausing on the apparatus set out on the small worktable in the corner.

  “I take it you have had an interesting day, Mr. Houdini,” he said in unaccented English.

  “I have. But I can often say as much.” Houdini sat down and began to eat an apple.

  “Forgive my rudeness. I come as a friend.” The man introduced himself as Viktor Grigoriev, an attaché of the Romanov family. “As you may know, the czar and czarina have, shall we say, an interest in the occult.” Grigoriev sat in the chair next to Houdini.

  “I do as well.”

  “What, may I ask, is the nature of your interest?”

  Houdini considered his answer. “I’m a magician. Much of what we do appears similar to what these so-called psychics or healers or whatever you want to call them do. I’ve yet to see an act of the spirits that I can’t explain through natural means. But there’s always doubt.”

  “I am correct that you make no claim to powers not of this world?”

  “That is correct. I can do things that are extraordinary, but they come from skill and practice.”

  “That is as I suspected. I’m glad to hear it.” He rose from his chair. “You would do well not to trust Chief Zubatov. I would in particular not make the assumption that the locks on the transport wagon will be as you found them today.”

  Houdini stood and extended his hand. He had suspected as much. “Thank you.”

  Grigoriev shook his hand. “I will be in touch, Mr. Houdini.”

  Houdini was getting hot. Normally he’d be out of the cabinet by now. He was a little bored as well. Sitting still was not in his nature. He’d been in the cabinet for thirty-five minutes. He may as well enliven the show a bit. He pulled aside the curtain and shook his head.

  “Please allow me to stretch my legs, ladies and gentlemen. It is rather cramped in here, and I’m not use to being contained for so long.” People laughed at this, and some shouted encouragement. In general it seemed to him that people were still in good spirits. He couldn’t see Harmsworth, but assumed he was happy with the proceedings. He crawled out of the cabinet.

  “Mr. Kelley,” he said, as loud as he could so as to be heard over the crowd, “I wonder if I might have a glass of water?”

  Kelley appeared flustered, even though Houdini had told him that this was something he often did. Sometimes, if things went badly, he’d code out to Bess that he needed a particular skeleton key from his trunk. She’d put the key in the glass and he’d get it in his mouth. As long as she held her hand the right way the key was impossible to spot.

  Kelley got his wits about him and nodded, and someone brought water from offstage. One of the panel members, taking his job seriously, examined the water glass. It was empty, of course. Smart man, though, Houdini thought. Any other night and he might have found something.

  The man, satisfied that the glass contained only water, allowed Kelley to bring it to him.

  “How you holding up, Kelley?” Houdini whispered as he took the glass in his manacled hands.

  Kelley’s hands shook as he released the glass. “What’s taking you so long?”

  “Harmsworth wants a show. And that’s what I’m giving him.”

  Houdini drank the water in three gulps and handed Kelley back the glass. He waved to the audience and walked back to his cabinet.

  “Excuse me, if you will. I must return to my work.”

  He knelt down and pulled the curtain closed. Something seemed wrong. The man who’d inspected his water—he’d seen him somewhere before, and not in London. He was a shadow of memory, just a flicker, a tiny sliver that dug its way into his mind. Was it his face? The way he moved? He tried to place him but failed.

  This was not good. He had a number of enemies in the magic community. That was, he’d told Bess, the price of being the best. His act had spawned imitators, and he’d crushed them, even going so far as to get his brother Dash to set himself up as a rival act so that he could draw out the copycats and use the publicity from discrediting them to promote his own show. They were all freeloaders, and they knew it. They’d stop at nothing to ruin him.

  His mouth tingled. His tongue felt foreign, swollen. The cabinet seemed like it was moving. He fought to stay upright and realized he was about to lose consciousness. He leaned back so he wouldn’t fall face-first onto the stage, and as he passed out he saw the face of his mother as clearly as if she were in the cabinet with him, smiling as though everything would be all right.

  He floated in and out of consciousness. Sometimes he was aware of where he was, and sometimes he was transported els
ewhere. The most vivid of these scenes took him back a year, to the bedroom of Milla Barry, an actress and singer who was sharing the bill with him in Munich. He was getting dressed, and Milla kept asking him why he didn’t leave Bess for her.

  “That’s not how it’s going to be,” he said.

  Milla sat up in bed. The sheets had ended up on the floor and she was naked. “Why do you want her when you can have this?”

  “Don’t talk like that.” He turned to look at her. She was beautiful, but he never should have become involved with her.

  She smiled that coy little smile that had started all this off. “Maybe I’ll just have to tell her about us.”

  Before he knew what was happening, he’d crossed the ten feet between them and had his right hand wrapped around her throat. His left hand was raised, and only her flinch made him realize what he was about to do. He released her and stepped back, startled.

  “You won’t say a thing to Bess,” he said in a voice he barely recognized.

  Milla got off the bed and picked up a sheet to cover herself.

  “You won’t say a thing to Bess,” he repeated.

  She swallowed. “No, of course not. I was only fooling.”

  He watched her for a moment longer, picked his coat up off the chair, and left.

  In the cabinet, eventually he was able to regain consciousness. He concentrated on his breathing, taking one slow breath and then another and then another. His legs had pins and needles and he was unbearably hot. He had to get himself out of the cabinet. His tools were in his coat pocket, but without the real cuffs he’d be found out the moment they were examined. He had to do the switch.

  With great effort he moved his body left and then right and then left again, swaying back and forth until he felt some sensation return to his legs. He had to try to stand or else risk passing out again. On the other side of his thin curtain four thousand pairs of eyes were focused on him.

  He pulled back the curtain and stood up, shaky and weak. Some people gasped. Others cheered until they saw him, saw the sweat running down his face, saw the cuffs still fastened around his wrists.

  Kelley came up to him, obviously concerned. He considered telling him he’d just been drugged, but he didn’t know if Kelley could be trusted. Drugged or not, he still needed to complete this escape or the man he’d painstakingly created would become a footnote in history.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, I apologize for the delay. These handcuffs are indeed a formidable opponent. I would like at this point to remove my coat. Mr. Kelley, would you be so kind as to unlock the cuffs so that I may make myself more comfortable.”

  For a second he thought Kelley was going to do it. The man looked terrified. “I’m sorry, Mr. Houdini,” he said in his odd baritone. “But the terms of the challenge do not allow me to take the cuffs off unless you have conceded.”

  “I will do no such thing!” He looked over at Bess. She could see something was wrong with him. “Houdini does not admit defeat!” This was an old code phrase of theirs. He’d only used it once before, in Blackburn with the plugged cuffs. It meant: Get help. Quick.

  Houdini reached into his pocket and pulled out his pocketknife. At the same time he palmed his tools and slipped them into the front pocket of his trousers as he opened the knife. He cut at his coat from the sleeve up, tearing at his lapel with his teeth, ripping the coat. The coat was rigged to come off easily, and in a matter of moments he had, to all appearances, cut his coat off. His head was foggy and he was having a hard time standing up, but he hoped that the audience would attribute his distress to the exertion of his escape.

  In his peripheral vision he saw Bess leave, walking briskly and then running. He couldn’t see the man who’d examined his water anywhere.

  “Mr. Kelley, I appreciate the situation you’re in and want you to know that I bear you no hard feelings.” He said this facing the audience—it was for their benefit. “I wonder, though, if I might have a cushion for my knees. I’ve been in there a while and though I am in excellent physical condition they’re quite sore.”

  Kelley motioned to one of the stagehands. Houdini took the cushion and bowed to the audience before returning to his cabinet. As he closed the curtain his vision faltered, and again he felt his head swim. There wasn’t much time.

  Grigoriev had been right. Where before there was only one lock on the door on the wagon, there were now several, each of them modern and complicated. Not necessarily unpickable but more of a challenge than he’d agreed to.

  Inside the prison he was taken to a room with a bare table. Zubatov was waiting there with a man who appeared to be some sort of doctor and an assembly of guards. Grigoriev was there as well, which surprised Houdini, but he decided not to let on that he knew him.

  “We had an agreement that there would be no additional locks used,” he said to Zubatov.

  “I wouldn’t think that a few extra locks would pose any impediment to a man of your skill. Am I to assume that you wish to back out?”

  “No,” Houdini said, “it makes no difference to me.”

  “And I assume you are still willing to consent to being searched?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  He removed his jacket and shirt. Two guards held his wrists and the doctor, a spectacled man with a sharp face and narrow eyes, ran his hands through his hair, then into his ears, and then over his neck. His mouth was forced open and the doctor’s fingers, ripe with the taste of stale tobacco, explored so far down his throat that he gagged.

  The examination continued downward, and then his hands were forcibly held out in front of him. The doctor peered at them intently, turning them at every conceivable angle, checking the webbed skin between his fingers, then moving up his arms, pressing his thumbs hard into the flesh of his armpits.

  The guards let go of his wrists but did not move away from him. Houdini removed his shoes and socks, then unbuckled his trousers and stepped out of them. The doctor performed an equally thorough search on his feet, beginning with the soles and working up his legs.

  The guards at his side seized his wrists and the doctor pulled his briefs down.

  “I assure you this is unnecessary,” Houdini said.

  Zubatov remained immobile. “Standard procedure,” he said.

  Whether this was standard procedure or not Houdini couldn’t say, but the ensuing search was both methodical and coarse. He had anticipated it, and the fact that they would immediately notice he was circumcised, a revelation that could prove far more dangerous than being locked in a wagon. To disguise this he’d constructed a fake penis of sorts—the tip was a prosthetic, convincing to the eye, but it would probably not hold up to a detailed examination. Fortunately the doctor did not seem interested in the tip of his penis.

  His wrists were released and he pulled up his briefs. It was cold but he repressed the urge to shiver.

  “I assume you’re satisfied that I am in possession of nothing but my wits?”

  They returned to the courtyard. As they approached the wagon Houdini looked again at the additional locks, shaking his head and whistling. An officer came up behind him with a set of British handcuffs.

  “Really?” Houdini said. “You’re changing the game, Chief Zubatov.” He extended his wrists and allowed the cuffs to be fastened. He then clambered into the wagon. The door was shut behind him and the locks engaged. A series of chains was wound around the door and additional locks fastened to these chains.

  Zubatov’s face appeared in the window. “One more thing, Mr. Houdini. The lock for the door is a peculiar one. To prevent escape, and to discourage attempts to free the imprisoned, there is no key to the lock here at Butyrskaya. The only key is in the possession of the prison warder in Siberia. It will take about three weeks for you to get there.”

  He heard laughter from the guards, and then the scuffling of their footsteps as they retreated inside the main prison building. He waited until he was satisfied they were gone and then got to work.

  Three quic
k slams and the handcuffs popped open. The locks on the wagon door were irrelevant—he had no intention of dealing with them. He felt he could probably pick them, but there was an easier way out. Despite their attempts to search him, he had managed to get his tools inside. He reached down to his right hand and pulled off one of his fingers.

  He smiled. It was amazing how similar all searches of his person were. Some were rougher than others, some looked harder than others, but once an area had been searched it was assumed irrevocably clean. Searches never made allowances for the possibility of change.

  When they checked his hands, they found four fingers and a thumb on each one. They could look forever and all they’d see was an ordinary set of hands. After they’d searched his hands, however, they’d allowed him free use of them to remove his shoes and trousers, and he’d taken advantage of this to slip his hand into his waistband where a false finger was waiting. It was, as far as misdirection goes, a fairly easy manoeuvre. Once the finger was in place, all he had to do was contort his hand slightly and control the angle it was viewed at and no one would be the wiser. And they never searched his hands twice.

  He’d identified the wagon’s weakness the day before. A quick look at the underside showed the floor was made of one-inch-thick wood planks, braced in two places. The floor was lined with zinc sheeting, not one solid piece but several strips overlapping each other. The zinc was presumably intended to aid in cleaning out the remarkable filth that would accumulate during the trip to Siberia, during which, if Zubatov was correct, the prisoner would at no time leave the wagon. But the zinc floor was the key to his escape.

  In a situation like this escaping from the wagon wasn’t enough. He must also be able to conceal how he got out. From inside the false finger Houdini retrieved a small metal cutter, similar to a can opener, a Gigli saw, and a small hand drill. With the metal cutter he began to slice through the zinc, cutting a square just large enough for him to fit through, the cuts in a spot where the zinc sheets overlapped. He peeled back the first layer of zinc and then, leaving an inch of overlap, cut through the second layer.