Saving Houdini

by Michael Redhill

  Houdini dismissed his friend’s comments with a wave of his hand. “I’ve been punched before and I’ll be punched again. What do you think, boys?” He patted his belly with both hands. “Would you like to take a shot?”

  Dash and Walt shook their heads emphatically no.

  “So,” he said. “It would seem this morning’s Gazette bears up your story.”

  “Flimflam!” said Jacobson. He stood with his back to them, flipping paper at a table. “Or witchcraft.”

  “It’s 1926, Solomon. We don’t believe in witchcraft anymore.”

  He turned in anger to Houdini. “If you believe them, you’re more gullible than the old ladies handing their money over to the mediums!”

  “Why don’t you go wet your whistle, Sol?”

  “My whistle is fully moistened, Harry. But I’ll go check on the food.”

  After he left, Houdini sighed. “It is hard to be close to anyone,” he said. “People do have their limits.”

  “Mr… . Harry,” said Blumenthal. “This boy must have told you about the vanish he claims he was in.”

  “Was in,” said Dash matter-of-factly.

  “I believe I know how to do it.”

  “Well, then, you must be a very good magician,” said Houdini, “but I know how to do it as well. Up to a point.” He looked at Dash with a slightly comic expression on his face.

  Blumenthal fiddled with his hat in his lap. “He says it must be my trick.”

  “Well, go on, then. Take it. I have plenty of tricks.” He turned to the boys. “And I hope you will come and see some of them.”

  “He needs your help,” said Dash. “I think we’re all supposed to help each other.”

  “I see,” said Houdini. “And how is it that you help me?”

  “I …” Dash began, but Blumenthal interrupted him.

  “I am prepared to sell you a share in it, if you like.”

  Dash glared at him.

  “Why would I buy a trick I already know how to do?”

  “Because if, on the off-chance, it works as young Master Woolf here says it does, it may be something you would be pleased to have a share in. And perhaps it only works the way he says it does if I am the one who performs the trick.”

  “He is the one who performs the trick,” said Dash. “It’s his trick, you can’t buy it.”

  Houdini looked perplexed for a moment. “You don’t want me to help him now?”

  “I do. But it’s his trick. He does it, and … and you come and watch it.”

  “What?” This from both Blumenthal and Walt.

  “Yeah. He comes and watches.”

  “Why?”

  Dash looked at the immortal, all-too-mortal magician. “So he sees it for himself.”

  Blumenthal shrugged. “Sure, why not? He can come. Why don’t we split the proceeds?” he said to Houdini.

  But something in the turn of the conversation had made Harry Houdini uncomfortable. He looked around the room. “What are you three plotting?”

  “Nothing,” said Dash. “But you should see it. Because if it works—”

  There was a knock at the door. Houdini rose, then thought better of it and sat down again. Dash had seen him wince.

  “You’re in pain.”

  “I have a gastritis,” Houdini said, waving off his concern. “I get it frequently. Hotel food, restaurant food—”

  “A punch in the gut,” said Walt.

  Houdini sat up straight, his face set, and there was no evidence that he was in any discomfort at all now, even as he leaned toward his guests. A man came in with a large black tray laden with plates of delicious-smelling food.

  “I know pain, gentlemen. Pain is my constant companion. I would be dead if it were not for pain and physical suffering. Could I do what I do if I feared it? If it were not in fact my friend? The show goes on. The show is everything.”

  “But don’t you think you should see a doctor?”

  Houdini stood. He unbuttoned his shirt and removed it. The man putting out the steak and the bowls of stew stood back. There was a small, red welt still glowing on the left side of Houdini’s torso. His stomach was tapered and muscular—it looked corrugated. Houdini held his left arm out to his side and he made a fist. The sinews in his arms popped out. He brought his fist down suddenly, in an arc toward his own body. It landed with a sharp slap in the centre of the welt. Harry Houdini’s face didn’t change. He did it again, hard.

  “Don’t,” said Dash. “Stop.”

  “This is not pain, young man.”

  “Fine. Stop it.”

  “No punch can fell Erich Weiss! Erich Weiss crushes stones in his hands!” He put his shirt back on and sat down. He gave the stunned waiter a couple of coins and then gestured to the food to invite them to eat. “That is boeuf bourguignon,” he said, waving his fingers at the bowls of stew. “If you don’t like that, there’s no hope for you.”

  They liked it just fine. And when every bit of china had been practically licked clean, and every piece of cutlery as well, Houdini said, “All right. I’ll help you, Herman Blumenthal. I’ll have the trick built and take half the proceeds it generates. However it works.” He turned his eye on each of them, an eyebrow cocked. “But only because I can’t resist a good story.”

  20

  Jacques Pelletier was a theatrical builder with a workshop in a huge, hangar-like building in Old Montreal near the water, on a street called Rue du Port. He supplied many of the theatres in Montreal with their sets, props, and even costumes for all kinds of shows, big and small. He employed a dozen people—welders, sewers, carpenters, painters, sculptors, riggers—to make it all. He was happy to welcome Houdini and his entourage in the afternoon. The two magicians and Pelletier hunched over Blumenthal’s sketches while Jacobson and Walt looked around the workshop.

  Dash’s mood had changed: nothing he said or did seemed to have the power to get Houdini to take his injury more seriously. And Blumenthal had managed to do business, despite Dash’s objections. He’d gotten Houdini excited about the trick—they’d pored over the drawings after lunch—and when Jacobson had returned, they’d explained their plan to him.

  Jacobson was as nonplussed as Dash, but for a different reason: he was furious that Houdini was being hospitable to a trio of strangers he’d sooner see on a train out of Montreal. And when he heard that Houdini had agreed to see the trick in Toronto, he’d flown into a rage. Finally, he struck a bargain: if Harry insisted, he could have the trick built, but he wasn’t getting off the train in Toronto. Enough was enough! He groaned when he heard that Houdini was going to give half the proceeds to Blumenthal, but at least he’d won on the other front. And anyway, what was Harry going to do? Cancel his show in Detroit Saturday night?

  That was exactly what Dashiel Woolf had been thinking. If he had failed to stop the punch, he could still prevent Houdini from meeting his fate in Detroit by getting him to stop in Toronto. But Jacobson had squashed even that hope. He waited by the door of the warehouse, despondent. He’d arrived in Montreal just wanting to get home, but the growing belief that he was supposed to help Houdini was casting a shadow over every thought. It felt like the cosmos was going to get in his way in whatever way it could.

  It was cold inside the building, which had steel walls and a high, curved ceiling, but there were stoves scattered here and there throughout, and a small cadre of men and women hustled around the place carrying bits of scenery. Originally—Pelletier had explained—the building had been used as a cold-storage facility for meat and fish (there were docks on the river not fifty feet away) but it had fallen into disuse, and twenty years ago he’d converted it.

  Dash looked out the door at the cobblestone streets. This old part of the city made him feel like he’d time-travelled again. Maybe if he stuck around long enough he’d meet some Indians in birchbark canoes.

  He felt a hand come down on his shoulder. It was Jacobson. “I don’t know what you boys are really up to,” he said.

  “We�
��re not up to anything,” Dash replied sullenly. “Harry offered to help Blumenthal and I guess I’m just along for the ride now.”

  “Like fun you are.” Jacobson held out a small paper wallet. “These are two tickets back to Toronto for you and your little partner in crime,” he said. “You leave at 10 a.m.”

  “I’m not leaving until Blumenthal has the trick. Would you?”

  “I’m doing what I would do. I’m sending you two jackanapeses back to where you came from. Your parents should be dealing with you, not us. Take these.”

  Dash took the wallet. There were two printed train tickets inside. Jacobson was regarding him with something in his eyes that looked strangely like fear.

  “You believe us,” Dash said.

  “I don’t know what I believe. All I know is that I’ve heard enough.” He pushed past Dash into the street beyond the workshop and put on his hat. “So be it.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “I have a letter to write,” he said.

  “And you trust us … jackanapeses … with your poor, helpless friend?”

  “Harry will have to take care of himself.”

  He turned a corner and was gone.

  Dash had the instinct to follow him. What use would he be here now, with Houdini already injured, already sick? He closed the door to Pelletier’s workshop and went out into the cool afternoon air. But when he turned the corner where Jacobson had gone, the man was nowhere in sight.

  Maybe the big lesson in all of this was that life could be as crummy in the past as it was in the present. He’d begun to notice that bad things hurt him more than good things made him feel good. Alex’s absence in his life was not getting easier as time went on. And he didn’t have anyone to take his place. Obviously, Walt wasn’t going to be a new, lifelong pal. Walter would be ninety-six in 2011. That was a stretch for anyone. Dash didn’t think he’d even ever met a person who was ninety-six. What a depressing thought.

  He walked into the thin, quiet streets of Old Montreal. It was tomblike; for a while he saw no other people at all. The buildings were old and made of square, smooth stone that seemed to catch the air and send it back even colder.

  He arrived on another street and there were some people here. There was a small grocery store and a restaurant selling crepes through a window. It was very cold out, but he walked at a good pace and stayed warm. It felt, in the silence and stillness, like there were eyes on him. He looked up from time to time into the big bright windows in the old buildings, but they were all empty. The hair on the back of his neck stood up.

  He went out of the Old City and back into downtown, keeping his eyes peeled for stray pigs. He avoided the train station. Although, for a moment he considered going in and just jumping a train back to Toronto. Who would notice anyway? He didn’t belong to anyone here, and in 2011 he’d already vanished, so it wouldn’t be a stretch just to disappear completely. The world would go on without him. It was going to do that anyway. Even if Blumenthal got the trick built, it wasn’t going to make him famous. It hadn’t made him famous in the world Dash lived in. And if time was time, forever and unchangeable, then Herman would never be famous. Never rich. Never great.

  He heard a voice calling to him as he approached Rue Sainte-Catherine. A fearful thrill went through him. He knew someone had been following him. He turned around and saw a policeman ambling up. Was there a reward on his head?

  “Good afternoon, young man,” he said. He was a large, round officer with a ring of keys on his hip. His badge said Constable Montrose. “You enjoying our chilly autumn weather?”

  “Oh, it’s fine weather,” said Dash. “Yes, sir! Thank you!”

  “Where are your parents, boy?”

  “My mum is finishing her tea in the hotel,” said Dash calmly. “She gave me permission to buy sweets.”

  “Well, don’t go now and rot your teeth.”

  “I won’t, sir. Honest. I’ll floss and everything.”

  “You’ll do what now, son?”

  “Floss?”

  A small clatch of people was gathering. Dash began to feel nervous.

  “And what hotel are your parents in?”

  “Prince of Wales.”

  “Uh-huh,” said the policeman. He was removing a little black book from his pocket. “And what would your name be?”

  “I’m, uh, Marty McFly and … um, and—”

  “I see.” He was writing. He paused to look over the top of his notebook. “Where on earth did you get those shoes, son?”

  “Oh, I, uh, my mother is an experimental shoemaker, and she, she—” He could feel the energy building up in his legs.

  “She what?” said Montrose.

  “She’s always coming up with ideas,” said a man in the crowd. He stepped forward.

  “Dad?” Dash said.

  But it wasn’t his father. It was a man who walked like him, and who, when he smiled at Dash, smiled just like his father.

  “Come on, buddy. Your mother and I are waiting for you at the hotel.” He offered his hand.

  In his peripheral vision, Dash saw Constable Montrose put his notebook away. Dash looked in the man’s eyes and saw his kind expression.

  “We don’t want to keep her waiting, now, do we, Dash?”

  He felt like he was going to faint. “Yeah … don’t want to keep her waiting.”

  “Nothing to see! Move along!” sang Montrose, and he tipped his cap to the man. Dash noticed he wore a black, featureless ring on his lapel.

  When they were alone, Dash, his voice full of awe, said, “Who are you?”

  “You’ll understand who I am later. Just get back down there. You want to spend every minute you can with him, don’t you?”

  “Houdini?”

  “No, buddy. Not Houdini. Now go.”

  Dash walked south in a stupor, toward the boundary of the Old City with its mazelike streets, and then he vanished into them like a deer into a forest. When he arrived back at Pelletier’s workshop, he was breathing hard. He clutched his shirt and forced himself to breathe normally.

  When he’d calmed down a little, he stood up and looked through the window in the workshop door. There was no one there.

  There was also no one in the old warehouse. There had been half a dozen people here before.

  “Not again,” Dash muttered.

  He walked in cautiously, shaking out his hands, which had begun tingling when the man appeared. He was still breathing hard. “Hello?” he called.

  Then he heard sounds from the back of the workshop. There were voices, the faint dinging of metal objects. He followed the sounds and came to the edge of a space he hadn’t seen before: a miniature stage, complete with lights, in the corner of the warehouse. And Houdini was standing on it, with everyone from the workshop around him. There were a few chairs in rows on risers. At the edge of the small crowd, Blumenthal and Walt stood watching.

  Dash remained in the shadows.

  “Bring up the lights again, Jacques,” said Houdini from the stage. The warehouse lights came back on. “Oh yes, I can still see the upper ring should be quite a bit smaller. We want one to fit just inside the other. Or perhaps— Jacques?”

  “Oui, maître?”

  “Do you think there could be a bevel in the upper ring? What if the edge interferes when it comes back up? No, hold on. That makes it less stable on the bottom. I think it should be smaller.”

  “Charlot? Tu là?” called Pelletier from the light board. A man at the side of the stage answered. “Peux tu couper la boucle?” Pelletier asked him.

  “Oui, chef!”

  “Vas-y, donc.”

  Houdini passed the ring to the man who stepped forward. “I don’t know,” he said. “Something is wrong. Why doesn’t everyone go back to what they were doing. I’m sure Monsieur Pelletier has got you doing important work for your other clients.”

  Most of them dispersed, although a couple couldn’t help stepping forward to shake the great man’s hand.

 
When they had all gone back to their stations, Houdini stepped toward Walt and Blumenthal. Dash watched them talking, but he couldn’t hear what they were saying. Houdini made shapes with his hands; Blumenthal nodded.

  Walter saw him standing in the shadows and gestured: where have you been? Dash remained where he was. Finally the other boy came out of the light and walked up to him.

  “What’s going on? Where’d you go?”

  “I went for a walk.”

  “You leaving us here to solve your problems for you?”

  “Oh, excellent!” said Harry Houdini, “you’re just in time.” He wasn’t talking to Dash, though. Jacobson had returned. He was holding an envelope in his hands. “Come look at this, see if you can’t figure out the problem with the sheath we’ve put in.”

  “I don’t wish to look.” Jacobson came forward slowly. “In fact, I’ve come to tender my resignation.”

  “Solomon.” Houdini held his arms out to him. “Solomon. Why don’t we skip the resigning and second thoughts and just make up now. You are quite right, I get carried away with myself. My dangerous enthusiasms, isn’t that how you put it?”

  “I am finished, Harry. You won’t listen to anybody. I hire bodyguards, you won’t use them. Bess herself asks you to cancel a show so you can take two days off for a broken ankle, but here you are in Montreal, charming them in two tongues. Well, you won’t charm me anymore. If I were just your manager, I would be happy to count the receipts, but I am your friend and I won’t be a part of this.”

  “Come now,” said Houdini, trying to draw him back into the lit part of the room. “Everyone has moments of doubt. But you must push through, not turn back. What would have happened if I had ever turned back, Sol?”

  “You’d be a rabbi.”

  Houdini laughed. “Perhaps. But I would never have been Houdini.”

  “Erich Weiss was good enough for me, Harry. I’m sorry.”

  Dash saw the man was decided. No amount of talking was going to change his mind. Houdini saw it as well.

  “Well,” he said. “What a sad tune I am hearing. And at a moment when something genuinely miraculous might be before us.”

  “What? From these devils? Sent from where, to pour what treacle in your ear?”