by Michael Dahl
A moment later, the lights flashed on for a second. Thunder crashed through the room. The walls and chairs shook. And then, from the high ceiling over the stage, smoke and light fell. Then came a man. He wore a red and green robe and a shining silver crown set in a big colorful turban.
As his feet touched the stage, he raised his arms and smiled.
“I am Brack,” he announced, “and I am Abracadabra! Be here one week from tonight for my first show in fifty years—and my last!”
Thunder clapped again. Lightning flashed across the ceiling. The crowd gasped.
Flashes went off. Hands went into the air. Frenzied reporters shouted out questions and demands. Magicians rushed the stage.
The place went, in a word, nuts.
* * *
It was an hour before the dining room and lobby were cleared out. While they waited for the craziness to die down, Charlie and Ty sat on one of the red velvet couches near the front desk.
“I can’t believe it,” Ty said.
Charlie grinned. “I kind of already knew,” he said.
Ty stared at him. “You’re kidding me,” he said.
“Nope,” Charlie said. “I figured it out, and Brack confirmed it.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out his golden ticket. “And I’m invited to the final performance.”
Ty narrowed his eyes. “I better be too,” he muttered.
“I’m sure I can bring a guest,” Charlie said, and winked.
Many of the magicians who attended the announcement had decided to get a room at the hotel. The line to check in was getting long.
Just then, a big group of reporters came shuffling across the lobby. The reporters were moving in a tight group, and they were shouting questions.
“I think they have Brack,” said Ty.
The group of reporters moved right at the boys. Soon it engulfed them.
“What tricks will you do?” one reporter shouted.
“Oh,” said Brack when he saw Charlie and Ty. Brack was in his elevator operator uniform again. His face showed the stress his announcement had created. “Hello, you two,” he said.
“Why have you been in hiding?” another reporter said.
“Where have you been hiding?” one more asked. Ty rolled his eyes.
“What’s going on?” Charlie asked Brack. He had to shout to be heard over the gaggle of reporters. He struggled to shuffle along inside the ambling crowd.
“Why are you retiring from magic, after being gone all these years?” said another reporter.
“Follow my lead,” Brack muttered to Charlie and Ty. He shuffled off in a new direction and the crowd followed. Ty and Charlie shuffled along with him.
“He’s heading for the elevator,” Ty muttered to Charlie.
Ty was right. When they got very close to the elevator bank, Brack put a hand on the boys’ collars, stepped backward into the open elevator, and then quickly closed the doors. The reporters were stuck on the other side.
“Whew,” Brack said, taking off his hat. “I knew this would cause a ruckus, but I wasn’t prepared for so much attention.” He shook his head slowly.
He pulled keys from his pocket—he had a lot of keys—and flipped through them until he found a very small golden one. Then he opened a tiny door on the elevator control panel.
“I never noticed that before,” Ty said.
Inside the little door was a keyhole. Brack used his little golden key, turned it to the right, and the elevator started going up.
“A secret floor,” said Ty in a hushed, awed voice.
He looked over at Charlie and narrowed his eyes. “Did you know about this?” he asked.
Charlie glanced at Brack, who had a twinkle in his eye.
“Uh, yeah,” Charlie said.
“I can’t believe it, Hitch,” Ty said. “I can’t believe it!”
For a second, Charlie saw a glimmer of the old Ty—the biggest bully in school, not his friend.
But then Brack said, calmly, “I asked Master Hitchcock to not say anything to you, Master Yu. I wanted to tell you myself, you see. The problem was, time ran out. I’m very sorry.”
“Oh, that’s okay, Brack,” Ty said. “I get it.” He narrowed his eyes at Charlie again, but the angry look was gone.
The elevator climbed and climbed. The dial above the door swung slowly, higher and higher. It went past the top floor and kept going.
Ty looked at Brack quizzically, but he just smiled and watched the dial climb.
Finally, the elevator stopped. A bell dinged. The doors slid open.
“Whoa,” said Ty. He stood there, dumbfounded, as Brack and Charlie stepped out. Before them was Brack’s house on the roof.
“Pretty cool, huh?” Charlie whispered as Ty walked slowly out of the elevator, looking around.
“Uh, yeah,” Ty said. “I can’t believe I never knew this was here.”
“Welcome to my home,” Brack said. He walked up the front path toward the big wooden doors of the mansion. “Please, follow me.”
Inside, Brack headed straight to the kitchen, a sunny room at the back of the house. “Have a seat, you two,” he said. “We’ve a lot to discuss.”
“What’s on your mind, Brack?” Ty said. He flipped around a chair and sat down. “Should we call you Abracadabra now?”
Brack laughed. “Don’t be silly,” he said. “Why, if anyone calls me Abracadabra, I’ll know to keep my guard up.”
“What do you mean?” Charlie asked as he sat down at the table.
Brack sighed and sipped his tea. “For a long time,” he said, “I was the most famous magician in the city, maybe in the country.”
“Pff,” said Ty. “You were the biggest magician in the world, probably ever.”
“Perhaps,” said Brack. “When I founded this hotel, I became quite an attraction. That much is certain. For many years, young magicians from all over the world wanted to share the stage with me.”
“Sure,” Charlie said. “Who wouldn’t?”
Brack nodded. “At first, I was honored,” he said. “But then it became clear: most of those young magicians were just looking to grab their own piece of fame. They didn’t respect me. They didn’t care about me at all.”
“Harsh,” said Ty.
“Indeed, it wasn’t long before a new breed of magician began showing up, right here at the hotel,” said Brack. “These were true cutthroats. If it would help their careers to take me down a notch, or eliminate me entirely, all the better. They’d stop at nothing to achieve their greedy goals.”
“Whoa,” Ty whispered.
“At first I tried to help,” Brack went on. “Soon it became overwhelming. So many tried to take advantage of me, or even try to put me down or set me up for failure. Then I realized I could so easily just disappear.”
“Poof!” Ty said. He snapped his fingers.
Brack chuckled. “Not quite like that,” he said. “That’s how I would have done it in a magic show, of course. In a grand puff of smoke, like at this morning’s press conference. But I had something different in mind.”
“So you became Brack,” Charlie said. “The mild-mannered, easy-going, hotel elevator operator.”
“Precisely,” Brack said. He frowned. “Now that I’m back, those fame-hungry magicians will begin hounding me at any moment. This time, I’m ready for them.”
He lifted a card from the table and passed it to Ty.
“Here you are. I sent these out yesterday,” Brack said. “Every magician in the country will be getting his or her invitation to my party today.”
Ty looked at Brack, his eyes wide. “You’re inviting them?” he said. “I thought you didn’t want to see these people!”
“Oh, I can’t stop them from showing up,” Brack said. “But this way, I will have the upper hand in two ways.”
&
nbsp; “Which ways?” Charlie asked.
“One, they will all be here at once,” Brack said. “They’ll spend all their time trying to impress each other and knock each other down. They won’t pester me.”
“And two?” Charlie said.
“Ah,” said Brack, smiling. “That’s where you boys come in.”
Ty and Charlie leaned forward.
“The party is tomorrow night,” Brack said. “And you’re both very important parts of it.”
“Us?” said Charlie. “But . . . we’re not magicians.”
“Indeed,” said Brack. He stood up and brought his teacup to the sink. “That’s why I know I can count on you two to keep an eye on everyone else.”
The next twenty-four hours were a flurry of activity in the hotel. Many magicians had already checked in. Now that the invitations had arrived, the magical guests gabbed and gossiped in the lobby for hours at a time. They had lunch in the hotel restaurant. They milled around the hotel games room, chatting about which tricks they’d show off at the party.
Meanwhile, the reporters were back. Word had gotten out, and it seemed like a big scoop.
The biggest scoop was Abracadabra’s performance at the magic show. There was little doubt among the reporters that he had some new amazing tricks up his silk sleeves.
One reporter in particular hung around the lobby a lot—usually right next to Charlie.
“But how did you know Brack the elevator operator was actually Abracadabra?” said Joey Bingham.
It was early Sunday morning. The party was that night, and there was a lot of work to do.
“I told you, Joey,” Charlie said. “I figured it out.”
Joey shook his head. “I find it hard to believe,” he said, “that you two would figure out this great secret.”
“Why?” said Ty. “We’re smart. I happen to be very intelligent, and Charlie is a total whiz at remembering stuff and figuring stuff out.”
Joey smirked. “Of course you are,” he said. He leaned close to the boys and said in a whisper, “But the rest of us are professional reporters. We investigate and discover secrets for a living.”
“You couldn’t find the missing boy,” Charlie said quickly.
Joey’s face went red. “I would have,” he said. “Eventually.”
“Anyway, we have to help Mr. Abracadabra set up for the party,” said Ty. He grabbed Charlie’s arm to pull him away. “We’re his friends, you know.”
Joey Bingham sneered as they walked off. Then he gasped—loudly—at something behind them.
The rest of the lobby—full of magicians and reporters—gasped too. Ty and Charlie turned and saw flashes go off. The reporters began to run for the front door as it swung closed. There, smiling and flourishing for the hundreds of cameras on him, stood the Great Theopolis.
Joey ran toward the door with the others. Charlie and Ty stayed back to watch. They leaned against the registration desk. Annie leaned on the desk from the other side.
“I thought he checked out,” Charlie said.
Annie said, “He did. I guess he’s back. He’ll want his room on the thirteenth floor again, I guess.” She started shuffling through the room cards and keys. “He always stays there.”
“He was probably invited to the big party,” said Charlie.
Ty nodded. “And after his big stunt with the disappearing kid last week at the show,” he said, “Theopolis is the most famous magician in town.”
“He was the most famous magician in town, you mean,” said Charlie with a smirk. “Now Brack is.”
“Yeah!” Annie said.
“And I bet Theopolis isn’t too happy about that,” Ty said. “We’ll have to keep a close eye on him.”
* * *
Theopolis and Joey Bingham weren’t the only familiar faces to arrive at the Abracadabra Hotel that day.
Charlie also spotted Professor Pontificate, the mind-reader and hypnotist, strolling around the lobby. And, he saw, there was Mr. Madagascar, a master of levitation and long-time resident of the hotel who hardly ever left his room. Today, though, Mr. M. was in the lobby with the rest of the crowd. So was his friend Dotty Drake. She’d been a great magician’s assistant in the old days.
Then there was Madame Krzyscky, the fire-eater from the theater’s premier show the week before. She wore a glittery skin-tight costume in red, orange, and yellow. She looked like fire herself as she walked around the lobby.
Ty elbowed Charlie in the side and pointed across the lobby. Charlie’s eyes went wide. Objects were flying through the air over the heads of the crowd in the lobby. He saw a bowling pin. He saw a baseball, a basketball, and a tennis racquet. He gasped when he saw a flaming stick, and then another.
Finally the objects stopped flying. A few people—reporters, mostly—applauded. The crowd parted and Charlie could see now: it was Mr. Thursday, master juggler.
A few weeks earlier, Charlie and Ty had thought Mr. Thursday was a ghost.
He’d been practicing his routine for a big comeback show in the hotel’s old theater. Little did they know then that the magicians were running a kind of dress rehearsal for the big reappearance of Abracadabra.
“I guess everyone’s here,” said Ty.
Charlie looked around the lobby.
There were other jugglers.
There were jesters.
There were magicians’ assistants—mostly women, but some men—of all ages, wearing leotards or long white gowns or silver sequined bodysuits.
There were plenty of men in tuxedoes and top hats, sometimes even with bunnies popping out of them.
There were all sorts of card tricks going on.
There were even people floating up near the ceiling, showing off their levitation skills.
The place was absolutely filthy with magicians.
“And just think,” Charlie said. He crossed his arms. “Each and every one of them will be at Brack’s party tonight.”
It was a warm evening, so most of the partygoers stayed outside. They sat on the benches in the rooftop garden. They lounged on the chairs next to the rooftop pool.
At first, no one paid much attention to Brack, all alone in his simple brown suit. Charlie and Ty stood nearby, so they could keep an eye on him. But before long, he’d been spotted, sitting at a table under a canopy.
“Hey, there’s the old master!” said a magician. Everyone looked, and it only took a few short seconds before Brack’s table was completely mobbed.
Magicians stood in front of his table, showing off their abilities. They made things disappear. They made things appear. They juggled. They levitated objects and levitated themselves. The assistants performed flourishes or little spins, showing off their clothes or hair or smile.
At the table, Brack smiled politely.
“Do you have an open slot in your farewell show, Mr. Abracadabra?” asked a woman who had just made her sister disappear—and then reappear as her brother.
“Please, Mr. Abracadabra,” said a man as he juggled five bowling balls while riding a unicycle, “make room for me on that stage!”
Brack didn’t respond to anyone. He just smiled.
Theopolis was the last magician to arrive. He strode off the elevator and right up the front path. Then he stomped to the front of the line of magicians.
Tonight he wore his most impressive garb: a heavy black robe that shined like silk, trimmed with silver and gold thread. He carried a staff, like some ancient wizard. On each side of him were assistants, both hobbled and bent. The assistants were dressed in burlap cloaks.
Charlie elbowed Ty, who was busy watching some jugglers practicing next to the pool.
“Look who’s here,” Charlie said.
Theopolis threw back the hood of his robe. At the same moment, a bolt of lightning—one of Theopolis’s special effects—struck his wiz
ard’s staff. Smoke rose up from his feet.
“Wow,” said Ty. “You have to admit, he knows how to make an entrance.”
“Mr. Abracadabra!” Theopolis said in his deepest voice. “I—the Great and Powerful Theopolis, lord of the demon realm and the greatest sorcerer in this dimension—have come to offer a challenge.”
Brack winked at Ty and Charlie. Then he looked back at Theopolis. “Go on,” he said.
A few people nearby chuckled. Theopolis ignored them. “This hotel has become old,” Theopolis said, grandly raising his arms. “You have become old.”
Brack shrugged and smiled. “Too true,” he said.
“Your retirement from magic,” said Theopolis, “draws near. You will no doubt enjoy a rest. It will do you good.”
“He’s been resting for fifty years,” Ty whispered to Charlie.
“The hotel itself could use some fixing too,” Theopolis went on. “Its age is showing, as yours is. It needs to be . . . updated. Brought up to modern times. You’ve been in hiding for a long time, old man. The world has changed, and so has magic.”
“Perhaps,” said Brack.
“And so, I offer this challenge,” Theopolis said. “I will now perform an act of magic so striking, so amazing, that you will not believe it possible.”
“An illusion?” Brack said.
“No illusion,” said Theopolis. “True magic—the demonic power I learned in my studies. Power from other dimensions.”
“I see,” said Brack. “Then what is the challenge?”
“I say it is magic,” Theopolis said. “You say it is an illusion. Then prove it. After the feat, you will have until the night of your final performance to show how it was done.”
“And if I can’t?” Brack said.
“Ah,” said Theopolis. He grinned and made a steeple of his fingers before his face. “If you cannot, then you back out of your final performance and hand the theater over to me . . . and the hotel along with it.”