31

STANDING in the wings one hour into the Wednesday matinee, she watches her husband raise his hands, urging the audience to fall silent. She is surprised how calm she feels when she hears him announce that his celebrated milk-can routine will not be presented that afternoon. He pauses, to allow some discontented muttering and even a chorus of boos from the cheap seats to swell and fade, before saying in a loud voice that the reason for the program change is the return of the astounding Metamorphosis effect featuring his original and most lovely assistant, Mrs Harry Houdini!

The applause as Bess steps on to stage is less than he has anticipated. But spectators are unaware how long it has been since her last appearance, and Harry is more affronted than she is by some wolf-whistles and crude comments about her legs from a drunk in the stalls. As Bess approaches the stage-front she senses a hush as people wonder what they will witness.

They see Bess take up a position next to the cabinet, which is taller than she is and broader still. Its front is open to the audience: a full-length dark-blue curtain has been pulled to Bess’s side. Within the cabinet is a trunk, its corners protected by brass flanges. Pulling together, their exertions calculated to make it seem heavier than it is, Vickery and Kukol manoeuvre the trunk forward, out of the cabinet, and use several keys to open padlocks securing its lid. From within they produce a black flannel bag, like a sack seven-feet long, a roll of tape, and some sealing-wax.

With Bess looking on, Harry – wearing a dress shirt, white bow-tie, and black trousers – steps into the bag with his hands tied and makes no protest as the sides of the bag are pulled up over him. Vickery winds tape around the opening; using a candle, Kukol melts wax to seal the ends. Spectators in the front rows are urged to inspect the result: Bess fancies she sees Rickards himself watching carefully. The assistants then hoist the bag with Harry inside and place it within the trunk. Its lid is closed; the locks secured. From within comes some muffled thumping, which causes laughter mixed with apprehension. Is there sufficient air for a man to breathe? Then the trunk is pushed back inside the cabinet. Kukol and Vickery withdraw to the wings. This is Bess’s moment. She can feel the audience watching her. Hear them. Smell them. For a few seconds she is all they can see. She wants to prolong this tantalising sense of expectation.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she calls out. Her voice seems thin and soft. ‘You must pay complete attention! I shall now clap my hands three times, and on the third and last occasion I invite you to watch closely for the effect.’

She claps once. Twice. All those eyes watching her … Three times. And as she does so, she steps back and to the side, within the opening of the cabinet, drawing the curtain closed behind herself.

The audience sees a tiny female figure – some lads at the side wonder if the Mysteriarch’s wife is actually being impersonated by a young boy – disappear from view. Then, almost at once, certainly no more than a few seconds later, the curtain is opened again with a flourish. But it is not the woman who made the announcement stepping forward, arms wide like a fisherman celebrating a catch. It is Houdini himself, the man sealed inside the trunk. The trunk that is now tugged to the front once again by the two assistants. Its padlocks are still in place. Keys are inserted and turned. The black bag is within. Kukol and Vickery lift it out tenderly, as if its contents are fragile. Its end is sealed. Houdini uses a knife to cut the tape.

The bag is opened and – even as spectators gasp and cheer – Mrs Houdini steps out, her hair barely ruffled, her hands tied just as her husband’s had been, her eyes very large, smiling broadly as Harry takes her hand.

‘We did it, my sweet,’ he says to her.

The audience cannot hear this, nor Vickery’s muttered comment to Kukol after an inspection of his watch:

‘Three and a half seconds – not bad at all.’

Spectators are unaware of what happened out of sight: Harry freeing his hands as soon as the bag is sealed and using a blade to slit one of its seams, then releasing a panel at the rear of the trunk. He was out even as Bess closed the curtain. While he was making his triumphant reappearance, she was reversing all his moves: slithering inside the trunk and then into the bag; breathing in the darkness and the scent of secrets. As Harry’s assistants tugged the trunk forward, she was completing the final step, using her teeth to secure the knot in the ribbon around her wrists. There is room for improvement – her exertions made the trunk wobble after the curtain had been opened – but she is exultant. She can do it still. But has he seen it?

As she takes her bows with her husband, she scans the front rows. Rickards catches her eyes and replicates her bow while, behind him – could it be …?

Just as the audience doesn’t know what happens within the cabinet, Harry is ignorant of the visitor who calls on his wife soon after the successful completion of the Metamorphosis routine. Harry is on stage, prone on a wooden bed-frame, wriggling and writhing for thirteen minutes to extricate himself from a mummy-like array of bandages. It is Vickery who seeks out Bess to tell her that a gentleman is waiting for her at the stage-door. She expects it is Rickards, paying his compliments. But her visitor is taller than the promoter. Taller, and with his face half-hidden by a broad-brimmed hat. She feels naked once again, though she has removed only her slippers.

‘Bella, Signora Beatrice,’ the composer says, his voice husky. ‘Molto bella. I must not stay. Like you I must be here, then – pronto! – not here.’

He rests his hands on her shoulders and leans forward to whisper something. His cheek brushes her ear, then he is gone. There is cheering in the theatre. Harry has shucked himself free of his bandages at last.