EASY POKER

EFFECT
A spectator selects five cards from the pack and is asked to imagine that it forms a perfect poker hand. Well, perfect except for one card. One card won’t help him win. Which card would he like to discard?

Without looking at any of them he discards one of the cards, say the two of hearts. He turns the remaining four face-up and discovers that he has the ten, jack, queen and king of clubs. Somehow he managed to get rid of the one that didn’t fit.

But can he find the card he needs to make a royal flush? He selects another card from the deck. Incredibly, it is the missing ace of clubs. What a guy!

METHOD
This is a solution to a poker problem that Fulves wrote about in Pallbearers Review. Check Francis Haxton’s Gambler’s Last Chance (Vol 2, No 10) for a similar effect.

There are many ways to approach the effect but this has the benefit of being almost self-working. The disadvantage is that it uses a double-back card.

Have the double-backer on top of the deck and below it, in no particular order, the royal flush in clubs. These five cards should be face up.

Begin by giving the deck a false shuffle bringing the set-up back to the top. Then slowly dribble the cards from the right hand to the left as you ask a spectator to call stop.

He does and you halt the dribble and drop the right hand cards face-up onto the left hand packet as you say, “We’ll cut the pack where you said stop.” This is a handling of the Christ Force.

Spread the face up cards into the right hand. “You could have stopped anywhere.” And divide the pack so that all the face down cards are in the left. Deal the top five cards face down onto the table. “But you stopped here. Let’s take the next five cards.”

Replace the right hand cards face-down under the left hand packet.

“I want you to imagine that you have just been dealt a poker hand. Not only that but it is a very good poker hand except for one card. One card spoils the hand. Which do you think it is?”

Since the cards are all face-down, he can only guess. Get as much fun as you can out of him picking one of the five cards. Then pick it up and place it face-down on top of the deck. Immediately execute a triple lift and push the face-up card that shows off the deck.

By the way, you can get a break ready for the triple as the spectator is choosing one of the tabled cards.

Whatever card shows, refer to it in some meaningful way. You might find he appears to have discarded a low value card. On the other hand it might be an ace. Make the most of it, then replace it face-down under the deck.

Because of the triple lift a club card now lies face-up under the double backer.

“You’ve got rid of one card. Time to choose another.”

Repeat the Christ Force, this time pushing a single card onto the table. For the moment keep it separate from the other four tabled cards.

Time for the finale. Turn over the first four chosen cards and reveal them to be almost a royal flush. Then turn over the remaining chosen card to show that it completes the hand perfectly.

That’s it. It is actually quite an economical handling. The real skill lies in making the effect clear to the spectators. They choose a poker hand, discard the odd card and find its replacement. Try experimenting with different presentations to find the approach that works best for you.

From the point of view of method it’s quite cheeky in that as soon as they have discarded one of the original five cards you force it right back on them!

SECRET OF THE CARDS

I remember the moment very clearly. I was at the office of Martin Breese videotaping Basil Horwitz as he demonstrated some of his material for a forthcoming book. This would have been in the mid-eighties.

Basil had dealt some ESP cards onto a table and I was looking through the viewfinder on the video camera. Then I noticed something very odd. I stopped filming, went over to the table and took a good look at those cards. They appeared perfectly ordinary, it was a pack of ESP Cards manufactured by Haines House of Cards in America. So I went back to the camera and looked through the viewfinder again and it was like looking through a pair of magic spectacles because I could see marks on the backs of the cards. I stepped away from the camera and looked at the cards again. To my surprise I could still see the marks.

“Basil, pick up those cards and give them a shuffle,” I said. Basil did, he knew I was up to something but couldn’t figure out what. “Now deal them in a row.” Five cards went face down onto the table. “Now turn the one on the right face up. It’s the star.” He did. And it was. And all the time I’d been standing a dozen feet away from him.

What I’d discovered, quite by accident, is that the Haines’ pack of ESP cards is marked. I’m not referring to the tiny markings at the corners, those are quite well known, but two big broad strokes on the backs that can be read across a room. In fact, here’s the peculiar thing. They can only be read across the room. Go up to the pack, examine the backs of the cards and I promise you you’ll never find those markings unless you know where to look.

Some years later, I mentioned this to magician and mentalist Ray Hyman on the phone, saying only that the Haines cards were marked. It’s a one-way mark, which is how I knew where the Star was on that table. I’d noted that its back was the wrong way up compared to the others. Anyway, Ray was coming to England to appear in a television documentary, and I met him at the airport on his arrival. First thing he did was bring out a deck of Haines ESP cards and ask where the hell the marks where. He’d been examining them on his plane journey and just couldn’t find them. But that’s the beauty of it. Look at the cards up close and it’s impossible to spot them. Put the cards on a table across the room, and they are as clear as day.

Enough of the teasing. The marks are the result of a flaw in the spacing of the tiny stars on the back of the cards. It produces two broad strokes across one end. And you can only see the strokes at a distance. I’ve tried to illustrate the position of the strokes in the diagram (1). Both cards have the marks at the same end, but I’ve highlighted them on the second card. They are impossible to see in the first card because of the reproduction process but if you had the real cards in front of you, you would be able to pick them out. Dig out a pack and try it for yourself.

As soon as you get near the cards, the markings disappear from sight, which means you have to be careful when sorting them into a one-way arrangement. Reading the cards up close is an acquired skill. Reading them from a distance is much much easier.

As for applications, well like names of the Devil, they are legion. Set up a pack in the usual Circle, Cross, Lines, Square, Star order. Have every Star arranged the wrong way and you have a stacked deck you can read across the room. Someone can cut and cut and deal four cards onto the table. You immediately know their order (if no Star appears, obviously you have the other four cards). From here, miracles can be worked.

The best kind of effect is one in which you stand well away from the spectator and the cards. A hands-off routine, possibly working with two spectators sitting at different tables, as they would be if involved in an old Duke University telepathy test. It’s a scenario that gives you a good excuse to use the cards. Have the spectators sit back to back, so that they can’t see each other. You, of course, can see all the cards as they are cut and dealt and you’ll find it easy to bring about remarkable coincidences just by controlling their actions and introducing one or two instances of Magicians Choice. I’ll leave the rest to you.

NOTES: This item was originally contributed to Trevor McCrombie’s online magazine The Centre Tear. As several readers proved, the marking system can be used in a variety of ways. So have fun!

A TRICK FROM ERIC MASON

Twenty years ago the late Eric Mason devised an effect called Stigma. It was an original idea involving the number and suit of a named card appearing as blisters on the performer’s fingers.

As similar effects are now coming onto the market I thought you might be interested in Eric’s original, taken from the notes and illustrations he gave me on 1st August 1986. They are only notes, not a full step by step description, but they should be enough to get a good idea of how Eric approached the problem. What a farsighted genius he was.

STIGMA by Eric Mason

To impress with any card called for! Ask the spectator to think of a card and visualise it as a large image and then to mentally compress it down to say approximately a half inch size. Reaching forward to confirm you pluck the image from its moment of time and space – your fingers appear to BURN! Gosh! You say – as your fingers open to show two blisters which represent the thought card, ‘I would have been burnt for this 300 years ago!’ (1).

Make up some gimmicks in airplane ply by cutting or burning out the indices of cards (2). Stick them together in pairs and assemble them as an index with perhaps a magnet added as (3). Placing (say) pairs together so that only two gimmicks have to be stolen out of an eight section index to render any playing card.

You do this by placing two tabs together and squeezing between the second finger and thumb. Raise a fake blister on both fingers allowing the tabs to drop into a finger palm where they remained concealed (1).

OPEN AND SHUT CASE

This item was previously published in New Talon number 3. It was inspired by Jack Yates’ effect Clue from his book Clue and other Miracles. It can be presented as a murder mystery game. But my main reason for describing it here is to highlight the method, which might interest anyone familiar with those logic puzzles featuring liars and truth-tellers.

Effect: The performer invites six spectators play the part of suspects in a game of murder. One of them is a murderer but only the murderer knows that. Three of them are compulsive liars. Fortunately the other three always tell the truth. The task of the performer is to navigate his way through this maze of deceit and correctly identify the murderer. Naturally, he always does.

Method: I’ll just describe the bare bones of the method. If you like the idea, you’ll find ways of dressing it up and devising an entertaining presentation. To perform the trick you’ll need six blank cards. On three of them write the word LIAR. On the other three write the word TRUTH. You’ll also need a bag (cloth or paper), five white counters and one black counter.

Arrange the cards so that they alternate TRUTH, LIAR, TRUTH, LIAR, TRUTH, LIAR. Put the counters in the bag. Get yourself six volunteers and you are all ready to go.

Bring out the cards. Display a couple of them to show that some of them bear the word LIAR while others contain the word TRUTH. Don’t mention anything about there being an even distribution of LIAR and TRUTH. And don’t reveal the fact that the words alternate. You may indulge in a brief false shuffle but if you do make it a casual looking one.

Arrange your six volunteers in a line. Get the attention of the first volunteer and show him how to cut the cards and complete the cut. Make sure he understands the procedure and then hand him the cards face down. Tell him to put the cards behind his back and give the cards a cut. And then another one. As he does this take out the cloth bag.

When he’s finished cutting the cards, ask him to take the top card of the packet and pass the remainder of the cards to the next volunteer. The second volunteer takes the new top card of the packet before passing the packet on to the third volunteer. Each volunteer takes a card from the top and then passes the cards on until all six volunteers have a card each.

Tell the volunteers to take a peek at the card they are holding. The cards tell them which roles they should play. They will either be a truth teller or a liar. You must really hammer it home that if the volunteer is to play the part of a liar he must lie all the time. It doesn’t matter what he says as long as it is a lie. On the other hand good liars tell lies that can be believed. The opposite applies to the truth-tellers. You cannot overemphasise this. So make it part of your presentation, talking about the compulsive liars and truth-tellers that are part of this story.

Look away while the volunteers peek at their cards. They can put the cards away when they’ve noted their role in the game. Explain that each volunteer will be asked to reach into the bag and pull out one of the counters. Whoever draws the black counter will play the part of the murderer.

The bag is passed from one volunteer to another so that they can draw counters. They hold the counters in their closed fists. Then, when everyone has one, you turn away and the volunteers look at the counters noting whether or not they have the black one. No one allows anyone else to see which counter they have. Only the person with the black counter knows that he or she will play the role of the murderer in this game. The counters are placed out of sight with the cards.

Let’s review the situation. You can’t possibly know who the liars are and who the truth-tellers are. And there is no way for you to know who chose the black counter so you don’t know who the murderer is either. And yet that is precisely what you are going to reveal. And you can do it with one simple question to each volunteer.

Example 1: Let’s assume that the third volunteer in the line of six is the murderer. Let’s also assume that because of the prearrangement of the cards the line alternates TLTLTL, which makes the third volunteer a truth-teller. If you ask each volunteer, “Do you know who the murderer is?” you would get the following yes or no answers: No, Yes, Yes, Yes, No, Yes.

You can see a pattern emerge. There is a block of three ‘yes’ answers. The middle volunteer of any block of three similar answers (in this case it happens to be ‘yes’) will be the murderer. It always works. If the alternation of the cards had made the third person in the line a liar, then you would have a block of three ‘no’ answers and the middle volunteer of this block would be the murderer.

You can also deduce that if the block of three answers is ‘yes’ then the murderer is a truth-teller. If ‘no,’ then the murder is a liar.

Example 2: The block of three might be split by the end of the line but if you are familiar with any kind of stack you will still be able to pick out the block of three. For instance, if the first volunteer in the row is the murderer and the row alternates LTLTLT then the answers to your question will be No, No, Yes, No, Yes, No. The block of three is split but it should be clear that the first volunteer is the middle one of the split block.

By asking only one question of each spectator you can instantly identify the murderer. When presenting the effect it’s best not to ask the key question, ‘Do you know who the murderer is?’ immediately. Instead, give the volunteers time to get into their roles of liars and truth-tellers. If you are presenting this as a murder mystery party you might ask them to think about what they had for dinner. Or to drink. And warn them that in a moment you will ask them a question and that the truth-tellers will always tell the truth but the liars will always lie. Then make good on your promise by asking what each of them what they had for dinner. Make light of the various answers you receive.

You now ask each of them the key question. But do it at random. Don’t just go along the line. Remember who gave what answer. Spot the block of three and deduce who the murderer is and whether they told the truth or a lie. In the finale you first reveal whether the murderer is a liar (a double sin) or a truth-teller. And then go on to identify him or her. It’s as simple as that but as with everything it will only be as entertaining as your presentation. So dress the routine as best you can.

Notes: Although you are looking for a block of three similar answers you can, in some circumstances, identify the murderer from questioning as few as three volunteers. Take Example 2. You only need answers from the first three volunteers (No, No, Yes) to tell you that the first volunteer is the murderer. That’s because if you hit two similar answers you are already in the block of three. Now you can ask the rest of the group completely different questions. It’ll confuse any clever puzzle-savvy folk trying to work out the method.

Need I mention that once you understand the basic principle you can improvise using a deck of playing cards and other items rather than having specially made cards, counters and bag? It makes a good impromptu party trick. Provided everyone is sober!

SYMPATHETIC CARDS FROM POCKET
Jesse Demaline had some very clever effects in The Magic Wand magazine but his Sympathetic Cards from Pocket (issue 254) may have been overlooked because of a typo in the article. It’s an intriguing effect. A diabolically simple method. And holds lots of potential for individual variation. Read on.

Effect: Imagine having three cards selected from a blue-backed deck. They are free selections and you really have no idea what cards are being chosen. Meanwhile, a second spectator is shuffling a red-backed deck of cards. They hand it to you and you place it in your jacket pocket.

Now for the magic; you reach inside a remove a card from the shuffled red-backed deck. Amazingly, it matches the first selection. You repeat the feat, pulling out another card and revealing that this one matches the second selection. Finally, you pull out a third card. And yes, it matches the third selection.

Method: It's a great effect and not difficult to do but I bet the method will disappoint you. That would be a pity, because it really is such a good routine. Here goes:

It all depends on using a Mene Tekel Deck. I can hear half of you crying "No!" and the other half wondering what the devil a Mene Tekel Deck is. To be honest it's not much used these days. It is a gimmicked deck consisting of twenty-six different cards and their duplicates. The cards are arranged in pairs and the rear card of each pair has been trimmed a little shorter than its mate. It's similar in construction to the more popular Svengali deck. You'll find more about the Mene Tekel Deck in Hugard's Encyclopedia of Card Tricks, if you're interested.

For this effect let's assume that the Mene Tekel Deck is blue-backed. The red-backed deck is quite ordinary and unprepared and is handed out to a spectator for shuffling. As that is done you bring out the Mene Tekel Deck and give it a few cuts. You can riffle spread the deck face up on the table if you want to show all the cards ordinary, or riffle through them as you would with a Svengali deck. After that you let the cards dribble from the right hand to the left and ask a spectator to call "stop." Stop the dribble action and thumb off the top card of the left portion of the deck and ask him to take it. That will be his selected card.

Because of the construction of the deck, it leaves a duplicate of his card on top of the left portion. Replace this packet on top of the right hand packet, bringing the duplicate to the top of the deck.

Now you go to a second spectator and have another card selected. Again dribble the cards from the right hand and into the left. Ask him to call "stop" at any point and offer him the card stopped at as before. This time you can't cut the deck to bring to the duplicate to the top. Instead, as you bring the right hand packet to the left, you simply thumb over the top card of the left packet and slide the right hand packet below it.

You don't need to make a move out of this. Just do it. If you want to cover it a little, turn to your right as you walk towards the next spectator and at that point ask him to look at his chosen card. As he does, make the move.

Dribble the cards again and ask a third spectator to call "stop." He does and is offered the top card of the left packet. Again, you bring the packets together and slide the new top card of the left portion onto the right portion as it is apparently replaced. If you've done all this correctly, you will have duplicates of each selected card on top of the deck. We're almost there.

Get a break under the top three cards of the deck and palm them into the right hand as you ask the spectator with the red-backed deck to stop shuffling. With the right hand, put the blue-backed deck down on the table. With the left hand, take back the red-backed deck. Transfer it to the right hand and place it into your right jacket pocket. Before the right hand comes out of the pocket, it leaves the palmed cards on top of the deck. The finishing line is in sight.

The rest is just showmanship. To produce the first spectator's card you pretend to fiddle around in your pocket and then bring out the third card down from the top. It's actually got a blue-back, not a red-back, so be careful not to expose it as you show the card and drop it face up onto the table. It matches the first spectator's selection. Similarly the second spectator's selection will be found second card down from the top. And the third spectator's selection will be the top card. Just be careful not to expose the backs as they are produced.

There's not really much more to it. By choreographing the effect properly you will make it easier for yourself. The three spectators who choose cards should be in front of you from left to right. Moving between them will help cover the repositioning of the duplicate cards. The spectator who shuffles the red-backed deck should be on your left. Moving towards him will help cover the palming of the duplicates. It also means it is natural to reach out to him with your left hand and take the deck back.

Final Notes: You can play around with different moves to get the duplicates to the top of the deck but I don't think it is worth complicating it too much. A simple modification you could make is in the loading of the duplicate to the top of the deck. Instead of just pushing the card over the side of the deck, to the right, pull it back with the thumb so that it projects an inch or so at the inner end of the deck. The right hand, now lying by your side, comes up towards the left portion of the deck, hits the injogged card and slides right under it as it is replaced on top of the left portion. It works smoothly and is well covered from the front if the left hand is held high and the deck tipped slightly towards you.

I did experiment with a Mene Tekel Deck arranged so that instead of alternating short/long the pairs alternated long/short. This meant that after a spectator had taken his selection, the duplicate was actually on the face of the upper (right) half of the deck. As the halves were brought together it could be loaded beneath the deck via the Ovette/Kelly move or one of the many variations such as that of Bruce Elliott's in 100 New Magic Tricks. Instead of the duplicates being top-palmed and loaded into the right jacket pocket, they are bottom palmed and deposited in the left. I'm not sure it was any improvement though.

Finally, you can dispense with the palming altogether if you just dip your right hand (and deck) into your right pocket as if opening it ready to receive the red-backed deck. Leave the duplicate cards behind. Put the blue-backed deck away and take the red-backed deck at fingertips and drop it into the pocket alongside the duplicates. The rest is as written.

So Special
Effect: This is an ambitious card routine using five cards. One of the cards repeatedly rises to the top of the packet. Finally it demonstrates its prowess by penetrating up through the entire deck.

Method: Packet Elevator tricks are not new but this has the distinction of using the double deal as the crux of the method. I was prompted to dig this out of the notebooks after reading Peter Duffie's book Card Conspiracy, where you'll find a number of routines using this sleight. The basic handling is also described in Hugard and Braue's Expert Card Technique, though with a full deck rather than a packet.

Begin by having five cards selected from the deck. Upjog each card as it is pointed to and then strip the five selections out.

Put the deck aside, but within easy reach, and spread the five selected cards between the hands and ask the spectator to choose just one of them.

Give him a pen to sign his name across his selection.

As he signs the card, make a Half Pass of the lower three cards of the four card packet that you are still holding.

Take the pen back and put it away. Then take the signed card and place it face up on what appears to be a face down packet of cards in the hands. You are holding the cards in the left hand dealing grip which is perfect for the double deal.

"The fact that you chosen this card from all the rest gives it a sense of pride. Really. It thinks it's special. Let me show you what I mean."

You apparently turn the signed card face down but in reality you execute a double deal, turning the top and bottom cards over as one. This puts the signed card second from the top.

Remove the top card with the right hand and with the left hand thumb push over the new top card of the packet. Don't spread the packet or you will expose the reversed cards. Now put the 'signed' card below the top card of the packet and square the cards up.

"Let me try to put your card second from the top."

Snap your fingers, do a dance or whatever else it takes to 'make the magic work' and then turn over the top card of the packet to reveal that the signed card has returned to the top.

"You see, it just won't settle for second spot. Thinks it's special. Got to be number one. Let's try again."

Execute another double deal as you apparently turn the signed card face down on top of the packet. Remove the top card face down in the right hand.

"This time we'll place it third from the top."

The left hand thumbs over the top two cards of the packet, again being careful not to expose the reversed card. Place the 'signed' card under the thumbed over cards, pause so that the spectator can appreciate the situation, and then square the packet. Snap your fingers and flip over the top card to show that the signed card has once again returned to the top.

Incidentally, all the turnovers should look alike. Don't use one handling for the double turnover and another when you are flipping over a single card.

"Okay, here's a toughie. This time it goes fourth from the top."

Execute a double turnover to flip the signed card face down. Remove the top card and this time place it fourth from the top of the packet. There are no more reversed cards so you can spread the cards widely when you do this.

Another click of the fingers and you can turn the top card over to show it is the signed card.

"Now this is difficult. Five cards, never been done. Watch."

Genuinely turnover the top card and then place it to the bottom of the packet. You spread the packet to show that it is really being placed there.

To get the card back to the top you execute a double turnover as you apparently flip the top card over. This leaves a face up card hidden under the face up signed card sets you up for the finish.

"Amazing. Almost don't believe it myself but your card can do even better than that. Look."

Execute a double turnover of the top two cards of the packet. Deal the top card, apparently the signed card, face down onto the table. Drop the rest of the packet face down on top of the face down deck which you put aside earlier. Pick the deck up and dribble it face down onto the table 'signed' card.

Ask the spectator to tap the top card of the deck and turn it over himself. He should be surprised to find that it is his signed selection.

And that's it!

Straight to the Point
I think it was Bob Ostin who first showed me how effective this trick could be. You've probably even read it. It is described under the title Round and Round and can be found in Chapter Five of The Royal Road to Card Magic, but it seems to have been overlooked by almost everyone.

The original made use of the Glimpse but that is not used in this version. The mechanics of the trick are almost childish but the timing and presentation turn what is really a very obvious ruse into a real baffler.

Begin by having a deck of cards shuffled and then five cards dealt face down onto the table. Ask a spectator to pick them up and mix them. Tell him to make sure that no one sees any of the cards. When he has finished shuffling, ask him to look at the top card of the packet, remember it, and replace it. You can turn aside while he does this. You want to make the most of the impossible conditions under which this location trick takes place.

"Okay, now put the cards behind your back. You're thinking of a card and I now want you to think of a number too. A simple number from 1 to 5. It's a free choice: 1,2,3,4,5. Chose any one of them and think of it. Got that?"

"I'm going to turn away while you do the next bit because I don't want you to think you're giving me any clues as to what is going on. You're thinking of a card. And you're thinking of a number. Now, whatever that number is, I want you to move that many cards from the top of the packet to the bottom. Do you understand?"

Repeat the instruction if he doesn't.

"Do it silently and slowly so that no one here could possibly know whether you're moving five cards or just one. Let me know when you've finished."

The spectator moves his cards and tells you when he has done.

"Okay, I'm still not looking at you. Will you place the cards face down into my hand."

You extend your hand behind you and take the packet of cards. As soon as you have them, turn to face him, keeping the cards behind your back.

"What I'm going to try and do is imagine I'm you. I'm going to try and imagine I'm thinking of a number and thinking of a card. The same card that you're thinking of."

Look him in the eyes and pretend to concentrate. Really you reverse the order of the cards behind your back and then move two cards from the top of the packet to the bottom. It doesn't matter if anyone sees you moving cards around. You're trying to imagine that you are him so it's reasonable that you will be duplicating his actions.

Suddenly, pretend that something is wrong. Something is not quite right. Turn away from him and hand him the packet of cards behind your back. You've still not looked at any of the cards.

"No, sorry, it's just not happening. Take the cards again. Put them behind you're back. Really think of your card……… Okay. That's it. Now think of your number again. And move that many cards from the top of the packet to the bottom. Do it slowly, do it quietly, don't let anyone know how many cards you're moving. Let me know when you've finished."

He tells you he has finished. You turn around but don't quite face him. Instead you extend your right hand and hold it palm up in front of him.

"Good, now take the top card bring it out and hold it face down above my hand. Keep the other cards behind your back."

He brings the top card out and holds it above your hand.

"Don't let me touch the card."

You don't look at the card either while he is doing this. But you do appear to concentrate and finally, say, "No. Throw it on the table. That's not it."

Ask him to take the next card from the top of the packet and hold it face down above your hand. Concentrate again and finish by saying, "No, that's not it either. Throw it on the table."

He takes a third card from the top of the packet and holds it above your hand. If he's followed the procedure correctly, the third card will be his selection. Trust me, it works. It'll always be the third card down in the packet. Finish by saying, "That's it. That's the one. Would you call out the name of the card you are thinking of?"

He does and you turn to face him. "Turn over the card." He'll be amazed to find that it is indeed the one he has been thinking of.

If you want to short cut the trick even further, ask him to think of the number first and then look at the five cards. He then remembers the card lying at his number from the face of the packet. This way he only moves cards from the top to the bottom of the packet once during the routine. It's a strong trick. You never looked at the cards, you never asked him for his thought of number, and you never touched the cards after he took them back. It's almost a miracle!

Final Notes: Want to tell him his thought of number too? All you need do is nail nick or crimp the top card of the packet before you hand it back. When you come to the revelation, have the third card, his selection, placed aside. Make it clear that's the card you are getting psychic vibes from. But just to make sure have the fourth and fifth cards brought out too, one at a time. You don't get any vibes from them so they go onto the table with the others. I should mention that the discards are dealt into a pile.

Now ask him to name his thought of card. He does and you have him turn that third card, the one placed aside, face up. It is his. He thinks the trick is over. That's your chance to glance down at the cards on the table. When you spot the crimped/nicked card, you can work out the thought of number because it will be that number of cards from the top of the packet. Don't forget to factor the third card into your calculations. Have the spectator concentrate on his number and reveal it in your best Dunninger manner.

Cyclic Aces

This idea was first published in Sorcerer magazine, issue 2 (1988). It’s a simple idea but you might find it useful. It’s also a good excuse for me to try out the OCR software on my new scanner. Let’s hope it works and following is transcribed without too many errors!

Effect: A deck of cards is shuffled, squared and placed in the centre of the table. “It is said that three is a lucky number,” says the performer, “Let’s see if that’s true.” The performer cuts the deck into three packets, stacking one on top of the other and bringing a new card to the top of the deck.

He turns the top card over and it is an Ace. Placing the Ace aside he says, “Well that’s pretty lucky, an Ace.” The performer cuts the cards again, saying, “Of course that’s all it was, pure luck. The odds against doing the same thing again must be pretty phenomenal.” After the cutting the new top card of the deck is turned over and is seen to be another Ace and this is placed with the previously tabled Ace.

The deck is cut again as the performer says, “Three cuts each time, and this is the third time... third time lucky perhaps.” The new top card is turned over and seen to be the third Ace. It’s placed aside, with the first two Aces, and the cutting procedure is repeated.

I should add at this point that the cutting procedure looks incredibly fair, to layman or magician, but despite this, when the new top card is turned over, it is the fourth Ace.

Method: This is more than just an Ace Cutting Routine, it’s a utility principle that you can expand upon and use in many different ways. The whole procedure is made possible by using one crimped card but it’s the novel way in which the crimped card resets itself for each Ace that is of interest. You’ll be glad to know that the trick is entirely self-working.

Place two Aces on top of the deck and the other two, together, about one-third from the face of the deck. crimp the card that lies above the lower pair of Aces. The crimp should be bent downwards and be positioned at the inner right corner of the deck when the deck is tabled face down.

False Shuffle the deck, retaining the positions of the Aces and crimp. An easy way to do this is to cut off the top third of the deck and Riffle Shuffle it into the upper third of the remaining portion. You are Riffle Shuffling above the Crimp and you allow the top two Aces to fall last. This can be repeated several times. You’ll find it even easier if you position the crimp and the Aces below it lower down in the deck before you begin. It will make no difference to the subsequent working.

Spread the deck face down just to show that there are no breaks or whatever and then square it and place it in the centre of the table. You place the deck almost at arm’s length from you. This is for two reasons. Firstly it is a very open gesture; somehow if the deck is away from your body it seems as if there is little you can do in the way of trickery. Secondly it enables you to see your crimp perfectly, a visual check just in case you foul up somewhere along the line.

Reach over and cut approximately one-third of the cards from the top of the deck and place them on the table, beside the original talon. Make a second cut, this time at your crimp, the crimped card becoming the face card of the packet you have just cut. Drop this packet onto the first tabled packet. Pick up the remainder of the deck and drop it on top of the first two portions. Turn over the top card, it will be an Ace.

The cutting can be made to look quite sloppy and effortless, which it almost is, thus adding to the deception. The remarkable thing is that the crimp is again nearly two-thirds down the deck but is now above what were the top two Aces.

Square the deck and repeat the cutting procedure, bringing another Ace to the top and setting the crimp above the third Ace. As each Ace is cut it is laid aside. Cut the deck again, bringing the third Ace to the top and at the same time setting the crimp above the last Ace. Finally cut for the fourth time, bringing the final Ace to the top and revealing it in your most dramatic manner.

Notes: That’s all there is to it but I hope you’ll agree that it is very deceptive and it seems almost impossible to control the Aces during the cuts. The fact that it is self-working should make it easy to use.

Those with a penchant for card handling can of course cull the required Aces to position. You might also like to just locate any pair of cards that happen to be together, position them about one-third in from the face and crimp the card above them as you spread the cards face up in front of you. This leaves only two cards, the other pair, which need to be cut or culled to the top, making your job that little bit easier.

To crimp the card I spread the cards face up between my hands, from left to right, raising them to a vertical position so that only I can see the faces. Having spotted a suitable pair of cards I spread them to the right and use my left thumb to crimp the lower left corner of the card immediately behind them. The left thumb just bends the corner upwards, towards the card’s face.

Vernon’s Aces Ride Again: By reversing the procedure you can use the crimp card to control the aces. In this version you openly places the aces into the deck, apparently at random, and then find them again. Pointless I know but that’s the magic business for you!

Start with the four Aces face up on the table and a crimp card two-thirds of the way down the deck. Cut off about one-third of the deck and table it. Take one of the Aces and drop it onto this packet. Make another cut, this time at the crimp, and drop this packet on top of the just-placed Ace. Pick up the remainder of the deck and drop it on top of the first two cut portions. You’ve secretly placed the crimp above the first Ace while apparently losing the Ace in the deck.

Repeat the procedure, cutting off about a third of the deck and tabling it. Place a second Ace on this portion and then cut another packet from the deck, again making the cut at your crimp, and drop it on top of the Ace. Pick up the remainder of the deck and drop it on top of the first two cut portions.

Repeat this for the third and fourth Aces and you will end up with two Aces on top of the deck and two below the crimped card. By reversing the original procedure you have arrived at the start position for the original Ace Cutting. Reveal the aces in any way you choose.

Not Quite Final Notes: There is more to say on this system but it will only detract from what is offered here. However, when setting up the Aces for cutting (the first routine) you may like to introduce the same sort of ruse that Vernon used in his Cutting the Aces routine (Stars of Magic). You can do this by setting the deck with an Ace on top, followed by a Six-spot, then five indifferent cards, the second Ace, then the rest of the deck with the crimp card set two-thirds of the way down just above the remaining pair of Aces.

Proceed with the first routine, cutting the first, second and third Aces as already explained. When you try to cut the fourth Ace you turn over a Six-spot instead. It looks as if you’ve missed but you recover the situation by explaining that the six in fact tells you that the last Ace is six cards down. Place the Six­-spot aside and then deal down six cards from the top of the deck, turning the Ace up on the last card dealt. The extra twist on the fourth Ace brings the routine to a more satisfying conclusion.

If your table space is limited you can always hold the deck in the left hand dealing grip and place the cut off packets on another spectator’s outstretched palm. Ask him to pretend he’s a table and then tap him on the head, knocking on wood for good luck.

A Four Star Discovery: With the deck in the left hand dealing grip and a crimp card a third in from the face, riffle down the outer left corner with the thumb and ask a spectator to call stop. Contrive it so that he halts you when you are about one-third down from the top. Cut this top packet to the table. Push off the new top card of the deck and raise it towards the spectator so that he can remember it. This will be his selection. Drop the selection face down on the tabled packet. Cut at your crimp and drop this packet on top of the selection. Place the remainder of the left hand cards on top of all, burying the selection completely.

Repeat this with three more selections and you will finish up with two selections on top of the deck and two under the crimp. It seems impossible since you do virtually nothing. The cards are in position to be revealed just as in the original Ace Cutting Routine.
However, to add spice to the proceedings try the following:

Hold the deck in the right hand, in position for an Overhand Shuffle with the cards facing left so that you can see them. Note the face card. Let’s imagine it’s a Six-spot. Pull the top and bottom cards off together, into the left hand, mentally counting ‘one’ and then draw off five more cards from the face of the deck, counting each one and bringing your count to ‘six’ which is equal to the noted card. The drawn off cards are shuffled on top of the original milked pair.

Drop the remainder of the deck on top and continue with any False Shuffle or Cut which retains the deck order. You can now cut to three of the selections, just as in the original routine. On cutting the fourth selection you will turn up the Six-spot. It looks like a mistake but you rectify it by dealing six cards off the deck and turning up the final card to reveal the fourth selection. Incidentally the selections will turn up in the reverse order to which they were chosen. That’s all for now. Have fun.

The Last Game
This poker routine was originally published in The New Talon. It began as an attempt to simplify Karl Fulves’ According to Hoyle, which was published in his The Magic Book, an excellent book now reprinted by Dover as the Big Book of Magic Tricks.

It’s a poker deal with a psychological flavour in which the spectators get the opportunity to switch hands with you during the game yet you always win. Fulves’ effect was great for someone who played poker but the stack was not easily remembered. The following stack is much simpler and you always win with a four-of-a-kind, a hand easily recognised even by non-players. I’ve also added the repeat deal and final blow-off, proving that the spectator just can’t win.

Remove the Ten of Clubs, Ten of Hearts and Ten of Diamonds from the deck and place them in the card case, wallet or anywhere else that you can produce them from later in the routine. The rest of the deck is stacked as follows, from the top:

AS, KS, QS, JS, 10S, AD, KD, QD, JD, X, AH, KH, QH, JH, X, AC, KC, QC, JC, REST OF DECK.

The “X” can be any card.

A quick glace will reveal that you are merely stacking the Royal Flushes minus the missing Ten spots. The flushes can be in any order as long as the Spades are on top and the other values follow the order of the Spades. For now use the above stack until you become familiar with the principle.

Phase One: Bring out the deck and give it your best False Shuffle, retaining the stack. Tell the spectators that you will show them a very unusual game of poker. Nominate four spectators to help as you finish your shuffles and cuts. Announce that you will deal a five handed game, five cards each, but each person at the table will get a chance to swap his cards with yours as the game proceeds.

Deal out the first five cards, from left to right, dealing to yourself last. Point out that you each have one cards and that one of the spectators can now swap with you, “Who will it be?” Let them choose the lucky person and then openly exchange your card with his. No one looks at their cards while this happens.

Deal a second round of cards so that you now have two cards each. Invite another spectator to swap his two cards with both of yours. It can be anyone except the person who swapped cards in the first round.

The cards are exchanged and you deal a third round. Again one of the spectators exchanges his hand of cards with yours. This leaves only one spectator who has not swapped. It also tells you which four of a kind you will end up with at the end of this phase. As you deal the cards are being dealt out Ace, King, Queen, Jack, Ten (or indifferent card). So, let’s say the second spectator from the left is the only one who has not swapped. You now know that you will end up with four Kings at the finish. Two rounds of cards have yet to be dealt but you could, if you wished, mention that you are trying to force the spectators to part with the four Kings.

Deal the fourth round of cards and ask the spectator, the one who has not yet exchanged cards) whether he would like to swap cards now or wait until the last round of cards is dealt. It makes no difference what he decides. Swap cards if he chooses and then deal a fifth round. Alternatively deal and then swap.

At this stage you have the winning hand but you play up the impossibility angle by offering them another choice. Tell them that only one spectator may play against you. Without looking at their cards they choose who it should be. Pick up the discarded hands and place them on top of the deck. Don’t shuffle each hand, just drop them one atop the other and then onto the deck because you are setting up Phase Two.

Finally, the nominated spectator turns over his hand as you turn over yours. You win with four of a kind. Don’t disturb the order of either hand as you pick them up and drop them on top of the deck. It doesn’t matter which hand goes on top of which.

Phase Two: False Shuffle and Cut as you tell the spectators that you had, of course, psychologically forced them to give up their best cards. This time you’ll give them a straight deal, no swaps.

Deal out five hands of poker from the top of the deck, dealing yourself last. Ask the spectators to choose one of their number to play against you. They choose and you now surprise them by saying that maybe, you’ve already forced a choice so you give him a chance to pick any one of the hands, bar yours, on the table.

The situation is, reading left to right, the first hand contains only spot cars, hands two to four contain Royal Flushes minus the Ten spots, your hand contains a Royal Flush in Spades. If the spectator chooses hands two, three or four then just return the discarded hands to the deck. If he chooses hand number one let him take it, then say that you’re feeling lucky tonight and you’ll let another spectator play against you. He chooses one of the remaining hands.

If you now have two spectators playing against you, get number 1to look at his hand (the spot cards) and offer him the opportunity to discard some of his cards and take replacements from the deck as is usual. Make sure he shows his hand to everyone who is watching so that they can feel part of the game. He exchanges cards and then you ask number 2 (holding what is almost a Royal Flush) to do the same. Of course he will discard only one card in the hope of filling his Royal Flush with the missing Ten.

If you’re only playing against one spectator, then it will be the one trying for the Royal Flush. In these circumstances I offer him the opportunity of discarding a card (or cards?) and choosing the replacement from anywhere in the deck which I spread face down across the table. Nothing could be fairer.

The spectators turn over their hands, one at a time, and you reveal yours to show an unbeatable Royal Flush. Finally, look at the spectator who was trying to fill a Royal Flush and ask him, naively, which card he was looking for. He will reply, “Ten of Diamonds,” or whatever, and you say, “I never take chances” and produce the missing Ten Spot from your card case or wallet. Be sure not to let the spectators see the other two cards that are in there. This should get a great response if you’ve been able to get the spectators involved with the win or lose situation.

If you are going to use this, you might like to produce the missing Ten spot from up your sleeve in classical card cheat fashion. This routine is particularly adaptable to a pseudo mental presentation because you know the type of hand you are going to win with and how the spectator will lose in the final phase. Judicious use of some alternative predictions could produce a very strong mental effect. Give some thought to the presentation and you may have something you’ll use for a long time.

One final point. If you are performing this routine for people who know a little more about poker than you do, you may find that in the second phase they will not want to exchange any cards. This will be because they possess a flush (five cards of the same suit) and will not risk swapping one of their cards in order to obtain the Ten spot. In order to prevent this just ensure that all the indifferent cards in the set-up are of the Spades suit. This way they’ll never end up with a flush following the deal in the second phase of the routine.

Zennerism Postscript
Following the previous post on Zennerism and The Zenner Effect, Patrick Converso has contacted me and I'm pleased to say that the original effect and its history will now be detailed in a new edition of The Zenner Effect published by TrickShop.com.

Anyone that has a copy of Ted Lesley's Working Performer's Marked Deck Manual will find a full deck handling for Zennerism on page 39.

I edited the manual for Martin Breese back in 1987 and it wasn't until I dug a copy out the other day that I remembered I'd included a couple of other effects as well as Zennerism. They are applications of the Ted Lesley marking system to a Peek Pack and they're not bad. Worth a look if you're one of those folks who keeps buying one-trick decks from the dealers at $20 a pop!

Zener and the Art of Inspiration

Yesterday I got an email from a friend asking if I’d seen the advert for TrickShop.com’s new trick as advertised on Duncan Trillo’s MagicWeek website. The trick is called The Zenner Effect. And the reason my friend had contacted me is that the advertising says that it is inspired by Zennerism, a trick I’d marketed back in 1980. The suspicion was that the new trick owed more than just inspiration to the original.

I downloaded The Zenner Effect and found it uncomfortably close to my 1980 routine. Virtually identical except for the handling of the finale. And bizarrely, in an age where magicians regularly attach their names to the flimsiest of ‘inventions,’ there was no name to claim credit for this particular inspiration.

Perhaps it is a matter of judgement. Is The Zenner Effect different enough from Zennerism to warrant marketing? Well, you can make that judgement yourself for what follows is a description of Zennerism, the trick from which The Zenner Effect draws its inspiration. I’ll also take the opportunity to correct one grievous mistake. Back in 1980 I spelled the names of the now familiar ESP testing cards incorrectly. They are Zener cards, named after Dr Karl Zener. Not Zenner cards. I notice that the anonymous writer of the TrickShop manuscript has even copied my error. Inspired indeed!

Zennerism
A prediction trick using ESP cards. You have five cards. The spectator has five cards. You place one card face down on the table, he places a card face down on top of yours. This is repeated with all ten cards. At the end of the trick, each pair of cards match. Okay, so it’s not quite as straight forward as that, but we’ll get to the details in a moment. First, some history.

My own interest in this matching effect began around 1973. I was on holiday in Blackpool where I met a magician called Peter Royal. He was demming svengalis for Mark Lewis who had a pitch in Ripley’s Odditorium on the promenade. Mark also had a magic studio and one of the items Peter showed me was a matching card trick. Five cards were laid face down on the table. The spectator laid five cards face up on top of them. And when the pairs were turned over, the cards matched.

If my memory is correct it was sold as something that Al Koran once used. The method consisted of five double back cards and five double facers. I think one side showed an ace to five of a red suit and the other an ace to five of a black suit. The double backers were placed on the table and the double facers were placed on top of them. And then you did the old two card monte move to apparently show that the faces matched.

It was a great effect but I wondered if there was a way of doing it without the fake cards. Back at the rented holiday flat I worked something out and showed it to Peter the next day. It used an ordinary deck and the one ahead method. Some years later Peter Royal marketed it as a manuscript.

Although very pleased with it at the time, I later discovered that the trick was really no different to other one ahead solutions that had already appeared in print. Perhaps the most famous version of the effect is that of Bro. John Hamman called The Million To One Chance. It can be found in LePaul’s The Card Magic of Bro John Hamman. An earlier version is in Dai Vernon’s booklet Select Secrets, as part of his Royal Marriages effect. One routine I haven’t seen is Rolf Andra’s ESP. It was marketed by Harry Stanley in the 1950s and might well have used the same principle.

One problem with all the one ahead solutions is that you often run into a dead end where you need to change the handling to accommodate choices that the spectator makes. Million To One Chance is a nightmare of mental agility. It is a brilliant effect but you really have to be on your toes to do it well. I’d imagine that someone like Lennart Green, with his deliberately chaotic presentation, could really make a grand performance out of it.

The principle behind Zennerism has one thing going for it. The routine never varies. There are no outs. I never felt it was 100% but I did think it worth publishing. Here it is again.

The Cards
You need two sets of Zener cards. They can be different colours on the face but should have the same back designs. And they need to be marked on the back. The Magic Christian ESP-Deck manufactured by Piatnik actually contains two sets of cards that are already marked. See here for a source of all kinds of ESP cards including SBS cards.

The Handling
Show the cards to the spectator, explain that they are symbols used for testing ESP, and then ask him to choose one of the packets. “This experiment involves five decisions. This is the first. Take one of the cards and put it in your pocket. Don’t look at it.”

Shuffle the chosen packet and then spread the cards out face down so he can take one. He puts it in his pocket sight unseen. However, because the cards are marked you know what it is. Let’s assume it is the star. By the way, this ruse is the foundation upon which Zennerism rests. It’s also the key method to The Zenner Effect.

Hand the rest of the packet to him and ask him to shuffle them. You pick up the remaining packet and shuffle those cards.

“Here’s the second decision.” You take the star from your set of cards and place it face down on the table. “Just take any of your cards and place it face down on top of mine. Don’t think about it. Just do it.” He does and you then tell him to mix up the three remaining cards he holds.

Look at the markings on the back of the card he just placed down. Take out the matching card from your set and place it face down on the table to the right of the first pair. “Let’s go again. Take another card. Don’t think about it. Don’t worry about it. Just take a card and put it on top of mine.” He takes another card and puts it on top of yours.

Read the back of the card he just dealt and take out the matching card from your set. Place it down on the table, always to the right of the tabled cards. I should say that you can either openly look at the faces of your cards or you can just read the backs and pretend to be pulling a card out at random. It’s up to you.

He now has two cards left. Tell him to take a card in each hand. “Now, when I say go, lay one of the cards down on top of mine. One, two, three, go!” He places a card down. You read the back as before and place another of your cards down next to it.

He only has one card in his hand and places it on top of yours. You place your last card down, saying, “You had no idea which card I’d be left with but you placed one card in your pocket right at the beginning. Take it out and put it down on mine.” He does.

There are now five pairs of cards on the table. Gather them up from left to right, into the left hand. As you pick up the fourth pair, get a break under the top card. Pick up the last pair saying, “This contains the card you placed in your pocket. Let’s leave that for last.” Briefly you drop the pair onto the left hand packet, but you immediately pick up all three cards above the break, as if two cards, and openly transfer them to the bottom of the packet.

“Let’s see how we did.” Deal off the top two cards, turning them over to reveal a matching pair. Lay the pair on the table. Deal off the next pair and place it face up on the table. The cards match. Same with the following two pairs. And finally, “The card you placed in your pocket.” Turn the last pair over, of course, the two symbols match.

Notes:
In the original manuscript I mentioned several things. First, that you could perform this trick with ordinary cards. The packets are stacked in a memorised order at the beginning of the effect. When the spectator takes the first card its position in the fan gives away its identity.

In this case the spectator deals his cards face up on top of yours, otherwise you have no way of knowing which cards he is placing down. I prefer to use marked cards. They are your cards anyway so they might as well be marked.

The Zenner Effect uses both these strategies. The only point in which the trick differs from Zennerism is the handling of the displacement at the finale. The handling in The Zenner Effect is an interesting idea but I prefer my own routine.

The handling in Zennerism was described for its simplicity but in fact I usually finished the routine with a bottom deal. I turned all the spectator’s cards face down before gathering the packets. The last pair went on top of the packet. I pushed over the top two cards and appeared to turn them over. Actually I executed a simple bottom deal, taking the top and bottom cards as a pair and throwing them face up onto the table. I separated these two cards on the table before taking subsequent pairs of cards and turning them over to reveal that all the symbols matched.

One final thought from the original Zennerism. You can do this trick with an ordinary deck. Give half to the spectator and take half yourself. The spectator puts a card in his pocket. You can force or glimpse this. Either way you know what it is and can now place a card face down on the table. The spectator places a card face up on top.

You continue placing cards face down and he follows each time with a face up card. Unless you have taken care to divide the deck equally there will be times when you can’t match the value of the spectator’s card. So just match the suit instead. Keep dealing until you have about ten or a dozen pairs of cards on the table, just as in the Hamman effect. Present the trick as quickly as you can, slapping cards down on the table and encouraging the spectator to make fast decisions. With so many cards involved I don’t even bother to turn the spectator’s cards face down. Just gather them up and deal off the top and bottom cards together, as a pair, into the right hand. Turn the pair over to show that the cards match. Then deal both cards face up to the table.

No one notices that the left hand packet is now topped by a face down card. You can now legitimately start dealing off pairs from the top and showing that they match. Most cards will match in value, some value and colour and others just suit. But it looks remarkable.

Here’s another tip for this presentation. Let’s say that the first card you placed down was a jack of spades. And you also know that the jack of clubs is in the spectator’s pocket. Well, during all the subsequent dealing it is just possible that the spectator will deal one of the red jacks face up onto one of your tabled cards. If this happens, and there are at least half a dozen pairs on the table, I stop the dealing procedure here.

I gather up the pairs, hand them to the spectator and ask him to cut the packet several times. As he does this I tell him I’m trying to get an impression of the card he placed in his pocket. When I see that he has a face down card on top of the packet, I tell him to stop cutting. Then I ask him to deal the cards off in pairs. They match. Finally, I mentally divine the card he put in his pocket right at the start. You can see that in this instance the pocketed card acts as insurance against ever reaching a dead end in the Hamman effect. Other ways of handling the finale should occur to you.

When downloading the The Zenner Effect from MagicShop I did send a note saying that I hoped the trick would be sufficiently different from Zennerism that I wouldn't be disappointed. I then received an email from the owner Patrick Converso who graciously refunded my money saying that he had intended to mention to Duncan Trillo that he wanted to send me a complimentary copy. Perhaps if he had contacted me before putting his manuscript on the market I wouldn’t have felt so irked by seeing Zennerism reproduced within its pages. Then again, you wouldn’t have been reading it here. Every cloud has a silver lining!

The Great Poker Trick
Nelson Downs described this in The Art of Magic (1909). It’s a fascinating idea. Imagine a totally impromptu poker deal with a brand new unopened borrowed deck. You shuffle the cards and deal out seven hands of poker. Everyone gets a full house, except you, you get a winning straight flush.

There’s a little more to it than that (isn’t there always) but it’s great idea all the same. Here’s the working as described in The Art of Magic. All you need is a deck that is in new deck order: Each suit separated, Ace to King from the bottom upwards.

The performer removes the pack from the wrapper, calling attention to the fact that the cards are fresh from the manufacturer. He throws away the joker and gives the pack a false shuffle, using whatever method he is most adept at. If versed in fancy blind cuts he may indulge in a series of manipulations of this kind; but for the purpose of the trick it is sufficient to give the cards a false shuffle. Then allow the spectators to cut the cards. They may cut as many times as they wish without destroying the order of the cards, as the halves simply revolve around each other. This is, in fact the strongest feature of the trick; for most persons believe that the conventional cut completely disarranges any prearranged order of the pack.

Now deal the cards out to six persons, giving the top card to No. 1; the second to No. 2; the third card to No. 3; the fourth card to No. 4; the fifth card to No. 5; and the sixth card to No. 6. Begin the round again, dealing the seventh card to No. 1, and so on to No. 6. As soon as the twelfth card is dealt, shift the next card (the thirteenth) to the bottom of the deck, and continue dealing two more rounds. As soon as the twenty-fourth card is dealt, shift the twenty-fifth card to the bottom of the pack, and then deal around once more, handing one card to each player. Now deal five cards from the top of the pack for your own hand. Ask the spectators to turn over their hands, and each one will be astonished to find that he holds a full house. The performer then turns over his own hand, exhibiting a straight flush.

CAUTION – If the order of the pack is ace, two, three, four etc., up to king, the performer must take note of the bottom card of the deck after the cut; for should the bottom card be a jack, the trick will not come out as described. Another cut will obviate this difficulty.

Downs suggested that the trick is best performed standing if the shifts are to be covered. Not a problem in his day, especially after his retirement from the stage, when a stand up performance at the Elks was a typical gig. He would deal the cards onto the spectators’ hands, which gave him enough cover to make the pass or sideslip in order to move the top card to the bottom of the deck.

Were it not for the shifts, this would be an almost self-working trick. All you have to do is get rid of two cards during the deal. It wouldn’t be too difficult to work in a line about the other players suddenly becoming suspicious and asking you to “burn a card.” So you openly take the top card off the deck, turn it over and place it on the bottom. This happens twice during the routine and obviates the need for the pass. Another observation is that at the end of the trick you practically have four-of-a-kind together, three at the bottom and one at the top of the deck. Must be useful for something.

The trick wasn’t original with Downs. He said it was a favourite of Adrian Plate. Tom Boyer published his version in 1926 in Linking Ring (Vol IV, No. 1). He dealt seven hands, dealing a bottom card on the 14th and 28th cards. This gave everyone a full house. The performer than draws four cards to win with a straight flush. Ross Bertram resurrected it, publishing it under his own name as Exhibition Poker Deal, in the Linking Ring (July 1930). Leslie Guest spotted that it was a variation of the Downs trick and added some notes of his own, including a story about throwing the unlucky thirteenth card away and the fact that the trick will not work if certain cards are showing on the bottom of the deck. Downs referred only to the Jack, but in fact there are more cards to look out for than that.

In August of 1942 the Linking Ring magazine presented yet another version of Klondyke Poker, this time by W. C. Fownes Jr and E. F. W. Salisbury. They credited Tom Bowyer with the notion of dealing out seven hands and added that if the card on the bottom of the deck is a Nine to King, you won’t get the straight flush. They also incorporated a Color Monte style patter story about gambling Dan McGrew who bet everything he had against all the players at the table. An open bottom deal was made to accompany the story of McGrew’s cheating. He is spotted and the other players demand he draw a new hand. He does, the straight flush of course, and still manages to win.

It’s a great trick, one step away from a self-working miracle.

Chalice from the Palace

Many decades ago, Cyril Tomlinson published a very good presentation idea for a popular mathematical swindle in Abracadabra magazine. I found it interesting because I’d once played with a Ken de Courcy routine sold by Supreme Magic called Luck of Lucretia. Both effects were themed around the idea that the performer can locate a glass filled with poison by the infamous Lucrezia Borgia. The following is an impromptu looking handling of the Tomlinson routine, suitable for performance in a bar or at a dinner table.

You need a pad and a felt-tipped pen, five beer mats and five empty glasses. Take out the pen and openly write something down on the back of each mat. The spectator’s don’t know what you’re writing. In fact, you are writing down five of their names, one on each mat.

“What I’d like to do is play a little game. Well, actually, you’ll be playing the game. It involves these five beer mats and those five glasses. And in a moment I want you to imagine that one of those glasses is filled with poison.”

As you write down the names, you need to mark one of the mats so that you’ll recognise it later on. One way of doing this is to make an ink mark on the second mat down in the stack as you write a name on the back of the top one. It’s just a matter of pushing over the top mat so that you can get access to the second. When you write a name on the reverse side of the marked mat, make sure it is the name of someone near to you because you’re going to use that spectator in the routine. Let’s assume his name is Bill.

When you’ve finished writing on each mat, turn them writing side down and mix them up. “Let me just give the mats a mix so that you don’t know which is which.” It’s practically a genuine shuffle. The only thing you have to do is make sure that the marked mat finishes in the centre of the stack of five. This is not difficult to engineer as you mix the cards between your hands. Deal out the mats in a row on the table. The centre mat will have the name “Bill” on its underside.

Ask one of the spectators to place an empty glass on each of the mats. “Now I mentioned that one of the glasses will be filled with poison. But who will the victim be?” Look at each of the people whose names you have written on the beer mats. Everyone in the audience should feel that he or she is a potential victim.

Take out the pad and write down the name that is on the mat at the centre of the row. Tear off the sheet and fold it up into a billet and then draw a skull and crossbones on the outside so that it represents the poison. Casually hand the folded paper to Bill. “I want you to move your hand along the row of glasses, back and forth. And whenever you feel the urge, drop the poison into one of the glasses.” If he happens to choose the glass standing on the mat bearing his name, well, your luck is in. You might decide to make the most of it and end the trick right here, revealing that he has chosen the glass standing on top of the predicted name. In most cases he won’t have dropped the billet into the centre glass so you would continue as follows:

Turn your back as soon as he has dropped the billet into one of the glasses. Put the pad away and you’re ready to start the trick.

Having seen which glass he chose, you know whether it is at an ODD or EVEN position in the row. This piece of information will decide what happens next. “I want you to change the position of that glass with the one next to it. It can be the one to its right or its left, it doesn’t matter which. Call out 'switch' when you’ve done that.”

This is just a practice session, to get Bill familiar with the moves. It means that if the glass started off at an EVEN position, it is now at an ODD position and vice versa.

Ask Bill to move the glass several more times and each time he moves it he calls out “switch.” If the glass is presently standing at an ODD position ask him to move it an ODD number of times, say 5. If it is at an EVEN position, ask him to move it an EVEN number of times, say 6.

At the end of all those moves, the glass will end up at position 2 or 4. “You’ve shuffled the glasses around and I couldn’t possibly know where the poisoned glass lies. But I’m going to take a chance. Take away the glass on the right. Good. And now would you take away the glass on the left. Good. I think the poison is still on the table.”

The spectators see that you have managed to leave the chosen glass in play.

Speak as if you are about to eliminate another glass. “And would you please take away….” Then change your mind. “No, I tell you what. Make three more switches.” Bill moves the glass three more times. This leaves the glass in the centre position. Again you eliminate the outer two glasses. “That’s better. Would you please take away the right hand glass. And now the glass on the left.”

Only one glass remains, the one with the billet inside. Somehow you have managed to keep it in play. “Strangely, the poisoned glass still remains.” Turn around to face the spectator and then turn over the empty beer mats to reveal the names on the backs. “So Johnny, Sarah, Mike and Leila, all got away. Let’s see who got the poisoned glass.” Ask Bill to lift up the last glass. You turn over the mat to display the name written on the reverse side. “Sorry Bill, looks like you’ve poisoned yourself.” Finish by asking Bill to remove the billet from the glass. He opens it and discovers that you predicted the victim’s name.

You can if you wish weave into your story some details about Lucrezia Borgia but not if you are performing before an audience of historians because Lucrezia is undergoing something of a character reassessment at the moment. Never do tricks for people who are cleverer than you are!

Finally, I’d recommend you look up Cyril Tomlinson’s original presentation in Abracadabra (Vol 28, No. 704) because he has a killer idea in which the “poison” materialises in the chosen glass. Very clever it is too.

Super Memory Remembered

There are some wonderful ideas to be found in the magic magazines of old and each time I delve into those old volumes is like a treasure hunt. It is a rare day that you don’t return laden with gems. The Magic Wand, a British journal published in the first half of the last century, is a site worth returning to again and again. It is now available on a searchable CD Rom courtesy of Martin Breese. Thank you Martin.

Some enterprising magicians have found that they can market memory courses to the general public. It makes sense. It's an alternate form of revenue and magicians are used to using mnemonics in their work. A good demonstration of the Giant Memory feat is all that's needed to convince prospective students that their magical tutor knows what he is talking about. The following routine could also prove to be an excellent classroom exercise.

The original title was Super Memory in Close Up and you can find it in issue 254 of The Magic Wand. It is the creation of Arthur W. Roots and all I’ve done is tweaked it a little and dusted it off in the hope that someone will find it of value. All you need are thirty blank visiting cards, a pencil and the ability to memorise a list of thirty objects using the standard mnemonic system.

I’ll assume that you are lecturing your class on the art of memory. Ask one of the class to call out any five objects eg Cat, Egg, Book, Clock, Desk. As he does so you write the name of each object on a card, turn the card over and write a number, from one to thirty, on the back of it. So the first card is numbered 1, the second 2, the third 3 and so on until you have five cards each bearing the name of a different object on one side and a number on the other.

Choose someone else and get them to name five different objects. Continue the writing and numbering. Go through all the cards until six people have helped you build a list of thirty objects and all thirty cards are numbered on the back with a number from 1 to 30.

This isn't the most stimulating part of the exercise which is why I suggest it would work in a memory class better than it would in your act. However, the action starts here. Ask someone to mix the thirty cards, number side up. Take the pack and spread it number side up across the table.

Three people now draw cards from the spread. You look at the numbers and, because of your mnemonic system, are able instantly to reveal the name objects on the other side. This is an extremely impressive demonstration of memory. You may even want to test your pupils' own recollection before revealing the answers.

You can repeat this or have the pack gathered up, shuffled and spread object side up across the table. Three cards are drawn out. You see the objects on them and so are able to reveal the numbers on the opposite sides. Cue more amazement and people saying they can't wait to sign up for the rest of the memory course.

To finish, ask someone to take the cards and fan them out with the object side facing them. Get them to stand behind you so that you can't see the cards. Now you are going to call out the entire list of thirty objects. Begin by calling out the first object in your memorised list. When the assistant acknowledges it ask him/her to hand the card to you. Place it object side up at the left side of the table. Call out each object, in order, from your list. Your assistant finds the card that matches, you take it and place it next to the previous card on the table, building a line of cards from left to right. Each time you name an object correctly make sure you get the assistant to acknowledge the fact that you are right. Speed up towards the end and add the usual dash of showmanship.

When all thirty cards are on the table the demonstration is finished. Well, almost. Now for the finale as you point out that not only did you remember the thirty objects but you remembered them in their correct order. Turn over the cards on the table to reveal that they are indeed arranged in numerical order. Cue applause.

That's it. It seems to me much more interesting than writing objects on a blackboard. And the fact that the names of the objects are not on view throughout the demonstration makes it seem all the more impressive. Using larger cards might make the demonstration play to a larger audience.

The Invisible Man
Harry Price is one of my favourite characters from the history of magic. He made his living as a professional psychic researcher and ghost hunter, working in the 1920s and 30s, apparently shining a light on the unexplained but in reality casting quite a shadow over almost everything that he touched. His books, and he wrote many, are absolutely fascinating. Harry's investigations were always founded on some kind of strangeness; a talking mongoose, a girl plagued by the devil, a medium who was tried and found guilty under the Witchcraft Act and, of course, the most haunted house in England, Borley Rectory.

He's worth rereading again and again. You never know what you might find in his writings that has some bearing on magic. Take the following as an example. A man who came to Harry Price claiming that he could make himself invisible.

One of the most brazen spellbinders who have ever entered my office was a man who called himself ‘Sandy MacPherson’: he was a Jew from Houndsditch. He came to see me because, he said, he had some wonderful apparatus by means of which he could make himself invisible at will. I call him the ‘Invisible Man’.

He said he wanted a large fee for a test, as it meant a van-load of ‘properties’ and a great deal of trouble to arrange his ‘set-up’. We compromised by agreeing to settle the carter’s bill.

The day – and a small pantechnicon – duly arrived for the test, and as the men carried in his impedimenta, I wondered if ‘Sandy’ had ever kept a draper’s shop, as his sole apparatus consisted of about a dozen tall pier glasses or mirrors such as they are used in the dressmaking stores where ladies foregather in such large numbers.

Sandy shut himself up in my séance-room for half an hour and then called me in and said he was ready for the test. He now commenced ‘hedging’; he said he could not make himself invisible, but could make his reflection invisible. On the principle of ‘half a loaf’, etc., I had to be content with the prospect of witnessing only a semi-miracle.

When I entered the séance-room (from which the daylight had been excluded), I found that all the tall mirrors had been stood vertically on their edges at one end of the apartment in a most curious formation, and at several different angles, roughly in the form of a semi-circle. In front of the looking-glasses was placed a chair. Sandy now asked me to switch off all the lights, count ten, and then switch them on again. This I did, and found that the spellbinder was sitting on the chair in front of the mirrors.

‘Walk slowly up to the chair’, said Sandy, ‘and see if you can find my reflection.’ I did as I was directed and must admit that for a fraction of a second I was genuinely startled. Although the end of the room furthest from the set-up was visible in every detail, the reflection of my Caledonian friend from Houndsditch appeared to be missing. The chair was also invisible, whereas normally, of course, both chair and man should have been reflected.

Although for a moment I was impressed at the result of the arrangement of the mirrors, my knowledge of the law of optics came to my rescue, and I quickly realised that what I saw before me was modelled on a well-known principle in conjuring which is often used in stage illusions. And I lost no time in telling Sandy what I thought of him and his ‘psychic gift’. I went up to him, made him stand up, moved his chair six inches from the spot where he had so carefully placed it, told him to sit down again, stepped back a few paces – and I saw the very unusual spectacle of half a man and half a chair reflected in the mirrors. A move of another six inches and both man and chair were fully reflected.

Well, they loaded up the van with a little less alacrity than when they unloaded it and, an hour later, when I was going to lunch, I saw Sandy and the van driver coming out of the local hostelry where, doubtless, they had been consoling each other with the fact that we live in a hard and incredulous world.

This story has a sequel. A few months after Sandy tried to ‘put over’ his mirror ‘phenomenon’, a toy, in which the same optical principle was employed, was put on the market. I was at once reminded of the illusion I had seen demonstrated in my séance-room. The toy was in the form of a box, closed on all sides, but partly open at the top. At one end of the box were a number of strips of looking-glass and, facing them, was a peep-hole. If a person put his eye to the peep-hole, he could see it plainly reflected in the mirrors opposite. Then, if a small object such as a marble, were placed in the box and the observer again placed his eye to the peep-hole, he could still see the reflection of his own eye – but neither the marble nor the reflection of the marble were visible. So my friend had turned his magic mirrors to account, after all. It is wonderful how these ‘Scotsmen’ persevere.

This account is taken from Harry's 1936 biography Confessions of a Ghost-Hunter. I've no idea what arrangement of mirrors Sandy used nor have I seen the optical toy that Harry Price mentions. If you know of either, do let me know.

You Have a Lucky Face

So there I was, standing outside a store in New Oxford Street, killing some time before a 3 o’clock meeting when I heard the words, “You have a lucky face.”

They came from a small Indian guy, possibly in his late teens. He’d crept up behind me and when I turned to face him, he said the words again. “You have a lucky face.”
“Pardon?” I said.
“You have a lucky face, yes very lucky. Let me see your hand.”
And I did, I let him see my hand. Instinctively I knew he wanted to read my palm so I held it palm uppermost and sure enough he started to point to the lines on my hand with a pen. As well as a pen he was carrying a small leather folder, the kind with a zipper around the edge. Clipped to the folder with his thumb were several small scraps of paper. “This is the lucky line,” he said, tracing one of the creases in my palm. “I show you.”

He started to write something down on one of the pieces of paper, rolled it into a ball and then dropped it onto my palm. I closed my hand to stop the ball of paper rolling away.

“Tell me the name of a flower,” he said.
“Rose” I answered.
“And a number from 1 to 5.”
“3” I said.
“Look at the paper.

I opened my hand, unrolled the paper and saw that he had written down the words rose and the number 3.

He started to write some other things on a second slip of paper and mutter some stuff about this being true, that I was very lucky and that money was coming my way. He looked up at my lucky face. “Do not shave or cut your hair on Tuesday” he advised. “Tuesday very lucky day for business. You will get much money.”

Then he stopped writing, reached into his leather folder and rummaged around inside. I could see other pieces of paper in there and something else, a picture of some kind. But what he brought out was what appeared to be a small red-brown nut or seed. He handed it to me. “This is very lucky stone. You keep it. You will be lucky.”

Obviously my lucky face and not shaving was not going to be enough to draw in the money on Tuesday. I was going to need celestial help and the stone would do the trick. Thank heavens I met this fortune teller today!

I looked at my watch and it was starting to get close to 3 o’clock so decided it was time to leave. But he kept talking away and then reached into his wallet again and pulled out the picture. It was a drawing of a holy man. Either that or James Randi. “This is my teacher,” he said. “Everything I say is true, this is what I believe.” Then came the capper, which I had been expecting from the first moment I heard the words about my lucky face. “Make a donation please.” The leather wallet now lay open on his upturned hands like the collection platter in a church. It was universal body language for “Give generously.”

Yes, here I was being hustled for money in the West End of London by an Indian fortune teller. There was something not quite right about it. I thought for a moment, looked at him and then pretended to search in my pockets, looking first in one and then the other. I found what I was looking for and held it out. “Here,” I said, “take this. It’s very lucky.” And I gave him the small red nut. He didn’t look very happy about this.

As I walked away I turned back and reminded him, “Oh, and don’t shave on Tuesday. Tuesday very lucky day for you.” I felt very pleased to have found such a good finish to our encounter.

I made my meeting on time but it was a messy affair and we didn’t really resolve anything. The trip into London had been a bit of a waste. But the real finale came this morning when I was browsing some news sites and read that main prize in the National Lottery was won by a man who had been given a lucky stone by a psychic.

In London.

At 3.15pm.

It's true!

I will not be shaving on Tuesday!

Okay, I made that bit about the lottery up. I hope you checked the link. Here’s the real 100% unvarnished truth.

I was really pleased when I heard the words “You have a lucky face” because a couple of years ago my friend Carlo told me about some psychic swindlers working in Hong Kong. They were Indian fortune tellers and the scam went like this.

They engaged you in conversation, wrote something down on a piece of paper and then asked you to think of a flower.

It was always a rose, most people will name a rose.

And then they asked you to choose a number from 1 to 5. You won't be surprised to hear that 3 is the most popular number.

But there was a third phase to the routine. They scribbled something on a slip of paper and asked for your date of birth. And when you opened the paper that’s exactly what you found written on it. Amazing. And worth ten dollars of anyone's money, which is what the fortune teller usually asked for.

Now the reason I wanted to see this is that unlike the first two parts of the trick it doesn’t depend on population stereotypes and fast talking. It depends on the fortune teller being able to write your date of birth down after you’ve said it and then switch it for the blank pellet that you’re holding in your hand.

Carlo is a knowledgeable sleight of hand magician so was able to work out the basic method. On my behalf he’d even offered the fortune tellers a couple of hundred dollars if they’d let him film them doing the routine. They all refused. So I was left to work out a suitable handling myself.

It was featured in an expose of fake psychics on the Channel 5 series Psychic Secrets Revealed that I consulted on. We managed to work out quite a smooth routine for Alistair Cook, the magician who was posing as a psychic on that show. We filmed him performing it in China Town to great effect. People are really amazed when they see their birthday written on that slip of paper. Which is why when the fortune teller asks for a donation you readily give one.

I went along with the first two predictions, naming rose and 3, because I wanted to see the switch in action. But he was so close to me that I knew the trick would be difficult to do well. So did he, unfortunately. Or perhaps he just thought I was so gullible he wouldn’t need it.

A switch is definitely part of the fortune teller’s repertoire. The tip-off is that there is no reason for using small pieces of paper in the first place if you are not going to switch them.

So listen out when walking through the West End. You may have a luckier face than mine and get an opportunity to see your birth date on one of those papers. But if you give money, give it for a performance well done. The only faith you'll be supporting is the one that fake psychics have in the gullibility of humankind. Oh, and keep a tight grip on your wallet. He might be small but I bet he can run like the clappers!

Hiding In Full View

I was reading David Hoy’s biography the other day - Super Psychic: The Incredible Dr Hoy. David Hoy aka Dr Faust the mentalist and mindreader is known among magicians as the inventor of the Tossed Out Deck effect. It's a great trick and still very much in use, passed down by Faust himself in an earlier book, this one for magicians, called The Bold and Subtle Miracles of Dr Faust.

But I bet few mentalists realise that the secret of the trick was later featured in Hoy's biography. Here is what author John Godwin has to say on page 27.

The whole mystery lay in the way David put his questions. For the entire deck consisted of eight of clubs. By naming two other cards he conveyed the impression that he was using a full deck. And since each participant had only seen one card, they assumed that the other two must have seen different cards.

Fortunately for Dr Hoy he had no further need for such trickery. By the 1970s he had become a full fledged radio psychic, helping callers find lost scissors and contact lenses as well as jobs in the construction industry. I'm not kidding.