We will suppose, in the first instance, that the back of the card is so dealt with. The rubbing does not alter its appearance, but gives it a thin coating of adhesive matter, and if another card is pressed against the surface so treated, the two adhere, and for the time become, in effect, one card only, viz., the one whose face is exposed, the other having temporarily disappeared from the pack.
This renders possible many striking effects. To take an elementary example, let us suppose that the old-fashioned flat card-box, or some other appliance for magically producing a card, is loaded with, say, a seven of diamonds. The corresponding card is forced on one of the company, and taken back into the middle of the pack, on the top of the prepared card. The performer does not disturb or tamper with the pack in the smallest degree. He merely squares up the cards, and, pressing them well together, hands them to be shuffled, meanwhile calling attention to the card-box, which is shown apparently empty. He then asks the name of the drawn card, announcing that it will at his command leave the pack and find its way into the box.
He now counts off the cards, showing the face of each as he does so, and leaving it exposed upon the table. The seven of diamonds has disappeared, being in fact hidden behind the prepared card, which we will suppose to be in this instance the queen of clubs.
Leaving the cards outspread upon the table, the performer opens the card-box, and shows that the missing card has somehow found its way into it.
In the hands of a novice, the trick might end at this point; but even a novice may very well carry it a stage further. To do so, he will in the first place replace the card in the box, in such a manner that it can be again “vanished.” In gathering together the outspread cards, he takes care to place the queen of clubs on top of the rest. As this, however, is the double card, the actual top card is of course the missing seven of diamonds. It is an easy matter, in handling the cards, to detach this from the queen of clubs, and, after a little “talkee-talkee,” show that it has left the box and returned to the pack.
The above would, however, be much too crude and elementary a proceeding to commend itself to the expert. In the trick next to be described the same expedient is employed after a more subtle fashion.
THE MISSING CARD
The requirements for this trick consist of two complete packs of cards and an extra card, which we will suppose to be the knave of diamonds. One of the two packs, which we will call A, has on top a card made adhesive at the back as above described, and its own knave of diamonds at the bottom. The other pack, B, is wholly unprepared.
The first step is to offer pack B to be shuffled, and when it is returned to palm on to it the spare knave of diamonds, after which the pack is left temporarily for the time being in view on the table. The next step is to pick up pack A, and force from it the knave of diamonds, receiving it back on top of the prepared card, passed to the middle of the pack for its reception. Squaring up the pack and applying the necessary pressure, the performer offers it to be shuffled, meanwhile delivering himself to something like the following effect.
“Before going further, ladies and gentlemen, I want you to remember exactly what has been done. A card has been chosen from this pack. It has been put back again, the cards have been shuffled, and you can all bear witness that I have not touched them since. Nobody knows, except the lady who chose it, what card she chose. Whereabouts in the pack it may be at this moment not one of us knows, even the lady herself. I can assure you truthfully that I don’t, but I propose, by force of magic, to compel that card, whatever it may be, to leave that pack altogether, and pass into the other one. Nay, more than that, I shall compel it to place itself at any number in that pack you like to name. What shall we say? Seventh? Good.