Free As if by Magic by Kerry Wilkinson Page A

smoke drifted away towards the roof. ‘He doesn’t have a phone. Come on, we can figure this out. We know it’s an illusion – people can’t just disappear. What were you watching?’
    Dave looked upwards, trying to remember. ‘The smoke distracted me for a moment but it was mainly him. I only looked away for less time than it would have taken to blink.’
    Jessica climbed down on to the floor and checked the empty canister, then walked the length of the stage. She opened a hatch in the front corner and peered inside, under the area where Balthazar had been sitting.
    ‘There’s an area under here,’ she said. ‘Do you want to go crawling around?’
    Dave pulled a face, then crouched down and started running his hand along the wood of the stage. ‘There’s no trapdoor here and there’s no way he could have got to where you are without us seeing him.’
    Jessica knew he was right and closed the hatch, letting it drop into place with a hard thump which echoed around the room.
    ‘Mirrors?’ Dave said.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Aren’t all these things done with mirrors?’
    ‘Surely that would be exposed the minute we moved?’
    Dave shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’
    Jessica walked backwards away from the stage, staring at the set-up and trying to think in three dimensions. He couldn’t have gone up, left or right because the smoke wouldn’t have covered him. He couldn’t have gone under the stage as there was no hidden door, forwards would have taken him towards them, which only left backwards.
    Jessica hopped on to the stage and walked to the far back wall. She ran a hand along the whitewashed surface but the bricks felt solid and unmoving. Dave was walking around the stage, each footstep making the floorboards creak. Jessica sat, resting her head against the wall and staring at the back of the throne.
    And then she saw it.
    Breaking into a grin, Jessica crossed her legs. ‘That’s a pretty good trick,’ she said loudly. Dave turned to look at her, eyebrows raised in confusion. Jessica dismissed him with a wave of her hand and continued speaking. ‘We can wait here all day if you want, it can’t be that comfortable.’
    Jessica listened but there was no response. ‘I bet that was quite the shock when we turned up yesterday with those items,’ she said. ‘The only thing I’m not sure of is if they ever really existed. I’m afraid you gave yourself away with your reaction.’
    For a moment, Jessica thought she was going to have to wait but then she heard a gentle tapping sound. She stood and smiled thinly at Dave, then crossed to the throne. From the front, the platform was narrow, just the width of the three steps, but from the back it was easier to see where the arch underneath the steps bulged ever so slightly. The throne was fixed to the platform but she pushed hard on the seat part until it collapsed on a hinge. As that swung downwards, a piece of the platform opened upwards, forming a tunnel that dropped into a hidden compartment in the curved part of the “D”. As she peered in, Jessica could see Balthazar’s face staring up at her with a weary smile on his face.
    ‘Ta-da!’ he said weakly as Jessica reached in to help pull him out.
    * * * * * * * * * * * * *
    The trick had worked solely because of the showmanship. The mechanics were incredibly simple. The curtain had stopped them seeing anything from below Balthazar’s chest but, as they assumed he was still sitting on the throne because his head position hadn’t changed, he flipped the same mechanism on the seat that Jessica had. The platform was completely hollow, meaning he could rest his feet within the arched part of the “D”. As soon as the smoke went off, he slid down into the platform’s hidden aluminium compartment, and the seat popped back into place. The whole thing had happened in barely a second but Jessica guessed that was what happened when you practised enough. Balthazar was, after all, nothing but an experienced