Free The Bullet Trick by Louise Welsh Page B

attention, slender strips of colour connecting them to me. I wanted to keep them at the moment the ribbon was at its tautest, and never let it snap until my final bow.
     
    The music died and I slid into my set, I was halfway through the first trick when I heard the whisper of conversation. The fragile strands connecting me to the audience snapped and it was as if I was a lonely soul on the top deck holding a bunch of limp streamers without even a breeze to give them a flutter.
     
    There was a clink of glass on glass as drinks were refreshed. A jarring note of laughter where there should have been the silence of suspense. I did the only thing I could do, kept the smile on my face and stumbled on until the moment came for the house lights to be raised. Now I could see the faces of my audience, too many of them in profile. I stepped forward, feeling like a man on the scaffold, and asked for a volunteer.
     
    Later, Sylvie would show me this was the wrong way to go about things. But that evening even the old lady who sold the tin toys stopped her rounds and waited for my humiliation. I paused three beats beyond comfort, unable to spot a dupe amongst the crowd, putting all my will into not begging. The stage lights seemed to flare again, the audience bled out of focus and even the candles seemed to lose their glow. A bead of perspiration slid down my spine. Then a young woman got to her feet and I knew everything was going to work out fine. And so it did, for a while.
     
    The girl bounded onto the stage with so much confidence I suddenly thought the audience might assume her to be my accomplice. I shouldn’t have worried. Even on that first night, though I was the one with the tricks and the tailcoat, everyone wanted to see what Sylvie would do.
     
    My volunteer was a slim girl in high-stacked boots and an old-fashioned shirtdress that showed off her figure. Her hair was sleek, cut close to her head, and her lips were painted a vampire red that glistened under the stage lights. She turned to face the audience. Her stare was confident, her mouth amused and I realised I should never have chosen her for my dupe. I swallowed, arranged my features in the semblance of a smile then went into my patter.
     
    'So, gorgeous, what’s your name?'
     
    'Sylvie.'
     
    She had an American accent, all Coca-Cola, Coors and Marlboros, a bland corporate voice that could have come from almost anywhere.
     
    'And what brings you to Berlin?'
     
    Sylvie shrugged and looked out into the darkness beyond the stage.
     
    'Life?'
     
    The crowd laughed, and I smiled, though I didn’t see the joke.
     
    'So, would you like to help me with a trick?'
     
    'I guess so.'
     
    Again her voice was deadpan and again a ripple of laughter worked its way through the audience. I might not be getting the jokes, but I was grateful. The clatter of glasses and conversation had ceased and all eyes were on us, the audience rooting for Sylvie, waiting for her to upstage me.
     
    I turned her towards me, looked into her grey-green eyes and grinned.
     
    'OK then, let’s get on with the show.'
     
    The shell game is an ancient trick also known as Chase the Lady, also known as Thimblerig. The man who first taught me prefaced his lesson with a warning.
     
    'This is a trick as old as Egypt — older, I don’t doubt. It has saved many a man from starvation and landed many another in debt or jail. The wise man is always on the showing side, never on the guessing.'
     
    My old teacher was right, but it isn’t big news that it’s better to be the sharper than the sharper’s dupe, so my variation had an extra distraction to twist the ruse.
     
    I fanned three brown envelopes in my left hand, and raised a picture of the crown jewels in my right, holding it high in the air so that the audience could see it. I’d thought that the royalist kick might go down well with the Germans, after all, they were related. I slid the photograph into one of the envelopes, making sure that