Free Now You See It: A Toby Peters Mystery by Stuart M. Kaminsky

weren’t looking for a man dressed like the one who had shot Gwen. We were looking for someone who had lost the disguise.
    “Would your friend please release my guest,” Ott said, pointing his drink at Phil whose right hand was now firmly around the turbaned man’s neck.
    “He’s my brother,” I said. “And my partner. And he has a very bad temper.”
    “And a voice of his own,” said Phil, letting the man go. “What the hell is going on here?”
    “I understand you were a policeman,” said Ott, emphasizing the word “were.”
    The man Ott had called “Leo” staggered back. It was not a magic moment for him.
    “I could call a real policeman and have him take you away,” said Ott, sweeping his cigarette-bearing hand in a broad arc.
    “Not before I convince you to tell us what the hell is going on here,” Phil said, taking a menacing step toward Ott who stood his ground.
    “It’s the anniversary of the death of Dranabadur,” Ott said, looking at a poster on his left.
    I remembered it now from the last time I had been here. The turbaned man, the emerald, the whiskers. I looked at it again. Dranabadur’s dark face filled the poster with the words: Dranabadur, the Orient’s Master of the Singing Blade of Death.
    “Leo, are you alright?” Ott asked casually.
    “Yes,” Leo gasped, moving past Ott.
    “Come,” Ott said with a smile I didn’t like as he turned his back on us and began to walk. “Dranabadur was a little known genius. Died twenty-seven years ago at exactly one-fifty-three in the morning, if the hospital report is to be believed.”
    We followed him as he talked.
    “Dranabadur’s real name was Irving Frankel,” Ott said. “Born in Brookline, Massachusetts, of less than noble or Oriental origin. He was a genius and went to his death without revealing the secret of his most famous trick, the singing blade.”
    “What killed him?” I asked.
    “The blade, of course,” said Ott, stepping into the living room that looked the same as when I’d last seen it, except it was now full of people. There were seven of them, all men, or, at least, I thought they were all men. They were all wearing white suits, beards, and turbans with a green stone. They were also all standing and facing us. Some of them had drinks in their hand.
    The little chubby one called Leo, who had greeted us at the door, moved to join the others.
    “Where’s your costume?” Phil asked Ott.
    “I never wear one for these events,” he said. “I lead the service. And I provide the reward of fifty thousand dollars to the one who solves Dranabadur’s illusion of the singing blade, solves it and gives me exclusive and binding rights to it.”
    He looked at his watch.
    “Hey,” Phil said, stepping in front of Ott who smiled more broadly, a mistake when dealing with my brother.
    I could see that Phil was giving serious consideration to committing mayhem.
    “We can talk after the memorial service,” said Ott, taking a step to his right so that he could see past Phil.
    I touched Phil’s arm, realizing too late that instead of restraining him, it might turn him on me.
    “We’re about to begin,” Ott announced.
    “Oh Christ,” sighed Phil. “This is bullshit, Tobias.”
    I shrugged. One of the Dranabadurs standing near the wall on our right reached up and flicked a switch. The room went dark. Then a dim green glow came from the ceiling. Light danced green on the well-polished head of the dark skull of Bombay, still sitting in the same place he had last faced me.
    “Magic,” said Ott, his face green, his smile more than a little nuts. “We live to perform, to dazzle, to mystify. We honor at the anniversary of their moment of departure those who have come before us, those who have achieved.…” He hesitated trying to find the right words.
    “The highest plateau of deception,” one of the whiskered group supplied.
    “Yes, thank you,” Ott said. “The highest plateau of deception. Dranabadur’s singing blade