The Lesson

The Third Visit, 4

— Like all swindlers, Ezra loved magicians, most especially those who escaped from bonds: handcuffs, ropes, boxes, etc. And make no mistake, Ezra was a swindler, even though he was a great master. He made terrible moves all the time! It’s just that it was hard for his opponents to see. But a magic show, have you seen such a performance?

They had been talking about Ezra for the past hour, with Stan asking questions of every sort, and Loring answering. The boy had apparently gotten a biography from someone and was reading it with the help of his oldest sister.

— I haven’t ever been to a show, he said, with as much sadness as he could muster.

— Well, in these, the magician, usually a man, is bound so he can’t possibly get out, and then, miraculously, he does. I am going to read to you from an account written by one such magician. He was a very good one, but they locked him up, and while he was in jail he wrote this book. As soon as he was done, he escaped.

— Did he stay escaped?

— He was stabbed in his sleep by the father of a girl he had taken in. He bled to death while trying to crawl out of the building. It was a boarding house with very long hallways. They rarely make buildings with hallways like that anymore. I suppose they are hazardous, at least for people who have been stabbed.

— All right, said Stan, a bit confused.

— Shall we start?

— Yes.

Stan curled up into something like the shape of a rabbit.

Loring opened a small square volume, shaped to look like a toffee box. One side unlocked, and then the flap opened and the pages might be turned. She rustled about in there for a minute or two before finding the passage she wanted.

— When one is dying, it is easy to grow fearful. And can it be called anything else but dying — being handcuffed, sewn into a bag that is then wrapped in chains and thrown into a river? The first minute, there is tremendous urgency. One feels one must struggle to escape, one tries as hard as one can, even in the smallest things: to grip the lock pick between two knuckles, pointing backwards, to use the slightest bit of razor to cut the bag. But in the second minute, and in the third, time stretches out. One feels no urgency at all, just a drifting lethargic sadness. This is the feeling of parting, and it grows on one as the breath slowly fails in the lungs. One begins to believe that one is saying goodbye — but if it happens that one believes too much, then that’s the end. Then the onlookers can dredge the river for a dead man chained up in a sack. But, if one can believe, in the midst of all that sadness, all that leave-taking, that a small thing and another small thing, each carefully, correctly done, will lead to escape…such a person may be called an escape artist, and for him there is always the tiniest bit of hope.

— Are there many of them?

— No, not many, said Loring. Of course, the bad ones don’t get very far.

She laughed.

— No, they don’t get very far at all.

— But are there any around here?

— There was one, a good one, but I don’t think he performs anymore. His theater was in a city nearby here. He was the only act that performed there; all the rest of the time, the theater was shut and no one could go in.

— Oh, I should just love to see it!

— It is something.

— What was his name?

— Dardanelle. Theodore Thomas Dardanelle, sometimes known as Menduus. He had one other amazing trick — with a broom, that I have never seen anyone else do. But I won’t ruin it for you. Perhaps one day you’ll see him, or someone else — one of his apprentices, do it. In any case, the time has come for us to play our weekly match. To the board!

Stan sat at the board. Loring sat.

The hands of the clock spun! Pieces fluttered and stood, and gathered at the corners of the table, sullen white and disconsolate black.

Soon, the boy had lost four more games.

— Next week, said Loring, we will talk about blindfold chess.

The doorbell rang.

— And here is your mother.

Stan stood, and crossed the floor. As he passed by the photograph of Ezra, it would not have been hard to suppose that there was some resemblance between the two.

Stop there, thought Loring.

Stan stopped, and stood for a minute.

— Goodbye, he said.