The Murder Artist

CHAPTER 25

I put in a call to Shoffler to tell him that I think his hunch may have been right on the money, that the link between the Gablers and my sons is one that we never would have come up with in a thousand years: magic. I want to talk it through with the detective, get his advice. But it turns out he’s in France for some kind of security conference. I leave a message.

I can intuit some of his advice, anyway. While I’m in Vegas, I should try to determine if The Piper worked here as a magician and follow out whatever other local leads I have.

Turns out, if it’s about magic, Vegas is the place to be. After three days, I’ve seen more doves and lighted candles materialize and disappear than I can count. It’s beginning to seem routine to me that a man in a tuxedo snaps his fingers and a dove or a duck – or a goose! – flutters into existence out of thin air. Or that he might turn a top hat upside down, thump it to show it’s empty, even call a volunteer to thrust a hand into its vacant interior. And then, with a wave of his wand, voilà! A rabbit. A real rabbit, which hops around on the stage, bewildered.

I’ve seen scarves and ropes and pieces of paper torn into shreds and restored to amazing intactness with the help of a few magic words. I’ve witnessed feats of mind reading, miraculous escapes, levitations, and dozens of transformations (a shred of paper into a bird, a ball into a rabbit, a doll into a woman, a piece of rope into a snake).

Any number of times, I’ve seen leggy beauties disappear, after which they step out, preening and smiling, from impossible and unexpected locations – the rear of the theater, for instance. At the San Remo, Showgirls of Magic (topless in the evening) are just what they sound like: leggy beauties doing tricks with cards and coins and, yes, bunnies.

After the shows, there are opportunities to buy merchandise; shops sell mementos of the performing magician, along with standard tricks and magic kits, reproduction posters, biographies of Houdini, books about magic.

It’s in these shops that I show my sketches of The Piper to magician clerks and cashiers, who perform card tricks and sleight of hand while they make change. I tell them the man in the sketch is a magician. Do they recognize him? A couple “think so,” but no one can put a name or place to the memory.

I’m getting myself a beer before the Lance Burton show when a bear of a man approaches me. “Boyd Veranek,” he says, “with a V. Pleased to meet you. Watch this.”

I get it – the guy’s going to do a magic trick. I don’t want to be his audience, but it’s crowded and without being rude, I can’t get away from him. He cups his huge pawlike hands together and pulls them slowly apart. In between his palms, a paper rose hovers and trembles in midair. He abruptly jerks his hands wide apart and the flower drifts toward the floor. He plucks it out of the air, holds it by the stem, and with a little bow, presents it to me.

It’s made from a Lance Burton napkin, its petals ingeniously scalloped, the stem tightly coiled paper. Veranek beams at me.

“You just made this… here? That’s pretty good.”

“Works better with the ladies, I guess,” Veranek says with a smile. “Hey – I saw you at Showgirls of Magic, saw you at Penn and Teller. Figured you’re a fellow illusionist. Am I right?”

“Not exactly – but I can see that you are.”

Veranek smiles, shrugs. “You might say. I’m a retired engineer. I used to do magic as a hobby, but it’s become a second career. I do kids’ parties, bar and bat mitzvahs, the occasional cruise or trade show. Helps, given what happened to my portfolio. Now, that was a disappearing act.” He laughs and I join him. “So if you’re not a magician,” he says, “you’re what? A magic junkie?”

I tell him that I’m a private investigator. That I’m looking into a murder. I no longer bring up my kids if I can help it, hoping to sidestep the predictable sequence that follows disclosure of my nightmare. Recognition and the obligatory expression of sympathy give way to fascination and then to a barely disguised repugnance. The fascination is easy to understand: it’s the instinct that makes us stare at car crashes. The repugnance is similar to what cancer victims or the disabled must recognize: Despite the fact that whatever is wrong is not contagious, there’s nevertheless a fear of contagion. A terrible thing happened to me: No one wants to catch my bad luck.

“A murder?” Boyd Veranek squints at me, as if he’s not sure whether I’m joking or not. “And all of these magic shows fit into this investigation… how? If you don’t mind my asking.”

“I think the killer is a magician.”

“Oh, boy. There goes the neighborhood. A professional? An amateur?”

I shake my head. “Don’t know. But I have some sketches. Mind taking a look?”

“By all means.” He squints, studies the sketches, shakes his head. “The murder was here? In Vegas?”

“Nearby. It was about three years ago. Showgirls murdered out in the Red Rock Canyon. You might have heard of it.”

He frowns, but any memory of the murders has been replaced by some fresher brutality. “Boy. I’m hitting all these shows to see if I can get a new wrinkle or two for my act, and you’re doing it… wow… to track a killer.”

I nod.

“You really want to know about magic – you ought to talk to Karl Kavanaugh,” Veranek says. “He lives here in Vegas and he knows everything.”

“Who is he?”

“He’s a magician, although he doesn’t perform much anymore. He works for Copperfield – who has a museum of magic here.”

“Really.”

“It’s a private museum, but the point is Karl knows everything about magic – A to Z. He’s a magician’s magician. He might be able to help you. Might even recognize your guy.”

“You have his number?”

“I don’t. Not on me. He’s probably in the book – Karl with a K, Kavanaugh, also with a K. If not, give me a call, because I can probably track down his number for you. I’m at the Luxor. Veranek, with a V.”

“Okay, thanks a lot.”

It’s only a few minutes until showtime and the crowd begins to drift into the auditorium. I’m about to join them when Veranek thrusts a glass into my hands. “Here comes my wife. Would you hold this for a sec?”

He’s fiddling with his program, doing something fast and furious with his hands. Moments later, a sweet-faced woman squeezes through the crowd and appears at his side.

“There was a line,” she says, “in the little girls’ room.”

“I’d say you just got out in time,” Veranek says. “Look what you picked up in there. Must have come outta the plumbing.” He plucks something from her shoulder and holds it in his cupped hand. An ingeniously fashioned frog crouches there. Somehow, he makes it jump.

“Oh, Boyyyyyd.” The woman giggles like a teenager.

I stare at the frog, which reminds me powerfully of the origami rabbit I found on the boys’ bureau.

A jolt of paranoia hits me. This guy approached me, not the other way around. He looks nothing like my sketch of The Piper, but he is tall. He makes folded animals. He does magic tricks.

“That’s amazing,” I hear myself say. “That frog, that’s really good.”

“Nah – it’s not very good. I’m way rusty. Mostly I do balloon art these days. Origami’s kind of faded. Too bad, in a way. Folding has a very long history in magic. It kind of figures – you know?”

“What do you mean?”

“For one thing, it requires dexterity,” Veranek says, “and if nothing else, magicians are good with their hands. Also – it’s a transformation. Just a few folds and you turn a flat piece of paper into a bird, an animal. People like that. But you don’t see much folding anymore. It’s all balloons these days.” He smiles. “Same idea, though.”

I feel a sense of pressure in my head, as if I’m underwater. “Can you do a rabbit?”

“Boyd,” the sweet-faced woman says, “I don’t want to miss the beginning of Lance.”

“Don’t worry, honey; I can make a rabbit in thirty seconds flat.”

And he does. With impressive manual dexterity, Veranek tears the back of his program into a square. Seconds later, he’s transformed it into a cute little bunny. It looks nothing like the rabbit I found in the boys’ room. I tell myself that it proves nothing, not really, but my suspicion of Boyd Veranek evaporates.

The lights in the foyer begin to flash.

“That’s amazing,” I say, admiring the rabbit perched on the back of Veranek’s hand.

“Boyd,” his wife says. “Come on.”

Veranek executes a little bow and – I don’t see it happen – makes the rabbit disappear.