Jeffery Deaver - The Vanished Man

"I -"

"Did you see them? Driving out to the desert yesterday?"

"I didn't see them."

She examined him closely and decided he was telling the truth. "If you do see them you let me know."

And she left him for her spaghetti, coagulating on a TV tray in the living room.

"My money, Mom!"

"Shut up. It's the Daily Double."

One day, performing a small show in Abracadabra, the boy was surprised to notice a slim, unsmiling man enter the store. As he walked toward the Magic Cavern all the magicians and clerks in the store fell silent. He was a famous illusionist and was appearing at the Tropicana. He was known for his temper and his dark, scary illusions.

After the show the illusionist gestured the boy over and nodded at the handwritten sign on stage. "You call yourself 'Young Houdini'?"

"Yeah."

"You think you're worthy of that name?"

"I don't know. I just liked it."

"Do some more." Nodding at a velvet table.

The boy did, nervous now, as the legend watched his moves.

A nod, which seemed to be an approving nod. That a fourteen-year-old boy would receive a compliment like this stunned the magicians in the room to silence.

"You want a lesson?"

The boy nodded, thrilled.

"Let me have the coins."

He held his open palm to offer the coins. The illusionist looked down, frowning.

"Where are they?"

His hand was empty. The illusionist, laughing harshly at the boy's bewildered expression, had already dipped them; the quarters were in his own hands. The boy was astonished; he hadn't felt a thing.

"Now I'll hold this one up in the air…"

The boy looked up but suddenly some instinct said, Close your fingers now! He's going to put the coins back. Embarrass him in front of a roomful of magicians. Grab his hand!

Suddenly, without looking down, the illusionist froze and whispered, "Are you sure you want to do it?"

The boy blinked in surprise. "I -"

"Think twice." A glance down at the boy's hand.

Young Houdini looked at his palm, which was tensed to catch the great illusionist's. He saw to his shock that the man had placed something there, but not the coins: five double-sided razor blades. If he'd closed his fingers as he'd planned, Young Houdini would've needed a dozen stitches.

"Let me see your hands," he said, taking the blades out of them and vanishing them instantly.

Young Houdini held his palms up and the man touched them, stroked them with his thumbs. It felt to the boy that there was an electric current running between them.

"You've got the hands to be great," he whispered for the boy alone to hear. "You've got the drive and I know you've got the cruelty… But you don't have the vision. Not yet." A blade appeared again and the man used it to slice through a piece of paper, which began to bleed. He crumpled the paper and then opened it up. There was no slash and no blood. He handed it to the boy, who noticed that on the inside was an address, written in red ink.

As the small audience of onlookers cheered and clapped with genuine admiration, or jealousy, the illusionist whispered, "Come see me," leaning forward, his lips brushing Young Houdini's ear. "You have a lot to learn. And I have a lot to teach."

The boy kept the illusionists address but he couldn't work up the courage to go see him. Then, at his fifteenth birthday party, his mother changed the course of his life forever by flying into a tirade and flinging a platter of fettuccine at her husband over some recently received intelligence about the notorious Mrs. Loam. Bottles flew, collectibles shattered, police arrived.

The boy decided he'd had enough. The next day he went to visit the illusionist, who agreed to be his mentor. The timing was perfect. In two days the man was starting an extensive tour of the United States. He needed an assistant. Young Houdini cleaned out his secret bank account and did just what his namesake had done: he ran away from home to work as a magician. There was one major difference between them, however; unlike Harry Houdini, who'd left home only to make money to help his impoverished family and who was soon reunited with them, young Malerick would never see any member of his again.

"Hey, how you doing?"

The woman's husky voice woke him out of these durable memories as he sat at the bar of the Upper West Side tavern. A regular here, he guessed. Fiftyish trying unsuccessfully for the illusion of ten years younger, she'd picked this hunting ground based largely on the dim lighting. She scooted onto a stool next to his and was leaning forward, flying a flag of cleavage.

"Sorry?"

"Just asked how you're doing. Don't think I've seen you in here."

"Just in town for a day or two."

"Ah," she said drunkenly. "Say, I need a light." Conveying the irritating impression that he should consider it a privilege to light her cigarette.

"Oh, sure," he said.

He clicked a lighter and held it up. This flame flickered madly, he observed, as she wrapped her red, bony fingers around his to guide the lighter to her lips.

"Thanks." She shot a narrow stream of smoke toward the ceiling. When she looked back Malerick had paid the bill and was pushing away from the bar.

She frowned.

"I have to go." He smiled and said, "Oh, here, you can keep that."

He handed her the small metal lighter. She took it and blinked. Her frown deepened. It was her own lighter, which he'd dipped from her purse when she'd leaned toward him.

Malerick whispered coldly, "Guess you didn't need one after all." Leaving her at the bar, two tears leading the mascara down her cheeks, he thought that of all the sadistic illusions he'd perpetrated, and had planned for, this weekend – the blood, the cut flesh, the fire – this one would perhaps be the most satisfying.

• • •

She heard the sirens when they were two blocks away from Rhyme's.

Amelia Sachs's mind did one of those funny jogs: hearing the urgent electronic catcall from some emergency vehicle, thinking the sound seemed to be coming from the direction of his townhouse.

Of course it wasn't, she decided.

Too much of a coincidence.

But then, the flashing lights, blue and red, were on Central Park West, where his place was located.

Come on, girl , she reassured herself, it's your imagination, stoked by the memory of the eerie harlequin on the banner in front of the Cirque Fantastique tent in the park, the masked performers, the horror of the Conjurer's murders.

They were making her paranoid.

Spooky…

Forget it.

Shifting the large shopping bag containing garlicky Cuban food from one hand to the other, she and Kara continued down the busy sidewalk, talking about parents, about careers, about the Cirque Fantastique. About men too.

Bang, bang…

The young woman sipped her double Cuban coffee, to which, she said, she'd become addicted at first taste. Not only was it half the price of Starbucks', Kara pointed out, but it was twice as strong. "I'm not sure about the math but I think that makes it four times as good," the young woman said. "I'll tell you, I love finds like this. It's the little things in life, don't you think?"

But Sachs had lost the thread of the conversation. Another ambulance sped by.

She sent a silent prayer that it keep going past Rhyme's.

It didn't. The vehicle braked to a fast stop at the corner next to his building.

"No," she whispered.

"What's going on?" Kara wondered. "An accident?"

Heart pounding, Sachs dropped the bags of food and began sprinting toward the building.

"Oh, Lincoln…"

Kara started after her, spilled hot coffee on her hand and dropped the cup. She kept up the pace beside the policewoman. "What's going on?"