IT WOULD seem almost as if the old-time magicians had used all the plots possible for the presentation of card tricks and that all that is left for the successors is to improve the method by which the old effects were done. This fact is one of the reasons why the public generally complains that magic is always the same. While to a magician a modem method of doing an old trick will convert it into a new trick to the lay man it remains simply the same old effect. Not knowing, nor caring to know, the vastly improved methods used to bring the effect about, he simply asks, ‘Why do magicians always do the same things?’ The best audiences to a skilled magician are those composed of people who know something of the technical part of magic and can therefore appreciate his skill. There would seem to be a good argument here in favor of a widespread promulgation of our so-called secrets, exposures if you will, but that is apart from our subject.
The first of the ‘Stop’ tricks was used and described by Robert-Houdin almost a century ago. Briefly the effect was this-three cards were selected from a pack, replaced and the pack shuffled. Standing beside a table the magician removed cards from the top one by one and laid them down, at the same time inviting the first of the spectators who had taken a card to call ‘Now’ whenever he chose, and stating that no matter when the call was made the card then in his hand would be the spectator’s. Such proved to be the case and the same effect was repeated with the remaining cards.
The Effect As Worked By Ralph W. Read
PROPS AND PREPARATION. A regular pack and a three-bank forcing pack to match; also the well-known ‘Card Servante’.
The forcing pack consists of ’short’ cards, say sixteen each of 9D, JS and 2H, with a ‘long’ card between each bank and one ‘long’ card on the bottom. These three ‘long’ cards are all alike, say ASH. Now add two indifferent ‘long’ cards to the pack, say a AS on bottom and a ADD on the top. This pack now has fifty-three cards which go in clip of the card servants on back of table or chair.
In the regular pack locate the AD, JS and ASH placing them on top of pack, and all is ready.
PERFORMANCE. False shuffle regular pack and force the AD, JS and ASH in order. Let spectators shuffle their cards back in, then you take pack, return to the platform and state what has been done, stressing the fact that each spectator shuffled. While talking you cut the pack a few times, but don’t expose any cards.
You now reach for the table (bearing servants with hand holding the regular pack ready for the switch, bring the table forward, and with forcing pack now in your hand, casually expose the bottom card AS . . . ‘I shall now remove the cards’ (you glance at AS . . . ‘I hope no one took this bottom one’ (remove AS and lay face down on the table). . . ‘I shall take them one at a time’ (remove top card–4D–and give the audience a flash of it) and place this on the table (lay down ADD ‘Will the party who selected the first card please say “Now” when he feels the impulse?’ You are slowly removing cards AD, one by one, placing them on the table as you speak and of course you hold his card when he calls ‘Now’.
If they delay saying ‘Now,’ you remove cards at snail’s pace-you can be as slow as they, and need never run beyond the sixteen bank. You can by play as to ‘this one, or the next?’–’Do you want to change your mind?’ etc., before you expose the card, and always have them name it before you turn it over.
You make the pass at the first ‘long’ card before starting on the second selection, and likewise for the last card. If the bottom card is accidentally exposed, the same ASH. gives mute evidence that there has been no manipulation.
A later addition to Robert Houdin’s trick provided for the spectator striking a bell of the push button variety instead of calling ‘Now’. For stage purposes the trick as described is still one of the most effective possible with cards but it is not suitable for close work or small audiences. The method that follows is specially adapted for such cases.
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