New York didn't want to know from Harry Houdini. I was with him when he went calling on a booking agent named Arthur Berg, who was a big fish in those days. They called him "Snaps," because he could make or break a career with a click of his fingers. Harry had been sending him stacks of clippings from small town newspapers, most of which had been planted-and sometimes even written-by yours truly. "Houdini Astounds Residents of Kennesaw." "Houdini A Delight, Say Audiences in Lynchburg." Personally, I didn't put a whole lot of stock in the good opinion of papers like the Brat-tleboro Gazette, but Harry did. He preserved each clipping as though it were edged in gold. Gathered them all up in a shiny leather binder, which he proudly laid out in front of Mr. Berg when we finally got in to see him. Snaps barely looked up from his desk. "Very nice, Mr. Houdini," he said. "But what have you done locally?"
It just about killed Harry. It was too late to hook up with another travelling show that season, and the small cash reserves we'd managed to build up on the road were draining rapidly. I finally got him a job at Huber's Fourteenth Street Museum. The dime museum. The ten-in-one.
You're too young to remember the ten-in-one. Some people called it the freak show, but it wasn't a freak show-not really. Human curiosities, they called them. Marvels of the natural world. Peerless prodigies of physical phenomena. You paid a dime, you got to see ten different acts. They say Barnum himself got it going. Gather 'round, all-the show is about to begin.
Just about every circus in America had a show like that on its midway. You paid a little extra, they lifted up the flap and let you in. It was supposed to make you feel sort of daring. The whole point was to turn the tip as quickly as possible. Sorry? The tip. That's the crowd. "Turning the tip" meant getting the crowd gathered, taking their money, and herding them through the tent as quick as you could. The acts were lined up on a platform, one after the other, and the talker would hustle the audience from one to the next as though pushing them with a broom.
Harry worked dozens of these places. In fact, they used to call him "Dime Museum Harry," and even after he'd made it big, he was always afraid that he might have to go back. It was no kind of life for Bess, I'll say that. She used to sell toothpaste to the other performers on the road, just to keep us fed.
Dime museums in New York were a whole lot different from dime museums on the road. For one thing, there were enough people in New York to keep the show running year round. On the road, stopping in the burgs and backwaters, pretty much everyone within twenty miles who had a dime would have seen the show after three days. In New York, with its constant supply of fresh marks, the shows tended to set up in storefronts and theater lobbies, rather than in tents or circus wagons. It made for more pleasant working conditions, and there was always a chance that a real live booker might catch your act. Or so we hoped.
There was only one spot open at Huber's Museum, so Harry and Bess did the act while I beat the bushes. I called on agents and managers with Harry's beloved press book, and talked a good line about his fabulous drawing power in central Illinois. I guess we'd been back in New York for about three weeks by then, and I had worked my way pretty much to the bottom of the pecking order. I seem to recall showing the book to a guy behind the screens of a Punch and Judy show. He didn't even bother to take the puppets off his hands, he just had me turn the pages for him. Even he couldn't use us.
It must have been around six in the evening when I caught the elevated train to Huber's. It was raining, and I can remember cradling the press book under my coat to protect the leather. I wasn't especially looking forward to seeing Harry. He'd just about reached the end of his tether, and I had no good news for him.
I left the train at Fourteenth Street and walked east toward Union Square. When I got to Huber's I found Albert Sandor leaning against the wall outside with a cigar clamped between his teeth, cleaning his nails with a toothpick. Albert was the outside talker at Huber's, the guy who kept up a fast-running patter to attract a crowd and move them through the "Hall of Curiosities." It was a rare thing to see Albert with his mouth shut, and I guessed that the talent was taking a doniker break.
Albert looked me up and down and gave a two-tone whistle. "Hot date?" he asked.
I was wearing a double-breasted wool suit that a tailor in Kansas City had assured me was the latest European fashion. A banker's gray with a windowpane check if you looked real close, wide lapels, and a nipped-in waist. I also had a cream-colored shirt with a fresh collar and cuffs, and a wide pukka silk tie which, if I'd unbuttoned my jacket, would have displayed a portrait of the late General Gordon. The haberdasher made me a deal. For good measure, I also had on a good pair of brown leather oxfords that still held their shine, though they no longer kept out water.
"Who's the lucky girl?" Albert asked.
"There's no girl," I said. "I wear my best suit when I go calling on bookers. It doesn't show the wear at the knees." I jerked my head toward the platform. "How's the draw?"
"Running at about three-quarter capacity," he said. "Not bad for a Tuesday."
"A tribute to the drawing power of the Great Hou-dinis, wouldn't you say? Might be time for Mr. Beck-man to move them up to the main stage." Mr. Beckman was the guy who managed Huber's at that time. He also happened to do the booking for a big variety palace called Thornton's across the street, a fact that was not lost on my brother.
Albert grinned and knocked the ash from his cigar. "Dancing girls, Dash. That's what brings the crowds, and that's what Mr. Beckman wants. 'Charming young ladies in revealing fashions.' That's what it says out front. The crowd at Thornton's wouldn't know what to make of an escapodontist."
"Escapologist."
"Whatever. Your brother is better off on the platform."
"We'll see," I said. "What sort of a mood is the justly celebrated self-liberator in this evening?"
Albert grinned and continued grooming his fingernails. "He was in a lovely humor when he came off after the three o'clock. Came up to me and demanded I deliver hot water and fresh towels to his dressing room after each performance."
"He has a dressing room?"
"Seems he's marked out some territory at the back. Near the boiler."
"Imagine that."
"So now he wants fresh towels, seeing as how he has a fancy dressing room."
"I'm sorry, Albert, he can be-"
He waved his toothpick. "Not a problem. I told him to take it up with the wardrobe mistress."
"Since when do we have a wardrobe mistress?"
"We don't"
I shifted the clipping book under my arm. "I'll talk to him."
"Do that."
"Any chance of giving him the extra time he wants? He wants to try out a new bit. Two audience members come up and tie his hands, then Harry-"
"I know, Dash. He told me all about it. He gets three minutes, just like everybody else."
"It could be a great act. He gets out of the ropes, and also a bag and a trunk. But the kicker is that-"
"-when it's all over, Bess is inside the trunk. I know, Dash. They've switched places. In the twinkling of an eye. But he still only gets three minutes. Just like everybody else."
I turned and gazed across the street at the marquee of Thornton's Theater, which was emblazoned with the name of Miss Annie Cummings, the Songbird from Savannah. "You know," I said, "my brother really is as good as he says he is."
"Sure, Dash. And one day it'll be his name up there in tall letters. And shortly after that, I'll be elected president of the United States."