"Never mind," Lieutenant Murray said. "Not important."
"He's been like this for days," Harry told the lieutenant. "Bess thinks he hit his head."
"My head is fine," I said. I gestured toward the closed doors where the council of city elders was taking place. "Can they really expect to hush the entire matter up?" I wondered. "You realize, Lieutenant, that my brother has never been one to suppress his own exploits."
"The public would be most interested-" Harry began.
"Tell me, Houdini," said the lieutenant. "Are your citizenship papers in order?"
The color drained from Harry's cheeks. "Don't be absurd!" he cried. "I'm as American as you are! I was born in Appleton, Wisconsin!"
"You're sure it wasn't Budapest?" He set down his tea cup as carefully as if it had been a hatching chick. "Look, Houdini, I don't give a tinker's damn whether you were born in Wisconsin or in Hungary or on the planet Jupiter. I'm just warning you. That's what they're going to use to keep you quiet." He sighed and looked at the closed doors. "These men always manage to get their way."
Matters developed much as the lieutenant had predicted. When the city worthies emerged from behind the closed doors, Harry and I were informed that certain information would be withheld from the general public so as to spare the Hendricks family any further distress. "I think poor Mrs. Hendricks has borne enough sorrow, don't you, gentlemen?" asked Mr. Grace. "Better for everyone if we keep this business to ourselves, wouldn't you agree?"
When it was clear that the Brothers Houdini were not prepared to argue, a climate of merry good fellowship prevailed-complete with whiskey and cigars and a series of ribald jokes from Mr. Platt. By the time the whiskey decanter had been drained and refilled three times, the company had grown extremely jovial indeed. I was enjoying a rubber of whist with a pair of aldermen and the junior senator when I happened to spy Harry across the smoke-filled room, deep in conversation with Mr. Grace. "That's the strangest request I've ever received, Mr. Houdini," I heard him say. "People usually want my help going the other way!" He clapped his arm across my brother's shoulders. "Let me see what I can fix up."
And so it came to pass that Harry got himself locked up in the Sing-Sing State Prison after all, while a retinue of journalists awaited news of his success or failure in the warden's office. It was arranged that I should join him in this adventure as well, so that I might share in the expected publicity windfall. Now, locked away in separate cells facing one another across a gloomy expanse of prison corridor, I found myself regretting my decision to participate. First of all, I had not realized that I would be obliged to submit to the most rigorous and degrading medical body search that one could possibly imagine. Also, Harry and I were both stark naked. The
guards had taken away all of our clothing, to forestall any possibility that we had tools concealed in them.
"Harry," I called, "can you hear me?" I leaned against the cell door and then quickly recoiled. The bars were freezing cold.
"Of course I can hear you, Dash."
"What are we doing here? You never did manage to break out of the lock-up at the precinct house. What makes you think you'll have any better luck here at Sing-Sing?"
"Call it a hunch," he answered. "I saw an opportunity and I seized it. We couldn't possibly ask for a better advertisement! Did you see how many newspapermen there were out there? Our names will be in every paper in town!"
"Madman and Brother Locked Away at Own Request," I said, imagining the headline my friend Biggs was likely to supply. "Best For All Concerned, Says Governor." I sat down on the metal bunk in my cell. "Good Lord, that's cold!" I cried, jumping up again. "Did they have to take away our clothing?"
"I'm afraid I insisted on it. I thought it would make our triumph more dramatic."
"But Harry, I don't see how you can possibly have concealed the lock-pick and reaching tool."
"I didn't."
"Pardon?"
"I don't have a lock-pick. I don't have a reaching tool."
I stepped to the door and gripped the bars. "Harry-''
"I learned a great deal down there in that tunnel beneath Mr. Wintour's house," Harry said. "I learned a great deal about treachery and deceit, and about what makes a man brave and what makes him foolish. I suppose Bess was right all along. I'm no hero, Dash. Josef and Frieda Graff are dead, and the world is no better for their passing. We might just as well have stayed at the dime museum."
"Harry, you know that's not-"
"There's one other thing I learned, Dash. I learned that appearances count for a great deal-perhaps more than the truth itself. Mr. Hendricks hoped to win a fortune by making it appear that he had done something he had not. I intend to do the same."
"What?"
"For weeks now I have been concentrating all my energy on how to escape from these cells. This was foolish. All that matters is to make it appear that I have escaped from the cell. I have Mr. Hendricks to thank for this."
"I'm not following you, Harry. This is no stage set. We're locked in a pair of cells at Sing-Sing. Either we escape or we don't. There's no room for window dressing."
"We're not locked in," said Harry.
"We're not?"
"No."
"Gee, Harry. These bars look pretty solid, and that lock seems awfully secure. Unless you're planning to bribe one of the guards, I really don't see how-"
"I would never bribe the guards. That would be dishonest."
"Then how do you propose to get out of here? You have no lock-pick, and even if you did, the lock is all the way down at the end of the corridor!"
"Do you remember when we used to play round robin, Dash? When we were boys in Appleton?"
"Harry, let me call the guard. You're clearly not yourself."
"Do you remember all those long afternoons I spent throwing a ball against the side of our house? Throwing and catching, for hours and hours at a time?"
"Of course, Harry, but-"
I heard a ragged, coughing sound from Harry's cell. His hands went to his mouth.
"What do you have there, Harry?"
"An India rubber ball. I swallowed it forty minutes ago."
"Harry, what in God's name-?"
"Watch this, Dash." He leaned against the door of his cell and let his arms dangle' through the bars. I could just see the little rubber ball clutched in his right hand. "You see the lock?"
"Of course."
"How far away do you suppose it is?"
"I don't know. Ten feet?"
"Eleven and three-quarters. Keep your eyes on the lock, Dash." Harry drew his right hand back and sailed the rubber ball at the opposite wall. I heard a faint thudding noise as the ball bounced against the brick, caromed off the floor, and struck the metal padlock squarely in the middle. To my astonishment, the heavy padlock instantly popped open and dropped to the floor with a noisy clatter.
"Harry-how-?"
"It was never locked, Dash. When I asked the warden to let me examine it, I stuffed a packet of cotton wadding down into the opening. It was sufficient to hold the shackle-bar in place, but it prevented the lock mechanism from engaging. The padlock was never properly fastened. We were never truly locked in."
I stared at the open lock on the floor between us. "That's absolutely brilliant," I said. "Why didn't I think of it?"
"Because, Dash," said Harry, pulling open the door of his cell, "you have no imagination."
Daniel Stashower
