• It was a normal London night, with a slight drizzle, the kind England is known for, and the fog that London has for so long been portrayed as having in the film industry. And it was on this night that people slowly trickled into the old dusty theater that is the Peculiar Cabernet. They trickled in, in twos and threes, and fours, as single people, as couples, as families. They pay their five quid apiece, to get their seat, the old blood red velvet faded to a pale red, all ripped with the fuzz creeping out. Soon everyone has sat down and the lights are dimmed. A spot light comes on, brightly lighting the man wearing a top hat, who is standing on stage, legs spread, and the tails of his coats seen behind them. His hands are clasped on top of his ebony cane that is like a spear stabbed into the stage in front of him. He stares out over the audience, silently. He pierces each and every person in a seat with a glance that seems as if it peeled back the layers of their lives, as if he knew everything about all of them, all their sins. Things like the affair that one man was having with the teenage nanny of his eight year old son, or the kitten that one little girl had locked up in a box with out food or water. After a few days it had stopped mewling so she buried it, box and all, in the back yard. This man, this stage master, with his fierce eyes peering over his spectacles knew everything about everyone in that theater.
    “You have all come here tonight, for whatever reason.”
    When he speaks it is in a deep baritone, the words shaking and vibrating its way into each person’s cerebellum.
    “However what you will get is not what you want, merely what you need.” A pause as he sweeps the crowd with his gaze once more.
    “These feats of magic and sorcery that you are to see tonight are unlike any you may have seen before. For unlike those hacks,” and he infuses that word with scorn, “that may have amused your fancies before, this show has no trapdoors, no smoke, no false bottoms or false hats, nothing up the sleeves or down the boots, no doubles and no mirrors. This show, ladies and gentlemen, is real magic. I don’t think that you’ll enjoy it.”
    And as he bows, just like that, he is gone and with no smoke, just as he had said. The light goes off and the show begins. And such a show was it; men being transported from box to box, women being cut in half, people vanishing and reappearing, doves appearing between the magicians hands, sword swallowing and fire breathing, card tricks and coin tricks, items floating, items being multiplied. And throughout it all the audience stares impassively at the stage, blank eyes betraying nothing. Except for one couple; a love filled boy and matching girl who oohhh and aahhh at every trick. And finally the finale; what the magicians titled the “Enchanted Casement.” The rest of the crowd continues to stare, no emotion showing, but the teenage couple is no longer filled with awe. Instead they stare with eyes wide, mouths agape, at the magic that is occurring on the stage. But let us go to the trick, the witchcraft on that stage, which changed them so. It is simple enough; a man walks on stage and hangs a window in mid air, with faces appearing behind it, but there is no one there. So simple and yet it affected them so. One could assume that it was a great illusion, and like all great illusions made the couple question the nature of reality. But soon it was over, the lights go out, the show is done. People get up and leave, as emotionless and silently as they watched, as mechanically as they came. Even the two teenagers so filled with love, who oohhhed and aahhhed throughout the show. If anything this was an audience who couldn’t tell the difference between magic and illusion, and to whom it would make no difference to them if every illusion was real. And as they walked out that teenage couple felt changed by what they had seen during that show, felt that once again, if only for a while, like when they were children, that magic was still alive and well in their world of technology, of steel and electricity, their world full of smoke and mirrors. And as they slept that night, holding each other in their arms, sweat mixing together, they dream of the “Enchanted Casement”, just like all the others of that audience. They dreamt and saw how the window was hung by hidden wires, that the faces were merely portrayed onto the glass by angled mirrors that reflected the faces of people standing off stage and out of sight. It was easy once you knew how it was done. And once again the night is foggy and wet, and after the drudgery of the day, the crowd walks along, emotionlessly, silent, one could even say zombie like, to the Peculiar Cabernet on the pier at the end of Hawthorn Street. And there they pay their five quid apiece, to sit down in the ripped and faded velvet seats. Once again the lights go dim, a spotlight flashes on, lighting a bespectacled, top hat wearing man, as he gazes over the crowd.
    “You have all come here tonight, for whatever reason.”
    Same deep baritone voice, shaking and vibrating its way through your ears.
    “However what you will get is not what you want, merely what you need.”
    The same pause, the same sweep of the eyes.
    “These feats of magic and sorcery that you are to see tonight are unlike any you may have seen before. For unlike those hacks,” same scornful emphasis on the word, “that may have amused your fancies before, this show has no trapdoors, no smoke, no false bottoms or false hats, nothing up the sleeves or down the boots, no doubles and no mirrors. This show, ladies and gentlemen, is real magic. I don’t think that you’ll enjoy it.”
    And the show begins; the same audience watching the same stage, the same tricks, blankly, silently and emotionlessly, showing nothing at the magic being performed; except for the new family of three, husband, wife and son, who oohhh and aahhh, in unison. But the teenage couple, love filled boy and matching girl sitting front and center, stare, making no sounds, no faces, waiting like the rest for the “Enchanted Casement”, forever waiting. Its easy once you know how its done.