Original by Stewart James
This trick, in its original form, already used a marked deck. All I added was the use of the corner-marked card. A small improvement, certainly, but it allows you to begin with the spectators shuffling the deck, which produces a big increase in the audience’s reaction, which is the ultimate test. Besides nobody knows this trick and it’s fantastic. It is in The James File, Volume One, page 1,171.
Effect
Two spectators shuffle a deck. You make two predictions on business cards, and the spectators use random numbers to select two cards. The first prediction matches Ricky’s card. The second prediction matches Lee’s card and is not written—it’s printed on the back of the business card.
Most of the tricks in this collection combine the marked deck with something else. This trick uses three deceptive principles—the marked deck, one ahead, and a very well concealed mathematical force—all canceling each other. There is just no way a spectator can penetrate the layers of deception. It really is a very, very impossible trick.
Fortunately it’s dead easy, and very straightforward for the audience.
Business Cards
Make up a stack of business cards, half of which are preprinted on the back with “Three of Clubs.”
The easiest way to get this that I know is to buy some laser printer business cards. These are designed to go through your inkjet or laser printer, and then you separate them yourself along pre-cut lines into 10 business cards.
Setup
Breather crimp the Three of Clubs so it will cut to the top.
Put the Three of Clubs 27th from top. If you’re handy with a faro, you can do this trick anytime: cut the Three of Clubs to top, faro check, and cut the top half to the bottom.
This trick requires two spectators, one to your left, and the other to your right. To keep them straight I’m going to call them Lee for left and Ricky for right. Sorry, Alex.
Go
Spread cards and casually give Lee the bottom half, including the Three of Clubs, to shuffle. Now give the top half to Ricky with the same request. It should look like you’re
just giving them both about half, and you don’t care if they each get exactly half. The corner mark and breather crimp make it easy for you to do this casually.
Take back Lee’s half first, and check if the Three of Clubs is on top. If you’ve used a breather crimp on the card, often it will be anyway. If not, cut it to the top. What I usually do is say “you shuffled. Did you cut?” If not, I say “I’ll do it” and give the deck a simple Charlier cut, which brings the breather to the top. I usually act like I think this is impressive, and then laugh at myself. If Lee did cut the cards, I say “was it a fancy one handed cut like this?” and do the Charlier. Either way it seems like a joke and not part of the method.
Take back Ricky’s half and put it on top of Lee’s. The Three of Clubs is now 27th from the top. This will be forced in a most diabolical manner.
Put the deck on the table, and ask Ricky to take less than half the deck. Avert your eyes, and ask Ricky to make sure it’s less than half, “or we won’t have enough cards later.” By the way don’t bother saying “cut off”—the word “take” is more casual.
Now ask Lee to take some of Ricky’s cards. Again you avert your eyes.
“Okay, so you both have some random number of cards, which nobody knows how many. Count them, but don’t let me or anybody else see how many.“
While they are doing this, pick up the remaining slightly-more-than-half the deck and deal it into a row across the table. Start to the left of center in your performing space and deal an overlapping row to the right, across your performing surface. Secretly you count as you deal, and space the cards so that when you have dealt 26, you just reach the right edge of whatever your space is, so you have to deal the last few under the cards on the left edge of the spread. Give this a few tries in practice and you’ll find it’s not hard and looks extremely casual.
By the way, that was half the method of the trick. Because whatever the total number of cards Ricky cut off, the Three of Clubs is now that many cards from the right edge of the spread. If you doubt it, try it. Like a good chain letter, this works whether you believe it or not.
Take a pre-printed Three of Clubs card and stare at Ricky. Gradually go through a time warp, then write Lee’s name (note: not Ricky’s), and pretend to write a prediction. Fold it and put it down—make sure it will not unfold and reveal the typed prediction.
Now have Ricky reveal the number of cards he or she counted; let’s say it’s 13. Count clearly and fairly from the right edge of the spread, and push out the 13th card; Let’s
say it’s the Queen of Hearts. Leave it face down in front of Ricky, “for drama.” Don’t forget it.
Now turn to Lee. Pick up a blank business card and write down Ricky’s name, and the name of the card you just pushed in front of Ricky. Fold this prediction to match and toss it next to the first one.
Count down to Lee’s number and push out the Three of Clubs. You may thank Stewart James for this, silently, every time you perform this trick. Check the mark, by the way;
you might have counted wrong or something could have happened. It’s not too late to switch Lee’s card for the Three of Clubs, which you can easily find in the spread.
Pick up both predictions, hold them both in your hand, and ask Ricky and Lee to turn over their cards. While this is happening, slide the predictions in your hand, switching their relative positions. Take the second prediction, open it but don’t look it. “You randomly chose the queen of hearts. I predicted: queen of hearts.” Show the prediction to the audience and let them react. This is pretty impossible, you have to admit.
Open the other prediction towards you and turn to Lee. “Your card was the Three of Clubs. This says Three of Clubs. And it’s printed.”
Turn the prediction to the audience and hold it out until someone takes it from you.
Notes
Do not say anything about the fact that you wrote the spectators’ names on the predictions. Don’t say, to yourself, “let me just put your name on it” while you’re writing it. Don’t don’t don’t don’t don’t. There—if that doesn’t stop you, I don’t know what will.
With a nail writer you can make both predictions while the cards are being shuffled.
This is basically Perfect Prediction from a few pages ago combined with the Stewart James force. I’ll leave the details to you.
Impromptu Version
You can do the trick without the pre-printed business cards, and it is a very clean and impossible double prediction. The beginning changes a bit: Give Ricky and Lee each 26 cards; don’t worry about the corner marked card. Read the top card of Lee’s half before Ricky’s cards are put on top—that’s the 27th card and thus the card you predict for Lee.
Predict Ricky’s card using the one-ahead method, as above. Voila—a completely hands off double prediction from a shuffled deck with no preparation beyond having the marked deck.
History
The idea of having the second prediction printed on the paper was taken from another Stewart James trick. I can’t remember which one it is, but if you take just a few moments and read The James File you’ll find it.