You start with a pair of pseudo-mate court cards – for description’s sake let’s assume the two red Queens. One starts on top of the deck, the other is fifth from the top. Enlist the assistance of two audience members. Spread through the deck for the first participant to touch the back of a card; in doing so, cull the fifth card under the spread (one of the two red Queens). When he touches the back of a card, separate the spread at that card and flick the edge with your thumb to indicate/confirm which card he wants. You’ll raise your right hand to apparently show the face of this card; in the process, force the Queen by straighten- ing the right fingers and pushing the Queen to the left. This gets covered in the action of raising the right hand to show the face of the card. Done properly, the illusion is perfect. (For more detail on this type of force, see page 173 of Simon Aronson’s Try the Impossible, or the Versatile Cull Switch on page 159 of Frank Simon’s Versatile Card Magic.)
Having forced the Queen, bring the hands back together and cull it and an extra card as you offer the spread to the second participant for a selection. Once she has touched her card, break the spread, this time with the touched card on top of the left-hand portion. Raise the left hand to show the second selection, and cull it with the others as you begin to coalesce the spread. The reason for the change of procedure is simple: If you raised the right hand again, you’d flash the culled cards. If you start with the person on your right for the first selection and the person on your left for the second, the change up will
By Antonio M. Cabr al
(For Entertainment Purposes Only)
make sense as a piece of blocking.
Once the second selection has been culled, close the spread bringing the culled cards to the bottom, slightly in-jogged. Bring them to the top using the lift shuffle control described in my July column. A nice feature of using the lift shuffle is that it brings the culled stock on top of the original top stock. After this brief shuffle, from the top of the deck down, you’ll have the first selection (a red Queen), a random card, the second selection, and the mate of the first selection (the second red Queen).
Give the cards a flashy in-the-hands false cut that retains the stock on top (try the Flip-Flap Cut on page 402 of Card College 2), and announce that you’ve found both cards at the same time. Ask your participants to each hold out a hand palm up as you pinky count to get ready for a triple lift. Turn over the triple to show the second selection but announce it as the first participant’s card. Suiting action to word, turn the triple down and deal the top card off into the first participant’s hand. Immediately turn over the next single card and announce it as the second participant’s card. Ask if you got the correct cards; as you’re waiting for the answer, turn the single card face down and do a top change. Deposit the changed card face down onto the second spectator’s hand while they both disappointedly tell you that you screwed up. Thanks to the triple-single, they’ll be convinced of your failure and you’ll have a big fat offbeat of relaxed attention to do the top change. After you’ve placed the second card in her hand, do an in-the-hands slip cut to lose the top (random) card.
Once they’ve acknowledged your failure, a lot of audiences will try to helpfully turn the first card over to show you sort of got one right. Don’t let this happen; you want to stay in control of the climax. Offer to fix the problem, make your magical gesture, and ask the first person to reveal the card in his hand; then the second spectator reveals the selection in her hand.
The second transposition is more of an offbeat quickie. Take the two cards back and offer to show how to make the cards change places. Hold the cards in the right hand with the Queen on the face and the other selection (let’s say it’s a Seven) behind it, and ask, “Just to clarify, you had the Queen, and you had the Seven?”
As you do this, you do the Vernon Optical Monte move. Flick the queen with your left thumb; then flick the other selection behind it (Photo 1). Turn the cards face down and pivot the two cards so they transpose, and flick the lowermost card with your thumb again (Photo 2). This is the Queen, but it will appear to be the other selection. Ask the second participant to take the Seven, and if you did the move correctly she will reach for the lowermost card. Let her take it and turn the other card over saying,
“Which leaves me the Queen…” Look surprised to be holding the Seven. (If she hesitates and doesn’t bite right away on the Monte move, I’ll pull both cards back and say, “You look confused. I’ll do this as fairly as possible,” and I’ll move right on to the third transposition.)
The third transposition uses an idea of Jack Carpenter’s, from his DVD All In, and is described here with his permis- sion. If you remembered to slip cut the random card into the deck earlier, the top card of the deck will now be the mate of the selected Queen. Get a break under that card as you take the two selections back with the Queen on the face. Turn the two selections face down on the deck, and then pick up all three cards by the ends. Peel the top card onto the deck and hold a break beneath it; then place the remaining double on top. Turn over the top single card to show the Queen. While holding the Queen, turn over the other two cards as one to show the Seven (the other Queen
is hidden behind it). Catch a break under the double as you turn it over. Ask one of your participants to hold out her hand one last time. As she does, turn the double down and push the top single card off the deck. Take the face-down card side-jogged on the face-up Queen, holding both cards as in Photo 3. Reach forward with the left hand to adjust where her palm-up hand is. While the left hand shades the right hand, turn the right hand palm down, transpos- ing the two cards in a sideways action similar to the Wild-card switch (Photo 4). Start to place both cards onto her upturned palm. What she’ll see is a face-up Queen, with the indexes hidden by the face-down card and your right fingers. She’ll assume the face-down card is the Seven. (This is Jack’s lovely subtlety from his trick Touch My Heart.)
Have her place a finger on the back of the face-down card. When she does, come away with the Queen, turning it face down in the process. You want her to realize it’s a Queen, without being aware that it’s the wrong Queen. Now you can finish with a top change, or you can place the card on top of the deck and do a double lift, showing that you now have the Seven, and she now has the Queen.
This sequence has proven an effective opener for me. I hope it proves the same for you. Look through your repertoire, you’ll probably find some effective uses for the triple-single as well.
Photo 1
Photo 2
Photo 3