The Spirit Cabinet (27 page)

Rudolfo only nodded, once, up and down.

Rudolfo argued against any appearance onstage of the hideous old steamer trunk, the Houdini Substitution Box. He did so with admirable restraint, pacing back and forth in the cavernous dressing room contained in the deepest bowels of the Abraxas Hotel. Jurgen sat on one of the couches, very placidly, his fingers interlocked. Interlocking his fingers seemed to be his current favourite pastime. Jurgen would make his digits mesh with care and precision, almost as though he were three years old and the exercise just a little beyond him.

“It’s not just that the box is ugly,” explained Rudolfo (that was top of the list, certainly), “it’s more that it doesn’t fit in. Everything else is very modern, high-tech.”

Jurgen made the steeple, opened his hands and saw all the people, although his nails, which had grown so long they curled like ram’s horns, interfered with the process.

“Stop that,” demanded Rudolfo.

“I agree it’s different,” said Jurgen. “That’s what’s good about it.”

Rudolfo slyly abandoned the discussion then, and allowed the Substitution Box to be wheeled out on the stage for the show one night. Jurgen’s mien changed abruptly. Instead of lumbering around the stage with the grace of Frankenstein’s monster, his bruised eyes pried apart, Jurgen became like a child on Christmas morn, racing around the old crate and clapping his hands together. Miranda trotted on in his wake, trying to take control of the situation, but when she reached for the lid, Jurgen had beaten her to it, throwing it open and bending over to pull out the canvas bag, the draping, the padlock, the ropes. In his giddy impatience, he presented his back to the audience, so for a few moments much of Miranda’s attention was devoted to the surreptitious application of her fingertips at strategic pressure points, hoping to turn the man about. But Jurgen only turned after he’d fished out the handcuffs, handing them to Miranda. He placed his wrists together and held them out. Miranda fastened the cuffs and then helped him into the canvas sack, binding the top with old frayed ropes that had been handled by Bess Houdini herself, all those many years ago. Jurgen disappeared into the crate.

Rudolfo watched all this on a black-and-white monitor in the dressing room, the pale ghostly Samson trembling by his side. Rudolfo didn’t wonder, then, why Samson was trembling, but he would later on that night, lying (all alone) in the huge circular bed.

Miranda closed the lid and fed the hasp of the padlock through the clasp. She clicked it shut, the sound alarmingly loud even in that grand hall, then she crossed behind the Substitution Box with the drapery in her hands and stepped up on top of the crate. She lifted the curtain and for a brief moment, except for the fingertips curled over the edge of the material, was hidden from view.

On the monitor hanging above Rudolfo’s eyes there was
static and distortion, the picture suddenly fractured, but it as quickly recomposed itself, accompanied by a whooshing sound that issued from the tiny speaker beside the monitor and from the stage some fifty feet away, and from the emptiness surrounding Rudolfo.

The curtain dropped and there stood Jurgen. He spread his arms with admirable aplomb, but there was no applause forthcoming. “You see?” Rudolfo spit toward the monitor screen. “Is
shit
.”

This didn’t seem to worry or concern Jurgen, who clambered down off the crate and removed the padlock. He threw open the lid (the canvas sack rose full of lumps and agitation), undid the ropes and then stepped back to reveal Miranda.

Miranda looked very odd. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair was tousled and her leotard no longer seemed to fit perfectly, the seams askew by a millimetre or two. The armpits were darkly dampened and the front was pricked by erect nipples. Now the applause started—at the back of the room, heading toward the front like a slow-roller at Coney Island—but Miranda didn’t wait around to acknowledge it. Instead she turned and trotted off the stage. The material at the back of her costume was wedged between the globes of her buttocks, and as she ran Miranda tried to pluck it out, and for some reason the audience was delighted at this. The applause was redoubled and decorated with cheers and bravos.

Rudolfo grudgingly allowed the bit to stay in the Show. He even took part, standing off to the side of the stage and delivering a kind of lecture. “It is Substitution Box owned by Houdini himself,” he told the audience. “The greatest magician that ever lived. Except for Jurgen.”

Rudolfo told Miranda she should keep picking material out of her ass, even though he himself found it indecorous and off-putting. When he told her this, Miranda’s eyes widened and her
nostrils flared. “What do you like about it?” she demanded. “The fact that everyone can see my bare butt or the fact that I look like a buffoon?”

Rudolfo shrugged. “Is combination.”

“You know, I’m the best box-jumper in this city. Hey, I’m one of the best
magicians
. All you want me for is my tits and ass.”

Rudolfo didn’t really contest the point. “Why you bring this up?”

Miranda stiffened so that she towered over Rudolfo. “Let’s just say,” she said, “that my eyes have been opened to some possibilities.” She turned on her heel and disappeared.

When she pushed open the door that led to the service hallways of the Abraxas Hotel, Miranda didn’t go to the bank of elevators that ascended to her gloomy suite. Instead she marched through the casino proper, a voyage that lasted many minutes, and emerged finally at the seemingly endless circular driveway. Standing amidst the giant half-naked doormen, smoking a cigarette with industry, was Preston.

“Hi,” said Miranda.

Preston flicked the cigarette away, even though it was freshly lit, and turned awkwardly. Miranda saw that he’d made some attempt to tame his hair, adding oil and forcing all of the strands to straggle off in the same direction. He had even shaved. “Hi,” he said. “How was the Show?”

Miranda nodded, which one would have thought an unsatisfactory response, although Preston accepted it easily enough. “So what do you want to do?” he wondered. “A movie or something?”

“I want to go to the desert.”

So they took a cab twenty miles to the north, and when the emptiness seemed vast enough, they got out. Preston tipped the driver half a buck. The moon was full, which pleased Miranda.
She hadn’t known it would be, had no way of reading the moon in the city of Las Vegas, Nevada, which was neon-bright enough to obscure the heavens. In her hometown, Maple Creek, Saskatchewan, the moon was practically a neighbour, lighting the night in a conscientious manner. But here was a full moon bathing the desert, and for a long time neither one of them said anything. They stood still and waited for the desert to come to life. That was how it felt, even though Miranda knew the desert was always alive, that the quickening process was really one of allowing oneself to perceive it.

So, for instance, it wasn’t that the lizards suddenly started darting to and fro, racing up and down the saguaros. They’d been doing that all along, that was essentially all they did, but, Miranda realized suddenly, Las Vegas can blind you to such subtleties. Or non-garishnesses, if one could coin such a word, because it was only in a vain and very human way that a lizard’s existence was subtle.

“So …” She flapped her arms up and down, as though halfheartedly testing her ability to fly. “It’s nice to be here with you.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure. Nice to be here. Nice to be with you. Nice.”

Preston shrugged, or so it appeared, although he was in truth shivering from the sunless chill and at the same time twitching somewhere deep in his being, tickled by the fingers of desire. But it looked enough like a shrug that Miranda turned away and folded her arms across her chest.

“So,” she demanded quietly, “have you been thinking about what we talked about the other night?”

“Thinking about it, sure,” Preston answered. “Deciding anything about it, no way.”

“I don’t know what’s to decide,” said Miranda, spinning around. “Anyone in town would jump at the chance. I’m the best.”

“I’m not disputing that. I’m just not sure.”

“You’re just not sure that having a thaumaturgical assistant with years of experience and a flawless body would enhance your act any.”

“You see, Miranda, that’s just it, I don’t have an
act
, I’m not like the boys, I do different things every night—”

“That’s cool. I’m adaptable.”

“I’m just not sure I need an assistant with a perfect body.”

“Hold on. I never said
perfect
. I said
flawless
.”

“There’s a difference?”

“Sure. Check a dictionary. First definition under the word
perfect
is
complete
.”

“Your body isn’t complete?”

“You said a mouthful.”

“But it is flawless.”

“No shit.”

“What are you missing?”

Miranda jerked her shoulders, looking up at the stars as if trying to fix her location, and looking then to the ground to see if she was rooted and stable. When she opened her mouth, it was to speak very quietly, almost too quietly for Preston and his furry ears to pick up. She said, “You don’t have to take my word for it.”

“Take your word for what?”

“That the Bod is flawless.”

“I have no problem accepting that.”

“You could check.”

“Oh, no, no, that won’t be necessary.”

Miranda laughed, a short euphonic howl that pierced the desolate night. “Hey, Preston,” she said, “I’ll make you a bet. If you find a flaw, I’ll drop the subject and never bring it up again.”

“Suppose I don’t find a flaw?”

Miranda crossed her arms and took hold of the bottom of her sweatshirt. The shirt not only announced the existence of
The
University of Saskatchewan Huskies
, it pictured a huskie, half-dog, half-wolf, although the beast looked slightly addled. Miranda pulled upwards, raising the curtain slowly on her belly and her breasts. Preston bit down hard on his bottom lip. Miranda hooked her thumbs in the waistband of her sweatpants, peeling them and her underwear—they looked like black jockey shorts, which for some reason made Preston gasp in a subdued, strangled, manner—and then she hopped around briefly, removing these garments over her sneakers. She placed her arms at her side and came to military attention. “Okay, Presto,” she said. “Do your best.”

“You’re right, I can’t see anyth—”

“Of course you can’t see anything from there, doofus. It’s not like I’m missing an arm. Come on, get over here. Check it out.”

Preston took a few steps closer and then hesitated, but Miranda reached out quickly and took hold of his arm. “Come here,” she said, and Preston stumbled forward. His mother had been a thaumaturgical assistant—Gwendolyn, her name was but called Guinevere on stage—“the fair maiden Guinevere.” Preston saw what he thought was a blemish, but it turned out to simply be a little pool of shadow nestled in the nape of Miranda’s neck. He stooped slightly then, and looked at her breasts. “Flawless, right?” muttered Miranda. “Yup,” agreed Preston. His mother had performed with his father for many years, until Preston was six or seven years old. Then she began to cry onstage, sometimes fleeing into the wings, more often remaining there, the tears running down her face and staining her satin costume. Preston fell to his knees and inspected Miranda’s navel, a likely site for imperfection, but whoever had attended at her birth had been meticulous, even artistic, leaving her with a fine and tiny crescent. Then Preston the Magnificent had performed with a series of younger women, several of whom
actually stayed at their home, one of whom, Preston recalled, was perpetually getting lost on her way to the washroom. This woman would stumble through the hallways late at night, tipsy and naked. Preston leaned forward to look at Miranda’s ankles and tarsi; he was bent as though the desert were an endless prayer shawl.

“Did you come?” asked Miranda quietly.

“Oh, yeah,” said Preston, clambering to his feet. “A while back.”

Miranda made a chicky sound with the side of her mouth. “There you go,” she said. She bent over and picked up her clothes from the ground. “So what do you say?”

Preston nodded very slowly. “Okay.”

A huge truck came and collected the silver ball, and later a helicopter landed on the grounds of
das eindrucksvollste Haus im Universum
. Curtis Sweetchurch leapt out of the plastic bubble and bolted for the house. He was running behind schedule, which was
absurd
, he had a personal time-management counsellor, for goodness sake, but on any occasion when he had to be somewhere—at the network television studio at 4:30 that afternoon, in this instance—the hours conspired to waylay him. He had gotten up at three o’clock that morning, and the pertinent page in his Daytimer was only partly festooned with yellow Post-its, but despite all that, it was now 2:45 and the minutes were dripping away. “Yoo-hoo!” he bellowed, still at some distance from the mansion, which Curtis thought was positively hideous, a half-digested piece of meat that had been spit up by some vast interplanetary being. “Rudy!” Sweetchurch shouted. “Jurgie!”