CHAPTER SIX

TAKING MAGIC TO THE HOME OF MAGIC

WHEN I started on my tour of the East I took with me a large company and a very considerable repertoire, for I knew that only the very best could hope to succeed in the land of magic. I found that nothing could be more suitable for the production of illusions than the atmosphere of most Eastern lands. The poorest of the inhabitants seem to be touched with a certain mysticism, and the colour of the Orient makes a wonderful background.

Of all the lands I visited none was more mystical and colourful than Siam. It was here that I had a very marvellous experience.

I opened at Bangkok, and had a very fine reception; in fact, my performance created a sensation. On the second night fifteen brothers of the King of Siam came to see the marvels I had been performing. I may mention that the King of Siam has fifty-six brothers altogether, so that the fifteen who came to see my performance were only a fraction of the total number.

Those who did come, however, enjoyed themselves very much, and they must have given a very favourable report to His Majesty, for on the next night I was approached by his aide-de-camp, who informed me that the King wished me to put on my performance at the palace.

This, of course, I was delighted to do, and the next day I went along with the aide-de-camp to choose the best room for the show.

The palace, I found, was very magnificent inside, with rich hangings and ornate furniture. And yet, though in magnificence it excelled anything I had ever seen before, it disappointed me. There was not a room large enough to take my full performance. Even the ball-room was too small.

I told the aide-de-camp my difficulty and suggested that I should give only a few of the smaller illusions, which I could bring inside the palace.

"No," he replied; "His Majesty wishes to see the performance which his brothers saw and were so delighted with."

"But how is it to be done?" I asked.

"I will ask His Majesty."

After a short time the aide-de-camp returned. "A theatre shall be built in the grounds," he reported. "It will be ready in seven days, in time for your performance."

The programme for the command performance before H.M. The King of Siam (Printed on orange silk)

I was amazed at this. It was indeed an honour to have a theatre built especially for me. But I was still more amazed at the progress of that special theatre. Five hundred men, mostly Chinese, were employed in the building of it. Two hundred and fifty worked in the day-time, and another two hundred and fifty at night. The entire strength of the motor-truck supply in Bangkok--eleven in all--was commandeered to bring the materials to the palace grounds. I spent most of my time there, watching the operations and seeing that the stage was built exactly as I wanted it.

The result was that, when at the end of the seven days the theatre was completed, it was perfect in size, height, and equipment, so far as I was concerned. All my illusions could be shown there to their best advantage.

The stage was about fifty feet square, lofty, and beautifully lighted. The auditorium, on the other hand, was small, and would hold only twenty-five people. The acoustics of this model theatre were the best I have ever known; the merest whisper could be heard in the most distant corner.

While I was superintending the building of this place I was privileged to see something which has been denied to any other European. At the time I had to keep it a strict secret, but now that the King of Siam is an exile I may tell what I saw.

In the grounds of the palace there is a secret shrine used only by the King and members of the Royal Family. I was taken there, and was struck dumb by the wonder of the sight. The walls of the temple were covered all over with precious stones, which glittered and sparkled in the sunlight. The shrine stood in the middle of a grove of trees, each of which had been modelled out of solid gold and silver, even to the frailest of the topmost leaves.

The shrine itself was of marble, and on the top of it there squatted a glittering crystal Buddha. The effect was marvellous and very awe-inspiring, for the light was reflected back from the god in a thousand different colours, and these in turn were caught up and reflected by the gold-and-silver trees around the shrine. The shrine itself was a miracle of carving; the work was so carefully done that at times the marble assumed the delicacy of lace, and this was warmed by the glowing reflections all round.

Four times a year the Buddha was clothed according to the seasons, but when I saw it there were no adornments and the sunshine blazed through the glass roof above the crystal god, so that it looked magnificent indeed.

On the night of my performance I took my company--which was numerous and included Lily, the royal Bengal tigress, for I was performing "The Tiger God" there--and we made our way to the palace grounds. The King, we found, was at dinner, for it was about eight o'clock.

As soon as the King heard of our arrival he insisted that we sit down to a meal, and he sent the food over from his own table. Even Lily the tigress and a horse which we had with us were not forgotten.

When the meal was over I went for a walk in the grounds with my manager, Roy Smith. There was no sign that the royal meal was approaching its end, so we examined some of the curious objects which were to be plainly seen in the brilliant moonlight.

It was ten o'clock before a message came to say that the King had left the palace and was making his way to the theatre. Even as we heard this we saw an ornate and dignified procession, headed by His Majesty, wending its way through the grounds. We stood and watched the richly dressed people until the King was almost level with us. Then Roy turned and ran, and I was just about to follow his example, when the King called to me.

"Don't run away, Mr. Goldin," he said in perfect English, "I want a word with you."

I was very astonished at this, for I could not think where the King could have seen me before, and I had no idea that he knew me. But I had the presence of mind to stand at attention and wait for the King's next remarks.

"You don't remember me, I see," he said, smiling.

I had to acknowledge that I did not, though there was something familiar about his smiling face.

"We met in the American Bar of the Hotel Cecil in London, many years ago," he reminded me, and then it all came back.

When I first arrived in London from America I met two small boys in the Cecil and I amused them for a few minutes with some little sleight-of-hand tricks. They had been very delighted with them, and had asked me to teach them how the tricks were done. I had not thought much of the incident at the time, and it was not till days afterwards that I discovered that these were the sons of the then King of Siam. Their father was bringing them to England to school, and I happened to meet them as they were passing through London.

This, then, was the man before whom I had to perform in the special theatre. The audience was composed almost entirely of men, and in the middle, seated on a small throne; was the King. He had no companion except a small English terrier, of which he was very fond.

The show was a great success, and so impressed was His Majesty that he asked me to perform the next two nights as well. I had intended to make that my last performance in Bangkok, but naturally I did not refuse this pressing invitation.

I performed fresh illusions on the other two occasions, and His Majesty was delighted. I think he was most bewildered when I brought an empty rickshaw on to the stage and made a man appear in it. He expressed so much astonishment at this that I was impelled to make him a present of "The Magic Rickshaw".

The egg-in-the-bag trick was another of His Majesty's favourites, and here I played the same trick on him that I played on King Edward VII.

As I have already said, when I am making the egg disappear from the bag I make an obvious pass to a back pocket. At this someone always says, "It's in your pocket." It is very necessary to the smooth working of the trick that they should make that remark. I can then take off my coat and allow someone in the audience to examine it. Of course, they find no egg in any of the pockets.

When I played this trick on the King of Siam, he said in a quiet voice, almost as if he were disgusted at my feeble efforts at deceiving him, "It's in your pocket."

My coat was searched and nothing was found. I then said that I would do the same trick with someone holding my wrists, so that he would be able to follow the trick very closely. To my astonishment the King himself rose to perform this little office for me.

He disconcerted me by holding my wrists in a vice-like grip, though this made no difference to the performance of the trick.

I showed him the bag, and he acknowledged that the egg was not inside it. I showed him my hands, and the egg was not there either. Then I dipped my hand into the bag, and there was the infernal egg, which I displayed to the astonished monarch.

On the third night of my performance the King honoured me by presenting me with a jewelled tiepin, and he also gave me an unprecedented fee, together with a generous allowance for expenses.

Presents from Royalty From H.M. King Edward VII H.M. King George V (When Prince of Wales) H.M. The Queen of Saxony H.M. The King of Siam

Soon after that delightful experience I was due to open at the Opera House, Singapore, and there I had a contretemps with the powers that be. In this case it was not a king, but the head of the city council.

In "The Tiger God" act I used a boiler. This generated the steam which formed a curtain on the stage behind which the tiger disappeared down a trapdoor.

No sooner did I arrive at my hotel at Singapore than the local manager came to see me. He announced that he had bad news for me.

"What's wrong?"

"Well," he said mournfully, "there's no trap-door, and never will be one. You're not allowed to have animals on the stage; and they won't allow the boiler inside the theatre."

That completely spoiled my act, and, as I knew that the theatre was sold out, I was at my wits' end what to do. The theatre belonged to the municipality, and those rules were part of the by-laws. The head of the municipality was an Englishman, a man who had important business interests there. I decided that the best thing I could do was to go and see him.

I told him my difficulty. "Either," I said, "you can have a really good show in Singapore, or you can send thirty-six people back to England at the expense of the government."

"I am sorry, Mr. Goldin," he said. "I sympathize with you, but I am afraid that we cannot vary our by-laws for you."

He took out a book and showed me the by-law in question.

"Why do you make this by-law about animals?" I asked him.

He said that he did not know.

"Then I will tell you. Animals make a mess about the theatre. My tigress is kept in a cage of her own and has a man to attend on her. There's no chance of a mess. Besides that, this law means small domestic animals such as cats and dogs. This is a wild animal and does not come under the ban."

I went on like this for a time, and then he acknowledged that there might be something in what I said. They might stretch a point and allow the tiger to appear.

"Now, what's the objection to a trap-door in the stage?"

"Obviously it would weaken the stage."

"I assure you that I can make a trap-door which will strengthen the stage, and not weaken it."

He said that was impossible.

I then asked him to call the city engineer.

"Now," I said. "I will cut the joist, not straight through but on the slant. This joist is about twentyfour feet by six inches. What weight would be sufficient to break it before it was cut?"

"About two tons, dropped from a height of twenty feet," replied the engineer.

"Suppose, having cut it on the slant, I fasten an iron bar alongside it; what weight would then be necessary?"

"At least double the weight."

Turning to the official, I said, "Will you agree if I have this alteration effected at my own expense?

He replied that he would.

We then came to the last point, the boiler. This they both declared was dangerous.

"Why dangerous?" I asked. "It is tested to resist a pressure of two hundred pounds a square inch, and I never use more than one hundred pounds." I showed them the certificates, and I assured them that it whistled when the pressure rose over one hundred pounds, and then we put the light out.

Then the engineer made a foolish remark. "What pressure do you usually work at?" he asked.

"Eighty-five to ninety."

"And what is the pressure at the end of the act?"

"About fifty pounds."

"It's dangerous to have a boiler with fifty pounds of pressure in her left in an empty theatre."

I had him there.

"How can it be dangerous when the fire is out?"

That finished it. I got my own way all right, and Singapore saw and enjoyed "The Tiger God". But it took me a solid hour's talking to put it through.

This tour of mine took place in the early days of the War, and I found Colombo full of patriotic excitement. I had hardly started my act in the theatre there when a man shouted out, "What part of Germany do you come from, Mr. Goldin?"

A murmur ran through the audience, and I saw that I was in for an ugly scene unless I could prove that I was not a German. For a fleeting second I wondered if I should have a show left when the crowd had had their way.

"Tell me," I shouted, "which part of the Zoo do you come from?"

That was the best I could do on the spur of the moment, and it raised a few laughs. Then I said, "I am not a German. I am Russian. Here is my passport. It shows that I am an American, but that I was born a Russian."

With that I won the audience over, for the town was full of Russians who were on their way to the Dardanelles.

Feeling myself safe, I looked hard at the man, and then I said, "Do you realize what that silly question of yours might have led to? You must be drunk."

"Yes, I am," he agreed at once.

After the show two Australians who had been in the audience came along with the drunken man.

"Here he is, Mr. Goldin. We've arrested him. What would you like us to do with him?"

"Well," I said, "he's very fond of talking about Germans; suppose you give him the chance to shoot a few of them."

With that they took him away with them and made him join the army.

Japan brought me a very different sort of adventure.

You may already know the story of the magician who, when performing in japan, had to ask a member of the audience to step on to the stage and act as interpreter. He performed all his best tricks, and was surprised to find that they were greeted by roars of laughter. The trouble was that the interpreter was telling the audience all he could see, and he could see quite a lot that the audience was not supposed to see.

That trick could hardly be played on me, because I do not usually need any conversation with my illusions, having perfected a silent act. But when I appeared in the Mikado's Theatre, Tokyo, I did want someone to interpret my opening speech for me. There was an audience of over thirty thousand people, and I felt that some sort of personal introduction was necessary.

To my great surprise a lady stepped promptly on to the stage, presented me with a bouquet, and then turned to the audience and began a long and impassioned speech.

I stood there helplessly, wondering what she was talking about. Was she seizing the opportunity to make a seditious speech? Whatever she was saying, this much was certain--she was holding up my act.

She was very evidently popular, for at the end of her speech she was greeted with a great burst of applause.

She bowed and then turned, smiling, to me. "All this applause is really for you, Mr. Goldin."

"For me?"

"Yes. I have been telling the audience that you are the man who was my master years ago and taught me all the magic I know. I have said that I am proud to have been your pupil and that I consider you the greatest illusionist alive."

That lady was Madame Tenkatsu, the greatest illusionist in japan. Years before, when she was about twelve years old, she had been in a famous Japanese troupe. She was, indeed, daughter of Taniche, the leader and organizer. These people I met in New York, and I took a liking to the little girl, and at her father's request I gave her some lessons in magic. Since those days she had progressed far, but she still remembered me and felt that she owed me a debt of gratitude.

We had a long talk about old times when we met after the show, and one thing she said impressed me more than anything else. She said that when she played in America she billed herself "The Pupil of Horace Goldin".