The Life and Afterlife of Harry Houdini by Joe Posnanski

Author:Joe Posnanski
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster
Published: 2019-10-21T16:00:00+00:00

MY GUESS

He switched the cuffs. Yeah, I know, I just quoted Josh saying that the method doesn’t matter, that it is the magic that endures, but let’s face it: you can’t write several chapters about the Mirror Cuffs and not at least try to guess the secret. My guess is that he switched the cuffs. I base my theory on a hint I got from Joe Notaro, and I think it’s the most elegant of all the possibilities.

There are three known sets of Mirror Cuffs. One is the original; the second is a duplicate given to him as a gift. Both are owned by David Copperfield. But there is a third set—Notaro found a photograph of what was called “The Special Pair of Handcuffs” in The Tatler magazine. They look identical to the Mirror Cuffs, but there is a key difference: these cuffs were not opened with the long and thin Bramah-style key that would have been impossible to use once locked in the cuffs. Instead, these open with a small key that would be both easy to hide and easy to use to escape the cuffs.

This is what Notaro (and I) believe happened: Everyone was shown the real Mirror Cuffs in the days before the escape. In publicity photographs, Houdini was seen wearing the real ones, and after the escape was done, Houdini walked onstage holding them.

But when Will A. Bennet locked the cuffs on Houdini’s wrists, he did not use the real Mirror Cuffs. He instead used the Tatler cuffs that were easy for Houdini to escape.

“I don’t buy into theories where a key is concealed in the glass of water or in Bess’s mouth when she gives him a kiss,” Notaro says. “I also don’t buy into the theory that he slipped one hand (although capable) to use a key. All of these things divert attention from the real secret.”

Notaro concedes that we can’t know if our guess is right. He and others have studied the photographs of Houdini while onstage at the Hippodrome, but the cuffs are so similar there is simply no way to tell which ones Houdini was wearing.

Look, this theory has as many problems as all the rest. But I like it.

In the end: what is magic? One of the loveliest definitions comes from the writer Ken Kesey. He was writing about how Deadheads—those Grateful Dead fans—traveled in the band not for the music or the drugs but for a sliver of magic. And every now and again, they found it.

“When you see something like that,” he wrote, “there’s a crack in your mind, and you know it’s a trick, but you can’t figure it out. The crack lets in all the light. It opens up all the possibilities.”

That is what the Mirror Cuffs escape does: it opens up all the possibilities. Did Bess plead with the reporter for the key and then somehow—either through water or a kiss—pass that key to Houdini? Unlikely, but maybe.

Did Houdini merely pull his hand out from the Mirror Cuffs and then use the key or a pick to get out of them? Unlikely, but maybe.

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