"Lisa Goldstein - Walking the Labyrith" - читать интересную книгу автора (Goldstein Lisa)

informality.”
Andrew could smell the man’s strong sweat. He fished a notebook
and pencil from his blazer pocket. “So,” he said. “Magic. Lead into
gold, water into wine, that sort of thing.”
“Gold into wine,” Callan said.
Andrew looked at him, discomfited. He had had a good strong
drink before the performance, thanking God, as he always did, that
Prohibition had ended two years before. He hadn’t thought anyone
could tell, though.
“That dame who disappeared,” Andrew said. “She went through
the trapdoor, right?”
 Callan put a thick finger to his lips.
“You don’t give away your secrets, is that it?”
Callan’s finger was still at his lips. No, Andrew saw — it was
pointing upwards, to the ceiling. “The room under the stage is
always called the trap room,” Callan said. “But in this particular
theater there’s no trapdoor.”
Andrew looked up at the unfinished ceiling. Pipes ran along it
and down the walls; there was no room for anything else. “I love
this theater,” Callan said. “It’s the most beautiful place in the
world.”
“So how did you do it?” Andrew asked.
“Trickery.”
“Right.” Andrew opened his notebook, glanced at the questions he
had written there. “Is everyone in the act part of your family?”
A woman came through the door. Callan stood and they
embraced. “What do you think?” she asked. “They loved us, didn’t
they?”
“Of course they did,” Callan said. He turned her toward Andrew
as if introducing her to an audience.
Andrew stood and doffed his skimmer. “Hello, ma’am,” he said.
“I’m Andrew Dodd from the Tribune .”
She held out her hand to him. “A pleasure,” she said. “I’m
Callan’s sister.”
Andrew took the hand, noticing the Allalie family resemblance.
Both brother and sister were short, muscular, with gaps between
their front teeth. But where Callan looked squat, like a frog or a
gargoyle, the same features had somehow combined to make his
sister almost beautiful. Her kimono was purple, with gold stars.
“And you’re all one family?” Andrew asked.
“Oh, yes,” the woman — she had to be Thorne — said. She leaned
against the piano and lit a cigarette with a green marble lighter,
fanning the smoke in front of her face.
“When did you get started? And how?”
“And why?” Thorne laughed.
More people were entering the trap room now, some still in
costume, some in ordinary work clothes. A woman painted gold
leaned over and kissed Callan, leaving a smear of gold on his cheek.
“Were you one of the statues?” Andrew asked her.
“Statues?” the woman said. She stood on tiptoe and kissed him as