He told me what to do when your hands are tied behind your back. You just bend forward and get your arms down over your hips until your hands are just behind your knees. Then sit on the floor with your legs crossed. Take each foot out through your looped arms, one at a time. That will bring your wrists in front of your body, where you can use your teeth to untie the knots. It’s not easy, Houdini explained, but it works. He encouraged me to try it.
He told me the trick to getting out of six or seven handcuffs is to make sure the easier ones were put on near your wrists and the harder ones closer to your elbows, where your arms are thicker. That way, you can break out of the easy ones first, and then just slip your arms through the harder ones.
Oh, and he said that whenever he escaped from a pair of handcuffs, he would ask if he could keep them as a souvenir. He would take them apart and file the insides down to make them easier to open next time. Then he’d plant them with people in the audience at his next show. Most people didn’t bring handcuffs to his shows, so he would just provide ones that were easy to escape from.
“Why would I need to know any of that?” I tapped.
“YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN IT MIGHT COME IN HANDY,” he replied. “AND NEVER MAKE A TRICK LOOK EASY. IF IT LOOKS EASY, THE AUDIENCE WON’T BE IMPRESSED. LET THEM SEE YOU STRUGGLE. MAKE IT LOOK HARD. PEOPLE WON’T CARE IF IT LOOKS EASY.”
There was more, but I think you get the idea.
“DO YOU WANT TO KNOW THE BIGGEST SECRET TO MY SUCCESS?” Houdini texted.
“Yes!” I tapped excitedly.
“WE ALL ARE AFRAID OF SOMETHING,” he texted. “EVEN THE RICHEST, MOST POWERFUL PERSON IN THE WORLD HAS FEAR. BUT IF I COULD BE TIED UP, SHACKLED, AND ESCAPE FROM A BOX THAT WAS THROWN INTO A RIVER, PEOPLE FEEL THEY CAN ESCAPE FROM THE THING THEY FEAR. I GAVE PEOPLE HOPE. THAT WAS MY POWER.”
Wow. It took me a minute to process all that.
But Houdini wasn’t finished texting. “WHAT DO YOU FEAR?” he asked.
I thought it over. The usual fears many people have—insects, blood, loud noises, scary monsters under the bed—never bothered me.
“Bullies,” I finally tapped. There’s this kid named Simon Foster at school who has been hassling me since second grade. “And heights. I don’t like high places.”
Ever since I was little, I got a weird feeling whenever I was in a tall building, or walking over a bridge. And I don’t like being in elevators.
“YOU CANNOT GET PAST FEAR UNLESS YOU CONFRONT IT,” Houdini replied. “THEN YOU REJECT FEAR. IF YOU CAN DO THAT, YOU CAN ACCOMPLISH WHAT APPEARS TO BE IMPOSSIBLE.”
Houdini had given me a lot of stuff to think about.
“Thank you,” I tapped. “It is nice of you to give me so much of your time.”
“I HAVE NOTHING BUT TIME,” he replied. “LIFE IS SHORT, BUT DEATH IS FOREVER.”
I was beginning to sense a certain sadness in Houdini’s texts. Maybe he was spending so much time texting with me because he was lonely. And I suppose eternity can be boring.
It was getting late. I had to get up for school in the morning.
“I have to go,” I tapped. “Can I text you again sometime?”
“I’M SORRY, NO. THE LIVING CANNOT CONTACT THE DEAD. IT IS A ONE-WAY STREET. ONLY THE DEAD CAN CONTACT THE LIVING. THAT IS ANOTHER ONE OF THE ADVANTAGES OF BEING DEAD.”
“Okay,” I tapped. “But I really want to do this again. There’s so much more I want to ask you. Like, how did you escape from a straitjacket? Stuff like that.”
“TOMORROW NIGHT,” was the reply.
FRIENDS AND ENEMIES
The largest church in the country is three blocks from my house. It’s the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. The thing is huge, and one of the windows is made out of ten thousand pieces of stained glass. But here’s the most amazing thing about the church—there are peacocks living in the parking lot.
I kid you not. The peacocks’ names are Phil, Jim, and yes…Harry. No, Harry wasn’t named after me or Harry Houdini. He was named after a priest. Peacocks have been living at the church since the 1980s, when they were donated by the Bronx Zoo. Here’s the church…
And here’s Phil…
Anyway, Zeke and I sometimes stop by to visit Phil, Jim, and Harry on our way home from school. They’re not all that friendly. You’re not supposed to feed them or touch them, but it’s kind of cool to see peacocks running around in the middle of New York City.
“You want to come over tonight and hang out?” Zeke asked as we watched Phil and Jim trudge around the driveway.
“I can’t,” I told him. “I gotta do something.”
It wasn’t like me to be secretive around Zeke. But he had already told me he thought I was crazy to think that dead people can communicate with the living. I didn’t want to tell him I couldn’t go over his house because I had an appointment to text with Harry Houdini again.
I couldn’t stop thinking about my text session the night before. Houdini had chosen me, of all the living people in the world, to communicate with. I had a delicious secret. I felt special. I wanted to share
