The Prestige

At the start he asked me if I was of a nervous disposition, and I said I was not. Tesla then gave me an iron bar to hold, one that was connected to the floor by a long chain. He brought to me a large glass dome, apparently filled with smoke or gas, and put it on the table before me. While I continued to hold the iron rod in my left hand, I placed, at his direction, the palm of my right hand against the glass chamber. Instantly, a brilliant light burst out inside the dome, and I felt every hair on my arm rise proud from my skin. I pulled back in alarm, and the light immediately vanished. Noticing Tesla's amused smile, I returned my hand to the glass and held it there steadily as the uncanny radiance burst forth once more.

There followed several more such experiments, some of which I had seen Tesla himself demonstrating in London. Determined not to reveal my nervous feelings, I endured the electrical discharging of each piece of apparatus stoically. Finally, Tesla asked me if I should care to sit within the main field of his Experimental Coil while he raised its power to twenty million volts!

'Is it entirely safe?' I enquired, but jutting my jaw a little, as if I were accustomed to taking risks.

'You have my word, sir. Is this not why you have come to see me?'

'Indeed it is,' I confirmed.

Tesla indicated I should sit on one of the wooden chairs, and I did so. Mr Alley also came forward. He was dragging one of the other chairs, and he placed it beside me and sat down. He handed me a sheet of newspaper.

'See if you can read by unearthly light!' he said, and both he and Tesla chuckled.

I was smiling with them as Tesla brought down a metal handle and with an ear-shattering crashing noise there was a sudden discharge of electrical power. It burst out from the coils of wire above my head, folding out like the petals of some vast and deadly chrysanthemum. I watched in stupefaction as these jerking, spitting electrical bolts curved first up and around the head of the coil, then began moving down towards Alley and myself, as if seeking us as prey. Alley remained still beside me, so I forced myself not to move. Suddenly, one of the bolts touched me, and ran up and down the length of my body as if tracing my outline. Again, my skin horripilated, and my eyes were scorched by the light, but otherwise there was no pain, no burning sensation, no feeling of electrical shock.

Alley indicated the newspaper I was still clutching, so I held it before me and discovered, sure enough, that the radiance from the electricity was more than bright enough to read by. As I held the page before me, two sparks ran across its surface, almost as if an attempt was being made to ignite the paper. Marvellously, miraculously, the page did not burn.

Afterwards, Tesla suggested I might like to take another short walk with him, and as soon as we were outside in the open air he said, 'Sir, let me congratulate you. You are brave.'

'I was determined not to show my true feelings,' I demurred.

Tesla told me many visitors to his laboratory were offered the same demonstrations I had just seen, but that few of them seemed ready to submit themselves to the imagined ravages of electrical discharge.

'Maybe they have not seen your demonstrations,' I suggested. 'I know you would not risk your own life, nor indeed that of someone who has travelled all the way from Great Britain to make you a business offer.'

'Indeed not,' said Tesla. 'Perhaps now is the time when we should quietly discuss business. May I beg details of what you have in mind?'

'This is what I am not entirely sure about—' I began, and paused, trying to formulate the words.

'Do you propose to invest in my researches?'

'No, sir, I do not,' I was able to say. 'I know that you have had many experiences with investors.'

'That indeed I have. I am thought by some to be a difficult man to work with, and very little I have in mind is likely to turn a short-term profit for an investor. It is something that has in the past caused vexed relationships.'

'And in the present too, may I dare to venture? Mr Morgan was clearly on your mind when we spoke the other day.'

'Mr J.P. Morgan is indeed a current preoccupation.'

'Then let me say candidly that I am a wealthy man, Mr Tesla. I hope I might be able to assist you.'

'But not by investment, you say.'

'By purchase,' I replied. 'I wish you to build me an electrical apparatus, and if we can agree a price I shall gladly pay for it.'

We had been strolling around the circumference of the cleared plateau on which the laboratory stands, but now Tesla came to a sudden halt. He struck a pose, staring thoughtfully towards the trees that covered the rising side of the mountain ahead of us.

'Which piece of apparatus do you require?' he said. 'As you have seen my work is theoretical, experimental. None of it is for sale, and everything I am using at present is invaluable to me.'

'Before I left England,' I said, 'I read a new article about your work in The Times . In the article it was said that you had discovered on a theoretical basis that electricity might be transmitted through the air, and that you planned to demonstrate the principle in the near future.' Tesla was watching me fiercely while I spoke, but having declared my interest to such an extent I had to go on. 'Many of your scientific colleagues have apparently said it is impossible, but you are confident of what you are doing. Would this be true?'

I stared directly into Tesla's eyes as I asked this final question, and saw that another great change had come across his features. Now his expression and gestures became animated and expressive.

'Yes, it is entirely true!' he cried, and at once launched into a wild and (to me) fairly incomprehensible account of what he planned.

Once thus begun he was unstoppable! He strode off in the direction we had been heading, speaking quickly and excitedly, making me trot to keep up with him. We were circling the laboratory at a distance, with the great balled spire constantly in view. Tesla gesticulated towards it several times while he spoke.

The essence of what he said was that he had long ago established that the most efficient way of transmitting his polyphase electrical current was to boost it to high voltages and direct it along high-tension cables. Now he was able to show that if the current was boosted to an even greater voltage then it became of extremely high frequency, and no cables at all would be required. The current would be sent out, radiated, cast broadly into the aether, whereupon by a series of detectors or receivers the electricity could be captured once more and turned to use.

'Imagine the possibilities, Mr Angier!' Tesla declared. 'Every appliance, every utility, every convenience known to man or imaginable by him will be propelled by electricity that emanates from the air!'

Then, in a way I found curiously reminiscent of my erstwhile fellow passenger Bob Tannhouse, Tesla launched into a litany of possibilities: light, heat, hot-water baths, food, houses, amusements, automobiles… all would be electrically powered in some mysterious and undescribed way.

'You have this working?' I asked.

'Without question! On an experimental basis, you understand, but the experiments are repeatable by others, should they bother to try, and they can be controlled. This is no phantasm! Within a few years I shall be generating power for the whole world in the way that at present I power the city of Buffalo!'

We had circled the large area of ground twice while this exposition poured out of him, and I kept my pace beside him, determined to let his scientific rapture run its course. I knew that with his great intelligence he would return eventually to what I had first told him.

Finally he did. 'Do I understand you to say you wish to buy this apparatus from me, Mr Angier?' he said.

'No, sir,' I replied. 'I am here to ask for another purchase.'

'I am fully engaged in the work I am describing!'

'I appreciate that, Mr Tesla. I am seeking something new. Tell me this: if electrical energy may be transmitted, could physical matter also be sent from one place to another?'

The steadiness of his answer surprised me. He said, 'Energy and matter are but two manifestations of the same force. Surely you realize this?'

'Yes, sir,' I said.

'Then you already know the answer. Though I must add that I cannot see why anyone should wish to transmit matter.'

'But could you make me the apparatus that would achieve this?'