Magic and Magician : A short story by Sayantan Basu

A helpless look is what my eyes cast upon the large, black hat. Just beside it is a black stick with which I picked a lively rabbit out of the hat, just a month ago. Yes, I am a magician. I am not that sort of magician who walks up to the stage in black coat, in a dazzled atmosphere and show magic to the already dazed audience. I am that sort of magician who performs magic anywhere, anytime and under any condition.

It so happened that one of my friends once challenged me to disappear in an open ground in broad daylight. I asked him to count upto five and upon his fifth count, I simply vanished. My poor friend was simply in a state of utter consternation as there was no place where one could hide in that ground. I reappeared after half an hour or so as I saw him sweating hard. So that’s me. I vanished in my unique style which I call ‘Now you see me. Now you don’t’.

One day a child asked me, “Who are you? Magician? Wizard? Or some sort of spirit?” That amused me a lot. My reply was “I am magic”. Yes you heard it right. I consider myself a magic, not a magician. Magicians vanish themselves, but actually remain hidden in the black stage. When I vanish, I do not hide. I really disappear. It all happens just like that

Just then it happened.

For some work, I had to go abroad. I preferred to go on a cruise. There on the cruise, I met a man. He introduced himself as a magician. I laughed silently hearing this. He invited me to watch a show he was going to perform that night on the cruise.

Nights! Dazzling floodlights and dazed audience! The very things I hated the most. But I could not resist myself from attending his show. That night, it was dark and with only the ship’s lights on, we could see the man standing in bright light. He asked for an iron chest and to my surprise, I found the ship’s crew had it ready. The show was, he would be locked in it and thrown in the dark sea. Then he would again come back to the surface. I learnt from my co-passenger that he had done this before and each time succeeded in coming back to the surface. The game began and the dark, monstrous sea engulfed the locked chest with the man in it. Half an hour passed; no one reappeared. That was a great shock to all the ship’s crew and I could see them pacing up and down the deck. I retired to my cabin. Ha! Coming up from the depth of the Pacific Ocean. Impossible for any mortal. Well, triumph, mixed with pain and pity described my feelings perfectly. I am still the greatest.

The next day, we were back to the shore, without the magician of course.

The navy went to search for him. They reached the spot where the sea engulfed the chest and reached the depth of the ocean.

What they found was a result of my present consternated condition. They found a chest – an open and empty chest containing a paper bearing the word –‘GOODBYE’.

The MAGICIAN had completed his MAGIC.

Sayantan Basu is a student of Funlish, class X.