An Impromptu Mental Card Routine

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AN IMPROMPTU MENTAL CARD ROUTINE

Nick Conticello

Copyrights Copyright © 2014 by Nicholas Conticello Published by Lybrary.com – http://www.lybrary.com All rights reserved. Allowed Usage This ebook is for personal and home use only. Renting or public viewing of this ebook is strictly prohibited. Any other use of this ebook — including reproduction for purposes other than those noted above, modification, distribution, or republication — without the prior written permission of Lybrary.com is strictly prohibited. We have a special arrangement for libraries. Please contact us for details. Disclaimer Lybrary.com used its best efforts in preparing this ebook. However, Lybrary.com makes no representation or warranties (express or implied, including, but not limited to, warranties of title, non-infringement, merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose) with respect to the accuracy, applicability, fitness, or completeness of the contents of this ebook. The information contained in this ebook is strictly for educational purposes. Therefore, if you wish to apply ideas contained in this ebook, you are taking full responsibility for your actions. Crime Watch Please help us to identify criminals. At the end of the day illegal copying will increase ebook prices for you or make such products impossible altogether. If you encounter suspicious activities, please contact us at [email protected] or any of our other email and mailing addresses. We reward any tips and information, which lead to the conviction of illegal copying activity with 50% of the punitive damages placed to our credit. Feedback Please send error corrections to [email protected]. We appreciate if you let us know about any typos, errors, or any other comments you would like to make.

Contents DEDICATION ...................................................................................................................... 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................... 5 INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................ 6 THOUGHT CAUGHT .......................................................................................................... 8 AP DIVINATION ................................................................................................................ 11 THE POWER OF FAITH ................................................................................................... 14 THE WIDDERSHINS CUT ................................................................................................17 ENVOI ............................................................................................................................... 19 ABOUT THE AUTHOR ..................................................................................................... 20

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DEDICATION This book is dedicated to the memory of Arnon I. Sincoff (1949-2013) without whose encouragement some decades ago this book would almost certainly not exist.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First of all, a full kneeling bow to my friends and mentors (in order of seniority) Wesley James and Doug Edwards for being twin fonts of knowledge. I was fortunate to meet late in their lives three masters: Mike Bornstein, Ken Krenzel, and Sam Schwartz. Each of these gentlemen offered me much encouragement in various ways. I miss them all terribly. A nod of gratitude to the two greatest giants of mathematical card magic (in one man's opinion): Charles T. Jordan and Alexander Elmsley. In baseball terms, Jordan was Ty Cobb, but Elmsley was Babe Ruth. Finally, I owe a debt of incalculable magnitude to Mr. Harry Lorayne. Harry was gracious enough to publish in Tarbell Vol. 7 not one, but two contributions from a very foolish boy who was eager to earn a free copy of said volume. In particular, Harry lavished five pages of attention on "Seeing Through the Deck," transforming it from a mere puzzle to a workable piece of card magic, complete with numerous variations. Moreover, Harry was kind enough to promote the trick in the very first article of David Regal's "Speaking Volumes" series in Genii Magazine a quarter century later. As he said to me the last time we met, thirty or so years ago, "I made ya immortal, kid!" He wasn't kidding. Being a contributor to Tarbell certainly gets attention in magic circles. Further than that, (joke intended) I must acknowledge Mr. Lorayne's influence on my writing style. It was said in tribute to the first World Chess Champion, Wilhelm Steinitz, that "this man has taught us all how to play chess." It can be likewise said of Harry Lorayne that he taught us all how to teach magic, as well as teaching magic superbly himself. Live long and prosper, Harry. Of course, I must not omit mention of my publisher, Chris Wasshuber of Lybrary.com. Mille grazie!

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INTRODUCTION This book contains three impromptu mental effects with ordinary playing cards that require little manual dexterity and feature intriguing new approaches in technique. It happens that they build in audience impact, so performed in sequence they constitute an effective routine. Mind you, these are hardly what one would call "self-working" card tricks. While little physical skill is required, a considerable amount of concentration and attention to detail is necessary to get the most out of this material. The first effect in particular will take a good deal of practice to obscure the mental counting that is needed. I don't wish to worry you needlessly. If you can count to 30 accurately you can perform all of these effects well. Also considerable thought must be given to patter and presentation. In the writer's view the routine lends itself to either a serious presentation, or a lighter, more humorous approach. The presentation offered herein tends toward the serious, as is this performer's bent with this material. That's a personal choice. At any rate, whichever style you choose, you will be wise to rehearse this material thoroughly before presenting it in public. The effects are unified in theme, but varied in detail: thought transference, clairvoyance, psychokinesis and/or precognition (that is, influencing the physical world by mental power or foreseeing the result of a random happenstance.) Of course, only a performer using a professorial approach would use any such terms with the audience. The techniques described herein hopefully break new ground. Obviously, I did not invent the sunken key card or the Automatic Placement. But to the best of my current knowledge, my applications are novel. I do lay claim in all modesty to the multiple key card technique I have dubbed the Radar Principle and to the counting system I have immodestly titled the Littlecount. Frankly I am loath to part with these concepts. They have served me well for many years, but I fear they may be too esoteric for some magicians. In the end I decided it is time to share these ideas with the magic community. Finally, a few words of caution. This routine was designed to be performed in an intimate setting, for an audience of one or a small group. I can't vouch for its effectiveness in other circumstances. However, I tend to work for small, tough audiences, generally consisting of magicians or chess players. Both types tend to be made up of analytical and assertive people. I assure you, I have generally fooled and entertained both types of audience with this and similar material.

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It is my fervent hope that you, dear reader, will do likewise. Nick Conticello Jersey City, New Jersey. October 2nd, 2014

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THOUGHT CAUGHT Effect: A shuffled deck is cut by the spectator. The performer deals out two hands of cards and asks the spectator to think of a card in either pile. The deck is assembled by the spectator and cut again. The performer looks through the deck and removes one card, which is in fact the selection. Method: Hand a deck out for shuffling. Upon retrieving it, ribbon spread it face up on the table and comment on the thoroughness of the mixing. As you do so, note any two consecutive cards very near the top of the deck. Also note which of the two cards is nearer the top, or rear, of the spread. Square the cards, turn them face down, and do a triple cut to the table. Each of the three cut piles should contain roughly a third of the pack. The top third with the keys becomes the lowest third of the pack. Ask your spectator to cut the pack about in half and complete the cut. This should bring your keys to the top third of the pack. Point out that at this stage nobody can know the exact position of any card in the pack. Now deal out two hands of cards, starting left, then right, then left, and continue in this fashion until you have two piles of 10 cards each on the table. Ask your spectator to pick up either pile and hold it in dealing position. Request your spectator to call out a number from one to ten. (This is inclusive, but you should say, "It could be one, or ten, or anything in between.") Instruct the spectator to count the ten cards one at a time, face down, onto the other ten card pile, but when she reaches her chosen number, she should take a peek at that card and remember it. When she has counted all ten cards onto the other ten, ask her to square the 20 cards neatly, then with one hand, break open the talon somewhere near center and deposit the 20 card group into the break and square the entire deck. Ask her to cut the pack and complete the cut. Get the pack back from her and say, "You can forget the number now. Just remember the card you are thinking of." Cut the pack yourself, more or less undoing her cut and centralizing her group of 20 cards. You on the other hand must remember her number and double it to get what we will call the key number. Viz:, if she called out seven, your key number is 14. You will now execute a two-part counting sequence that will end on her chosen card. Spread the deck between your hands proceeding from face to back. When you arrive at the first key (whichever of the two) count it as one and continue counting singly until you reach the second key. If the second key falls on an even number, you are set to count directly to the chosen card. If the count ends on an odd number, you must make an adjustment. First we will assume the count ends on an even number. Beginning with the even number on the second key, count forward or backward by two's until you reach the key number. The card that falls on the key number will be the chosen

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card. E.g., your key number is 14. The second key arrives at 12. Continue counting by two's toward the rear of the spread. The next card is "14," the key number, so that is the chosen card. Another example: suppose the spectator called out 3. Your key number is 6. When you count from the first key to the second, the count ends at 12. Retrace your steps, counting by two's toward the face of the spread, "10, 8, 6..." The card which falls on 6 is the chosen card. Now let's go back and consider what to do if the single count ends on an odd number. Say the key number is 14 and the second key lands on 9. The adjustment depends precisely on which of the keys the first count ends upon. If the count ends on the key that was nearer the top of the deck at the start, you add one and finish as above. If the count ends on the key that was nearer the face, you subtract one and finish as above. In our example, let's say the key on the count of 9 is the card nearer the top of the deck. So add 1 to get 10 and continue toward the back of the spread, starting with the next card, "12, 14..." The card falling on 14 is the selection. One last example. This time, the called number is three, so your key number is 6. Again the first part of the count ends on 11, and the key it falls upon is the key nearer the face of the deck. So you subtract one to get 10, and continue counting towards the face, "8, 6..." The card falling on 6 is the chosen card. This counting procedure (which I call the Littlecount) may seem absurdly involved but in fact it is extremely simple once you get the hang of it. In practice the audience will see you spread quickly through the cards and decide on one. To end, remove the selection and table it some distance from the deck, making it clear that you are committed to this card. Have the spectator name her card and turn over the single card. Strike an applause cue, although you may have to wait a few beats after the audible gasp of surprise you should hear. ADDENDA: The more sophisticated your audience, the more powerful this is. They will realize just how impossible this is. There are other ways to get the keys. For instance, you can glimpse the top two cards as you cut the pack for an Off-Center Faro leaving the keys on top together. Then triple cut as explained and you are all set. (Obviously, the Off-Center Faro need not be perfect.) If you happen to have glimpsed the top cards in an earlier effect, you can leave the deck tabled, patter for "time misdirection,", then false shuffle and triple cut. Or, with the keys on top, you can undercut two-thirds of the deck and overhand shuffle these cards onto the keys without an injog, then have the pack cut. All that is necessary is that the keys are among the cards you will deal out after the cut. If you are working for magicians you may let them deal out the two hands. If you are working for laypeople, though, it is better to deal out the two hands yourself. The trick

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plays faster and there is less chance of an accident. Just make it clear you are not peeking at any faces or putting any work in the cards. And there is nothing sacred about 10 cards in each hand. As long as the keys get dealt out, all that matters is that there are the same number of cards in each dealt hand for the mathematics to work. This item is a modern treatment of two Annemann effects, "Locatrix" and "The $1000 Test Card Location." The operative mechanism I call The Radar Principle, since the target card ends up in the center of an indeterminate group of cards. The target is found by counting the group and calculating the midpoint, a process akin to the workings of radar in the 3-D world. The concept was first revealed (without the appellation) in my effect "Seeing Through the Deck" in Tarbell Vol. 7. The present effect creates a "radar" situation by vastly different means. I devised the basic concept of this item over 42 years ago. The idea was to have a rosary stacked deck shuffled imperfectly, leaving at least three consecutive cards together. Then the deck would be dealt into two piles of 26, one pile reversed as part of a selection process, setting up the "Radar" relation amongst the floating keys. Of course, you would then have to find a pair of stacked cards separated by exactly one card, count to the other key, divide this number in half, and at long last count to the selected card. If the audience was still awake, they might be slightly amused. (I remember distinctly explaining all this to Wesley James at Tannen's one Saturday afternoon. He showed admirable restraint by not strangling me on the spot.) Needless to say, I never performed this item. About 12 or so years later, I worked out the Littlecount procedure at the urging of the late Arnon Sincoff. (Little Count, by the way, is the English translation of my family name.) A decade or so after that, I recalled my childish "inspiration" and created this effect. Performed by itself, it's good session material. But it fits perfectly as the opener to a thematic routine like this. The Littlecount is the basis for some intriguing location effects. This is the most cumbersome version, but it is necessary to explain this in full to teach a couple of other items. Most Littlecount effects are much, much simpler to execute. But those will wait for a volume dedicated to the concept.

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AP DIVINATION Effect: After performing "Thought Caught" the performer assembles the pack and offers it to the spectator for shuffling. "I'll try something harder this time," he says. "This time I'll try to find a card you are thinking of without looking at the faces." The spectator is asked to cut off a number of cards totaling somewhere from 10 to 20. She counts her cards and remembers the total. The performer takes the remaining cards and shows them to her one at a time, asking her to remember the card that falls on her secret number. After showing her 20 cards he cuts the packet and drops the uncounted cards onto the 20. The spectator tables her counted cards, the performer drops his cards onto them and shuffles and/or cuts the deck. Then he starts spreading off small groups of cards face down, trying to sense whether or not the spectator's card is among them. Eventually he narrows it down to a small group and eliminates cards one by one until he is holding one card. The spectator names her card. The performer turns over the card he holds and it is the thought-of card. Method: For this effect you need a full pack of 52 cards. 1. After delivering the opening patter, ask the spectator to cut off somewhere between 10 and 20 cards. The unspoken rationale is that last time she thought of a number from 1 to 10 and told you what it is. Now she will think of a random unknown number. Have her count her cards quietly under the table or out of your sight in some other fashion. 2. Patter: "Since you are thinking of a number more than 10, we will skip the first 10 cards." Take the deck face down and push off 10 cards one at a time, one under the other, without looking at the faces. Continue, "If you are thinking of 11, please remember this card..." Take the 11th card under the first 10 but let her see its face. This 11th card is slightly upjogged. Take the 12th card, counting it as 12 aloud and aligning this card with the 11th. Proceed in like fashion until you reach 20. At this point you have the selection group completely outjogged from the first 10 cards. Table the rest of the pack and square the 20 you hold, forming a break between the top 10 and bottom 10. Then casually cut to the break, transposing the packets. Don't comment on this, just do it. Drop the cards you hold onto the table, separate from the cards you tabled above. Pick up the previously tabled cards and drop them onto the 20 card pile. If you can do a simple false cut, do so now. 3. Ask the spectator to place her cards on the table. Drop your cards onto hers and false shuffle and/or false cut. (The Widdershins Cut fits nicely here.) Say, "You can forget the number now. Just remember the card you thought of." At this point, her chosen card is 22nd from the top of the deck. (Had you not cut the top 10 cards to the bottom in Step 2, it would now be 32nd from the top. This is of course the well-known Automatic Placement.)

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4. You will now reveal her card by the process given in my effect "The Shadow Divination" from my earlier book The Shadow Placement. At the same time you will set a sunken key card for the final effect of the routine. Patter: "I'm not going to look at the faces of these cards, it might be distracting. Instead, I'll use a process called divination. It's something like dousing with playing cards." Push off the first five cards face down and hold them separate from the pack. Pause, feeling the face of these cards with your fingers, shake your head and discard them to the table. Repeat this process with minor acting variations, e.g, muttering, looking skyward for guidance, and the like, 3 more times until you have 20 discards in a sloppy pile on the table. 5. Push off the fifth group of five, pause a second, then say, "I think it's one of these." Table the rest of the deck some distance apart from the discards. Now you will eliminate four of these cards via a disguised Down/Under Deal. Take the first card, feel its face, and say, "No, not this one." Discard this card to the table separate from the original 20 discards. This is important. You want to leave those 20 cards alone for the time being. Take off the second card (the selection,) feel it and say, "Maybe" and place it at the bottom of the four cards you hold. Take the third card, feel it and discard it to the table. Take the fourth card, feel it and place it to the bottom of the three you hold. Take the next card, feel it and discard it to the table, saying, "OK, it's one of these two." The selection is the uppermost of the two you hold. Take off the top card, feel it, feel the face of the card in your other hand, agonize for a second or two, and finally discard the indifferent card onto the original 20 discards. Ask the spectator to name her card. Turn the card you hold over slowly to display it. 6. Remember the name of the selected card, as it will be your sunken key. As you assemble the deck, make sure this known card goes directly under the 21 card pile of discards, and make sure these 22 cards end up on top of the assembled pack. Casually false shuffle and/or false cut. You now know the identity of the 22nd card from the top of the pack and are ready to perform the finale, "The Power of Faith." ADDENDA: No one will notice the discrepant discard of the indifferent card. The audience's only concern will be whether or not you found the right card. You could eliminate the cut of the 20 cards and do the revelation with the seventh group of five cards, but it takes too long and it's a bit more awkward to set the sunken key. CREDITS: The Automatic Placement seems to have been developed independently by Eddie Joseph and Gerald Kosky. Ed Marlo, who may also have devised it on his own, definitely gave it its name. I had assumed the idea of cutting the selection packet to bring the target card closer to the top was original with me. However, to be safe, I asked my publisher Chris Wasshuber to consult with Paul Gordon, the author of Explorations, a book devoted in part to the Automatic Placement, to ascertain whether or not my idea had been anticipated. Mr.Gordon replied that he has published a similar approach in an effect in his compilation work Gold Dust. He indicated, however, that my version was a bit different. Thanks, Mr. Gordon!

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The Down/Under deal revelation is an old idea. I found it in an effect called "Not Your Card?" in The Magic World of Stewart Judah (Magic, Inc. 1966)

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THE POWER OF FAITH Effect: The performer tells the audience he will attempt an experiment in communication and cooperation. He shuffles and cuts a pack of cards and asks a spectator to cut off some cards and think of one and bury it in the pack. The spectator takes a few more cards and thinks of a card matching the first in either suit or value and bury that card in the pack. The performer then shuffles and/or cuts the pack, then cuts in half and shows half to the spectator to be sure that one selection is in each half. The performer then announces his belief that the chosen cards occupy the same position from the tops of their respective piles. If the spectator can believe firmly enough as well, their belief might become a reality. Sure enough, the selections are found to be the same distance from the tops of their piles. Method and Presentation: You must first learn the identity of the 22nd card from the top of the pack. If you are continuing after "AP Divination" described earlier, you already have the required sunken key. The presentation below assumes you are concluding the routine with this item. 1. Patter, "Well, our minds seem to be in tune, so we're ready to try something exceptional. You've heard the old saying that 'two heads are better than one?' We are going to find out. If we work together we will achieve something really amazing." 2. False shuffle and false cut the pack, keeping the key in place. If you can't false shuffle, at least false cut, but if you prefer, do neither, just proceed, since the spectator will be doing quite a bit of shuffling. 3. Table the deck in front of your spectator, and ask her to cut off about a third of the deck. As she cuts, estimate the size of her cut to be sure she hasn't cut too little, a quarter or less, or too many, a group including the key. If necessary, ask her to replace the cut and try again. The rationale will be apparent from the rest of the selection procedure. 4. Ask her to spread the cards she holds so she alone can see the faces and mentally choose a card. Stress that she remember the card exactly. When she has one ask her to remove it from the packet and place it face down on the table. 5. Invite her to mix the packet she holds, then ask her to place the pile face down on the table apart from the deck and the selection. Then ask her to place the selected card on her cut-off pile. When she's done that, ask her to bury her card by cutting off about half of the larger tabled pile and place those cards directly onto the pile. She must not mix this last group as it contains your key card. Let her square the large packet containing her card.

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6. Indicate the remaining third of the pack. Ask her to shuffle it. Say, "Now, I'd like you to look through these cards you hold and think of any card that matches your first choice in either suit or value. You will thus establish a psychic link between yourself and the cards." When she has one, ask her to take it out and place it on the tabled two-thirds of the pack. Finally let her mix the small packet she holds and place it onto the tabled cards, burying her second selection as well. Ask her to square the cards neatly. 7. At this point, you must mix the cards somehow without disturbing their order. A false shuffle of some sort is ideal. At the very least, you must give the deck a false cut. This is essential to justify the next step of looking through half the cards. If you don't mix, it is obvious that one selection is in each half. (I'll describe my shuffle in the Addenda.) 8. After the false mixing, cut off as close to half the deck as you can manage without looking studied. If in doubt, take an extra card or two from the center. (Of course, you must not disarrange these cards just yet.) Patter: "Nobody can know the locations of your two thought-of cards. But we need there to be exactly one card in each half, so I'm going to show you this half. Please check that one and only one selection is in this half. Of course don't let me know what it is." 9. Turn the half you hold face up and spread it between your hands so the spectator can see the faces and start spreading the cards from face to back a few at a time, but be sure to inspect every face. When you see your key, which should be near the face of your packet, count it mentally as "one." Continue the count until you reach twenty-two. Hold a break here. Spread the last few cards so the spectator can see them, and when you finish, cut at the break so the key is brought to the 22nd position from the rear of the face up packet. Should you run out of cards before you reach 22 in your mental count, subtract the number you reach at the end from 22 and cut that many cards from the face of the half to the rear. As long as the key ends up 22nd from the top, the effect will work. After the cut turn the cards you hold face down and table them to the left of the other, untouched half. 10. Patter, "You saw just one of your cards, right? Good." Indicate the half on your right and say, "Do you have any idea exactly where in this pile your other card may be?" After the negative response, point to both piles and continue, "How likely is it, do you think, that your cards are the same number from the top in these two piles?" Whatever the response, turn the right half face up and say, "What about now?" Continue, "Despite the fact that neither of us have looked through this pile on my right, I believe strongly that each of your cards occupies the same position from the tops of their piles as the other. You alone thought of these cards. If you believe it too, it may very well happen." Pause a second or two to let this sink in. 11. Say, "I'm going to take off the top cards of these piles, one in each hand. If you see one of your cards in my hand, say 'stop' at once. Otherwise, I'll discard them and take the next pair. I'll continue until I am holding one of your cards in my right hand." Take off the top cards of each pile into your hands, the face up card in your right hand. Proceed as outlined in the patter, maintaining a brisk pace, until after 17 cards or so the spectator stops you.

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12. Say, "If we have succeeded the card in my left hand is the other card you thought of. For the first time, tell us all its name." After she calls out the name, slowly turn over the card in your left hand. If you have an audience of more than one, hold both cards face outwards toward the audience. Hold the position and smile. You should get a good round of applause here. ADDENDA: The shuffle I use in Step 7 is a variation of a technique described by Frank Garcia in Million Dollar Card Secrets. I cut off the top half with my left hand and shuffle the packets together Zarrow style, making sure the top card of the right hand half is woven between the top two cards of the left hand (original top) half. Then I unweave the halves under cover of the top two as Garcia describes. Thus a random card from close to the center of the pack is moved to second from the top. Surprisingly, this does not affect the relationship of the key to the two selections, as long as this card started between the key and the first selection. Thus I need not do a slip cut at the beginning, and the illusion of a shuffle is enhanced by the interlacing of the top cards. This is not the place to try to teach a false shuffle in detail. If you have Garcia's book, check it out. Otherwise, stick with a false cut. I've described the presentation in detail because the effect is a bit complicated and must be made clear in the audience's mind. Thus the patter is extremely important. CREDITS: The inspiration for this effect is an Alex Elmsley item called "Buried Treasure" which first appeared in The Pentagram (Vol. 7, No.5, Feb.1953, p.39) A version of it, retitled "Elmsley's Card Coincidence," was included by Martin Gardner in his seminal work Mathematics, Magic, and Mystery (pp. 25-26 of the Dover edition.) I first saw it in Gardner's book about 45 years ago. The effect as described was not quite perfect. By about 1985, I worked out a version with one sunken key in which the selections were made by spectators cutting piles off the top and glimpsing the face cards of each pile, then returning them in reverse order, a procedure which resembled the Elmsley Fan and Weave Control, about which at the time I knew nothing. About a decade after that I worked out the current handling which permits the spectator(s) to shuffle the selection piles. I did not keep detailed notes in those days, so it is hard to be more specific. The credit info above is from Minch’s The Collected Works of Alex Elmsley, Vol. 2, pp. 485-486. Readers of my previous work will notice a similarity between the present effect and "The Three Predictions" from The Shadow Placement. There is certainly a family resemblance. Both effects are solutions to the problem of performing a Smith Myth type effect for a single selector. I am certain that this effect was worked out before "The Three Predictions." There is an effect by Howard Schwarzman in Harry Lorayne's Close-Up Card Magic called "Two-Gether" which is a Smith Myth effect using a sunken key. However, his method is vastly different from the item described here. The title of this effect is an homage to the Paul Curry classic "The Power of Thought."

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THE WIDDERSHINS CUT This false cut will be of particular interest to left-handed card workers (like myself.) However, a slight modification can make it practicable for righties. I'll take the liberty of describing the echt version for southpaws first. Imagine a 2x2 matrix superimposed on your working surface. In other words, for those of you who just panicked, visualize four quadrants on your table in a square array. Hold the deck by the long sides in your left hand face down. The deck starts in the lower left quadrant. With your right hand, undercut about half the cards and carry this lower half to the upper right quadrant, diagonally upward from the lower half. Retain hold of each half in its respective hand. The next two cuts occur simultaneously. The left hand cuts off about half of its cards and deposits them in the upper left quadrant, while the right hand cuts off about half of its cards and deposits them in the lower right quadrant. (If this cutting system seems familiar to some of you, it should. It's based on an Ace revelation attributed, I believe, to Bob Veeser.) Withdraw your hands from the cards for a moment to let the square array fix itself in the onlookers' consciousness. Now reassemble the pack by picking up the quarter in the lower left quadrant in your left hand and proceeding counter-clockwise drop this quarter on the cards in the lower right quadrant and these two squared on the cards in the upper right quadrant. At this point, transfer the three quarters you have assembled into your right hand and sweep the remaining quarter in the upper left quadrant off the table and onto the cards in your right hand. Not a card has been disarranged. Note that by starting at any point in the matrix and picking up the piles in a counterclockwise fashion, the worst that will happen is that you will give the deck a simple straight cut. By starting in the upper left and circling around counterclockwise you will assemble the deck in its original order. However, I think the action described in the preceding paragraphs is both more natural and more deceptive. I may be in the minority, of course, but do give this a try. Now, for all you right handed folks, start with the deck in your right hand in the lower right corner. The left hand undercuts half and moves these to the upper left quadrant. Simultaneously cut off the top halves of the two piles and fill in the matrix depositing the cards cut from the upper left to the lower left and those on the lower right to the upper right. Pause, then assemble starting on the lower right and proceeding clockwise to pick up the next two quarters. Finally transfer the assembled three quarters to your left hand and sweep the remaining pile onto these. Again the cards are back in their original order.

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ADDENDA: Lately, instead of sweeping the three combined piles off the table, I simply slap the final pile in the upper left quadrant onto the combined pile and just pick up the deck. The word "widdershins" is an archaic term for counter-clockwise. It seems apropos for the title of this technique, don't you think? CREDITS: Obviously, the Veeser technique is the primary inspiration for this idea, but also I was intrigued by an unpublished five-way cut of Doug Edwards. I don't know his method, but I appreciate the utility of his idea and this item reflects my attempt to create something for myself along the same lines.

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ENVOI Well, there we are. I trust you found this material intriguing, at least. I have not gone too deeply into why these effects work. Nor is my mathematical training sufficient to offer formal proofs. Sorry about that. If you liked this material and would enjoy reading more of the same, please let my publisher know. The applications in this book barely scratch the surface of what can be done with these ideas. There is in fact enough material for separate works on the Radar Principle, the modified Automatic Placement, and the Sunken Key. Until we meet again... Ciao.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR In his teens, Nick Conticello published two effects in the seventh volume of the legendary Tarbell Course in Magic. He continued to create magic during a successful career as a chess player, teacher and organizer. In retirement, he has fully dedicated himself to the art. This is his fourth published book.

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