The music was sweet, light tripping notes. The gears of the pedestal were ticking in the rhythm of a metronome – or a bomb. Malakhai was turning round. One arm was in motion as he stroked the rosined bow across the strings. His other hand fingered the neck of the instrument to form the chords and pluck riffs of light running notes. She watched his back and the action of the bow arm working across the strings of the violin.

The weapon fired. She tracked the arrow by the flight of the red scarf streaming out behind it. Malakhai’s foot kicked out. The trajectory stopped at his body, as if the arrow had pierced him. He recovered his balance, still turning round, still playing, completing his revolution until he faced his audience of one. And though the music had never ended, the violin’s bow was gone, and he was drawing the deadly arrow across the strings for the final note. The red scarf hung from the shaft.

The overhead lamp went out. The whole world went black.

Without conscious guidance, Mallory’s right hand was reaching for her gun. She heard his shoes on the steps, and listened to her target so she could shoot him in the dark.

A standing lamp switched on at the base of the platform. „Well?“ Malakhai bent down to touch the globe lamp on the floor, and it pulsated with light. „Did you like it?“ He walked around the base of the platform, turning on all the lamps.

And now she saw the more chilling illusion, a lithe shadow moving across the face of a distant packing crate. The slender silhouette was on the run, as if it had been left behind and was hurrying to catch up to the darkness at the back of the cellar. But between lamplight and shadow, there was no solid form.

Too much wine. She pushed the glass to the edge of the table. Cigarettes that lit themselves, and now this. „How did you do that? The shadow.“

„Oh, that? I thought you’d be more interested in the trick that wounded Louisa.“

„That was it?“

„Disappointed again?“ He smiled. „But you liked the shadow, so it’s not a total loss.“

„I know you didn’t snatch that arrow out of the air, not at two hundred and thirty-five feet a second. It can’t be done. The arrow missed you, right? You hid the bow under the violin after you switched it for a second arrow.“

„Wrong. There was only one arrow.“

„You didn’t catch that arrow.“ She walked over to the pedestal and looked into the empty magazine. „I saw you load it.“

„But you didn’t see me unload it. You were coughing, remember?“

„I saw it fly.“

„You saw the scarf fly. It was tied to wire that fed from the crossbow to my hand. The arrow – the only arrow – was always under the violin.“

„But you didn’t pull on any wire. I would’ve seen that.“ It would have been a very long pull.

„The wire led through my fingers to wrap around a block of wood on the floor. When I kicked the block off the back of the platform, I sent it far enough for the wire to pull the scarf into my hand.“

Now she tried to remember what had come first – the off-balance kick or the flight of the red scarf. All she knew for certain was that he had suckered her into behaving like a civilian witness, seeing things that were not there. „So that’s all there is to it?“

„I knew you’d be irritated. It’s all so simple – after someone tells you how it’s done.“

„Getting shot with a scarf isn’t dangerous. You said – “

„Max was only a boy when he came up with this illusion. The dying finale came later in his career, a rather ingenious way of securing his tricks. No magician ever stole from him. He was the only one willing to take a genuine risk.“

„A death wish?“

„Nothing that trite.“ Malakhai sat down on the bottom step of the platform. „I think the war ended too soon for Max. He saw it through the eyes of a Yank – a generational trial by fire. His life was so much larger then. The postwar world was an anticlimax. Nothing had color anymore. No taste, no texture.“

„And he was married to a woman he didn’t love,“ said Mallory.

Malakhai nodded as he reached for a bottle, then held it up to the light. „We’re out of wine. I’ll be right back.“ He walked around the dragon screen and set the bottle down beside the wardrobe trunk. Mallory came up behind him, but not quietly enough. Her eyes caught his hand quickly withdrawing from another pocket in Louisa’s clothes.

He stroked the material of a green pantsuit. „Faustine’s gold dancing shoes would go well with this. I wonder what they’re doing in this trunk. I never saw Louisa wear them.“

„Maybe she went dancing with someone else. I asked you if Louisa had lovers. You never – “ When the shadow moved across the trunk, she pulled her gun and whirled around. There was nothing there but smoke rising from an ashtray on the floor.

„It’s only Louisa,“ said Malakhai. „She won’t hurt you, Mallory. She likes you.“

„How did you do that?“

„No one has ever figured that out. But you’re welcome to try.“ His hands moved on to a pair of plain cloth trousers.

„Maybe this is what you’re looking for?“ She handed him the passport. It was opened to the inside page and its mutilated photograph. „I thought Edith Candle might have done that.“

He held up the ruined likeness of his wife. „This was the only picture of Louisa. Yes, Edith probably did it. Poor woman – jealous of a ghost.“

„At first, I thought you married Louisa to give her a new identity for a legal passport. But I underestimated you, Malakhai. It’s a professional forgery. I almost took it for the genuine article.“

He shook his head. „I can’t take the credit. This passport was Nick Prado’s work. He had a small business forging papers for refugees.“

„He was in the Resistance?“

„Sorry, nothing that glamorous. Forgery was his day job. A local printer provided the clientele. Nick had a room at the back of the shop.“

„So magic didn’t pay very well?“

„Faustine’s apprentices weren’t on salary. We all had to earn a living on the outside. The old lady was only generous with her costume allowance. It didn’t matter if we starved, as long as we made a good appearance.“

„And after she died?“

„The profits were pretty meager. They wouldn’t support all of us.“ He was still fixated on the ruined face in the passport. „I wish Edith hadn’t done this.“

Mallory took the passport from his hand. „Maybe you’re the one who cut up Louisa’s photograph. Did you go a little crazy?“ She tapped the portrait. „Did you slash this face?“

He kept his silence.

She leaned closer. „You were angry, out of control.“ And now the gamble, the guess, the closing shot. „You knew your wife was cheating on you. Louisa was sleeping with Max Candle.“

„Yes, I knew. But I forgave them.“

The armchair’s skin was soft, and the deep cushion cupped around his backside in an intimacy he had never enjoyed with a woman. Yet Detective Sergeant Riker could not be entirely comfortable here, and it was nothing to do with the new tension between himself and his partner.

Mallory’s living room had the cold look of a vacant apartment, though it was fully furnished in the high contrast of black leather and white carpet, sharp angles of costly woods, glass and chrome – appointments well beyond the means of a cop. The most striking feature was the panoramic window overlooking Central Park. Such views did not come cheap.

Riker didn’t want to know where all her excess money came from. But he had dark suspicions that she might be up to something perfectly legal. She was too open about living higher and dressing better than cops who were known to be on the take. He coupled this with her catlike patience for the long setup to a vicious pratfall. So he never asked any blunt questions about money, lest he wind up falling on his face, the next victim of Mallory’s unique tripping style.