Page 20 - Unlikely Stories 1

Madagascar Madness

“So am I. And you don’t know how right you are: I have seen the
death camps.”
“Then the rumors were true. I suppose it was inevitable, once the
British pushed the Axis out of here in ’42. Please come up here out
of the sun, young man. You may as well rest a little before you return
to your base.” He spoke a few words in a language Seidell did not
understand to a woman standing in the shadows of the verandah.
“Yes, sit with me a while and have a cool drink.”
“Thank you, sir.” Seidell climbed the rickety stairs. A dog lying
next to his host lifted its head to sniff at him, then resumed its
sprawled posture. The two men, one old, stiff and immobile, the
other an energetic youth, faced each other across a low bamboo
table. The woman set down wooden cups of a local fermented
beverage and retired to the inside of the house.
“I will tell you my story,” said the elder after sipping reflectively at
the drink. “But I cannot go with you. My real name is Erich Weiss.
Does that mean anything to you?”
“No, sir. It does not.”
Erich Weiss sighed. “I’m not surprised. You were an infant when I
died.”
Herbert Seidell frowned, looked at the contents of his cup.
“No, I didn’t mean that literally,” said Weiss. “But the world,
except for a very small number of people, is convinced that Harry
Houdini, the world’s greatest magician, died October 31, 1926.”
“Houdini! But he did die! I saw photographs of his funeral. It was
huge. And then his widow held a séance every Halloween to make
contact with his spirit.”
Weiss smiled again. “It was my greatest escape and disappearing
act, all in one. I couldn’t have done it without Bess’s help, of
course—she was my wife. She let me go with several thousand
dollars—never mind how much—in return for letting her manage my
legacy and sell my collections. It may seem heartless to you, a
youngster with at least some illusions intact, but it was the cleanest
way for me to leave a life of which I had become fatigued and ill-
equipped to continue. Neither of us wanted a rancorous divorce and

19