Fillets of Plaice, by Gerald Durrell Read Online Free PDF Page B

objects but I had never seen it done quite so skilfully with four eggs, which are, after all difficult to conceal and are the easiest things to break during such a trick, thus spoiling the whole effect.
    Mactavish bowed to our solemn clapping and, to our great astonishment, there were even a few desultory claps from the villagers. Some of the older men, in fact, who had slightly defective eyesight switched tables with the younger ones so that they were closer to us.
    “You see what I mean?” said Mactavish proudly. “Little bit of magic works wonders.”
    He then produced from his pocket a pack of cards and proceeded to go through the normal routine that conjurers use with cards, flourishing them up in the air so that they landed on his hand and spread out along his arm without a single card failing. The villagers were now really excited and from sitting on the opposite side of the square from us, they had now converged on us. The old men with defective eyesight had in fact become so intrigued that they had moved their chairs forward until they were almost sitting at our table.
    It was obvious that Mactavish was enjoying himself immensely. He put an egg into his mouth, scrunched it up and then opened his mouth wide to show that there was no egg there and produced it from his shirt pocket. Now there came a hearty round of applause from the villagers.
    “Isn't he clever!” said Margo.
    “I told you he was alright,” said Leslie, “and he's a damned good pistol shot, too.”
    “I must ask him how he does these, um…, illusions,” said Theodore.
    “I wonder if he knows how to saw a woman in half,” said Larry thoughtfully, “I mean, so that you could get the half that functions but doesn't talk.”
    “Larry dear,” said Mother, “I do wish you wouldn't say things like that in front of Gerry.”
    Now came Mactavish's big moment. The front row of the village audience consisted entirely of old men with long white beards, and the younger men were standing in the background craning their necks to watch his tricks. Mactavish strode forward to the oldest of the old men, who must surely have been the mayor of the village since we had noticed he had been given a special place of honour so that he could see the tricks more clearly. Mactavish stood there for a moment with his hands up, fingers spread wide, and said in Greek,
    “I will now show you another trick.”
    Swiftly, he reached down and produced from the old man's beard a drachma and threw the silver-coloured coin on the ground. There was a gasp of astonishment from the assembled company. Then, having raised his arms and spread his fingers wide once more, he reached into the other side of the old man's beard and produced a five-drachma piece, which he again, with a flourish, threw on the ground.
    “Now,” said Mactavish in Greek, holding up his hands once more, you ye seen how I have produced by magic this money from the mayor's beard…”
    “Can you produce more?” inquired the mayor in a quavering voice.
    “Yes, yes,” came a chorus of villagers, “can you produce more?”
    “I will see what my magic can do,” said Mactavish, by now completely carried away.
    In rapid succession he produced from the mayor's beard a whole series of ten-drachma coins, which he threw on the mounting pile on the ground. In those days Greece was so poverty stricken that the shower of silver Mactavish was producing out of the mayor's beard represented a small fortune.
    It was at that point that Mactavish over-reached himself He produced from the mayor's beard a fifty-drachma note. The “ah's” of excitement were almost deafening. Encouraged by this, Mactavish produced four more fifty-drachma notes. The mayor sat there entranced. Periodically he would whisper a blessing to one or another of the many saints who he felt were producing this miracle.
    “I think, you know,” said Theodore in a tentative tone of voice, “it would be perhaps advisable not to produce any more.”
    But Mactavish was too flushed with