The Transported Man.

When I called Enright to ask if Challoner could come to his party too, he laughed and said of course:- “I didn’t realise he was still in the area or I’d have invited him myself.”

Angela has seen him since. She went down to the theatre to find the magicians and ended up seeing a show. About twenty or so of the magicians were in Ruskins bar over from the theatres, with another dozen in the The Brown Bear round the corner, split along some political division or other that I don’t get. Apparently one lot believe the other lot are exploitative or something. I must look into to it more, since my father probably belonged to one of the camps, and the others are less likely to invite me to their parties. An acolyte of Enright went round the pubs and gathered them all into The Lyceum.

They took their seats in the front few rows of the stalls. Angela was invited along, because she knew enough about magic to bluff an invite, and her looks probably did a lot to help. Enright appeared on the stage and welcomed them all. He said some of them knew why the market venture had now ceased, but for those that didn’t:-
“We have succeeded, beyond our reasonable hopes.” He announced with a flourish, and stepped down into the crowd, where he shook hands left and right like a politician. And like a politician, he never really said what it was he was claiming as a triumph, and then he backed out of the crowd, out of the doors, which slowly swung closed behind him. And then instantly he was on stage again: Enright shouted from the stage:-
“We have found what we sought!”
And he stepped down from the stage again, into the crowd, who this time shook his hand with greater enthusiasm, some of them laughing, some of them baffled or even angry. Enright spoke naturally – the people Angela spoke to afterwards said he knew them and continued the conversation he’d just been having – and then he stepped out of the door again, to appear in the circle seats above them, triumphant again. As soon as he was hidden by the angle of the balcony he was on stage a third time, and this time he just clapped his hands and joined the now delirious crowd.

“I thought, since as an illusionists trick this has been given some recent popularity, it might be fun to indulge in the real thing.” Enright said.
One of the more cynical members of the audience said afterwards, when they were back in The Brown Bear, that he had extreme doubts and reservations, but since he happened to have a piece of chalk in his pocket (by force of habit), the second time Enright joined them from the stage he had marked his sleeve, and the same mark was on his arm up in the circle, and the same mark was on his arm as he reappeared on stage the third time.

It’s not impossible to perform such a trick and fool an audience of strangers. The timing of it, since one of the cynics went back stage and timed the distances, would require at least three people who looked identical. Not only that, but the audience were not strangers. There were people among the crowd who had known Enright for decades, and who would know if he was false in any way. There were people in the audience who had trained themselves to recognise any such deceptions. The unanimous opinion was that this was genuine. Enright has found a source of magic that survived.