With a pack of cards in his hands, Houdini couldn’t kiss the hem of the late Ricky Jay’s rolled-up sleeve. As a mentalist, he would have been shamed by today’s master, Derren Brown. Never a great illusionist, he lacked mystery and atmosphere his stagecraft was ordinary. But now, having spent most of the previous five years in Europe, he had to conquer America all over again. He had conquered inspectors from Berlin and Scotland Yard, who chained him up and then watched, bewildered, as he broke free.

Indeed, he was an affront to authorities everywhere. It was a time of intense anti-Semitism in Russia, and Houdini, who was Jewish, wanted to flummox the tsarist politsiya. In Europe, he had pulled off such stunts as escaping (in 1903) from the “Siberian Transport Cell,” a metal safe on wheels that was used to haul political renegades off to prison. As a beginner, he had performed with trained monkeys and fat ladies a few years later, he did his tricks in a tuxedo with a boutonnière.

He had toured all over the United States, playing circus sideshows, vaudeville houses, and packed theatres of the Orpheum Circuit. He was thirty-four and had worked in show business for fifteen years. In 1908, Harry Houdini-“The World’s Handcuff King and Prison Breaker”-needed a new act.

The handcuff king