In our last post we introduced you to Houdini’s greatest fan and would-be successor, the last of the "-inis,” The Great Saltini.
When we left The Great Saltini he had just been conned out of his last hundred dollars by a cleverer magician than he. Desperate to get both money and dignity back, Saltini resolved to turn his knock into a boost.
Like Houdini, he fancied himself something of a writer and longed to see his name in print. So he wrote an amusing story about that nasty little con, and called it “Magic is My Business.” Then he took it across town to Rolling Stone magazine, hoping for a fee much fatter than a measly hundred bucks, and for his byline on the cover. Houdini, his feisty and self-promoting hero, would have been proud.
Saltini, through his agent, arranged an appointment with Jann Wenner, the legendary founder and editor-in-chief.
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| Jann Wenner in his office at 625 Third Street, San Francisco |
But when he arrived at Rolling Stone’s headquarters at 625 Third Street in San Francisco, Wenner refused to see him. Instead, Paul Block, one of Wenner’s army of editors, met him in the lobby.
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| Rolling Stone's San Francisco headquarters |
Block was a short, extremely handsome man, addicted to cigars and said to “get more ass than a ‘49er quarterback.” Block had volunteered to handle him because he had the hots for Saltini’s agent, Anita Cross, who looked like a movie star.
Block half-listened as Saltini explained his story and handed him the manuscript. Block took the pages and said, “Have your agent call me. It’s Anita Cross, right? She’s hot, no??”
Saltini smiled noncommittally. Though he realized Anita was a traffic-stopping knockout, he had never regarded her that way because she was his agent. Sacred, sort of like your mother.
Block, trying to drum up business that would require Anita’s presence, suddenly got a brainstorm.
“Hey, listen!” he cried excitedly, “let’s do a big four-page color spread about how to saw a woman in half! We’d get some real babe, scantily-clad -- maybe Anita! -- put you in tails with your chainsaw, really do it up!”
Block got so excited about his idea that he called in some of the other editors and a couple of graphic artists. They got excited, too, and began to rhapsodize, wiseacre and spin. Block began to fantasize lewdly about scantily-clad literary agents.
It felt like the idea was lifting the building off its moorings when Block turned to Saltini and asked,
“Say. How DO you saw a lady in half, anyway?”
An expectant hush fell over the conference room.
Saltini whispered, “Couldn’t we keep it a secret?”
That just whetted their appetites. “Magic is My Business” dropped into oblivion. All that counted was sawing a lady in half. They forced Saltini to put up or shut up.
He reluctantly began to explain that there are several methods. You could do it simply and classically, or it could mushroom into something like his specialty: using a chainsaw. But the basic secret was …
You never saw so many faces fall so far.
“Oh. Hm.”
“Mm. ‘Course it had to be something like that.”
“Mn."
“Well. I’m going over to Enrico’s. Anyone want to come?”
Saltini stared at the group in amazement, as he saw his career slide down the tubes. Then it hit him.
“Hey, wait a minute,” he cried. “The trouble with you guys is - you really believe in magic!”
Block looked at him blankly, and replied:
“Well, yeah. I believe in it. But I don’t give a shit about it!”
Saltini, desperate now, said, "Would you like to see a card trick?"
"No," Block replied.
As they trooped out, leaving Saltini behind, he had the uncomfortable feeling that he had read this story somewhere before, and that the ending left something to be desired.
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(Images via Google Images)
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