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The Mystery of the Magician's Handsome Assistant;

a Tale of Betrayal of Both Sorts!

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Panko the Magician! Watch Him with Stunned Amazement as he pulls a LIVE Rabbit from His Hat, Look on in Terror as He Drinks an Entire Bottle of Deadly Poison, watch as Live Doves fly out of his open hands! Could your child be one of the chosen few to have a very lucky !!Real Gold Coin!! pulled out of Their Ear? Come and balance on the very edge of your seat as He throws razor sharp Daggers with deadly accuracy at his handsome Young Assistant.

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"Look at me when I'm talking to you," snarled Panko The Magician, raising the belt over his head, "Because I'm talking to you," Panko brought the belt down again, the boy screamed again, arching his back away from the belt. "I need all these swords polished before you go to bed -- tonight. We have a performance tomorrow," Panko said, clobbering the boy with his other fist. Panko was a cruel man, but smart, he only beat the boy where others wouldn't see. Bruises can only go where they won't show!

But Master, that will take all night, I won't get any sleep!"

"You can sleep when you're dead," Panko laughed and clouting the lad in the back of the head, he stomped out of the tent.

Eeto was alone with his task.

After polishing one sword in the first hour, he knew it would take until past dawn to get them all sanded, powdered, polished and then oiled by hand. But when he laid the first sword down, Eeto noticed that he couldn't tell which of the sword had been polished and which ones hadn't, except by which pile they were in; on the left or the right.

Magicians need sleep, and by this time his Master was surely sound asleep. Mistakes happen when you are tired. His Master needed sleep, but Eeto needed his sleep too. The Master gets all the glory, but let me tell you, without a skilled assistant, all sorts of things might go very wrong. Getting an idea to make things go faster, Eeto got an oily rag and used it to wipe all the fingerprints off the swords, and then racked blades in their cases, they glimmered and glinted in the guttering lamp light. The Master would never know. Eeto went to his pallet and his last thought, drifting off, was that he would finally get one over on Master Panko. And he slept soundly.

In the early morning it was time to make Master's breakfast then see if there was enough left for him to eat. Then feed the doves, feed the rabbit, clean the cages, get his Master's bath ready, make sure the iron was hot enough to press their costumes for the performance. It was a busy time.

Panko came up to the lad.

"Hey, Worthless, here's tonight's routine. We start with doves and rabbits, then cards, the knives, and last; poison. You got that, Shithead?" "Yes," Master, "I got it."

By the time Eeto had made Master's dinner and prepped the rabbits for the show, there was barely time to stick his head into a bucket of fresh water and wash his hair, so it would dry by show time. He was busy from morning to performance time, and just before he was to go on, Panko cornered him again. "You cheated me, you didn't polish the swords. If you had polished them, there would be a rag damp with oil and a rag still damp with water. You just wiped them with oil. You'll get a special beating after the performance, you lazy shit. And here," Panko shoved a large brown bottle with the words "Deadly Poison" in red letters across the label, "You didn't fill the bottle for tonight's performance!"

Eeto asked, "Is this the bottle for the water or for the poison?

"You worthless little shit, do something right for a change, fill it with water."

In the big Top the show was running well, the crowd were eating it up, Panko was basking in the applause, grinning. Eeto thought, "Maybe things won't be so bad tonight." The master walked around the ring, smiling broadly and waving his hat to the crowd. Then with a bow, he addresses his audience, "Tonight, as promised, I will amaze you all by changing a bottle of poison into a bottle of water! Voila," with a flourish of his cape,

The crowd were on the edge of their seats during the knife throwing act, they had gotten totally psyched, the throws were so brutally close to Eeto's skin, but didn't actually land hit, thank goodness, and the crowd applauded wildly.

Then came the Poison Act; Eeto gave the pigeon just one drop from the bottle and released the bird, which flew away, up, flew about 10 meters, and fell to the ground, twitched once, then lay lifeless on the sand. With a flourish of his own short cape Eeto handed the bottle to The Great Panko. After holding the bottle aloft for all to see, with his own flourish, The Great Panko drained the whole bottle in a single draught. He then walked around the inside of the ring, arms in the air in victory, the crowd silent and expectant and hushed. Suddenly, Panko bent-over doubled, grasping his throat, now grasping his stomach and falling to his knees. The crowd moved to the edge of their seats, waiting for him to rise, expecting - that any second - he would stand, and amaze them.

"Little Pig," Panko grabbed his stomach and moaned, "Pig, you, the wrong bottle, did it wrong, th' wrong bottle. ... The poison th' first bottle, water the second. ... put wrong bottle, ..." and his breath rattled as he struggled to take another breath. "Stupid Shit."

Eeto made a show of concern, rolling Panko to his back, then jostled his Master up, so Master's head was resting in his lap, he lovingly brushing the hair out of his Master's eyes. Eeto squeezed some false tears out of his eyes, so indeed, he looked very sad. He leaned in very close, "Oh, no, Master," Eeto whispered quietly, his head bowing down low enough, that to the crowd it looked like he was kissing his Master's forehead.

"No, Master, no I didn't, I didn't, not in the wrong bottle. No,..." And two of his tears fell on his Master's face.

" ... I made sure to put it into both bottles."