MAX MAVEN

Kurotsoke.
gimmicks.
thought at
he throws

It's a very clever effect because it requires no

When I watched Maven on the tape do it, I
first that the bag must be gimmicked, but then
it out to the audience. Here's the scoop:

You have one black and five white stones showing in your
hand. When you go to put the stones in the bag, you finger
palm the black stone. So the first four specs can only get
white stones. Now, however the jig is up--when the fifth
spec picks from the bag, if you continued to retain the stone
in your hand, he would know something was wrong since
there would only be one stone left in the bag--he'll be able
to feel that. So for the fifth spec you drop the black stone
back into the bag. He now has a free choice of either the
black stone or the remaining white stone. The sixth spec
gets the last stone.
So the black stone is held by the fifth or sixth spec. Here's
where there's a cute verbal misdirection. You say before
you begin that your job is to find the black stone and
eliminate everyone with the white stone. Now you turn to
the fifth spec (who should be near the front of the house)
and say with a dramatic flair--"Show me your stone!" If he
had the black stone, you've just found him and you declare
victory. If he has a white stone however, "Ah, I've
eliminated the first suspect." The ambiguity here is very
convincing because remember the last thing you said to the
audience was that you were going to eliminate everyone
with the white stone. So now you go to specs 1, 2 and 3
and demand that they show you their white stones as you
announce that you've eliminated them too. So now you're
down to specs 4 and 6, with 6 holding the stone. It's nice if
you can arrange it so that 4 is near the front and 6 is at the
back. You place yourself between them and wheeling from
one to the other you point and say, "You've (pointing to 4)
got the white stone, and you're (pointing to 6) the

murderer."
So that's it. I think it's a very elegant solution, although I
think the alternate ending plays better than getting a direct
hit.