Imagine a handsome lacquered oak box with a lid mounted on brass hinges. The magician opens the box to reveal a row of 6 brightly painted, rainbow-colored wooden blocks nestled snugly inside. A long, rigid spike passes through a hole at one end of the box, through holes in the centers of the blocks, and out through another hole at the opposite end of the box. When the magician turns the box upside down, the spike holds the blocks securely in place.

The magician pulls the spike out, and all the blocks fall onto the table. He invites a member of

the audience to inspect everything, then asks the volunteer to name his favorite 2 colors of any of the blocks.

The magician stacks the blocks back in the box, closes the lid, and replaces the spike, pushing it from end to end. Holes in the lid reveal that the blocks still appear to be lined up in a row, as they were before. Yet when the magician raps twice on the lid with his knuckles and turns the box upside down, the 2 blocks that the volunteer selected fall out, while the other 4 remain inside, still impaled on the spike. How did the chosen blocks escape?

Photography by Garry McLeod

70 Make: Volume 13