The kerosene lantern hanging over the tailboard cast its glow for no great distance. She could see clearly only the nearest rows of people who had come to watch this amateur show, the talent for which had been recruited from the campers themselves. Everything else was in shadow. Cindy took a deep breath and announced:

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, I, the Great Cindy Simpson, will thrill you with feats of magic and leaderdemain! I will prove to you that the hand is quicker than the eye! Watch closely!"

She saw her brother grinning up at her and winked at him. Alec was two and a half years older than she. But, she thought proudly, even though he was only fourteen, still he was taller than some of the grown men present. Of course, in this crowd of people, all waiting to join the run into Oklahoma to claim land, there were short men as well as tall.

Cindy tried and failed to find her mother in the crowd. Thinking of her mother, she also thought of Mindy and was suddenly and terribly lonesome. Mindy, Cindy's identical twin sister, had suffered a winter fever. It was thought that she could not stand the long wagon trip from Missouri into Kansas, and down through the Cherokee Outlet, or Strip, as it was often called, on the north to the border of the lands that were being opened for settlement. So Mindy had been left in Missouri with Grandpa and Grandma Simpson. But she was coming by train, and Cindy hoped it would be soon. This very afternoon her father had gone to the nearest railroad station, which was two miles away, to see if there was a message.

Giving herself back to the spirit of her act, Cindy took one of her mother's silk handkerchiefs from the little table of articles beside her and waved it gracefully. She continued:

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, keep your eyes on the handkerchief! You can see for yourselves that there is nothing unusual about it! It is just an ordinary handkerchief, until I fold it in my hand!"

Cindy folded it carefully in her hand, clamped her small fist about it, and waved her arm aloft. When she opened her fist the handkerchief was gone. A small wire hook on the end of an elastic band attached to the armhole of her camisole had drawn the handkerchief only part way up her sleeve. Still, it was out of the crowd's sight. Cindy tossed the long black braids that hung over her shoulders and pretended shocked surprise.

"Oh! It's gone!" she exclaimed. "One of my mother's best, too! Now what shall I do?"

She waved her arm again, bending it as she did so, to let the stretched elastic go slack. At the same time she pulled a silk thread, one end of which had been tied to the handkerchief before she picked it up. The other end was looped, and she'd slipped the loop over her finger. As magically as it had disappeared, the handkerchief was there again. Cindy cried happily, "Ah! It's back! See what magic can do?"

She returned the handkerchief to the table, picked up a short wand, and showed it to her audience. "The witches' wand!" she said darkly. "But it has no power over the Great Cindy! Listen!"

She tapped the wand on the table, and the sound of the thumping reached the farthest edges of the crowd.

"As you can see," she announced, "it's very solid! Now I'll roll it in this magic paper!"

She rolled it in a piece of ordinary paper and held it up in full view of the crowd. Then she tore wand and paper into tiny bits, threw them into the air, and let them float down among her audience. Nobody except Cindy and Alec knew that the wand itself was paper, with a small chunk of lead, to make the thumping sound, in one end.

Cindy did half a dozen more tricks and then picked up the only real magic prop she had. It was a wicked-looking knife given to her by a farmhand whom she had known on the Missouri farm where her father had worked before coming to seek his own land in Oklahoma. The same farmhand had also taught her the rest of her magic.

"Before I perform this last and greatest feat," she said, "I wish to prove to all of you that this is a real knife. One of you must examine it. You!"

Her eyes fell on a short, swarthy man who wore a red handkerchief around his neck and another bound over his hair. Cindy hesitated. Did the man have eyes like a cat? Or did she only think so? She was not sure, and she stepped forward to press the knife into his hand.

"Take it!" she urged.

He took it, but he seemed to do so unwillingly, and his eyes remained on Cindy.

"Cut something, please," she requested.

He slid the knife along the wagon's tailboard, and a long sliver of wood curled up. Cindy smiled sweetly.

"Do you want to try it on something else?" she asked.

The man merely stared at her. When Cindy stretched out her hand, he put the knife in it and backed hastily away. Cindy thanked him and went on with her show.

"You have seen for yourselves, ladies and gentlemen, that this knife is razor-sharp! Watch closely!"

Before the crowd could guess what was going to happen, they saw Cindy seemingly plunge the cruel blade into her heart. Blood spurted, and just before she fell Cindy heard a woman scream. A moment later Cindy got up, bowed, and to the mad applause of everyone except the man with cat's eyes, leaped lightly from the tailboard.

Still grinning, Alec joined her. "Gee! You were great, sis!" he exclaimed.

"Was I really?"

"Best ever. And you sure bowled over one member of your audience."

"The woman who screamed?"