MIST

By Adrien Lochon
First Edition — December 2018
Cover art by @v_forvalentin
 ADRIEN LOCHON'S

MIST
MARKLESS, IMPROMPTU SNEAK THIEF



What follows is one of my pet routines. If the title didn’t give it away yet, it’s based on Larry
Becker’s “Sneak Thief”1 and Max Maven’s “Desire,”2 as well as many other variations3. But
what makes this version different is it uses no gimmicks and no marks of any kind. All you
need are four business cards and a writing instrument and you’re good to go.

It’s one of my workhorses because I get so much out of so little work. It can be done in
walk around and table hopping situations. It involves multiple people. It can be made as
long or short as I need it. It’s technically easy to do, and it’s a beautiful plot that, in my
opinion, really shows what a mind reader is supposed to do.

In this routine, you hand four participants a business card each and ask them to draw
something. When they’re done, you collect the cards, mix them and hand them to a
participant. The participant turns over the first drawing and after you analyze it, you
determine its author. You repeat the feat for the second and third drawings and, for the last
drawing; you duplicate it without going near the card.

This structure is something that appeals to me because the vision I have of a real mind
reader wouldn’t have a little “three effect mini show” ready to perform at each table. He
would, instead, sit at the table, talk to the people a bit and show them what he does. He
would seem to do one thing (even if in reality he was showing how he combines multiple
skills into one demonstration) and that would be it. So approaching a group and showing
them you can read them to the point where you know what each would draw is pretty
impressive and, right before that trick gets old, you step up a notch and actually determine
what someone drew without looking at it.

1 From “Stunners,” by Larry Becker (1992)

2 From “The Blue Book of Mentalism,”, by Philip T. Goldstein (1976)
3Jared Kopf’s “The Oneiromancer’s Index,” from “Vaticinium Ex Eventu” (2016) and Andy Nyman’s
“Magician’s Graphology” from “Get Nyman” (2004), to name a couple.
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Explanation

For the sake of explanation, let’s imagine you’re at a table with four participants, named A,
B, C and D. Hand each of them a business card and ask them to draw something simple4
on the back of the card. If there are more than four people at the table, I often perform
something really quick as a sort of warm-up while the other four people draw their
masterpieces. I’ll often use a star sign reveal using a PA, Ever Elizalde’s “Manoeda” or any
other flavour of which hand routine.

Collect the four cards in A, B, C, D order, so that you end up with a stack where the bottom
card is A’s and the top one is D’s. You’re now going to perform two Elmsley Counts5 , but
make sure you don’t do the counts perfectly. Everything you’re used to hiding in an
Elmsley Count, you’ll want to show. So it must look as if you’re moving two cards at once,
sliding cards from the bottom, etc. It should look chaotic and random.

Of course, it is anything but chaotic and random. After the two counts, you know the cards
are in D, B, A, C order. You now need to peek the bottom card. You can use any peek
you’re comfortable with, but I like to employ Nico Heinrich’s Paddle Peek, from his book
Dopamine.

Fig. 1 Fig. 2

Fig. 3 Fig. 4

4You could, obviously, have them write something instead of drawing or even give them the choice to either
draw or write.
5 Originally named the “Ghost Count” by Alex Elmsley in Elmsley's “The Four Card Trick” (1959).
—2—
After the two counts, you’ll have the cards in mechanics grip in your right hand (Fig. 1). As
you ask one participant to extend their hand, do a paddle move (Fig. 2 and 3) as your own
hand goes from being palm up and close to you, to being palm down and extended away
from you (Fig. 4). This gives you a brief glimpse at the bottom card (which you know
belongs to participant C). In this position, drop the cards into the participant’s hands.

So at this point, the dirty work is done. You know the order of the cards, and you know
what’s drawn on the bottom one. Ask the participant to turn over the top card (which
belongs to D), give it any kind of analysis you fancy and say it’s participant D’s card. Take
your applause and ask the participant holding the cards to turn over the next one. You
know it’s B’s, so do your thing and reveal that. Have the next card turned over, which you
know is A’s. Go through your process and reveal it (I like to speed things up on the third
card, as we’ve moved from a 1 in 4 to a 1 in 2 and it’s not as impressive).

There’s only one card left, so everyone knows it’s C’s. But you also know what’s drawn on
it, so use your best theatrics to reveal it and take your final applause.

When I showed Nico Heinrich this routine, he immediately suggested adding an equivoque
when there are only two cards left, which I think really improves the routine. Put both cards
on the table (or spread both in your hands) and ask the participant to take one of them. If
he takes the card you peeked, ask him to fold it and place it in his pocket, while you openly
look at the remaining card and reveal its author. This adds a really nice layer of
deceptiveness, as it reinforces the notion that you never touched the card. If he takes the
other card, continue the routine as described above.

Single Participant Variation

On occasion, I do this to a single participant. There are a lot of options for things to be
written. One that I particularly enjoy is asking them to write the name of someone they
love, someone they hate, someone they’d like to meet and someone completely made up.

If you have them write in this order, you’ll get a peek at the name of the person they’d like
to meet. So now you’ll start by reading one name and it’ll be the name of someone made
up. You can say you feel no emotional connection between them and this name, so it must
be the made up one. Next, you’ll read the name of someone they hate, so you can say
something about their state of mind when they think of this person. Next is the person they
love and you can, again, go into how amazing it feels when they think of this person, so it
must be the person they love.

And now, after a series of rather personal reveals, you can reveal the name of the person
they’d like to meet. This is a powerful experience for the participant. Don’t underestimate it.

—3—
Single Drawing Variation

You can also make this much simpler and have them draw or write something on a single
card and mix it among three other blank cards. If you hold three blank cards on your left
hand, place the participant’s card second from the top and perform two Elmsley Counts,
you’ll end up with their card on the bottom, so you can perform the paddle move peek
discussed earlier, and right before you drop the cards on their hand, cut one card from the
top (which places their card third from the top).

Have them peek at the top card and “read” their reaction to tell there’s nothing on that
card. Have them turn over the next card and, again, you “read” them and reveal the card is
blank. On the third card, say you spotted a reaction, so you take the last card and confirm
it’s also blank.

They’re left with one card — their card — in their hand. It seems as if you never touched
the cards and yet, you can reveal exactly what’s written on it.

Three-Point Reading

Here’s a small idea to turn a drawing duplication into a warm reading. You can specify how
they should choose a drawing: if they’re introverted, they should think of something
typically indoors. If they’re extroverted, they should think of something usually found
outside. If they’re more intellectual than emotional, they should draw something small.
Otherwise, they should draw a larger object. If at this point in their life, they’re more
focused on work/school/career, they should draw something man-made. If, on the other
hand, they are more focused on relationships, family or friends, they should draw
something natural.

So if they draw a flower in a pot. You know they are an introvert, intellectual person who is
focusing on relationships. This is a lot for a reading.

Closing Thoughts

I’ve used this routine quite a lot in almost every situation, and it’s something that never
fails to amaze. Make sure you go through a proper process and don’t simply tell the
participants who is the author of each drawing. Take your time to give a reading about the
author: you’ve got so much going on in your favor. No one knows who drew each card, but
you’re looking straight at the author, so you can go into details like what you think the
gender of the author is, what is their personality like, you can take a couple of guesses
about them and, when you’re satisfied, reveal the author.

—4—
The presentational angles are endless here: you can go the psychological or scientific
approach or you can go full mystic/psychic. It really is up to you and your character, so
don’t be afraid of the bold method and remember this routine was created with laymen in
mind. I’ve done it countless times and I’ve convinced people I was really doing what I
claimed to be doing most of the time.

Before we wrap this thing up, I’d like to thank Craig Logan for his help in editing this PDF,
as well as Ever Elizalde and Steve Wachner who have collectively put up with all the
iterations of this document and gave me feedback throughout the process. And, of course,
a special thanks to Nico Heinrich, for giving me permission to include his Paddle Peek. I’m
thankful that I’m surrounded by amazing people, so thank you all.

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