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The roots of this routine go back more than half a century, to Charles Jordan's "Demon's Divination". In that routine, a spectator was asked to think of a card. Groups of cards were then displayed (28 in all), with the spectator asked whether the thought-of value and/or suit were represented in various sets. From the information given, the performer was able to determine the specific mentally selected card. Joseph Ovette's "The Buddha Whispers" offered essentially the same premise, but reduced the number of shown cards to 24. (In Howard Albright's version, "Perfect Card Divination", the number was increased to a full 52-card set-up.) The principle was cleverly refined some years later, by U. F. Grant, in his "Monte Carlo" (one of the "Secret Service" series of manuscripts). Grant artfully concealed the mathematical nature of the method with a marvelous gambling presentation. This version also employed a 24-card
set-up. In the 1981 book "Fourcast", Karl Fulves appended a magical production of the chosen card to the Grant routine.
Some time ago, I set about trying to streamline the effect. The principle is clever and functional, but displaying four sets of six cards is tedious and rather suspect. Clearly, there are limitations as to just how much the information could be reduced and still be practical. It occured
to me, however, that there were subtleties which could be incorporated in such a way as to by-pass some of those limitations. After much effort (and many discarded versions), the following routine evolved. The number of cards displayed has been reduced to ten (actually
eight, plus two nulls). Obviously, this affords far too little information with which to work, so there must be some cheating going on. Yes.
There is a ten-card set-up on top of the pack: the top five cards consist
of an ace, three, six, eight, and court card. The suits of these are confined
to spades and hearts, but it doesn't matter which value is of which
suit. Too, the order of the cards within the set is immaterial. The next
five cards are a deuce, three, seven, eight, and court card. These cards
must be all hearts and clubs. Again, they can be in any order.
You will need, in addition to the set-up deck, a piece of paper; a pencil
or pen; and a book or box of matches. Begin by inquiring, "Have you ever
played Zen Poker? It's very similar to Two-Handed Solitaire, but rather
different..." Bring out the pack of cards.