RobVerse (RV)
[Reprinted from Robin Robertson/Peter Duffie Joint Linking Ring Parade (July 2000).
This move was inspired by Larry Jennings' "Larreverse" in Lewis Ganson's Dai Vernon's Ultimate Secrets of
Card Magic (Supreme, nd, ch. 10), and published in Card Modes (pp. 38-40).
The purpose of both moves is to turn a card face-up secretly while you turn the card under it face-down.
Start by reversing a card in the middle of the deck. Spread the cards from left to right under you come to the face-up card. It should be under your left thumb, pushed to the side of the left hand cards. The right fingertips grip the card that is immediately to its right, at the farthest right edge from underneath.
Now slide the right hand to the left until the right hand card covers the face-up card. Don't worry about alignment. Grip both cards with the right fingers, pull them to the right face-up, then pivot them over to the left. The right hand cards will provide cover during this process. Square the deck as you finish.
There should be a rhythm to this process: spread until you come to the face-up card. Pause. Slide to the left, slide to the right, flip-over, square. If you do this to the same rhythm as it takes you to read those words, you'll do it just right.
Straddle-RV Ace Production
Here we use a variation of RV called "Straddle-RV. Simply square the face-up card roughly with the card underneath it as you begin RV, then turn all three cards over as one. You need a little more cover for this, but it's almost angle-free.
Set-up: 4 Aces on top, alternating colors. The 4th Ace from the top has a stronger longitudinal bend in it that the others. Just hold it face-down from above on the long sides and bend them almost together.
1. Remark that you need a special card for this trick. As you're saying this, get a break under the top two cards
and cut them to the middle, holding the break. Then begin spreading the cards from hand-to-hand. Stop at the break
and turn the Ace under the break face-up. "An Ace will do."
2. Turn it face-down again, using the Straddle-RV move. Lay the deck down on the table for a minute.
3. "But really I need more than the single Ace." Pick up the deck in the left hand and Charlier Cut,
immediately flipping the top half over onto the right fingers. Simultaneously the right and left thumbs push off
the top cards so that they can be grasped between 1st and 2nd fingers. All 4 Aces will now
display.
4. To clean-up, drop the two Aces between 1st and 2nd fingertips on the table, then thumb
the face-up Aces on top of their packets onto the table as well. Both hands should turn palm-down in the process.
Left hand then turns palm-up and the right hand deposits its half on top.
