Before long the room filled, the lights went down to a spotlight on the stage, and, a single figure stepped into view. At that point an announcer came over the sound system and said “In town just this night and on a tour that includes Chicago, New York, Toronto, and, Montreal---let’s give a big round of applause to the Astounding Randi.”
“The Astounding Randi” was about five foot ten in height, had brown hair that was long enough to cover his ears and was combed-over to the point where it was lightly touching the over-sized, almost owlish-looking glasses. He had a prominent nose, somewhat protuding teeth, and a weak chin. He was dressed in a blue sports jacket, with a diagonal stripe tie, over jeans and wore expensive moccasin loafers. The spotlight made his especially pale white skin almost glow in the dark. When the applause began to tail off, he began to speak in a quiet voice---one that people had to strain to hear. This caused more and more people to quickly quiet-down. The audience quickly became silent.
“---the human mind is far greater than most of us imagine. If it is trained and harnessed to the will, people can see far more around them than they think they can. Does this mean that someone can read another person’s mind? I’ll let people make up their own minds on that score.”
“But first, let’s get the lighting crew to randomly select some people from the audience. These will be the folks I can talk to and pursue my investigations with.”
At that point other, other spotlights came on and started to play across the audience.
“As I look across the faces before me, I am trying to get a sense of what people are feeling. It’s like trying to sort through a beach to find a single grain of sand. It’s possible to do, but requires focus. It can be done, but I need to quiet my mind and centre it into a tighter and tighter beam.”
At this point the irises on the searching spotlights shrank a bit, leaving smaller, hotter lights playing across the audience.
“And at the same time that my focus becomes tighter, I can sense people’s feelings more clearly. There are people that come through a little better than others. I think I have them now. Stop the search!”
At that point the spotlights stopped moving and focused on six different individuals---one of which was the short woman in front of Sally and Nate.
“The six people that the spotlight has stopped at---I think that I might have a little better luck connecting with them. If you want, why not walk up to the stage so I can see if I can ‘read’ you?” The man on the stage smiled and gestured with his hands. At that point some pleasant music came out of the speakers that lined the stage and coloured spots formed a line with him in the middle. While this was happening, the six individuals---including the woman in front of Nate and Sally---got up and walked to the stage.
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