Mehlman’s interest in this story lies in the delicate balance of falsehood and truth on which the final revelation relies. The master, a successful fraud, is himself defrauded in the process of his own greatest success. For the purposes of the present book, the physical absence of the “dwarf” in the performance before the despot is the point of emphasis. The juggler’s mastery emerges from his control over the single ball and, in particular, his apparent capacity to make the ball behave as though it were alive. That talent is fraudulent because the ball is actually alive, insofar as it possesses within itself a living body that manipulates the ball on the master’s behalf. His genius mastery over the ball is nothing but a kind of spiritualist parlor trick. What appears to be a living ball is, ultimately, an expression of human collaboration. That the “dwarf” is not merely necessary to the performance but concealed within the ball further underlines such a reading. As was the case with so many Page 25 →actual automatons (Abnet 2020, 48–49), the magical ball only appears to live because it has, at its heart, a living being. When the “dwarf” is absent, though, we discover a new reality. The ball itself is a living accomplice in the act. It, not the “dwarf,” is docile, recalcitrant, tender and mocking, obliging and faltering. Although we might be inclined to assume, in the spirit of many a sporting film