"Then the psychic is not moving."
Again they sat in silence, and after some minutes the fumbling began again and the horn was heard sc.r.a.ping slowly about, as if being lifted with effort only to fall back with a clang.
"Is it too heavy?" asked Clarke.
Three sharp raps replied--an angry "yes"--and then, with a petulant swing, the instrument apparently left the table and floated upon the air. In deep amazement Morton listened for some movement, some sound from Viola, but there was none, not a breath, not a rustle of motion where she sat, and the silk thread was tight and calm. "She has nothing to do with _that_," he said, beneath his breath.
Kate called excitedly, "Oh! It touched me."
"What touched you?" asked Weissmann.
"The horn."
"Did it b.u.mp you?"
"No, it seemed to float against me."
Morton spoke out sharply: "Where is Mr. Clarke?"
"Right here on my right," replied Kate.
"What idiotic business!" he exclaimed, mystified, nevertheless.
The horn dropped to the middle of the table, but was immediately swept into the air again as if by a new and more vigorous hand, and a voice heavily mixed with air, but a man"s voice unmistakably, spoke directly to Morton, sternly, contemptuously.
"We meet you on your own level. You asked for material tests, and now conditions being as you have made them--proceed. What would you have us do?"
"Who are you?"
"I am Donald McLeod--grandfather to the psychic."
At this moment Morton became seized of the most vivid realization of the physical characteristics of the man back of the voice. In some mysterious way, through some hitherto unknown sense, he was aware of a long, rugged face, with bleak and k.n.o.bby brow. The lips were thin, the mouth wide, the dark-gray eyes contemptuous. "It is all an inner delusion caused by some resemblance of this voice to that of some one I have known," he said to himself; but a shiver ran over him as he questioned the old man. "If you are the grandfather of the psychic,"
he said, "I would like to ask you if you think it fair to a young girl to use her against her will for such foolery as this?"
"The purposes are grand, the work she is doing important--therefore I answer yes. She is yet but a child, and the things she does of her own motion trivial and vain. We make of her an instrument that will enable man to triumph over the grave. You will observe that we do not harm her, we take but little of her time, after all. You are unnecessarily alarmed. Our regard for her welfare far exceeds yours. Her troubles arise from her resistance. If she would yield herself entirely, she would be happy."
As the voice paused, Morton asked, "Weissmann, can you hear what is being said to me?"
"Very indistinctly," answered Weissmann.
"What does it say?" asked Kate. "I can only hear a kind of jumble."
Weissmann interjected; "I must ask you, Mrs. Rice, have you tight hold of Mr. Clarke"s hand?"
"Yes," answered Kate.
Morton"s brain whirled in confusion and conjecture. He believed the whole thing to be a piece of juggling, and yet he could not connect Viola in any way with it, and it seemed impossible, also, for Mrs.
Lambert to sit where she was and handle the cone, to say nothing of the ventriloquistic skill necessary to carry on this conversation. He again addressed the voice: "You consider your control of the psychic to be justified?"
"We do."
"Do you know, also, what perilous notoriety, what positive disgrace--from every human point of view--you are about to bring upon her?"
The hidden old man pondered a moment, as if to master a profound contempt, then answered: "We have taken all things into account. When she has grown to years of sobriety she will thank us that we turned her aside from dancing and from light conversation, and from all loose-minded companions. All the sane pleasures are now hers. She is soon to be idolized by thousands. Her playing on the piano, her singing are as the rustle of leaves in the forest compared to her mediumship, which is as a trumpet-blast opening the gates of the city of refuge to let the weary traveller in." The voice weakened a little.
"The earth-life is but a school--the real life is here. Besides, when she has completely subordinated her will to ours, when she has given our message--" The spirit grand-sire seemed to falter and diminish.
"My power is waning, but I will again manifest. We will try--" The voice stopped as though a door had been shut upon the speaker, and the megaphone dropped upon the table.
"All that is very interesting," commented Weissmann, "but inconclusive. Is it all over?"
"Oh no," answered Mrs. Lambert. "They are uniting upon something wonderful--I feel it."
As they listened the horn moved feebly, uneasily rising a few inches, only to fall as though some weak hand were struggling with it; but at last it turned towards Weissmann, and from it issued the voice of a little girl, thrillingly sweet and so clear that Serviss could hear every word. She addressed Weissmann in German, calling him father, asking him to tell mother not to grieve, that they would soon all be together in a bright land.
To this Weissmann replied in harsh accent: "You a.s.sert you are my daughter?"
The voice sweetly answered: "Yes, I am Mina--"
"But Mina could not understand a word of English--how is that?"
The little voice hesitated. "It is hard to explain," she replied, still in German. "I can _understand_ you in any language--but I can only speak as you taught me."
Thereupon he addressed her in French, to which she replied easily, but in her native tongue.
As this curious dialogue went on Serviss was searching vainly for an explanation. "Mr. Clarke, will you kindly speak at the same time that this voice appears?"
Clarke began a discourse, and the two voices went on at the same time.
The young scientist then said: "Mrs. Lambert, will you permit Kate to lay her hand over your lips? You understand, it is for the sake of science--"
"Certainly," said Mrs. Lambert.
Here the test failed of completeness, it was so difficult to get the three voices precisely together; but at last it seemed that the child"s voice was produced at the same time that Clarke spoke and while Kate"s hand covered the mother"s mouth.
Thereupon the little voice said farewell, and all was silent for a few moments. The cone rose again into the air and a soft, sibilant voice addressed Mrs. Lambert.
"Oh!" she cried, joyfully. "It is Robert!--Yes, dear, I"m listening.
I"m so glad you"ve come. Can"t you talk with Professor Serviss?--He says he will try," she said to the company.
As Morton waited the cone gently touched him on the shoulder, and a moment later a man"s voice, utterly different from the first one and of most refined accent, half spoke, half whispered: "We are glad to meet you, professor. I am deeply gratified by your interest in our dear girl."
"Who are you?" he asked, moved, in spite of himself, by a liking for this new personality, so distinct from the others.
"I am R.M. Waldron--Viola"s father."
He seemed to wait for questions, and Serviss asked: "How do _you_ feel about your daughter"s mediumship? Are you not uneasy when you think of what you are demanding of her?"
The invisible one sighed, hesitated, and replied with evident sadness: "It troubles me to find her reluctant. I wish she were happier in the work. It seems so important to us." Then the voice brightened. "But perhaps it is only for a little while. After the public test--after the truth of her mediumship is made manifest--I think, I hope, we will ask less of her. Perhaps it will be possible to release her altogether for a time; but for the present she is too valuable--" The sentence was lost in a buzz of inarticulate whispering, as if two or three friends were consulting. The opening and closing of lips could be heard, and a stir within the horn was curiously trivial in effect, as if a mouse were at play with a dry leaf.
"If I were to organize a committee of men like Weissmann and Tolman, and other men of international fame, willing to test your daughter"s powers, will you give over this public demonstration--this publishing of a challenge?"