"How can you tell?" asked Kate, her voice faint and shrill with awe.
"The fall of the horn to the floor is a sure sign of the end. You may turn up the gas, but very slowly."
Stunned by the significance, the far-reaching implications of his experiment, Morton remained standing while Weissmann turned on the light.
Pale, in deep, placid sleep, Viola sat precisely as they had left her, bound, helpless, and exonerated. She recalled to Morton"s mind a picture (in his school-books) of a martyr-maiden, who was depicted chained to the altar of some hideous, heathen deity, a monster who devoured the flesh of virgins and demanded with pitiless l.u.s.t the fairest of the race.
Of her innocence he was at that moment profoundly convinced.
XIV
PUZZLED PHILOSOPHERS
While he still stood looking down upon her Viola began to moan and toss her head from side to side.
"She is waking," cried Mrs. Lambert. "Let me go to her."
"No!" commanded Weissmann, "disturb nothing till we have examined all things."
"Make your studies quickly," said Morton, his heart tender to the girl"s sufferings. "We must release her as soon as possible."
Weissmann was not to be hastened. "If we do not now go slowly we lose much of what we are trying to attain. We must take her pulse and temperature, and observe the position of every object."
"Quite right," agreed Clarke, "Do not be troubled--the psychic is being cared for."
Thus rea.s.sured the two investigators scrutinized, measured, made notes, while Kate and Mrs. Lambert stood waiting, watching with anxious eyes the changes which came to Viola"s face. Weissmann talked on in a disjointed mutter. "You see? She has no pulse. The threads are unbroken. The table is thirty inches from her finger-tips. Observe this pad, forty-eight inches from her hand--and which contains a message."
"Read it!" demanded Kate.
He complied. ""_You ask for a particle of matter to be moved from A to B without the use of any force known to science. Here in this winegla.s.s is the test. Oh, men of science, how long will you close your eyes to the grander truths._""
"That is from father," remarked Mrs. Lambert.
"It is signed "McLeod," and under it are two words, "Loggy" and "Mother," each in different handwriting."
"Give it to me!" cried Kate, deeply moved.
"And here is the winegla.s.s," replied Weissmann, extracting from among the books a beautiful piece of antique crystal.
Kate took it reverentially, as if receiving it from the hand of her dead mother. "How came that here?"
"You recognize it? It was not left here by mistake?"
"Oh no. There are only four of them left and I keep them locked away.
I have not had them out in months."
Clarke smiled in benign triumph. "That is why they brought it--to show you that matter is an illusion and to prove that dematerialization and transubstantiation are facts. That was the bell we heard."
"Morton, what do _you_ think? How could--"
But Morton was bending above Viola and did not heed his sister. The girl"s eyes were opening as from natural slumber, and he said, gently: "I hope you are not in pain? We will release you in a moment."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE GIRL"S EYES WERE OPENING AS FROM NATURAL SLUMBER"]
She smiled faintly as she recognized him. "My arms are numb, and my feet feel as if strips of wood were nailed to my soles," she answered, wearily, "and my head is aching dreadfully; but that will soon pa.s.s."
"She always complains of her feet," the mother explained. "She can"t walk for quite a little while afterwards."
"You poor thing!" exclaimed Kate. "You are a martyr--that"s what you are."
Viola looked up with sweet and anxious glance. "Did anything happen?
Did your friends come to you, Mrs. Rice?"
"No, but several voices spoke to Morton."
"I"m sorry no one came to you. I"ve been a long way off this time,"
she continued, with dreamy, inward glance, "into a beautiful country from which I hated to return. I wouldn"t have come back to you at all only a thread of light tied my soul to my body and drew me down to earth in spite of myself."
"What was it like--that far country?" asked Morton.
She pondered sleepily. "I can"t tell you--only it was very beautiful and I was happy. Every one lived in the light with nothing to fear. I had no memory of the earth--only of my body which I was sorry for.
There was no death, no cold, no darkness up there. I was very happy and free."
"You should be free and happy here," answered Morton, gravely. "Come, doctor, can"t we free her now?"
"Yes, you may do so," he replied, still busy with his note-book.
The young host, with a feeling of having been unnecessarily brutal, ripped the tape loose from the floor, and Kate slipped the loops from Viola"s ankles. Then, leaning on her hostess"s arm, she rose slowly, smiling brightly, her weakness most appealing. "I hope a great deal happened--it means so much to me. I want to talk, but I can"t now, my head is too thick. You must tell me all about it pretty soon."
"A great deal happened--you are quite clear of any connection with it."
Her face lit with placid joy. "Oh, I"m so glad! It must be very late,"
she added, turning to her mother.
"Yes, and we must be going," responded Mrs. Lambert, nervously. "Mr.
Pratt will be impatient."
"I wish you"d stay with me to-night," pleaded Kate. "It was all so wonderful. I can"t let you go. Please stay! Both of you. You"re too tired to go out into the raw air."
"Oh no, we can"t do that--not to-night," Viola answered, decisively.
Morton threw back the doors. "Kate, take Miss Lambert into the dining-room and give her something to drink. She is quite exhausted.
Let me steady you," he said, tenderly, touching her arm. "You fairly reel with weakness."