"How can you tell?"
"I hear them." A faint whisper soon distinguished itself, and Mrs. Joyce reported that Mr. Blodgett was speaking. "He says he realizes the importance of this test, and that he has summoned all the most powerful of the spirits within reach, and that they will do all they can. He says the wire cage is a new condition, but they will meet it. Be patient; the strain on Lucy is very great, but it cannot be avoided."
In the silence which followed this conversation Leo shuddered and clutched Victor"s hand as if for protection. "The other world is opening. Don"t you feel it?" She whispered. "I can hear the rustle of wings."
He, growing very tense himself, answered: "I feel only my mother"s anxiety. Are you comfortable, mother?" he asked.
She did not reply, and Mrs. Joyce said, "She is asleep." And all became silent again.
"h.e.l.lo!" exclaimed Stinchfield. "Who touched me?"
"No one in the circle," answered Mrs. Joyce, highly elated.
"I certainly felt a hand on my shoulder--there it comes again! Shall I flash my camera?"
"_Not now!_" came a clear, full whisper, apparently from the cabinet.
"_You would fail now. Wait._"
"Who spoke?" asked Bartol.
As there was no reply, Mrs. Joyce asked, "Is it you, Mr. Blodgett?"
"_No!_" the whisper replied.
"Is it Watts?"
"_Yes._"
"It is Isaac Watts. Now it is his science against yours, Mr.
Stinchfield."
Bartol fell into the mode at once. "We are glad to be so honored. Now Watts, I want--and I must have--incontestable proof of the psychic"s abnormal power--nothing else can save her from State prison. Do you realize that?"
"_We do._"
"Very well, proceed."
"_What would you call incontestable proof?_"
"I should say a registered pressure on the key or the lighting of the lamp above the cabinet--"
A vivid red flash lit up the room. Stinchfield shouted, "The lamp--the lamp was lit!"
His excitement, to all but Bartol, was ludicrously high, and Mrs. Joyce openly chuckled. "What else do you want done, Mr. Science?"
"Writing independent of Mrs. Ollnee," replied Bartol.
After a long and painful silence the bell tinkled faintly, and as all listened breathlessly the zither began to play.
"Now who is doing that?" asked the engineer.
"_Turn on the green light!_" suggested the Voice.
Stinchfield lit the green lamp, and by its glow the psychic was seen in her cage reclining limply, her face ghostly white in the light. Bartol looked about the circle. Every hand was in view, and yet the zither continued to play its weird and wistful little tune. Leo and Mrs. Joyce took this as a matter of course, but the men sat in rigid amazement.
"_Lights out!_" whispered the Voice.
Stinchfield put out his lamp. "That is astounding," he said. "I cannot a.n.a.lyze that."
"_Will you swear the psychic did not do it?_" asked the Voice.
The engineer hesitated. "Yes," he finally said.
"_Is this sufficient?_" asked the unseen.
Bartol replied. "Sufficient for my argument; but I do not understand these physical effects, and the jury may demand other proof. It will be necessary for us to show that the messages which misled, as well as those which comforted, came from some power outside the psychic and beyond her control. I believe that, as in the case of Anna Rothe--condemned by a German court to a long term of imprisonment--the charge of imposture and swindling made against Mrs. Ollnee must lie, unless I can demonstrate that these messages come from her subconscious self in some occult way, or from personalities other than herself. In fact, the whole case against Mrs. Ollnee lies in the question--does she believe in The Voices as ent.i.ties existing and acting outside herself--"
He interrupted himself to say: "Something is tapping my hand. It feels like the small tin horn."
"_It is!_" came the answer in such volume that it could be heard all over the room.
"_Does this not prove the medium innocent of ventriloquism?_"
"Stinchfield--what about this?" asked Bartol.
The engineer could only repeat: "I don"t understand it. It is out of my range."
Again the red lamp above the cabinet flashed, and by its momentary glow the horn was seen floating high over the cage, in which the medium sat motionless and ghastly white.
"Shall I flashlight that?" asked Stinchfield again.
"_No_," answered the Voice. "_The flashlight is very dangerous. We must use it only for the supreme thing. Be patient!_"
There was no longer any spirit of jocularity in the room. Each one acknowledged the presence of something profoundly mysterious, something capable of transforming physical science from top to bottom, something so far-reaching in its effect on law and morals as to benumb the faculties of those who perceived it. It was in no sense a religious awe with Bartol; it was the humbleness which comes to the greatest minds as they confront the unknowable deeps of matter and of s.p.a.ce.
The boy and girl forgot their names, their s.e.x. They touched hands as two infinitely small insects might do in the impenetrable night of their world (their hates as unimportant as their loves). Only the bereaved wife and mother leaned forward with the believer"s full faith in the heaven from which the beloved forms of her dead were about to issue.
Suddenly the curtains of the alcove opened, disclosing a narrow strip of some glowing white substance. It was not metal, and it was not drapery.
It was something not cla.s.sified in science, and Stinchfield stared at it with a.n.a.lytic eyes, talking under breath to Bartol. "It is not phosphorus, but like it. I wonder if it emits heat?"
Mrs. Joyce explained: "It is the half-opened door into the celestial plane. I saw a face looking out."
This light vanished as silently as it came, and the zither began to play again, and a mult.i.tude of fairy voices--like a splendid chorus heard far down a shining hall--sang exquisitely but sadly an unknown anthem. While still the men of law and science listened in stupefaction the voices died out, and the zither, still playing, rose in the air, and at the instant when it was sounding nearest the ceiling the red lamp above the cabinet was again lighted, and the instrument, played by two faintly perceived hands, continued floating in the air.
Silent, open-mouthed, staring, Stinchfield heard the zither descend to the table before him. Then he awoke. "I must photograph _that_!"
"_Not yet_," insisted the Voice. "_Wait for a more important sign._"