The Necromancers

in her house, as much as in any in London, that the modern prophets were to be met with-severe-looking women in shapeless dresses, little men and big, with lo

be true and untrue simultaneously-that what might be facts on This Side, as she would have expressed it, might be falsehoods on the Other. She was accustomed, therefore, to attend All Sain

with penciled dark eyebrows, a small aquiline nose

five-o'clock tea. I say "corresponded," since both of them were sufficiently advanced to have renounced actual tea altogether. Mrs. Stapleton partook of a little hot water out of a cop

they were discus

e is such a man, you know. So often those others are not quite like men at a

James Vincent. Even dear Tom was almost polite to him: he couldn't bea

-"his powers always seem to me so much grea

on finished

Sunday?" she sa

a talk. I have asked a clergyman I know in to meet him. It seems to me such a

is

n I met in the summer. I promised to let hi

murmured her

at the differences began. There was a deal more in Mrs. Stapleton besides the kittenish qualities. She was perfectly capable of delivering a speech in public; she had written some really well-expressed articles in various Higher periodicals; and she had a will-power beyond the ordinary. At the point where Lady Laura began to deprecate and soothe, Mrs. Stapleton began to clear decks for action, so to speak, to be incisive, to be fervent, even to be rather eloquent. She kept "dear Tom," the Colonel, not crushed or beaten, for th

suggestiveness that marks the Higher Thought: decked with ornaments emblematical of at least three religions, and provided with a faldstool and an exceedingly easy chair. It was here that she was accustomed t

dearest; i

bell below m

she said, pleasantly apprehensive. "It's

's figure

ady.... Is your l

Bax

taplet

, dearest.... You remem

hostess. "Yes, do see him, Maud; you

nk into a chair again; and in a minu

nd that grow their hair rather long and wear turn-down collars, and have just found out the hopeless banality of all orthodoxy whatever. She even bore with them when they called themselves unmoral. But she r

her hand wi

, Mr. Baxter. To be quite truthful, she is at hom

dee

mportant, just as you do. Do sit d

, th

nk she'll be very long this evening. Can I give her

stick down carefully,

said. "The fact is, I came partly t

rustled and rea

of you," she said. "Is th

seems rather particular to me. It's wh

w, I was wondering as we talked. Now do tell

ery imperceptive and gross. Laurie seemed perfectly at his ease, dressed quite in the proper way, and

ly, please?" he asked,

ouch of childish intensity that her fri

l that kind of thing, more than I can say. It did seem to me so-well

s;

I must say that an awful lot of it seems to me still great rubbish; and the

! Ah,

thing real at the back of it all. And then, if that is so, if it really is true that it is possible to get into actual touch with people who are dead-

tightly enough over his knee to whiten the knuckles. She remembered Lady Laura's remarks about the village girl, and understood. But she perceived that she mus

oo speak quite freely? Yes? Well, I am so glad you have spoken out. Of course, we are quite accustomed to being distrusted

lf, exposed. But that is natural, is it not? Why, there have been bad Catholics, too, have there not? And, after all, we are only huma

ard of Mr.

that.... Well, but the point you want to get at is this, is

ing at her steadily

twenty years ago. I have received messages from his own lips ... and communications in other ways too, concerning matters only known to him and to mysel

w in his low chair, his hand

let me test it?" he

. She was in some fine silk that fell straight from

not compete with the East. We are only children beside them.) Well, this man, Mr. Vincent-I think I spoke of him to you last week-he is

d at her wit

"You will remember that I am not yet in t

have any right to ask. We do not ask for blind fai

nodded

o me reasonab

moment. Then she deter

-Mr. Baxter-forgive me for aski

ed was a sympathetic tone, and was scarcely pr

affair, Mrs.

she said; she thought she might venture for such a purpose. N

here, mechanically warming his hands and sta

ad been conscious of a curious repulsion with regard to the whole matter-a repulsion not only of con

as not yet in the least convinced, but he was anxious,

again, as he had been disappointed in everything else. These things did not happen-the dead did not return. Step by step those things that for centuries had been deemed evidence of the supernatural, one by one had been explained and discounted. Hypnotism, water divining, witchcraft, and the rest. All these had once been believed

d, and the two

ou called, Mr. Baxter;

remulous with pleasure at we

has explained-

ot as a skeptic, but as an inquirer, that is all that