He was still at breakfast, deeply engaged with his alluring vision, when
Mrs. Joyce and his mother entered the room. As he rose to greet them
Mrs. Joyce asked, "Have you seen Mr. Bartol?"
"Not yet--but he is up. I am to see him soon. Where is Leo?"
"She is not feeling very brisk this morning, and is taking her coffee in
bed."
He said no more, but resumed his seat, richer by this added proof of the
deep perturbation through which the girl had passed. He was
disappointed, and eager to see her, but the conviction that she had been
sleepless from love of him put him among the clouds. He would have
forgotten his appointment with Bartol had not the maid reminded him of
it. Even then he tried to avoid it. "You're sure he wanted me? Didn't he
mean my mother?"
"I'm quite sure he said Mister Ollnee."
"Mother, what do you suppose he wants of me?"
"I don't know, Victor. Perhaps he wants to talk over the trial."
"Come back and tell us as soon as you can," commanded Mrs. Joyce. "I'm
crazy to know what he did last night, and what he really thinks of us?"
Victor promised to report, and went away to his interview with a vague
alarm disturbing the blissful self-satisfaction of the early morning.
He found Bartol seated at a big table with a writing-pad before him and
four or five open volumes disposed about as if for reference. He, too,
looked old and worn and rather grim, but he greeted his guest politely.
"Good-morning. Have you seen your mother this morning?"
"Yes, I have just left her at breakfast."
"How is she?"
"She seems quite herself--a little pale, perhaps."
"Be seated, please. I want to go over our case with you. First of all, I
want you to tell me once more, and in full detail, all you know of your
mother's life. Begin at the beginning and leave nothing out. Don't
theorize or try to explain--give me the facts as you have observed
them."
This was not the kind of business to which a love-exalted youth would
set himself, but Victor squared himself before the brooding face and
deep-set eyes of his host, and entered once more upon the story of the
"ghost-room," which had been the one dark spot in his childhood, and
which became again in a moment the overshadowing torment of his young
manhood.
As he talked the intent look of the man before him, his short, sharp,
significant questions inspired him. He poured forth in eloquent and
moving phrase the story of his sudden awakening to a knowledge that his
mother was a paid medium, and under persecution by the press of the
city. He told of his sittings with her, wherein he had savagely
determined to unmask her for her own good. He admitted his complete
failure. He related his experiences during the time she lay in deathly
trance, and his voice lost its smooth flow as he approached the most
marvelous experience of all, when the vast and murmuring wind blew
through the small room and Altair came with sad, sweet face, to bewitch
him and to shake his conceptions of the universe to their foundation
stones. He confessed his bewilderment and confusion, and ended by
saying: "It's all unnatural, diseased. I can't believe it is the real
side of things."
"I wonder that you kept your head at all," remarked Bartol. "Your youth
and good, hot blood protect you. Have you talked with your mother about
our sitting?"
"Only a few words. She came to my room last night and told me she had
only a dim recollection of what took place. She said The Voices wanted
to talk to me--but I didn't want them to talk to me--and said so--and
she went away."
Bartol mused. "Belief is not a matter of evidence; it is a habit of
mind. I find myself unable to follow the evidence of my own senses. My
tests of your mother last night convinced me at the moment that she had
the right to claim supernormal powers. She seemingly turned matter into
a mere abstraction, and made the learning of physicists the chatter of
children." As he spoke his memory of what he had seen freshened and his
excitement increased. His voice deepened and his eyes glowed. "Here are
my notes of what took place, and I have spent the night in comparing my
observations with those of Sir William Crookes concerning the medium
Home. In a certain very real sense the phenomena I witnessed were quite
as marvelous as those Crookes chronicled." He rose and began to walk up
and down the room. "And yet this morning I do not believe--I cannot
believe--that writing was precipitated in a closed book held in my hand,
that a pen rose of its own volition and tapped upon the table.
"The tendency of any mind, any science, is to harden, to crystallize, to
reach a stopping point. The student is prone to think that the knowledge
of the physical universe which we have must be the larger part of all
that is knowable--and that soon we will have gathered it all into our
text-books. Of course this is the sheerest self-delusion. A little
thought will make clear that all we know is as nothing compared to that
which remains to be known. Up to ten o'clock last night I was one of
those who believe that the domain of nature is pretty thoroughly mapped
out, staked, and plowed by the investigator, but this morning I find my
horizons again extended. It would be foolish to say that an hour's
experiments and a night of reading along new lines had overturned all
the landmarks of biologic science; but I confess that the world for me
has greatly changed. I held in my hand last night a force _in action_
for which science has no name and no place--and yet thirty years ago Sir
William Crookes wrote of this same force in the spirit with which he
discussed other elements and powers, and yet his testimony is not
accepted by his fellows even to-day.
"Your mother met every test cheerfully and instantly, and demonstrated
to me, as Home did to Crookes, as Slade did to Zollner, that matter, as
we think we know it, does not exist. She convinced me not merely of her
honesty, but of her high powers as a psychic. A calm, persistent,
logical purpose ran through all her manifestations, and her
Voices--whatever they may mean to you--advised me to sit again with her
and to have you and Miss Wood, Mrs. Joyce, and Marie always in the
circle. This I intend to do. I feel at this moment as if no other
business mattered. I have been here at my desk since midnight, reading,
comparing notes, trying to convince myself that I have not gone suddenly
mad.
"If I was not utterly deceived, if your fresh, keen young eyes are of
any use whatsoever, if the words of Crookes, Wallace, Lombroso, and
their like are of any weight, then we have in your mother a rare and
subtle organism whose powers are of more importance than the rings of
Saturn or the canals of Mars."
Victor was awed, carried out of himself and his small concerns by the
deep voice of the great lawyer as he formulated his impassioned yet
restrained musings. It was evident that he welcomed this opportunity of
putting his thoughts into words, of ordering his words into argument.
Half in reverie and half in conscious statement to the entranced youth,
he poured forth his troubled soul.
"I was a materialist when your mother entered my house. I believed that
the man who died went out like a candle. The grave was the end. To me
the so-called revelations of Buddha, Gautama, Christ, were the vague
dreams of the heart-sick, the stricken mourners of the earth--not one of
them brought a beam of hope--but in this modern spirit of
experimentation, in the work of Crookes and his like, I see
a ray of light. Your mother's impersonations of my wife, her
messages--Voices--may be due to mind-reading, to clairvoyance, but _the
method of their delivery_ certainly lies beyond any known law. In that
glows my hope. Grant the possibility of direct writing, of the power of
the mind to _think_ its will upon paper without the aid of hand or pen,
and a whole new world is opened up, the horizons of life are infinitely
extended."
He paused abruptly. "I was weary of my days. Yesterday I moved as a
creature of habit. This morning it seems that I have a new interest. I
am convinced that in defending your mother I am defending something
precious to the human race; but I must be very sure of my ground. I must
scrutinize every phase of her power, and you must help me. You are young
and well-trained. You have a good mind, and I am persuaded you will go
far. Your mother worships you, lives for you. Now, you and I together
must make such study of her mediumship as America has never seen--a
study which shall have nothing to do with any ism, fad, or prejudice.
Will you help me?"
Victor, overwhelmed by the confidence of the great lawyer, by the honor
which this plea laid upon his young shoulders, could only stammer, "I
will do my best."
Bartol thanked him. "I see now, as I never did before, that this power
is a subtle, personal, psychical adjustment, and the part you are to
play is a double one. First, you are her son, and your presence and
influence are indispensable. Secondly, you are vigorous and alert,
comparatively free from the wrecking effect of bereavement such as
mine. I confess I cannot trust myself in the face of the supposed appeal
of my dead. I am like the doctor who refuses to practise upon his own
child--my desires blind me. At the same time I see that we cannot thrust
strangers upon your mother, especially in her present excited state.
What I propose is a series of private experiments, including chemical
tests, instantaneous photographs, and the like, which shall convince
both judge and jury of the reality of these phenomena. This case will
come before my friend, Judge Matthews, and we have in him a just and
penetrating mind. If I can make him feel my own present conviction we
may rest our case safely with any unprejudiced jury."
He paused and picked up a volume from the table. "Crookes is explicit.
He says he _saw_ the lath move without visible cause, he _saw_ Home
thrust his hand into the hearth and stir the coals, he _saw_ the
accordion play without any reason; and in all this he is sustained by
other men testing each phenomenon by means of electrical registering
devices. Now we must duplicate these. We must go into court armed with
photographs, records, and witnesses. We will make this a _cause
celebre_--doing our small part to forward this superb and fearless
European movement. I intend to be both lawyer and physicist hereafter,"
he ended, with a smile.
That the great lawyer was now completely engaged upon his mother's
defense Victor exultantly perceived, and it gave him a feeling of pride
and security, but this was followed by a sense of being uprooted. The
sight of this man, inspired yet confounded by what had come to him in a
single sitting, brought new and disturbing force to all that had
happened to himself. Was it possible that thought could be precipitated
like dew upon a sheet of paper?
"Now," resumed Bartol, "I have made a further discovery. There is a
brotherhood of what we may call true experimentalists--beginning with
Marc, Thury, and the Count de Gasparin, and running to Flammarion and
Richet, in Paris; the Dialectical Society, Sir William Crookes, Alfred
Russell Wallace, Sir Oliver Lodge, in England; thence back to the
Continent, to Zollner, Aksakof, Ochorowicz, De Rochas, Maxwell,
Morselli, and Lombroso. I need a condensed record of these experiments,
and a synopsis of each theory. Once within this group, you will learn by
cross-reference the names of all those whom each of these
experimentalists regard as reliable. You can work here or take the books
to your room--perhaps, on the whole, Morselli's record is first in
importance. Bring me a clear and full abstract of that as soon as you
can."
"I do not read Italian," confessed Victor; "but Leo--Miss Wood--does;
perhaps she will help me."
"Very good. Now as to the mechanical side of this matter. I have a
nephew who is an expert photographer and a clever electrician. With your
permission, I will send for him and see what he can do. He is a man of
high standing in his profession, and a quiet personality--one that will
not irritate or alarm your mother. Shall I bring him in and give her
over to all?"
"Certainly. I'm sure mother wants you to have full charge."
"Very well. We will set to work at once, for our case may come up this
week. At its lowest terms, the Aiken charge involves--to us--the
admission that our client is highly suggestible and that she has been
used as an unconscious stool-pigeon by Pettus. For the present we must
proceed upon this basis. Suggestion is more or less accepted at the
present time, and we may be able to get the jury to admit our plea; but
I will not conceal from you the fact that your mother stands in danger
of severe punishment. The _Star_ has singled her out as a scapegoat, and
is behind the Aikens. They will push her hard. I do not think they will
follow her here, but if they do I shall send you to my nephew's
home.--Now to Morselli. We must know just where he stands on this
amazing branch of biology. Will you make this synopsis to-day?"
Victor's eyes glowed with the fire of his awakened pride and resolution.
"If you'll let me help you, Mr. Bartol, I'll show you what my training
has been. I'm quick in some things. I will collate and put in order all
the latest deductions of science--" He stopped. "But what exactly do you
intend to do with my mother?"
"I mean to confine her in such wise as to demonstrate precisely what she
can do and what she cannot. I must divide what is conscious from that
which is unconscious. I must understand precisely how she produces these
messages, voices, and faces. We are agreed that she is not _consciously_
deceptive?" He questioned Victor with a glance.
"I _know_ she is honest."
"Very well, we must demonstrate her honesty. We must photograph her
so-called materializations side by side with her own body, and we must
register the work of these invisible hands, and in every possible way
demonstrate that she is the medium and not the originating cause of
these messages. In no other way can we save her from disgrace and a
prison cell."
The youth went away with a humming sound in his head. The thought of his
gentle little mother herded with vile women within the gray walls of a
penitentiary filled him with such horror that his face went drawn and
white. "It shall not be! I will not have it so!" he said, and yet he saw
no other way in which to prevent it. All depended upon the man whose
impassioned words still rang in his ears, and his admiration for the
lawyer rose to that love which youth yields to the highest manhood.