A NEW MEDIUM
“My dear Mrs. Lucien—why, what is the matter?”
Mrs. Wylie ran hurriedly to her friend’s side, but stopped, frightened
at the unseeing, vacant stare which met her. During the fortnight
intervening since the seance she had met her friend daily, but never had
seen her as now.
Mrs. Lucien sat by a small sewing-table, her hands resting upon it, her
eyes gazing vacantly into space. Her expression was uncanny in its
fixity, and her hands moved restlessly over the smooth surface before
her. Her aspect was that of one whose outer senses were locked and all
thought and sight turned inward.
The little Dolores, who had opened the door to Mrs. Wylie, resumed her
position by her mother, her hands resting in her mother’s lap, her
troubled eyes searching her mother’s face.
Mrs. Wylie, unable to win any response or recognition, stood silent and
frightened, watching the entranced woman. Then her eyes fell upon the
swiftly moving fingers. What was she doing? Surely she was forming
letters—writing. Was it possible? She seemed to see her own name spelled
from the ends of those fingers. Mrs. Wylie had seen such things before
from professed mediums. Suddenly a thought came to her. She detached the
little gold pencil from her watch guard and laid in with her
shopping-tablet on the table before the woman. In a moment Mrs. Lucien
seized the pencil and was writing rapidly, her eyes still fixed and
unseeing.
When she at last relinquished the tablet Mrs. Wylie took it up, and read
in letters scrawling and unlike the chirography of her friend, the
following:
“My dear friend:
“Why do you hesitate on the dark borders of prejudice and ignorance? Why
not come into the full light of the truth? Our hands would gladly lead
you if you would take them. There is much to believe that is truth;
there is much to reject that is untruth. You accept much untruth. But
you shall soon know all.
“E. M. B.”
What did this meaningless missive prove? That Mrs. Lucien was other than
she seemed? Mrs. Wylie could think of no one having those initials. Ah,
yes. She did have a friend, long ago, by the name of Emma Boyleson. She
could not remember her middle name, or if she had one. It might have
been “M.” But she was dead, died a long while ago, when only a little
more than a child. And why, if it came from her,—Mrs. Wylie’s instincts
denied the possibility,—why should she write such stuff as this? Simply
to mystify her? Could she be mistaken in Mrs. Lucien? Could it be
possible that she was one of those dreaded charlatans? But if so, how
could she have known anything about Emma Boyleson? She had never
mentioned her, so far as she could remember, even to Mr. Wylie.
She would arouse Mrs. Lucien and sift this affair thoroughly.
“Mrs. Lucien! Mrs. Lucien!” she said imperatively.
She was gratified to see a change pass over the woman’s face. Mrs.
Lucien started, shivered, pressed her hands to her forehead.
“What is the matter, Mrs. Lucien,” again demanded Mrs. Wylie, bending
over her.
The dazed woman brushed her eyes and looked about her.
“Have I been asleep?” she asked plaintively.
“Yes, and writing me a letter in your dreams,” chirruped her visitor
gaily. “Now you may arouse yourself and interpret it for me.”
Mrs. Lucien shook her head, while the look of awe deepened in her face.
“Ah, can it be possible,” she murmured, “that Dr. Lyman told me the
truth, and that I am really a medium? How strange it seems, and yet he
promised me it should be.”
“You a medium?” Mrs. Wylie shrank from her hostess involuntarily.
“Yes, Dr. Lyman told me I was mediumistic, and that if I would sit down
at just the same time every evening, and allow myself to become entirely
passive I would soon be made the instrument to take and convey the words
of the invisible to the visible. I did not think, however, to obtain
this so soon.”
“O Mrs. Lucien, how could you lend yourself to such experiments? You
would not deceive me, would you? Tell me truly, did you know what you
were doing when you wrote that message to me?”
“No more than I know what I do in my sleep. I have a feeling that I have
had dreams, but I cannot recall them.”
“Did this ever happen before?”
“I have had this feeling and a partial remembrance of dreams, but I do
not know what I have ever written.”
“Do you think Dr. Lyman had anything to do with this?”
“No, only so far as he has assisted in developing me.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I think he exercised some—mesmeric power or influence over me, while in
attendance at his lectures.”
“You horrify me! And would you continue to go and hear him, when you
knew this?”
“Why, yes. I hoped he might develop me into a medium. Why should I not?”
Mrs. Lucien’s innocent, dark eyes looked up inquiringly.
“I think it is dreadful—dreadful! I would not be under his influence for
anything.”
“But it is not his influence. It is—Oh! I cannot tell you. It is a power
from beyond. Why should I fear to speak to those I love?”
“I cannot bear to think of it,” Mrs. Wylie said, shivering. “We do not
know to whom we are talking. We have no proof of their identity, and
know not if the power be good or evil.”
“What, not when we see, as we did a short time ago, the faces of those
we have known and loved here on earth?”
Mrs. Wylie shook her head.
“A delusion of the senses!” she said positively.
Mrs. Lucien gazed pityingly upon her.
“I am sure, dear Mrs. Wylie, that when we see a photograph taken of a
spirit face we can not doubt its genuineness. Cameras do not lie.”
“Don’t they? I am not sure. I have heard that people have tried to get
pictures of materialized spirits, and failed. The camera plate reveals
_nothing_, proving the delusions. Did you ever see an authentic
spirit-photograph?”
“My father did, and I have often heard him tell the story, although he
does not profess to believe in spiritism. He is a member of the Masonic
fraternity, and while in the West, a number of years ago, one of his
brother knights sickened and died. The family had no good portrait of
the man, and my father, who was superintending the funeral arrangements,
obtained permission to get some one to take a picture of the corpse.
“There was a young lady photographer a few doors away and she was called
in. She told them she was out of negative plates (they were in a country
town where supplies were not readily obtainable) but that any glass
would do. Accordingly she found a pane of window glass, and cut it to
the required dimensions and prepared it otherwise for the holder. My
father propped the man upon pillows as well as he could, and the artist
focused upon him with care. Removing the plate she took it to a dark
closet, previously prepared, to apply the developing solution, and then
brought it forth to show to my father. He looked at it, and exclaimed in
surprise, for instead of the dead man alone, there were three figures
upon the negative, a very good portrait of the corpse, and on either
side a man and a woman, their faces growing more distinct as they
looked. The artist was as much surprised as my father, and could not
account for the phenomenon. At last they called in a friend of the
family, who at once recognized and pronounced the portraits to be those
of a deceased brother and sister of the dead man. The widow corroborated
their statements, recognizing them and calling them by their names. My
father ordered the artist to take another picture, as he wanted to keep
this, and she did so, obtaining one of the dead man alone. I have not
only my father’s word for this, but that of others who were present at
the time and acquainted with the facts. Certainly, dear Mrs. Wylie, that
could have come only from actual materialized spirits before the
camera.”
“Unless the images were already stamped upon the plate by some natural
process before the picture was taken. The glass might have been some old
cast-off negative from a studio; or I have read of breath pictures
stamped upon window-panes by natural, if not well-understood, forces.
There might have been a mirror behind the dead man, which reflected your
father and the artist as the picture was being taken. Of course it is
very mysterious, but might have a simple explanation if we could find
it. The orientals believe they have astral bodies which they can project
at will. I am willing, I think, to believe in _anything_, rather than
spirits; for, my dear friend, even if we grant that the spirits of our
dear departed are near us, and acting as guardian-angels to us, do you
think it would be necessary for them to resort to so much that is
unpleasant and almost ludicrous in order to make us aware of their
presence? And even if they are able to make themselves visible to the
eye of the camera, is it well for us to try to communicate with them and
to seek to discover that which God has hidden from us?”
“My dear, we are told to seek for the _truth_. And why, then, is it not
well? Surely, if the presence of my children was dear to me on earth, it
is dear to me now.”
“Yes, if you were in heaven with them; but I cannot believe such
doubtful converse as this, gotten through mediumistic agency, can be
well for any one.”
“I can see no possible harm in it,” returned Mrs. Lucien, with an air of
conviction. “Even Christ materialized after his crucifixion.”
“But He didn’t have a cabinet and a medium to assist Him,” replied Mrs.
Wylie, with some asperity. “There is really so much that is despicable
and demoralizing connected with the history of this belief that I
confess I have little patience with the followers of it.”
“My dear, wrong has been done in all sects and societies. Any new belief
is apt to draw to itself many who are no honor to it.”
“But think of all this buffoonery of materialization in a cabinet, and
table-rappings, and tying with cords, and so forth. I cannot believe in
it. Hermann can surpass it by his magic.”
“Did not Moses and Elijah materialize?”
“Not in a cabinet. Besides, the days of miracles are passed.”
“I cannot think so,” said Mrs. Lucien, clasping her hands and looking
upward with a rapturous glance.
“Well,” said Mrs. Wylie, rising, “I am sorry you are so much interested
in the subject. I have never seen anything but sorrow come of it.”
“Is there not sorrow everywhere, Mrs. Wylie? This day is, I think,
symbolical of life, or of many lives.” She threw open a window, and the
two stepped out upon a small balcony above the street.
A heavy calm was over and about all nature. The whistle of the oncoming
train, the rattle of the car over the pavement was louder and more
discordant than on brighter, sunnier days. Even the voices of the people
on the street grew distinct and harsh, as the air, damp with the
approaching storm, bore their words with clearness to the twain above
them.
Little gusts of wind caught up the dust from the trampled pavement, and
whisked it over, in tyrannous derision, and a dusky, yellow hue shone
upon the faces of humanity. The swinging signs before the shop creaked
and groaned ominously, and the flag upon the tall pole in the park shook
out its folds, then wound them about the halyards and hung limp and
spiritless.
The faint muttering of a cloud skirting the horizon was at times heard,
when the sound of busy humanity was for a moment hushed.
Mrs. Lucien stood, leaning over the railing of the veranda, her pale
cheek resting in the soft upturned palm of her hand, and her eyes fixed
on the moving panorama before her.
“I feel as though listening to the voice of God coming from yonder
storm-cloud,” she said. “How responsive is all nature to the ominous
warning there. Even the trees seem to be holding their breaths and
waiting for the presence to pass by. Notice how different is the quiver
of the leaflets now from their usual merry, rollicking dance in the wind
and sunshine at other times.”
“I suppose the atmosphere is more dense and heavy,” said Mrs. Wylie,
determined not to be betrayed into sentimentality.
“I like to think they understand the portent of the thunder and are
afraid,” replied the other. “They are saying their prayers now, and
asking that they may survive the blows and buffeting of the coming
tempest. Hear the sparrows chirp to call their families together. To me
there is no time so grand, so inspiring as this.”
“But if you were in the West, where cyclones are common, what would you
feel?” asked the practical Mrs. Wylie.
“Fear, terror, and trembling like the leaves, no doubt,” replied Mrs.
Lucien. “The anger and fury expressed in a tornado must be dreadful. I
shudder at the thought of it. But after the wind comes a still small
voice. Ah, how can people who live and breathe the beneficent air of
heaven, who witness the wonderful phenomena of nature, say or believe
there is no grand, marvelous unity controlling it all? Truly, it _is_
the fool who sayeth in his heart, there is no God.
“We can feel His wonderful love and care in the beautiful earth and
flowers about us, can perceive His righteous law in the retributive
justice of all nature, and His might and omnipotence in the
thunder-storm and cyclone. Ah, it is a wonderful thing to live, to know
that in a little while we shall have crossed to the other side, beyond
time and eternity. And then we may see and know the Law-giver, this
Almighty One, who carries worlds in his hands, yet deigns to note a
sparrow’s fall.”
“Yes,” assented Mrs. Wylie, “it is a wonderful thing to live.” But she
sighed. She could not forget the scene that presented itself to her eyes
earlier in the morning, and she bade her friend good-by abstractedly,
and passed out into the hurrying world upon the street, her mind heavy
and oppressed.