seances fail is when some inharmonious soul is present--some
personality not completely EN RAPPORT with the spirit of the gathering.
I remember, for instance, an occasion when a gentleman from Kentucky
had most ardently desired to get into communication with the astrals of
some mint juleps he had loved very deeply in life. Everything seemed
propitious, but though I struggled hard I simply could not get the
julep spirit to descend to our mortal plane. Finally I made inquiry and
found that one of the guests was a root-beer manufacturer. Of course
you may say that was petty jealousy on the side of the departed, but
even these vanished spirits have their human phases."

She was silent for a moment.

"You can imagine," she said, "what a perplexity I was in when I
discovered these hitherto unsuspected powers in myself. Was I justified
in putting them to use, for the good of humanity? And wasn't there a
certain pathetic significance in the fact that I, the daughter of the
man who had done so much to put these poor lonely spirits into the
Beyond, should be made their sole channel of reunion with their
bereaved and sorrowing adorers? In all his harangues, I had never heard
my Father attack anything but the actual DRINKING of liquor. This form
of communication seemed to me to solve so many problems. And it was in
this way that I first met Virgil."

"Virgil?" said Bleak, absent-mindedly, for he was wondering whether he
might be privileged to attend one of these seances.

"Virgil Quimbleton," she said. "In the early days of my trances I was
much haunted by the spirit of a certain cocktail--blended, I believe,
of champagne and angostura--which insisted that it would be
inconsolable until it could get in contact with Quimbleton and reassure
him as to the certainty of its existence beyond mortal bars. The deep
affection and old comradeship evidently cherished between Quimbleton
and this cocktail was very touching, and I was more than happy to be
able to effect their reunion. It was for this reason that Quimbleton,
under a careful disguise, came to live next door to us on Caraway
Street. I would go out into the garden and have a trance; Quimbleton,
poor bereaved fellow, would sit by me in the dusk and revel with the
spirit of his dear comrade. This common bond soon ripened into Jove,
and we became betrothed."

She stripped off one of her gloves and showed Bleak a beautiful
amethyst ring.

"This is my engagement ring," she said.