, Henry spoke.

"Look here, Tom," he said, "you've given me a tip. I'm going to camp out
in the Grey Room to-night. Then, in the morning, I'll tell Uncle Walter
I have done so, and the ghost's number will be up."

"Quite all right, old man--only the plan must be modified. I'll
sleep there. I'm death on it, and the brilliant inspiration was mine,
remember."

"You can't. He refused to let you."

"I didn't hear him."

"Oh, yes, you did--everybody did. Besides, this is fairly my task--you
won't deny that. Chadlands will be mine, some day, so it's up to me to
knock this musty yarn on the head once and for all. Could anything be
more absurd than shutting up a fine room like that? I'm really rather
ashamed of Uncle Walter."

"Of course it's absurd but, honestly, I'm rather keen about this. I'd
dearly love to add a medieval phantom to my experiences, and only wish I
thought anything would show up. I beg you'll raise no objection. It was
my idea, and I very much wish to make the experiment. Of course, I don't
believe in anything supernatural."

They went back to the billiard-room, dismissed Fred Caunter, the
footman, who was waiting to put out the lights, and continued their
discussion. The argument began to grow strenuous, for each proved
determined, and who owned the stronger will seemed a doubtful question.

For a time, since no conclusion could satisfy both, they abandoned
the centre of contention and debated, as their elders had done, on
the general question. Henry declared himself not wholly convinced. He
adopted an agnostic attitude, while Tom frankly disbelieved. The one
preserved an open mind, the other scoffed at apparitions in general.

"It's humbug to say sailors are superstitious now," he asserted. "They
might have been, but my experience is that they are no more credulous
than other people in these days. Anyway, I'm not. Life is a matter of
chemistry. There's no mumbo jumbo about it, in my opinion. Chemical
analysis has reached down to hormones and enzymes and all manner of
subtle secretions discovered by this generation of inquirers; but
it's all organic. Nobody has ever found anything that isn't. Existence
depends on matter, and when the chemical process breaks down, the
organism perishes and leaves nothing. When a man can't go on breathing,
he's dead, and there's an end of him."

But Henry had read modern science also.

"What about the vital spark, then? Biologists don't turn down the theory
of vit