pped forth from the cabinet she fixed upon
them a pair of questioning eyes. There was not a particle of recognition
in their expression. Presently she spoke. Her voice was a mezzo-soprano,
low and sweet, but just now sharpened by an accent of apprehension.

"Where am I?" she asked.

After a moment, during which their brains reeled with an amazement so
utter that they doubted the evidence of their senses--doubted even their
own existence and identities, there had simultaneously flashed over the
minds of Paul and Miss Ludington the explanation of what they beheld.

The prodigy, the theoretical possibility of which they had discussed
after the seance of the week before, and scarcely thought of since, had
come to pass. Dr. Hull had proved wrong, and Paul had proved right. A
medium had died during a materialization, and the materialized spirit had
succeeded to her vitality, and was alive as one of them.

It was no longer the spirit of Ida, knowing them by a spirit's intuition,
which was before them, but the girl Ida Ludington, whose curious,
unrecognizing glance testified to her ignorance of aught which the Hilton
school-girl of forty years ago had not known.

It was with an inexpressible throb of exultation, after the stupor of
their first momentary astonishment, that they comprehended the miracle by
which in the moment when the hope of ever beholding Ida again had seemed
taken from them, had restored her not only to their eyes, but to life.
But how should they accost her, how make themselves known to her, how go
about even to answer the question she had asked without terrifying her
with new and deeper mysteries?

While they stood dumb, with hearts yearning toward her, but powerless to
think of words with which to address her, Dr. Hull, hearing the sound of
her voice, stepped out from the cabinet. At the sight of Ida he started
back astounded, and Paul heard him exclaim under his breath, "I never
thought of this"

Then he laid his hand on Paul's arm and said, in an agitated whisper,
"You were right. It has happened as you said. My God, what can we say to
her?"

Meanwhile, Ida was evidently becoming much alarmed at the strange looks
bent upon her. "Perhaps, sir," she said, addressing Dr. Hull, with an
appealing accent, "you will tell me how I came in this place?"

Then ensued an extraordinary scene of explanation, in which, seconding
one another's efforts, striving to hit upon simpler analogies, plainer
terms, Paul