at I can."

"And, gentlemen," laughed the Prince, who had been standing with them
and now moved away towards Nitocris, "I sincerely hope that what you
find out will be worth the learning."

"He's a big man, that," said Professor van Huysman, when he was out of
earshot, "but he's not the sort I'd have much use for. I wonder why
those people who are on the war-path in his country ever let him out of
it alive?"

In accordance with Phadrig's request, they made a triangle of which he
was the central point. Without any formula of introduction, he said
rather abruptly:

"Professor van Huysman, will you oblige me by taking a croquet ball and
holding it in your hand as tightly as you can?"

Brenda ran out of the circle and gave him one. He took it and gripped it
in a fist that looked made to hold things. Phadrig glanced at the ball,
and said quietly:

"Follow me!"

Then he turned away, and, in spite of all the Professor's efforts to
hold it, the ball somehow slipped through his fingers and fell on to the
lawn. Then, to the utter amazement of every one, except Franklin
Marmion, it rolled towards the Adept and followed him at a distance of
about three yards as he walked round the circle of spectators. He did
not even look at it. When he had made the round, he took his place in
the Triangle of Science, and the ball stopped at his feet.

"It is now released, Professor," he said to Van Huysman. "You may take
it away, if you wish."

There was something in the saying of the last sentence that nettled him.
He had seen all, or nearly all, the physical laws, which were to him as
the Credo is to a Catholic or the Profession of Faith to a Moslem,
openly and shamelessly outraged, defied, and set at nought. To say he
was angry would be to give a very inadequate idea of his feelings,
because he, the greatest exposer of Spiritualism, Dowieism, and
Christian Scientism in the United States, was not only angry, but--for
the time being only, as he hoped--utterly bewildered. It was too much,
as he would have put it, to take lying down, and so, greatly daring, he
took a couple of strides towards Phadrig, and said with a snarl in his
voice:

"I guess you mean really if _you_ wish, Mr Miracle-Worker. It was mighty
clever, however you did it, but you haven't got me to believe that
physical laws are frauds yet. You want me to pick that ball up?"

"Certainly, Professor--if you can--now," replied Phadrig, with a little
twitch of his lips whi