hese by placing
them under his back. Now Godfrey knew something of the inadequate and
clumsy methods affected by alleged communicating spirits, and half
automatically began to repeat the alphabet. When he got to the letter
I, there was a loud rap. He began again, and at A came another rap.
Once more he tried, for something seemed to make him do so, and was
stopped at M.

"I am," he murmured, and recommenced until the word "here" was spelt
out, after which came three rapid raps to signify a full stop.

"Who is here?" he asked in his own mind, at the same time determining
that he would leave it at that. It was of no use at all, for the other
party evidently intended to go on.

There was a perfect rain of raps, on the bed, off the bed, on the
floor, even on the jug by the washstand; indeed, he thought that this
and other articles were being moved about the room. To stop this
multiform assault once more he took refuge in the alphabet, with the
result that the raps unmistakably spelt the word "Eleanor."

"Great Heavens!" he thought to himself, "that dreadful spirit girl
here, in my bedroom! How can she? It is most improper, but I don't
suppose she cares a sou for that."

In his despair and alarm he tucked the clothes tightly round him, and
thrusting out his head, said in trembling accents:

"Please go away. You know I never asked you to come, and really it
isn't right," remarks which he thought, though, like all the rest, this
may have been fancy, were followed by a sound of ghostly laughter. What
was more, the bedclothes suddenly slipped off him, or--oh horror!
perhaps they were pulled off. At any rate, they went, and when next he
saw them they were lying in a heap by the side of the bed.

Then it would seem that he fainted, overcome by these terrors, real or
imaginary. At any rate, when he opened his eyes again it was to see the
daylight creeping into the room (never before had he appreciated so
thoroughly the beauties of the dawn) and to find himself lying half
frozen on the bed with the pillow, which he was clasping
affectionately, for his sole covering.

At breakfast that morning he looked so peculiar and dilapidated, that
Madame and Juliette made tender inquiries as to his health, to which he
replied that his bedclothes had come off in the night and the cold had
given him a chill "in the middle." They were very sympathetic, and
dosed him with hot _cafe-au-lait_, but the Pasteur, studying him
through the blue