test
possible jet flickered in the chandelier. They had all, save Mrs.
Winslow, been served with a message, and she was now the inquirer,
solemnly asking of another medium some information from the dear
departed from over the river.

"Shall I soon receive word from an absent friend?"--(evidently meaning
Le Compte, who had disappeared a month or two previous). Three
affirmative raps followed.

"Shall I succeed in my case against Lyon?" The spirits were certain that
she would.

"Shall I be rewarded for all my trouble?" she asked, waiting tremblingly
for an answer.

To this inquiry three thundering raps were heard at the door.

What could it mean?

The members of the little circle were completely unnerved. And it was
not strange either. Here were nearly a dozen people closely huddled in
the centre of a room so dark that only the dim, indistinct outline of
any person, or thing, could be seen in the ghostly gloaming. They
believed, pretended they believed, or acquiesced in the belief or
pretension, that they were in direct communication with the spirit-land.

In the most ridiculous condition of mind which any person might enter
into such a performance, the secrecy and mysteriousness of the seance,
the hushed silence, the darkness, and that tension of the mind caused by
a constant expectation of some startling manifestation, will compel in
the most sceptical mind a strange feeling of solemnity akin to awe; so
that when Mrs. Winslow's last inquiry was answered so pat, as well as
with such an alarming loudness, the entire company sprang to their feet,
and on this occasion there was genuine surprise in the faces of my
detectives.

Bang, bang, bang! came the second series of raps, which promised Mrs.
Winslow she should be "rewarded for all her trouble."

But the answer, in the way it came, didn't seem to satisfy her. Somebody
stepped to the chandelier and turned on the light, which showed all the
company to have been considerably startled; but the hostess was white
from fear.

"Won't _somebody_ see what new form of the devil has been sent here to
annoy me?" she asked passionately.

Fox, as "somebody," stepped briskly to the door and turned the key just
as the first "Bang!" of another series of raps was begun, and opening
it quickly discovered a dapper young fellow with a big black bottle held
by the neck in his hand, which was raised for the purpose of giving the
door bang number two.

In response to Fox's loud a