to the hall. These windows,
opening on a garden, were closed by outside shutters, now bolted. The
third side was a blank wall, beyond which lay the library. On the fourth
side were the double doors into the hall.

As, although the results we obtained were far beyond any expectations,
the purely physical phenomena were relatively insignificant, it is not
necessary to go further into the detail of the room. Robinson has done
that, anyhow, for the Society of Psychical Research, a proceeding
to which I was opposed, as will be understood by the close of the
narrative.

Further to satisfy Mrs. Dane, we examined the walls and floor-boards
carefully, and Herbert, armed with a candle, went down to the cellar
and investigated from below, returning to announce in a loud voice which
made us all jump that it seemed all clear enough down there. After that
we sat and waited, and I daresay the bareness and darkness of the
room put us into excellent receptive condition. I know that I myself,
probably owing to an astigmatism, once or twice felt that I saw wavering
shadows in corners, and I felt again some of the strangeness I had felt
during the day. We spoke in whispers, and Alice Robinson recited the
history of a haunted house where she had visited in England. But Herbert
was still cynical. He said, I remember:

"Here we are, six intelligent persons of above the average grade, and in
a few minutes our hair will be rising and our pulses hammering while a
Choctaw Indian control, in atrocious English, will tell us she is happy
and we are happy and so everybody's happy. Hanky panky!"

"You may be as skeptical as you please, if you will only be fair,
Herbert," Mrs. Dane said.

"And by that you mean--"

"During the sitting keep an open mind and a closed mouth," she replied,
cheerfully.

As I said at the beginning, this is not a ghost story. Parts of it we
now understand, other parts we do not. For the physical phenomena we
have no adequate explanation. They occurred. We saw and heard them. For
the other part of the seance we have come to a conclusion satisfactory
to ourselves, a conclusion not reached, however, until some of us had
gone through some dangerous experiences, and had been brought into
contact with things hitherto outside the orderly progression of our
lives.

But at no time, although incredible things happened, did any one of us
glimpse that strange world of the spirit that seemed so often almost
within our range of v