s the cabinet with his back to
the windows, Mrs. Stapleton opposite to her.

An endless procession of thoughts defiled before her as she sat, yet
these too were somewhat remote--far up, so to speak, on the
superficies of consciousness: they did not approach that realm of the
will poised now and attentive on another range of existence. Once and
again she glanced up without moving her head at the three-quarter
profile on her left, at the somewhat Zulu-like outline opposite to
her; then down again at the polished little round table and the six
hands laid upon it. And meanwhile her brain revolved images rather
than thoughts, memories rather than reflections--vignettes, so to
speak,--old Mr. Cathcart in his spats and frock-coat, the look on the
medium's face, there and gone again in an instant as he had heard the
stranger's name; the carved oak stalls of the chancel towards which
she had faced this morning, the look of the park, the bloom upon the
still leafless trees, the radiance of the blue spring sky....

It must have been, she thought, after a little over an hour that the
first expected movement made itself felt--a long trembling shudder
through the wood beneath her hands, followed by a strange sensation of
lightness, as if the whole table rose a little from the floor. Then,
almost before the movement subsided, a torrent of little taps poured
itself out, as delicate and as swift and, it seemed, as perfectly
calculated, as the rapping of some minute electric hammer. This was
new to her, yet not so unlike other experiences as to seem strange or
perturbing in any way.... Again she bent her attention to the table as
the vibration ceased.

There followed a long silence.

It must have been about ten minutes later that she became aware of the
next phenomenon; and her attention had been called to it by a sudden
noiseless uplifting of the profile on her left. She turned her face to
the cabinet and looked; and there, perfectly discernible, was some
movement going on between the curtains. For the moment she could see
the medium clearly, his arms folded, indicated by the white lines of
his cuffs across his breast, his head sunk forward in deep sleep; and
at the next instant the curtains flapped two or three times, as if
jerked from within, and finally rested completely closed.

She glanced quickly at the boy on her left, and in the diffused light
from the other room could see him distinctly, his eyes open and
watching, his li