"We shall be obliged to shut out all young men from our committee," the old scientist jocularly remarked, as he stood looking down at them. "Lovely psychics like you would put the whole American Academy of Science in disorder."
Clarke, raging with jealous fire, turned to Weissmann in truculent mood. "Well, Dr. Weissmann, how do you account for these phenomena? To whose agency do you ascribe these marvels?"
"Spooks!" answered the old man, with cheerful promptness.
Clarke reeled before this laconic admission. "What! You agree? You admit the agency of spirits?"
"Certainly--unless I say Miss Lambert wriggled herself out of her skin, which would not be nice of me, or that you are the greatest ventriloquist in the world. No, I prefer to compliment the spirits."
Clarke's face darkened. The old man's face and voice were too jocose. "I see you do not value our wonderful experiences to-night."
Viola, pinching her sleeve about her wrist, looked up roguishly. "I couldn't possibly wriggle out of my gown, could I, Dr. Weissmann? And if I did, how could I get the tacks back without a hammer?"
"Precisely. You would be more burglarious than the ghosts which walk through the key-holes," he answered.
"And the little girl who spoke German--who was she?" asked Kate.
The hour that followed was a delicious one for the young people, for they had come at last to some sweet and subtle understanding. As she recovered the use of her limbs Viola glowed with joy of Morton's change of attitude towards her. He, on his part, was puzzled by this mood. It was as if she had been vindicated to herself--liberated from some dead body of doubt.
Clarke glowered in silence; disapproving, with manifest disdain, the levity of the scientists, and resenting bitterly Viola's growing trust and confidence in Serviss. Each moment his anger took on heat, and he found it hard to reply even to his hostess, who tried to interest him in a deeper discussion of the evening's marvels. He seemed to have but one desire--to get away and to take Viola with him.
"Tell me," said Viola to Morton, "did papa speak to you?"
"A voice purporting to be your father spoke a few words."
"He is very nice. Didn't you think so?"
"The voice was very gentle and refined, and expressed a very tender regard for you."
She sighed. "I have never heard my father's voice, for he always comes when I am in my deepest trances. They say that I will be permitted some day to hear all the voices through the cone--I only hear them now in an interior way."
"Do you really suffer as you seem to do?" he asked, the echo of his pity still in his tone.