While he still stood looking down upon her Viola began to moan and toss her head from side to side.
"She is waking," cried Mrs. Lambert. "Let me go to her."
"No!" commanded Weissmann, "disturb nothing till we have examined all things."
"Make your studies quickly," said Morton, his heart tender to the girl's sufferings. "We must release her as soon as possible."
Weissmann was not to be hastened. "If we do not now go slowly we lose much of what we are trying to attain. We must take her pulse and temperature, and observe the position of every object."
"Quite right," agreed Clarke, "Do not be troubled--the psychic is being cared for."
Thus reassured the two investigators scrutinized, measured, made notes, while Kate and Mrs. Lambert stood waiting, watching with anxious eyes the changes which came to Viola's face. Weissmann talked on in a disjointed mutter. "You see? She has no pulse. The threads are unbroken. The table is thirty inches from her finger-tips. Observe this pad, forty-eight inches from her hand--and which contains a message."
"Read it!" demanded Kate.
He complied. "'You ask for a particle of matter to be moved from A to B without the use of any force known to science. Here in this wineglass is the test. Oh, men of science, how long will you close your eyes to the grander truths.'"
"That is from father," remarked Mrs. Lambert.
"It is signed 'McLeod,' and under it are two words, 'Loggy' and 'Mother,' each in different handwriting."
"Give it to me!" cried Kate, deeply moved.
"And here is the wineglass," replied Weissmann, extracting from among the books a beautiful piece of antique crystal.
Kate took it reverentially, as if receiving it from the hand of her dead mother. "How came that here?"
"You recognize it? It was not left here by mistake?"
"Oh no. There are only four of them left and I keep them locked away. I have not had them out in months."
Clarke smiled in benign triumph. "That is why they brought it--to show you that matter is an illusion and to prove that dematerialization and transubstantiation are facts. That was the bell we heard."
"Morton, what do you think? How could--"
But Morton was bending above Viola and did not heed his sister. The girl's eyes were opening as from natural slumber, and he said, gently: "I hope you are not in pain? We will release you in a moment."
She smiled faintly as she recognized him. "My arms are numb, and my feet feel as if strips of wood were nailed to my soles," she answered, wearily, "and my head is aching dreadfully; but that will soon pass."