Clarke's face was darkly stubborn. "Then you will have no sittings. My challenge will go forth next Sunday afternoon, and one of the unchangeable clauses of that challenge will be this: the sittings must take place in Pratt's library and I must be present."
"I hope you will not insist on that," Morton further urged; "for Miss Lambert's sake you must not. To incorporate such terms in your challenge will brand her as an impostor and you and Pratt as her confederates. In this statement I think you will find her 'controls' agreeing. They were undecided to-night, but when they consider carefully they will see that my advice is sound."
Clarke's eyes were aflame. "You have my terms. Accept them or refuse them, as you please."
Viola, returning, extended her hand to Morton with a trustful smile. "I've had a beautiful evening."
"To say that after we have tied you hand and foot till you were numb, and kept you in the dark all the evening, is very gracious of you. I feel very much the brutal host. But you must come again. I swear Kate shall not pester you next time."
Kate was indignant. "Well, I like that! when you were the one crazy to experiment. Of course they're coming, coming to stay to-morrow night, and any one who dares to talk ghosts to her will be sent to bed."
And so in a hearty, cordial clangor of farewells they got out into the hall, and Morton, seeing Viola in her handsome cloak, her eyes shining, her face once more gay and smiling, was again filled with wonder at her astounding resiliency of mood. It was as if two sharply differentiated souls alternated in the possession of her body.
Clarke, wearing a cape overcoat and a soft hat, was far less admirable in appearance than when, with head uncovered, he sat within. He resembled a comic picture of an old-fashioned tragedian--a man glad to feel the finger of remark directed towards him, but his face was bitter, his eyes burning with anger, his lips white with pain.
Serviss relented as he studied him. "You'd better take Britt's trail and return to the mountains," he said, kindly. "This is a bad climate for you."
"My work is here," he replied, curtly. "I have no fear," and so they parted.
Weissmann was sitting in silent meditation in one corner of the dining-room when Serviss returned. "Well, master, what do you think of to-night's performance?"
Weissmann replied, in ironical phrase: "Hearing in civilized man is vague and indefinite. Spooks do well to limit their manifestations to a sense which most powerfully appeals to the imagination."