"Victor, father tells me that Mr. Bartol will be convinced. He is the greatest mind I have ever met. If I can bring him to a belief in the spirit world it will be the most important victory of my life."
"What did he say to you? What did he think?"
"I don't know; and strange to say, I cannot read his mind. He seems convinced of the phenomena, and yet I can't tell for certain. He was skeptical at the beginning, as nearly every one is."
Hitherto, at every such opening, Victor had rushed in to pluck the heart out of her mystery, but now he restrained himself, for fear of trapping her into some admission, which would make his own testimony more difficult in court. He took a seat on the bed and regarded her with meditative eyes, and she went on.
"The Voices are clamoring round me still. They want to speak to you."
"I don't want to hear them--not to-night," he replied, coldly. "Tell them to wait and talk to me when Mr. Bartol is listening."
She seemed disappointed and a little hurt by his tone. "Altair is here. She wishes most to speak."
Interest awoke in him. "What does she want of me?"
She listened. "She says, '_Trust Mr. Bartol._'"
He could see nothing, hear nothing, therefore his face lost its light.
"Well, we've got to trust him. He's all the help in sight."
Something, a breath, the light caress of a hand, passed over his hair, and a whisper that was almost tone spoke in his ear, "_Fear nothing, if you will be guided and protected._"
Sweet as this voice was, it irritated him, for he could not disassociate his mother from it. Indeed, it had something subtly familiar in its utterance, and yet he could not accuse her of deceit. He only roughly said: "Don't do that! I don't like that!"
Silence followed, and then his mother sadly said: "You have hurt her. She will not speak again."
"Let her show herself. How do I know who is speaking to me? Let me see her face again." He added this in a gentler voice, being moved by a vivid memory of the exquisite picture Altair had made.
After another pause Mrs. Ollnee answered: "She will do so. She says soon. She has gone; but your father wants to speak to you."
Victor rose impatiently. "Tell him to come again some other time. I'm sleepy now."
She turned away saddened by his manner, and with a gentle "good-night" went softly from the room.