HE departure of the District-Attorney and Miss Coates, left Vera free to consider how serious, if she carried out her threat, the consequences might be. But of this chance she did not avail herself. Instead, with nervous zeal she began to prepare for her masquerade. It was as though her promise to Winthrop to abandon her old friends had filled her with remorse, and that she now, by an extravagance of loyalty, was endeavoring to make amends.
At nine o'clock, with the Vances, she arrived at the house of Mr. Hallowell. Already, to the same place, a wagon had carried the cabinet, a parlor organ, and a dozen of those camp-chairs that are associated with house weddings and funerals; and while, in the library Vance and Mannie arranged these to their liking, on the third floor, Vera, with Mrs. Vance, waited for that moment to arrive when Vance considered her entrance would be the most effective.
This entrance was to be made through the doorway that opened from the hall on the second story into the library. To the right of this door, in an angle of two walls, was the cabinet, and on the left, the first of the camp-chairs. These had been placed in a semicircle that stretched across the room,and ended at the parlor organ. The door from Mr. Hallowell's bedroom opened directly upon the semicircle, in the centre of which Vance had placed the invalid's arm-chair.
Vance, in his manner, as professional and undisturbed as a photographer focussing his camera and arranging his screens was explaining to Judge Gaylor the setting of his stage. The judge was an unwilling audience. Unlike the showman, for him, the occasion held only terrors. He was driven by misgivings, swept by sudden panics. He scowled at the cabinet, intruding upon the privacy of the room where for years, without the aid of accessories, by his brains alone, he had brought Mr. Hallowell almost to the point of abject submission to his wishes. He turned upon Vance with bitter self-disgust.
"So, I've got down as low as this, have I?" he demanded.
Vance heard him, undisturbed.
"I must ask you," he said, briskly, "to help me keep the people just as I seat them. They will be in this half-circle facing the cabinet and holding hands. Those we know are against us," he explained, "will have one of my friends. Professor Strombergk, or Mrs. Marsh, or my wife, on each side of them. If there should be any attempt to rush the cabinet—we must get there first. I will be outside the cabinet working the rappings, the floating music, and the astral bodies." At the sight of the expression these words brought to the face of Gaylor, Vance permitted himself the shadow of a smile. "I can take care of myself," he went on, "but, remember—Vera must not be caught outside the cabinet! When the lights go up, she must be found with the ropes still tied."
Gaylor turned from him with an exclamation of disgust.
"Pah!" he muttered; "It's a hell of a business!"
Vance continued unmoved. "And, another thing," he said, "about these lights; this switch throws them all off, doesn't it?" He pressed a button on the left of the door, and the electric lights in the walls and under a green shade on the library table faded and disappeared, leaving the room, save for the light from the hall, in darkness.
"That's the way we want it," said the showman.
From the hall Mannie appeared between the curtains that hung across the doorway. "What are you doing with the lights?" he demanded. "You want to break my neck? All our people are downstairs," he announced.
Vance turned on the lights. At the same moment Rainey came from the bedroom into the library. It was evident that to sustain his courage he had been drinking. He made no effort to greet those in the room, but glared sullenly at the cabinet and the row of chairs.
"Well," exclaimed Vance cheerfully, "if our folks are all here, we're all right."
Glancing behind him, Mannie took Vance by the sleeve, and led him to the centre of the room.
"No, we're not all right," said the boy "that Miss Coates has brought a friend with her. She says Hallowell told her she could bring a friend. She says this young fellow is her friend. I think he's a !"
"What nonsense," exclaimed Gaylor in alarm. "No detective would force his way into this house."
"She says," continued Mannie, disregarding Gaylor, and still addressing Vance, "'he's a seeker after the Truth.' I'll bet," declared the boy, violently, "he's a seeker after the truth!"
Garrett came hastily and noiselessly into the room. He nodded toward Mannie.
"Has he told you?" he asked.
"Yes," Gaylor answered, "who is he?"
"The reporter who was here this morning," Garrett returned. "The one who threatened"