"I am only the living gate by which the spirit forms pass from the realm of mind into the world of matter," Celia replied.
"Quite so," said Adele comfortably. "Now let us be sensible and dine. We can amuse ourselves with mademoiselle's rigmaroles afterwards."
Mme. Dauvray was indignant. Celia, for her part, felt humiliated and small. They sat down to their dinner in the garden, but the rain began to fall and drove them indoors. There were a few people dining at the same hour, but none near enough to overhear them. Alike in the garden and the dining-room, Adele Tace kept up the same note of ridicule and disbelief. She had been carefully tutored for her work. She was able to cite the stock cases of exposure—"LES FRERES Davenport," as she called them, Eusapia Palladino and Dr. Slade. She knew the precautions which had been taken to prevent trickery and where those precautions had failed. Her whole conversation was carefully planned to one end, and to one end alone. She wished to produce in the minds of her companions so complete an impression of her scepticism that it would seem the most natural thing in the world to both of them that she should insist upon subjecting Celia to the severest tests. The rain ceased, and they took their coffee on the terrace of the hotel. Mme. Dauvray had been really pained by the conversation of Adele Tace. She had all the missionary zeal of a fanatic.
"I do hope, Adele, that we shall make you believe. But we shall. Oh, I am confident we shall." And her voice was feverish.
Adele dropped for the moment her tone of raillery.
"I am not unwilling to believe," she said, "but I cannot. I am interested—yes. You see how much I have studied the subject. But I cannot believe. I have heard stories of how these manifestations are produced—stories which make me laugh. I cannot help it. The tricks are so easy. A young girl wearing a black frock which does not rustle—it is always a black frock, is it not, because a black frock cannot be seen in the dark?—carrying a scarf or veil, with which she can make any sort of headdress if only she is a little clever, and shod in a pair of felt-soled slippers, is shut up in a cabinet or placed behind a screen, and the lights are turned down or out—" Adele broke off with a comic shrug of the shoulders. "Bah! It ought not to deceive a child."
Celia sat with a face which WOULD grow red. She did not look, but none the less she was aware that Mme. Dauvray was gazing at her with a perplexed frown and some return of her suspicion showing in her eyes. Adele Tace was not content to leave the subject there.
"Perhaps," she said, with a smile, "Mlle. Celie dresses in that way for a seance?"
"Madame shall see to-night," Celia stammered, and Camille Dauvray rather sternly repeated her words.
"Yes, Adele shall see to-night. I myself will decide what you shall wear, Celie."