So there were eight of us—three women and five men—who went upstairs and quietly inspected the all but lifeless form of Ariadne and afterwards gathered in the library below.
All were thoroughly familiar with the situation. Miss Clarke calmly commented to the effect that the entire Blind Spot affair was due wholly and simply to the cumulative effects of so many, many subjects; the result, in other words, of error.
Dr. Malloy was equally outspoken in his announcement that he proposed to deal with the matter from the standpoint of psychic aberration. He mentioned dissociated personalities, group hypnosis, and so on. But he declared that he was open to conviction, and anxious to get any and all facts.
Sir Henry had a good deal of difficulty in getting Mme. Le Fabre to commit herself. Probably she felt that, since Sir Henry had gone on record as being doubtful of the spiritistic explanation of psychic phenomena, she might get into a controversy with him. But in the end she stated that she expected to find our little mystery simply a novel variation on what was so familiar to her.
As might be supposed, General Hume had no opinion. He merely expressed himself as being prepared to accept any sound theory, or portions of such theories as might be advanced, and arrive at a workable conclusion therefrom. Which was exactly what we wanted of him.
Of them all, Professor Herold showed the most enthusiasm. Perhaps this was because, despite his attainments, he is still young. At any rate, he made it clear that he was fully prepared to learn something entirely new in science. And he was almost eager to adjust his previous notions and facts to the new discoveries.
When all these various viewpoints had been cleared up, and we felt that we understood each other, it was inevitable that we should look to Sir Henry to state his position. This one man combined a large amount of the various, specialised abilities for which the others were noted, and they all knew and respected him accordingly. Had he stood and theorised half the afternoon, they would willingly have sat and listened. But instead he glanced at his watch, and observed:
“To me, the most important development of all was hearing the sound of a dog's bark coming from the ring. As I recall the details, the sound was emitted just after the gem had been submitted to considerable handling, from Miss Fenton's fingers to her brother's and back again. In other words, it was subjected to a mixture of opposing animal magnetisms. Suppose we experiment further with it now.”
Charlotte slipped the gem from her finger and passed it around. Each of us held it for a second or two; after which Charlotte clasped the ring tightly in her palm, while we all joined hands.
It was, as I have said, broad daylight; the hour, shortly after one. Scarcely had our hands completed the circuit than something happened.