"I can't explain it yet," Wise said, frankly, "but I'll find out all about it. To you, Mr. Crane, it seems additional proof of your son's communication through that medium. To me it is additional and very strong proof of her fraud. Now, we'll leave it at that for the present, but I promise to explain it to you soon."
"All right, Mr. Wise, you'll not be offended, I trust, if I say I don't believe you can make good your word. But I'm not surprised at your attitude. Some minds are almost incapable of belief in the occult, and will accept the most absurd and far-fetched explanations rather than the simple and plausible one of spirit communication. I can't understand such a mental attitude, but I've met so many like you that I'm obliged to recognize its existence."
"Oh, Mr. Wise," Mrs. Crane said, "it does seem so strange that a clear-headed, deep-thinking man like yourself prefers to believe that Madame Parlato could get Peter's handkerchief and could produce it so mysteriously for you rather than the rational belief that Peter sent it himself."
Zizi looked at the speaker with kindly eyes.
"Dear Mrs. Crane," she said, "what will hurt me most when we expose that medium's fraud is the fact of your disappointment."
"Don't worry about that," smiled Benjamin Crane, "you haven't exposed her yet! Meantime, I shall incorporate this experience of the handkerchief in my next book."
"Oh, don't!" cried Zizi, involuntarily. "You'll make yourself a laughing-stock——"
She paused, unwilling to hurt his feelings.
But so assured of his beliefs was Benjamin Crane that he shook his head and said:
"No fear of that, child. I'll take all risks. Have you any idea how my book has been received? It's just gone into another big edition, and my publishers are clamoring for my second book, which is nearly finished. But to return to the case of McClellan Thorpe. Did Peter tell you——"