“I do,” admitted the Seer sorrowfully as he passed slowly downward still swaying along the circle of attraction. “But now”—he implored—“as you have no further use for me, can’t we take a spell off for further discussion? I’m getting pretty tired, Bill.”
“I never did see such a kicker,” said Bill. “When I’ve been so considerate, too. Why, you see, Leff, that the chrysalis of attraction in which you move is so cunningly tempered as to swing you in a perfect circle about twenty feet in diameter. So, you see, you are in no sense exposed, as it were, publicly. You are so adjusted as not to be dragged through the roof, over the damp grass, through the sewer pipes nor yet across the clothes-line in the back yard. In thus making you a strictly Private Exhibit I’ve paid the deference due to your profession which you yourself have so disgraced. I wonder, now, Leff, if you haven’t guessed what I’ve been up to all this time?”
Alonzo shook his head dejectedly.
“No?”—interrogatively. “Well, then,” said Bill—“I’ve just reached the delicate point of practically solving the problem of astral substance; or, of reducing astral substance to visible, tangible, physical substance. And the proof which is necessary depends now only upon the nicety of modern mechanical construction. In short, I believe that I am about to demonstrate that in electro-dynamics lurks the secret of the ‘Soul.’”
“But, Bill, I say,—Bill, old fellow. Surely you are not going to experiment on ME? Surely you are going to release me from this uncomfortable situation?”
“Why, my dear boy,” said Bill Vanderhook good humoredly, “would you balk such an experiment on the very threshold of success? Permit me to assure you that the performance is only half over and the best of the features are yet to come.”
CHAPTER XI.
UP AGAINST IT.