Will turned the light on again in a turmoil of surprise. He had never before seen anything that looked so like a genuine miracle. There stood the Seer, erect and smiling, with all the envelopes in a huddled heap on the little round table on the platform beside him. With a quiet air of triumph, he stepped down to the floor, and reading out the names as he walked along the rows, replaced in each outstretched hand—its own envelope, unopened. The visitors tore the covers off before his eyes, and found inside—their own manuscript, exactly as they had written it. It was a most convincing trick, and the Colorado Seer had good cause to be proud of the astounded way in which his company received it.
A buzz of voices ran humming round the room for some minutes together as the Seer concluded. Everybody hazarded some conjecture of his own, more or less inept, as to how the man did it. The younger ladies were mostly of opinion that he “must have a confederate”—though how a confederate could help him with this particular trick, they didn’t deign to explain, not having, indeed, any clear picture of their own in their sapient heads as to the nature of the confederacy. They merely threw out the hint in the self-same expansive and generous spirit in which they are wont to opine that “it’s done by electricity,” or, that “the thing has springs in it.” Mr Arthur Sartoris, the East End curate, and two old maids with amiable profiles in a back row, were inclined to set it down to “cerebral undulations in the ethereal medium”—which, of course, would be competent to explain almost anything, if they only existed. Lady Martindale leaned rather towards the extremer view that “the man had dealings with a familiar spirit,” and objected to take any further part in such doubtful proceedings. Sir Henry, while not venturing to offer any direct explanation, was yet reminded at once of some very remarkable and surprising feats he had seen performed by a fakir in India, who had told him the name of his future wife, made a mango-tree grow and bear fruit before his eyes, and sent a boy to climb up a loose end of twine till he disappeared in space, whence he was precipitated in fragments a few minutes later, to get up and walk away one moment afterwards, at the first touch of the fakir’s wand, as cool and unconcerned as if nothing had happened. Everybody had a theory which satisfied himself; and every theory alike seemed pure bosh to Will Deverill.
To everybody’s surprise, however, Florian’s melodious voice, after that one interruption, took no further part in the brisk discussion. The world rather expected that Florian would intervene with some abstruse hypothesis of telepathic action, or enlarge on the occult influence of soul upon soul, without the need for any gross and palpable link of material connection. But Florian held his peace. He had an idea of his own, and he wasn’t going to impart it for nothing to anybody. Only once did he speak. “The man has eyes in the back of his head,” a lady had cried after one trick in profound astonishment.
“Say, rather, the man has eyes in the tips of his fingers,” Florian corrected gravely. For he was no fool, Florian.
The Seer heard him, and darted a strange glance at his face. This man Wood was too clever. The Seer must square him!
The evening wore away, and conjecture died down. The Seer mixed with the throng in his private capacity, told good stories to the men with a strong Western flavour, said pretty things to the women with Parisian grace, and flashed his expressive eyes into theirs to point them. Everybody allowed he was a most agreeable man, and everybody thought his performance “simply marvellous.”
Florian waited on the door-step as the Seer was leaving. “I’ll walk home with you,” he said, with an air of quiet determination.
The Seer stared at him hard. “As you like,” he answered, coldly; but it was clear from his tone he distrusted Florian.
They walked round the corner for some yards in silence. Then Florian spoke first. “There was only one thing I didn’t quite understand,” he began, with a confidential air, “and that was how the dickens you managed to get those gummed envelopes open.”
The Seer stood still for a second, and fronted him. They were in a lonely street. “Now, you look here, Mr Florian Wood,” the American said quietly, dropping back all at once into his native dialect and his native accent, “you lay low this evening. You thought you spotted it. I saw you lay low, and I knew pretty well you meant to come round and have it out some time with me. Well, sir, what do you mean by insinuating to a gentleman like me that I broke those there envelopes? That’s an imputation on my honesty and honour; and out West, you know, we answer questions like that only one way . . . with a six-shooter.”