"I wonder how it came in your pocket," said Slade reflectively. "Maybe he dropped it there in the dark — without realizing it. The other night, you say?"
"Yes. To-night, he was working with a trumpet. Say — that was weird, all right. It had a lighted end, and you could see it floating all around through the air, with a voice coming out of it!"
"That trumpet gag is old stuff," said Slade, with a knowing air. "The end comes off the trumpet — nothing but a luminous band — and he must have had it hooked on to an extension rod like this one on the watch. That would let him keep the people looking up, thinking they were seeing the trumpet floating.
"Then you figure he had the trumpet with him?" Dick quizzed.
"Sure. So he could make the voices himself. A whisper sounds uncanny through one of those trumpets."
"But I heard a noise like a man drowning. It sounded real—"
"Did he have a bucket of water there?" interposed Slade.
"Yes. Not a bucket" — Dick corrected — "it was a big Hindu bowl."
"That gives it away," laughed Slade. "I know how he did it. He put the end of the trumpet into the water — the big end — and then blew through the small end. It makes a gurgling sound, like a man choking.
"I'm nobody's fool on this sort of stuff, you know," he went on. "I've run into some of these fakers before. But from all I hear, Rajah Brahman must be the ace of them."