"You are fools—madmen," hotly answered Serviss. "You would sacrifice this girl to a brazen scheme of self-advertising?"
Clarke was contemptuous. "That is your point of view. From our side there is no greater glory than to be an Evangel of the New Faith. What matters the comment of the gross and self-satisfied to us who work for the happiness of those who mourn? The world in which we live despises the materialism of yours."
At this moment a new conception of Clarke's plan crossed Serviss's mind. "He is deeper than I thought. He would discredit the girl in the eyes of normal suitors, thereby assuring her to himself." Aloud he said: "Miss Lambert's right to herself should be your first consideration. She is something more than a trumpet for sounding your fame."
Clarke's resounding voice had drawn Mrs. Lambert from her room, and she now hurried down the stairway with intent to calm him.
Serviss turned to her. "Again I beg of you, Mrs. Lambert, to consider well before you consent to this plan. Your daughter's name will be a jest from one end of the country to the other. It doesn't matter how sincere and earnest you are, the public will regard this challenge as a seeking for notoriety. Your daughter is about to be flung to the beasts." Seeing something unyielding in her eyes, he added, with such intensity his own heart responded: "Will you stake your daughter's reputation, her health, her reason, upon the issue of a voice in the dark?"
"Yes, when the voice is that of her own father. He knows the future. He will protect her. I have no fear."
There was such conviction, such immutable faith in her gentle voice, that Serviss was confounded. When he spoke, in answer, his voice was lower in key, with a cadence of hopeless appeal.
"How do you know these advisers are your husband and your father? You must be very certain of them."
"I am certain. I believe in them as I believe in my own existence." The line of her mouth lost something of its sweetness, and Serviss, seeing this, took another tack.
"Granted these voices are genuine, they may be mistaken—rash with zeal. You wouldn't say that they have gained infallibility—a knowledge of both past and future—merely by passing to the shadow world?"