He began quite formally, and with a well-laid-out line of questions, but she was not the kind of witness to permit that. She broke out of his boundaries on the third query, and laughingly refused to discuss her losses. "I am holding no one but myself responsible," she said. "I was greedy—I couldn't let well enough alone, that's all."
"No, that is not all," he insisted. "My mother is charged with advising people to put money into the hands of a swindler—"
"I don't believe that. I think she was honest in believing that Pettus would enrich us all. She was deceived like the rest of us."
"But what becomes of the infallible Voices?"
She laughed. "They are fallible, that's all. They made a gross blunder in Pettus."
"Mr. Bartol suggests that my mother may have been hypnotized by Pettus and made to work his will, and I think he's right. He thinks the whole thing comes down to illusion—to hypnotic control and telepathy."
She looked thoughtful. "I had a stage of believing that; but it doesn't explain all, it only explains a small part. Does it explain Altair to you?"
His glance fell. "Nothing explains Altair—nor that moaning wind—nor the writing on the slates."
"And the letter—have you forgotten that?"
"Half an hour ago, as we were playing tennis, I had forgotten it. I was cut loose from the whole blessed mess—now it all comes back upon me like a cloud."