By night my mind was in a turmoil and my nerves on edge, my confidence shaken, my faith in the balance—which did not lessen the difficulties of an interview prompted chiefly by intellectual interest. Establishing connection with an unfamiliar personality is not easy, at best, and frequently some time is required to obtain free communication. On this occasion, instead of devoting the evening to perfecting one connection, several persons were called, all but one responding, and the messages, with one or two exceptions, were unsatisfactory. There were vain and fatiguing efforts to write a name unknown to any of us, and most of the efforts to obtain specific evidential data were unsuccessful. Whether this was due to my own lack of confidence, to interference by the enemy, or to the fact that at no time have the individuals communicating through me concerned themselves with personal and specific details—except occasionally, for my own greater conviction—I do not know.
At midnight, when this interview was over and we were alone, although wearied to the point of exhaustion, I asked again about Mr. Farrow, receiving the same reply, with a variation to the effect that the cablegram announcing his death had been delayed by the censor, and with occasional phrases of appeal and encouragement—merely intensifying my bewilderment—from Mary K. and Maynard.
“Are you sure you haven’t been away and let in disintegrating forces?” I asked Mary K.
“No, we have been here. They can’t touch your purpose. Don’t fear. You will be perfectly reassured soon,” was her reply, which, had we but recognized it, was an intimation that disintegrating forces had been in partial control in spite of all effort to overcome them.
Again I asked why the word “dead” had been used, and was told: “That is what the cable to Cass says.” Which manifestly did not explain.
Sunday morning, Maynard Holt’s familiar signature came at once, followed by a long, personal message to a friend who was present, steadily written, and pointed by an occasional characteristic turn of phrase, indicating a clear and uninterrupted connection.
When this had been finished, Cass asked, “Shall I go to the office for that cable?”
“It is not there.”
“It’s all a mistake?” I urged.
“Farrow is here.”