“Several authentic cases,” said Recklow quietly. But Benton’s face was a study.
Tressa looked up at her husband. He dropped his hand reassuringly on her shoulder and nodded with a slight smile.
“There—there was something else,” she said with considerable hesitation—“something not quite in line of duty—perhaps——”
“It seems to concern Benton,” added Cleves, smiling.
“What is it?” inquired Selden, smiling also as Benton’s features froze to a mask.
“Let me tell you, first,” interrupted Cleves, “that my wife’s psychic ability and skill can make me visualise and actually see scenes and people which, God knows, I never before laid eyes upon, but which she has both seen and known.
“And one morning, in Florida, I asked her to do something strange—something of that sort to amuse me—and we were sitting on the steps of our cottage—you know, the old club-house at Orchid!—and the first I knew I saw, in the mist on the St. Johns, a Chinese bridge humped up over that very commonplace stream, and thousands of people passing over it,—and a city beyond—the town of Yian, Tressa tells me,—and I heard the Buddhist bells and the big temple gong and the noises in streets and on the water——”
He was becoming considerably excited at the memory, and his lean face reddened and he gesticulated as he spoke:
“It was astounding, Recklow! There was that bridge, and all those people moving over it; and the city beyond, and the boats and shipping, and the vast murmur of multitudes.... And then, there on the bridge crossing toward Yian, I saw a young girl, who turned and looked back at my wife and laughed.”
“And I told him it was Yulun,” said Tressa, simply.