“Nonsense!” exclaimed Grover.
“To a scientific mind—yes. To an ignorant native of a country without educational facilities or communication such as our radio, telephone and so on—not so nonsensical. Besides, I have heard and I have seen curious things.”
“Like what?” Tip demanded.
“In India, a seed planted and an orange bush growing before my eyes. Or a rope flung into the air, staying aloft as if hooked to some invisible support, while a boy clambers up and seems to vanish.
“In Tibet, as well as in India, men who can apparently walk on water. Of course, our science explains it as hypnotism—the man who performs the feats is able to secure control over some part of the onlooker’s mind, impress his thoughts on the other mind, and make one believe the trick is a real occurrence.”
“I have read about men who can walk on pits of live coals,” Roger added.
“Those tricks or those marvels do not explain this film,” Grover was not satisfied, Roger knew by his tone.
“How about telepathy? Thought transference?”
“I believe,” Grover answered, “there is some ground for accepting that as possible. It might be reasonable to admit that if a man, by years of practice, can train himself and also treat his feet so that he can walk on fiery coals, a man might become able to impress a powerful idea on another without words. But—on a film!”
“In the sect of the Bon, or manipulators of the darker forces of Nature and of man’s superstition which is half of black magic,” the experimenter declared, “strange powers exist. I have read of a French scientist who has succeeded in developing a film so sensitive that a powerful thought, held by his trained mind, seemed to cause some changes in the film. This is a similar situation produced by some Oriental master mind, probably.”