Victor Ollnee's Discipline

She said, quite simply: "I have no objection at all. I am in your hands."

After the older women left the room Victor drew near to Leo with a low word. "Poor little mother! she is in the hands of the inquisition to-night."

Thrilling to the excitement of the hour, she forgot her resentful superior pose. "Isn't that little man magnificent? Why didn't you go in for civil engineering or chemistry?"

"Because no one had sense enough to advise me," he bitterly answered.

"Think where that funny little body has carried that head," she continued, still studying Stinchfield. "If he had only been given shoulders like yours – "

"I'm glad you like something about me."

"I was speaking of your body as a machine for carrying a brain around over the earth."

"You seem to think of me as having no brain."

"Oh, not quite so bad as that. You have a brain, but it's undeveloped."

"I'm growing up rapidly these days. Seems like I'd lived a year since our walk last night."

She colored a little. "Forget that and I'll forgive you."

"I can't forget that."

"Have you any idea what the tests are to be?" she asked, in an effort to change the subject.

"No, I'm outside of it all. I hope they won't scare my poor little mother out of her senses. Ought I to step in and stop it?"

"No, not unless The Voices say so. They welcome investigation – so they've always said. What I should insist on, if I were you, is plenty of time and a series of sittings."

She was speaking now in gracious mood, and he, eager to win from her a fuller expression of forgiveness, spoke again, bravely. "I hope you are not going to be angry with me?"

"Not at all," she replied, with disheartening, impersonal cordiality. "I was partly to blame. I forgot you were a hot-headed boy."

"Don't take that tone with me – I won't stand it!"

"How can you help it?" she answered, with a smile, and moved toward the end of the table where Bartol and Stinchfield still sat smoking and leisurely sipping their coffee.

The little engineer sprang up as she drew near, and stood like a soldier at attention as she said, "Are you in merciless mood to-night, Mr. Stinchfield?"

"Far from it," he responded. "I'm in a receptive mood. The fact that Mr. Bartol has found enough in this subject to wish to investigate predisposes me to open-mindedness."

"Suppose we go into the library," suggested Bartol, and they all followed him across the hall.

Leo walked with the engineer, leaving Victor in the rear, hurt and suffering sorely.

It was not so much her displayed interest in Stinchfield as her haughty disregard of himself that touched his self-esteem. Thereafter he sulked like the boy she declared him to be.

When his mother came in robed in black and looking the sad young widow he was on the verge of rebellion against the whole plan of action, but he kept silence while Bartol explained his design.

"It is customary for 'mediums' to have things their own way, but in this case Mrs. Ollnee has placed herself entirely in my hands. The tests will be made in my study." He turned the key and unlocked the door. "Mr. Stinchfield will enter first and see that the room is as we left it."

The engineer entered, and after a moment's survey called: "All is untouched. Come in."

Bartol led the way with Mrs. Ollnee, and when Victor, the last to enter, had paced slowly over the threshold Stinchfield locked the door and handed the key to his host. The inquisition was begun.

The most notable furnishing of the room was a battery of three cameras, so arranged that they could be operated instantaneously, and Mrs. Joyce asked, anxiously, "Has the band consented to this?"

"They have consented to a trial," answered Mrs. Ollnee, in a faint voice. She had grown very pale, and her hands were trembling. To Victor this seemed like the tremor of terror, and his heart was aching with pity.

On one side of the room a deep alcove lined with books had been turned into a dark-room by means of curtains, and before these draperies stood the inevitable wooden table, but beside it, inclosing a chair, was a conical cage of wire netting encircled by bands of copper.

Mrs. Joyce exclaimed, "You do not intend to cage her in that?"

"That is my intention," calmly replied Bartol.

"Have the controls consented?" asked Mrs. Joyce.

"Yes," answered Mrs. Ollnee.

Of the further intricacies of Stinchfield's preparation Victor had no hint, so artfully were they concealed; but he recognized in it all a kind of humorous skepticism (which the engineer radiated in spite of his manifest wish to appear respectful); and as his mother entered her little torture tent Victor said, "You needn't do this if you don't want to, mother."

"Your father commands it," she replied, submissively.

Stinchfield screwed the cage to the floor and made an attachment to a small wire which ran along the book-case to a dark corner. Victor was enough of the physicist to infer that his mother was now surrounded by an electric current.

Bartol explained: "We are to start in total darkness, and then we intend to try various degrees and colors of lights. Mrs. Ollnee, how will you have us sit?"

"I want Victor opposite me, with Leo at his right and Louise at his left. Mr. Stinchfield will then be able to operate his wires. You, Mr. Bartol, sit at Leo's right and nearest the cage." Her voice was now quite firm, and her manner decided. "All sit at the table for a time."

Stinchfield snapped out the lights, one by one, till only two, one red, the other green, struggled against the darkness. When these went out the room was perfectly black.

Bartol then said: "In the cabinet behind the medium is a self-registering column of mercury, a typewriter, and a switch, which will light a lamp which hangs in the ceiling above the cabinet, and which has no other connection. The psychic is inclosed in a mesh of steel wire too fine to permit the putting forth of a finger. If the lamp is lighted, the column of mercury lifted, or the typewriter keys depressed, it will be by some supra-normal power of the medium. There is also on a table just inside the curtains, with paper and pencils, a small tin trumpet, a bell, and a zither upon it. If possible, we wish to obtain a written message independent of Mrs. Ollnee."

"It is the unexpected that happens," remarked Mrs. Joyce. "Shall we clasp hands, Lucy?"

"Yes," answered Mrs. Ollnee.

Victor, reaching for Leo's hand, tingled with something not scientific, a current of something subtler than electricity which came from her palm. He thought he detected in her fingers a returning warmth of grasp.

"They are here," announced Mrs. Joyce, after some ten minutes of silence.

"Who are here?" asked Bartol.

"My band – and many others."

"How can you tell?"

"I hear them." A faint whisper soon distinguished itself, and Mrs. Joyce reported that Mr. Blodgett was speaking. "He says he realizes the importance of this test, and that he has summoned all the most powerful of the spirits within reach, and that they will do all they can. He says the wire cage is a new condition, but they will meet it. Be patient; the strain on Lucy is very great, but it cannot be avoided."

In the silence which followed this conversation Leo shuddered and clutched Victor's hand as if for protection. "The other world is opening. Don't you feel it?" She whispered. "I can hear the rustle of wings."

He, growing very tense himself, answered: "I feel only my mother's anxiety. Are you comfortable, mother?" he asked.

She did not reply, and Mrs. Joyce said, "She is asleep." And all became silent again.

"Hello!" exclaimed Stinchfield. "Who touched me?"

"No one in the circle," answered Mrs. Joyce, highly elated.

"I certainly felt a hand on my shoulder – there it comes again! Shall I flash my camera?"

"Not now!" came a clear, full whisper, apparently from the cabinet. "You would fail now. Wait."

"Who spoke?" asked Bartol.

As there was no reply, Mrs. Joyce asked, "Is it you, Mr. Blodgett?"

"No!" the whisper replied.

"Is it Watts?"

"Yes."

"It is Isaac Watts. Now it is his science against yours, Mr. Stinchfield."

Bartol fell into the mode at once. "We are glad to be so honored. Now Watts, I want – and I must have – incontestable proof of the psychic's abnormal power – nothing else can save her from State prison. Do you realize that?"

"We do."

"Very well, proceed."

"What would you call incontestable proof?"

"I should say a registered pressure on the key or the lighting of the lamp above the cabinet – "

A vivid red flash lit up the room. Stinchfield shouted, "The lamp – the lamp was lit!"

His excitement, to all but Bartol, was ludicrously high, and Mrs. Joyce openly chuckled. "What else do you want done, Mr. Science?"

"Writing independent of Mrs. Ollnee," replied Bartol.

After a long and painful silence the bell tinkled faintly, and as all listened breathlessly the zither began to play.

"Now who is doing that?" asked the engineer.

"Turn on the green light!" suggested the Voice.

Stinchfield lit the green lamp, and by its glow the psychic was seen in her cage reclining limply, her face ghostly white in the light. Bartol looked about the circle. Every hand was in view, and yet the zither continued to play its weird and wistful little tune. Leo and Mrs. Joyce took this as a matter of course, but the men sat in rigid amazement.

"Lights out!" whispered the Voice.

Stinchfield put out his lamp. "That is astounding," he said. "I cannot analyze that."

"Will you swear the psychic did not do it?" asked the Voice.

The engineer hesitated. "Yes," he finally said.

"Is this sufficient?" asked the unseen.

Bartol replied. "Sufficient for my argument; but I do not understand these physical effects, and the jury may demand other proof. It will be necessary for us to show that the messages which misled, as well as those which comforted, came from some power outside the psychic and beyond her control. I believe that, as in the case of Anna Rothe – condemned by a German court to a long term of imprisonment – the charge of imposture and swindling made against Mrs. Ollnee must lie, unless I can demonstrate that these messages come from her subconscious self in some occult way, or from personalities other than herself. In fact, the whole case against Mrs. Ollnee lies in the question – does she believe in The Voices as entities existing and acting outside herself – "

He interrupted himself to say: "Something is tapping my hand. It feels like the small tin horn."

"It is!" came the answer in such volume that it could be heard all over the room.

"Does this not prove the medium innocent of ventriloquism?"

"Stinchfield – what about this?" asked Bartol.

The engineer could only repeat: "I don't understand it. It is out of my range."

Again the red lamp above the cabinet flashed, and by its momentary glow the horn was seen floating high over the cage, in which the medium sat motionless and ghastly white.

"Shall I flashlight that?" asked Stinchfield again.

"No," answered the Voice. "The flashlight is very dangerous. We must use it only for the supreme thing. Be patient!"

There was no longer any spirit of jocularity in the room. Each one acknowledged the presence of something profoundly mysterious, something capable of transforming physical science from top to bottom, something so far-reaching in its effect on law and morals as to benumb the faculties of those who perceived it. It was in no sense a religious awe with Bartol; it was the humbleness which comes to the greatest minds as they confront the unknowable deeps of matter and of space.

The boy and girl forgot their names, their sex. They touched hands as two infinitely small insects might do in the impenetrable night of their world (their hates as unimportant as their loves). Only the bereaved wife and mother leaned forward with the believer's full faith in the heaven from which the beloved forms of her dead were about to issue.

Suddenly the curtains of the alcove opened, disclosing a narrow strip of some glowing white substance. It was not metal, and it was not drapery. It was something not classified in science, and Stinchfield stared at it with analytic eyes, talking under breath to Bartol. "It is not phosphorus, but like it. I wonder if it emits heat?"

Mrs. Joyce explained: "It is the half-opened door into the celestial plane. I saw a face looking out."

This light vanished as silently as it came, and the zither began to play again, and a multitude of fairy voices – like a splendid chorus heard far down a shining hall – sang exquisitely but sadly an unknown anthem. While still the men of law and science listened in stupefaction the voices died out, and the zither, still playing, rose in the air, and at the instant when it was sounding nearest the ceiling the red lamp above the cabinet was again lighted, and the instrument, played by two faintly perceived hands, continued floating in the air.

Silent, open-mouthed, staring, Stinchfield heard the zither descend to the table before him. Then he awoke. "I must photograph that!"

"Not yet," insisted the Voice. "Wait for a more important sign."

In Victor's mind a complete revulsion to faith had come. His heart went out in a rush of remorseful tenderness and awe. The last lingering doubt of his mother disappeared. Like a flash of lightning memory swept back over his past. All he had seen and heard of the "ghost-room" stood revealed in a pure white light. "It was all true – all of it. She has never deceived me or any one else; she is wonderful and pure as an angel!" Incredible as were the effects he had seen, and which he had rejected as unconscious trickery, not one of them was more destructive of the teaching of his books than this vision of the zither played high in the air by sad, sweet hands. He longed to clasp his mother to his bosom to ask her forgiveness, but his throat choked with an emotion he could not utter.

Bartol, with tense voice, said to Stinchfield: "We have succeeded in paralleling Crookes' experiment. With this alone I can save her."

The flash of radiance from the cabinet interrupted him, and a new voice – an imperative voice – called:

"Green light!"

Stinchfield turned his switch, and there in the glow of the lamp stood a tall female figure with pale, sweet, oval face and dark, mysterious eyes.

"It is Altair!" exclaimed Leo.

Victor shivered with awe and exalted admiration, for the eyes seemed to look straight at him. The room was filled with that familiar unaccountable odor, and a cold wind blew as before from the celestial visitant, with suggestions of limitless space and cold, white light.

"Be faithful," the sweet Voice said. "Do not grieve. Do your work. Good-by."

The vision lasted but an instant, but in that moment Stinchfield and Bartol both perceived the psychic in her electric prison, lying like a corpse with lolling head and ghostly, sunken cheeks. She seemed to have lost half her bulk; like a partly filled garment she draped her chair.

The engineer spoke in a voice soft, pleading, husky with excitement. "May I flashlight now?"

"Not that – but this!" uttered a man's voice, and forth from the cabinet a faintly luminous mist appeared.

"Red lamp!"

In the glow of the sixteen-candle-power light the face of a bearded man was plainly seen. It wore a look of grave expectancy.

"Shall I fire?" asked Stinchfield.

"It may destroy our instrument," answered the figure. "But proceed."

The blinding flash which followed was accompanied by a cry, followed by a moan, and Lucy Ollnee was heard to topple from her chair to the floor. In the moment of horrified silence which followed the Voice commanded:

"Be silent! Do not stir! Turn off your current."

In his excitement Stinchfield turned off both light and current, and left the whole room in darkness. Victor was on his feet crying out: "She has fallen! She is dying!"

"Stay where you are, my son. Keep the room dark. We will take care of your mother."

So absolute was his faith at the moment, Victor resumed his seat, though he was trembling with fear. Leo reached for his hand. "Don't be frightened. They will care for her."

"We have witnessed the miraculous," declared Bartol, stricken into irresolution by what had taken place.

Mrs. Joyce, accustomed to these marvels, added her word of warning. "Don't go to her yet. Spirits are all about her. It has been a terrible shock, but they will heal her."

Stunned silent, baffled by what he had seen, the scientist sat with his hand on the switches controlling the lights ready to carry out the orders of his invisible colleague.

"Red light!" commanded the Voice. "Approach – quietly. Victor, take charge of your mother's body. She will not re-enter it. Her spirit is with us."

Victor went forward and knelt in agony while the engineer lifted the cage and delivered the unconscious psychic into his hands.

Lucy Ollnee breathed no more. She had died as she had lived, a martyr to the unseen world.

But her death was triumphant, for on the sensitive plate of each camera science and law were able to read the proof of her power. In the dark face of his grandsire Victor read a stern contempt as though he said:

"Deny and still deny. In the end you must believe."

In the alcove on the pad these words were written in his mother's hand: "Do not grieve. My work is done. I do not go far. I shall be near to cheer and guide you. Your future is secure. Work hard, be patient, and all will be well. Farewell, but not good-by."

Below, written in the quaint script which Victor recognized, were these words: "Men of science and of law, blazon forth the marvels you have seen and tested. Make the world ring with them; in such wise will you advance veneration for God and remove the fear of death.

"WATTS."