Part 22 (1/2)
Morton started--stared. ”No! Not a public challenge.”
”Isn't it pitiful? Yes, he's going to speak on the second of next month at the Spirit Temple, and he's going to publicly describe Viola's powers, and, as her manager, challenge the world to prove her false.”
As Morton's mind flashed over the consequences of this challenge, his face paled. ”Good G.o.d, what an ordeal! But the girl, does she consent?”
”She does and she doesn't. As a sweet, nice child she shrinks from it; but as a 'psychic,' as they call her, she has no choice. These inner forces seem able to take her by the throat any minute. They seized her while I was there. Morton, she impersonated Aunt Dosia, and delivered the most vindictive message--she scared me blue. You never saw anything more dramatic--more awful.”
”What was the message?”
”Something about a debt she wanted us to pay. She was furious about it. I don't know of any debt; do you?”
”No. How did the message come?”
As Kate described it, the impersonation grew grotesque, lost much of its power to horrify, and Morton, though he writhed at thought of the girl's depravity, blamed the mother and Clarke for it. Kate made end by saying: ”It _was_ horrible to see, and it startled me. Then the other messages, those written ones, came through her hand--”
”Automatic writing, they call it. That has no value--none whatever.
The whole programme was arranged for your benefit.”
”No, it wasn't. The girl was carried out of herself. She is somehow enslaved by Clarke, and she wants help. She wants to be investigated; but she wants it done privately. She wants you to do it. She begs you to do it.”
”Begs me?” His eyebrows lifted.
”Yes, she pa.s.sionately desires your advice. The poor thing made an appeal that would have touched your heart. She wants to be cured of this horrid thing--whatever it is. She wants to escape from Pratt and Clarke and all the rest of those queer people. You must take it up, Morton. _You_ must make up a committee and take charge of her.”
”Clarke is mad. No reputable man of science will go on such a committee. The girl will fall into the hands of notoriety-seekers--men of position do not meddle with such questions.”
Kate flared forth. ”Why don't they? It is their duty just as much as it is Viola's duty to offer herself. That is where I lose patience with you men of science. Why _don't_ you meet these people half-way?
Women wouldn't be such bigots--such cowards. If you don't help this poor girl I'll consider you a bigot and coward with the rest.”
”Your whole position is most feminine,” said Morton, arguing as much against himself as against Kate. ”You've only seen this girl once--you have witnessed only one of her performances, and yet you are ready to champion her before the world. I wish you'd tell me how you arrived at a conviction of her honesty. Think of it! She a.s.sumes to be the mouth-piece of the dead. The very a.s.sumption is a discredit.”
”I don't care; she has good, honest, sweet eyes.”
”I bow to the force of the eyes, but over against her claim I put the denials of science. The phenomena these fanatics base their hopes upon science has already proven to be tricks, illusions, deceits.”
”I don't care, her story, her own att.i.tude towards the thing, convinced me that she is _honest_.”
”It's the rogue who looks like a gentleman who runs the longest race.”
”Well,” ended Kate, rather helplessly, ”see her--see her before you condemn her.”
”But I _have_ seen her--I've spent more days in her company than you have hours.”
Kate looked at him with new interest. ”You didn't tell me that before.
You said you'd met her casually.”
”She is enormously interesting, but”--his voice changed to earnest protest--”but, Kate, the thing the girl claims to be is out of key with all organized human knowledge. It is a survival of the past. It belongs to a world of dreams and portents. It is of a piece with the old crone's tales, fortune-telling, palmistry, and all the rest of the hodge-podge or hocus-pocus which makes up the world of the unlearned.