Part 6 (1/2)

This was too much for my friend, who bent forward eagerly, saying:--”_Do let me try if I cannot see them too!_”

Well, she ”tried” for the greater part of two hours, but absolutely in vain, and then got up, and suggested going home to luncheon. She added navely: ”I _thought_ they must have something wrong about them, and I am quite sure of it now, _or I should have seen them_.”

But it had taken her two hours of failure to be absolutely convinced that they came straight from the devil!

One sign--also birds--appeared to me on one occasion only. We had returned to Denver, where Miss Greenlow and I were to separate after a year's constant travel together. She was going back to San Francisco to take steamer for the Sandwich Islands, and thence on to Australia; whilst I was returning to England for family reasons.

I had arranged to dine with the hospitable Dean of Denver the evening of the day of her departure, and I had not realised how much less lonely one would have felt had my journey East corresponded more closely with her journey West, especially as she was obliged to leave the hotel about nine o'clock in the morning.

Waking early, and lying in bed, feeling very melancholy at the idea of being left behind and alone in the very centre of America, I looked up, and, to my delight, saw a new sign.

Not my little birds this time, but two big, plump father and mother birds, with a short string attached, not horizontally as before, but perpendicularly. At the end of this little string was a tiny bird, even smaller than the swallows, being evidently guided by the two big birds, and quite safe in their charge.

My room communicated with that of my companion, whose door was open, and I told her of this new ”sign in the heavens,” adding that I hoped it had come to stay. Fortunately, I found a pencil, and made a rough sketch at the time, or I might have been tempted to imagine that I had never seen it at all, for the trio never appeared again, though I have longed to see them, and have certainly required the consolation quite as much, many times, since that far-away summer morning in Denver, Colorado.

On reaching home after this long American trip, I found a budget of letters awaiting me--amongst them a little registered box containing a kind birthday present from the brother who has been mentioned in the Introduction to this book. Was it another case of mental affinity which had induced him unconsciously to choose a gold brooch with two swallows in gold and pearls? Not an uncommon design; but _the birds were exactly the same size as those I was in the habit of seeing just at that time_.

I never told him how extraordinarily _a propos_ his present had proved, but I have always looked upon that brooch as a mascot, and have certainly worn it every day since it came into my possession.

CHAPTER III

AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND

Shortly after the Jubilee of 1887 had taken place, I sailed for Australia and New Zealand.

My first psychic experience in the Colonies took place in Melbourne, some months after my landing in Tasmania.

The wife of one of the ”prominent citizens” in Melbourne had been specially invited to meet me at an afternoon reception in the house of friends to whom I had carried letters of introduction, as she was said to be so deeply interested in everything psychic, and would greatly enjoy hearing my American experiences. Fortunately, the lady arrived late, and we had already enjoyed some interesting conversation before she came. A wetter ”wet blanket” it has never been my fortune to encounter. She was a very handsome woman, and therefore good to look at, but in the _role_ of sympathetic audience she was a miserable failure.

She sat with a cold, gla.s.sy eye fixed upon me, whilst I endeavoured to continue the conversation which had been interrupted by her arrival.

She might just as well have _said_ as have looked the words: ”Now go on making a fool of yourself!--that is just what I have come to see.”

The position was hopeless. So I began to talk about the weather, which is disagreeable enough from sirocco in the hot spring months (it was the end of October) to be useful.

Presently the daughter of the house came up to me, and said:

”Do, please, go on telling us your interesting experiences, Miss Bates; we can talk about other things at any time, and we asked Mrs Burroughes on purpose to meet you.”

The lady in question had joined another group by this time, so I was able to whisper in reply: ”I am so very sorry, but I cannot possibly talk of these things before your friend--she paralyses me absolutely from any psychic point of view. She is very handsome, and I like looking at her, but I cannot talk to her except about the weather.”

”How very odd!” was the unexpected reply. ”That is just what Lizzie Maynard says. And I did very much want Lizzie to hear about America too, but she has gone off to the other end of the room, saying she knows you won't be able to talk whilst Mrs Burroughes is here.”

This was interesting, for I had not noticed the young girl mentioned, who had not been introduced to me. So when my young hostess asked ”if she might bring Lizzie to see me at my hotel next day,” I gladly acquiesced, in spite of feeling very far from well at the moment.

This feeling of _malaise_ increased in the night, and was, in fact, the precursor of a short but sharp attack of a form of typhoid which was running through the hotel at the time. Being in bed next afternoon about four o'clock, I was dismayed to hear that Miss Maynard had arrived to see me, and, moreover, had arrived _alone_. I had never spoken to the girl nor even consciously set eyes on her before, but I knew she must have come at least three miles from the suburb where she lived, and would probably refuse to have a cup of tea downstairs during my absence.

There was nothing for it, therefore, but to make an effort, order tea to be brought for her to my room, and send a message hoping she would not mind seeing me in my bedroom.