Page:Doughty--Mirrikh or A woman from Mars.djvu/91

 exhibit my powers for the asking. Why, what is this? Can it be possible! My book!”

There it lay open upon the floor just where I had thrown it. I had forgotten its existence, but now as he leaned back and picked it up I could do no less than make some  explanation.

The attempt was a lame one I fear, but he listened in polite silence. I did not tell him who opened the bag, but he seemed to understand instinctively that it was not I.

Just as I ceased speaking, the thunder began crashing again. I remember that there was a particularly fearful clap when he opened the book, and running the pages over hastily began to read.

What he read—and he began it without the slightest explanation—was the report of a committee appointed by a theosophic society in England to examine into the claims of a noted Spiritualist who professed to have been bodily levitated through an open, third story window; not once, but frequently, with the power to control his levitations to  a certain extent, although admitting ignorance as to how he  was taken, where he went, or by what means he was  brought back. The report of the committee was to the effect that they, on several occasions—always in the dark—did actually witness the levitation of this individual. The names signed were those of a clergyman, a noted barrister and a baronet, who to his other distinctions was able to add the M. P. Altogether it was just about the most  remarkable reading I ever listened to. If I chose I could furnish names and dates, but as I propose to confine myself strictly to the matters which came under my own observation, I forbear.

“You have heard?” he said quietly, as he concluded. “In your own sober England, Mr. Philpot, precisely what I have done on several occasions with which you may be  more or less acquainted, has been done. Need I say more?”

“It would be a trifle more satisfactory if you would,” returned the Doctor seriously. “I have read of this business before. That medium has since been exposed as a fraud.”

“Was the secret of his levitation exposed?”

“No. I understand not.”

Simply the man was caught cheating at some other trick?”

“So far as I have heard that is all. He pretended to materialize a spirit, which proved to be himself.”