Page:Isis very much unveiled - being the story of the great Mahatma hoax (IA b24884273).pdf/143

Rh doubt, the damaging suggestiveness of the contents of the one and of the circumstances under which the other was produced. I for my part applaud his choice, because it will bring him into sharp conflict, as regards the one missive, with Mrs. Besant, and as regards the other, with Colonel Olcott.

In regard to all those missives which were palmed off on Mrs. Besant herself, my account is based, as regards generalities, on Mrs. Besant’s own statements and Mr. Judge’s own admissions. As regards details, however, I have had to rely on intimates and colleagues at Avenue-road, to whom Mrs. Besant told the wondrous tale at the time.

The story of the Cabinet missive is briefly this (see “Isis Very Much Unveiled,” p. 28). Mr. Judge suggests to Mrs. Besant that they should put a question to the Masters by writing it on paper, and placing this in a certain cabinet in “H.P.B.’s” room. The result was the endorsement of the paper with the words, “Yes,” “And hope,” in the red script used in all these communications, and also the impression of what Madame Blavatsky called the “flap-doodle” seal, under circumstances which demonstrated either psychic precipitation on the part of the Master, or else vulgar trickery on the part of Mr. Judge.

Mr. Judge declares “no such thing took place.”

Now, on the facts stated, it is obvious that only one person can authoritatively contradict Mr. Judge here: to wit, Mrs. Besant. This I am bound to suppose that she will do; for my version of the story is that given by her on the day after the occurrence to a colleague, who quoted it from his diary. Mrs. Besant also showed what purported to be the missive, sealed and endorsed as described, and this to several people. At Adyar, at the beginning of this year, when the Judge missives were being blown upon all round, she repeated the story, with only one correction—a notable one—that she had not, as she at first implied, stayed in the room all the time during Mr. Judge’s working of the Cabinet oracle.

What Mr. Judge will do if Mrs. Besant sticks to her version of the story I do not know. But he has already, in the secret circular lately divulged, disposed of the rest of her action in this matter as due to