Madame le Claire stood in the little curtained alcove, empty save for the great tiger-skin rug, the dais, and a chair or two. She was gowned once more in the yellow and black, and stood in tigrine splendor cap-a-pie. Amidon felt her old power over him, as he approached her and looked into those mysterious eyes, and knew that he should do her bidding. She looked at his troubled countenance, and pitied him for his long evening of mental strain. She had seen his devotion to Elizabeth, and, be it confessed, was jealous in spite of herself. Pity and jealousy inspired the resolution which now formed in her mind: she would for an interval--an interval definitely limited--restore Eugene Brassfield to this company in which he was so completely at home, and lay the troubled ghost, Amidon. He would appear to better advantage altogether and do himself more credit; he would, in fact, be more convincingly Bellevale's "chief citizen." She bowed deeply and waved him to the chair. Then she performed the charm of "woven paces and of waving arms," and he slept, "lost to life and use and name and fame." "When he opens his eyes," said she, "he will know nothing, think nothing, do nothing, except what I suggest." "Make him dance with the broom," suggested Cox. "Let's have his inaugural address," petitioned Edgington. "Give him this," said Alvord, offering a coin, "and make him think it's hot. People in this neighborhood would go farther to see Brassfield drop a piece of money, than to interview a live dinosaur!" The laughter at this sally was lost on Madame le Claire. She was looking down on the unconscious Amidon, and wondering how any one could think of making him the instrument of buffoonery. "I will perform only one simple, yet very difficult, lest," said she. "This gentleman will soon wake as Mr. Brassfield, and will be his old and usual self among you until a certain hour, which I will write on this card, and seal up in this envelope, so that no one will know, and inform Mr. Brassfield by suggestion. When that particular moment arrives, wherever he may be, whatever he may be doing, he will enter the cataleptic state. The test is regarded as a severe and perfect one. The card will remain in the possession of Major Pumphrey until it succeeds or fails, and the envelope will then be opened." Kneeling on the dais, she seemed whispering in the subject's ear. Then, tapping his wrist, she said, decisively, "Wake!" It was Eugene Brassfield who opened his eyes on a circle of his friends, associates and cronies. He rose lightly and confidently, and laughed at the chaffing of his friends. He bowed to Madame le Claire, and moved across the room to Elizabeth's side, with an air of incipient proprietorship. "No true lover of carnations," he confided to her, "could wish you to wear them as you do to-night." "Really? I suppose I ought to ask why?"