ANNA PÁVLOVNA. No; you'll have to answer for it! Such tricks won't do. We'll have you up before the Justice of the Peace! BETSY [comes forward] Let her go, mamma. Or, if you wish to have her tried, you must have me tried too! She and I did it together. ANNA PÁVLOVNA. Well, of course, if _you_ have a hand in anything, what can one expect but the very worst results! Enter the Professor. PROFESSOR. How do you do, Anna Pávlovna? How do you do, Miss Betsy? Leoníd Fyódoritch, I have brought you a report of the Thirteenth Congress of Spiritualists at Chicago. An amazing speech by Schmidt! LEONÍD FYÓDORITCH. Oh, that is interesting! ANNA PÁVLOVNA. I will tell you something much more interesting! It turns out that both you and my husband were fooled by this girl! Betsy takes it on herself, but that is only to annoy me. It was an illiterate peasant girl who fooled you, and you believed it all. There were no mediumistic phenomena last night; it was she [pointing to Tánya] who did it! PROFESSOR [taking off his overcoat] What do you mean? ANNA PÁVLOVNA. I mean that it was she who, in the dark, played on the guitar and beat my husband on the head and performed all your idiotic tricks--and she has just confessed! PROFESSOR [smiling] What does that prove? ANNA PÁVLOVNA. It proves that your mediumism is--tomfoolery; that's what it proves! PROFESSOR. Because this young girl wished to deceive, we are to conclude that mediumism is "tomfoolery," as you are pleased to express it? [Smiles] A curious conclusion! Very possibly this young girl may have wished to deceive: that often occurs. She may even have done something; but then, what she did--_she_ did. But the manifestations of mediumistic energy still remain manifestations of _mediumistic_ energy! It is even very probable that what this young girl did, evoked (and so to say solicited) the manifestation of mediumistic energy,--giving it a definite form. ANNA PÁVLOVNA. Another lecture! PROFESSOR [sternly] You say, Anna Pávlovna, that this girl, and perhaps this dear young lady also, did something; but the light we all saw, and, in the first case the fall, and in the second the rise of temperature, and Grossman's excitement and vibration--were those things also done by this girl? And these are facts, Anna Pávlovna, facts! No! Anna Pávlovna, there are things which must be investigated and fully understood before they can be talked about, things too serious, too serious ... LEONÍD FYÓDORITCH. And the child that Márya Vasílevna distinctly saw? Why, I saw it too.... That could not have been done by this girl. ANNA PÁVLOVNA. You think yourself wise, but you are--a fool. LEONÍD FYÓDORITCH. Well, I'm going.... Alexéy Vladímiritch, will you come? [Exit into his study]. PROFESSOR [shrugging his shoulders, follows] Oh, how far, how far, we still lag behind Western Europe! Enter Jacob.