"Who ought to know best," repeated Mr. Bowyer; "for every body will tell you, my dear, that the mind is so dependent upon the body. I suppose he must be right. I suppose it is just the imagination of a nervous child working upon the data which have been given,--the picture; and then, as you justly remind me, all we have been saying--" "How could the child know what we have been saying, Francis?" "Connie has heard nothing that any one has been saying; and there is no picture." "My dear lady, you hear what the doctor says. If there is no picture, and she has heard nothing, I suppose, then, your premises are gone, and the conclusion falls to the ground." "What does it matter about premises?" cried the vicar's wife; "here is something dreadful that has happened. Oh, what nonsense that is about imagination; children have no imagination. A dreadful thing has happened. In heaven's name, Francis, tell this poor child what she is to do." "My dear," said the vicar again, "you are asking me to believe in purgatory,--nothing less. You are asking me to contradict the church's teaching. Mary, you must compose yourself. You must wait till this excitement has passed away." "I can see by her eyes that she did not sleep last night," the doctor said, relieved. "We shall have her seeing visions too, if we don't take care." "And, my dear Mary," said the vicar, "if you will think of it, it is derogatory to the dignity of--of our dear friends who have passed away. How can we suppose that one of the blessed would come down from heaven, and walk about her own house, which she had just left, and show herself to a--to a--little child who had never seen her before." "Impossible," said the doctor. "I told you so; a stranger--that had no connection with her, knew nothing about her--" "Instead of," said the vicar, with a slight tremor, "making herself known, if that was permitted, to--to me, for example, or our friend here." "That sounds reasonable, Mary," said Mrs. Bowyer; "don't you think so, my dear? If she had come to one of us, or to yourself, my darling, I should never have wondered, after all that has happened. But to this little child--" "Whereas there is nothing more likely--more consonant with all the teachings of science--than that the little thing should have this hallucination, of which you ought never to have heard a word. You are the very last person--" "That is true," said the vicar, "and all the associations of the place must be overwhelming. My dear, we must take her away with us. Mrs. Turner, I am sure, is very kind, but it cannot be good for Mary to be here."