“Around this small table we sit, as at séance,” he said; “but no medium--only the potsherd. With these flexible bands I will attach, temporarily, the parts, and stand the vase in Mr. Halesowen’s frame, here by the window--so. Beside it we will place the lamp, shaded thus--so that a dim light is upon it. We can just see from where we sit in the dark. We will now wait until it is more dusk.” Accordingly, we went out on to the balcony and smoked for an hour, Zeda polluting the clean air with the fumes of the long, black cigars he affected. They had an appearance as of dried twigs and an odour so wholly original as to defy simile. Between eight and nine o’clock he expressed himself satisfied with the light--or, rather, lack of it--and we all gathered around the table in the gloom, spreading our hands as he directed. For close upon an hour we sat in tense silence, the room seeming to be very hot. A slight breeze off the Common had wafted the fumes of Zeda’s cigar in through the open windows, which he had afterward closed, and the reek filled the air as with something palpable--and nauseous. I was growing very weary of the business, and Lesty, despite the doctor’s warning against disturbing the silence, had begun to cough and fidget irritably, when the rumbling foreign voice came, so unexpectedly as to startle us all: “It is useless to-night; something is not propitious. Turn up the lights.” From the celerity with which Halesowen complied, I divined that he, too, had been growing impatient. “There is some not suitable condition,” said Zeda, relocking his portion of the vase in its case. “To-morrow we shall make some changes in the order.” He seemed not at all disappointed, being apparently as confident as ever in the ultimate success of the séances. One of the windows, he suggested, should be left open on the following evening during our sitting; and this we were only too glad to agree upon, since it would possibly serve to clear the atmosphere, somewhat, of the odour emanating from the doctor’s cigars. Several other points he also mentioned as being conceivably responsible for our initial failure--such as our positions around the table, and the relative distance of the potsherd. “We shall see to-morrow,” were his last words as he left us. “A perfect monument of mendacity!” muttered Lesty, as we heard the retiring footsteps of our foreign friend on the gravel below; “and I think his accent is assumed. I don’t know why we even seem to credit such an incredible fable.” “I don’t know, either,” said Halesowen, reflectively. “But he certainly possesses the missing part of the vase, and if he does not believe the story himself, what earthly object can he hope to serve by these séances?” “Give it up!” replied Lesty, promptly; and that, I think, rather aptly expressed the mental attitude of all three.