"Funny thing how different people are," she began. "Now, I get your condition right off. You ain’t at all like the rest of the folks that come here. I get a condition of study, like. I see what you might call books around you everywhere—not account-books, but more on the literary. Books and sheep, you understand. Not live ones! I would say they was more on the dead sheep. Flat ones, too, with hair, like—queer, ain’t it? Sounds like nonsense I suppose, but that’s just what I get. They must be some mistake somehow." She drew her hand across her forehead and snapped the electricity off her finger-tips. Then she rubbed her hands and twisted her mouth. "Do you know what I mean?" "Why, it might be wool perhaps; I have something to do with wool," he offered. "Now ain’t that strange? It _is_ wool, as sure’s you’re born! I can see what you might call skins and bales of wool. And I get a condition of business, too—but not what you might call a retail business. Seems like it was more on the wholesale." "Yes, that’s right," he assented, nodding. "What did I tell you!" she exclaimed. "I do believe I may get something after all, though very often the first time ain’t what you might call a success, and sitters are liable to get discouraged. I can tell you only just what my guides give me, you know, and sometimes Luella is pernickerty. She’s my chief control. You know how it is yourself, for you’ll be a man that knows women right down to the ground, and you’ve always been a favorite with the ladies, too." "Oh, I never knew many women," he said modestly. "It ain’t the number I’m speaking of. It’s the hold you had over ’em, specially when you was a young man. They was women who would do anything you asked them and be glad of the chance; now, wasn’t they? Did you ever know of a party, what you might call a young woman, though not so very young, with the initial C?" She mumbled the letter so that it was not quite distinguishable. "G?" he said. "Why, yes!—was that the first name or the last?" "It seems like it was the first name, the way I get it—would it be Grace?" This was, of course, a random "fishing test," and she got a bite. "My wife’s name was Grace." She hooked the fact, noticing the tense, and let her line play out to distract his attention temporarily. "It don’t seem quite like your wife. Seems like it was another woman who you was fond of. Maybe it was meant for the last name. Sometimes my control does get things awfully mixed. Or, it might be a middle initial. You wait a minute and maybe I’ll get it stronger." "Oh, if it was the last name, I think I recognize it." She had another line out and another bite, now, and played to land both, coaxing the truth gently from him. "Yes, it’s a last name, and she was terrible fond of you. She was in love with you for some time, you understand? And there was some trouble between you." "There was, indeed!" Mr. Payson shook his head solemnly.