As he looked, a sudden draft made one leaf of charcoal glow to a red heat, and the writing showed plain—black on a cherry-colored ground. He stooped curiously to read it, and saw that it was the remains of a card, filled with Fancy Gray’s handwriting. He remembered abstracting her notes upon Clytie, made after that first day’s reading. He had placed it in the letter-drawer for safe keeping, and had forgotten to remove it. Only the lower part was legible: "... intuitive powers (?!) Play her Mysticism. ..... Easy. Sympathetic fool ...." The glow suddenly faded, the charred paper writhed again, black and impotent. He gave it a vicious jab with the poker, and scattered it to ashes. *CHAPTER XIII* *THE BLOODSUCKER* Professor Vixley’s place was on Turk Street, the lower flat of three, whose separate doors made a triplet at the top of a tri-divided flight of wooden steps up from the sidewalk. The door had a plate-glass window, behind which was a cheap lace curtain. At the side, nailed over the letter slip, was a card bearing the written inscription, +−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−+ | | | PROF. P. VIXLEY. | | | +−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−−+ Inside, a narrow hall ran down into the house, doors leading at intervals on the right hand, to small box-like rooms. The first one was the Professor’s sitting- and reception-room, the shearing place for his lambs. The small type-writer on a stand and his roll-top desk attempted to give the room a businesslike aspect, while the homelier needs of comfort were satisfied by the machine-carved Morris chair, a padded, quilted couch with "hand-painted" sofa cushions and a macramé fringe along the mantel. Art was represented by the lincrusta-walton dado below the blank white plastered walls, partly covered with "spirit photographs," and a small parlor organ in the corner. A canary in a gilded cage gave a touch of gaiety to the apartment. Here Professor Vixley sat smoking a terrible cigar. Beside him, upon a small draped table, was a pile of small school slates, a tumbler of water and a sad towel. Opposite him, in a patent rocking-chair, was a young woman of some twenty-four or five years. She was a blonde, with pompadoured citron-yellow hair. Her eyes were deep violet, her nose slightly retroussé, giving her a whimsical, almost petulantly juvenile look that was decidedly engaging. She was dressed in black, so fittingly that no man would remember what she wore five minutes after he left her. This attractive creature, for she was indubitably winsome, was Flora Flint, by profession a materializing medium. Her past was prolific in adventure; by her alluring person and the dashing spirit shown in her eyes, her future promised as much as her past. "Are you busy to-day, Vixley?" she said.