This had once been a dining-room and its walls were covered with a figured paper, above which was a bright red border decorated with Japanese fans and parasols. A few gaudy paper lanterns hung from the ceiling, and here and there were hung framed mottoes: "There Is No Death"—"We Shall Meet Again"—"There Is a Land that is Fairer than Day." This room was filled with chairs set in rows, and would hold some forty or fifty persons. It was separated by an arch from a smaller room beyond, where, upon a platform, stood a table with an open Bible, an organ, two chairs and a folding screen. Only the front seats were at present occupied, these by habitués of the place, all firm believers, a picturesque group showing at a glance the stigmata of eccentricity or mental aberration. For the most part they were women in black; they bowed to one another as they sat down, then waited in stolid patience for the séance to open. The others were pale, blue-eyed men with drooping mustaches and carefully parted hair, and a whiskered, bald-headed old gentleman or two who sat in silence. The room was dimly illuminated by side lights. Farther down the hallway, opposite the foot of a flight of stairs leading upward to her living-rooms, was Madam Spoll’s "study," and here she was, this evening, preparing for business. This room was small and crowded with furniture. The marble mantel held an assortment of bisque bric-à-brac, sea-shells, paper knives and cheap curiosities. The walls were covered with photographs, a placque or two, fans and picture cards. A huge folding bed, foolishly imitating a mirrored sideboard, occupied one corner of the room. A couch covered with fancy cushions and tidies ran beside it. A table, heavily draped, a three-legged tea-stand, an easel with a satin sash bearing the portrait, photographically enlarged in crayon, of a bold, smirking, overdressed little girl, a ragged trunk and several plush-covered chairs were huddled, higgledy-piggledy, along the other side of the room. Upon the couch Madam Spoll sat, spraying envelopes with alcohol from an atomizer on a small bamboo stand before her. She was an enormous woman of masculine type, with short, briskly curling, iron-gray hair and a triple chin. Heavy eyebrows, heavy lips, heavy ears and cheeks had Madam Spoll, but her forehead was unlined with wrinkles; her expression was serene, and, when she smiled, engaging and conciliating. She was dressed in black satin with wing-like sleeves, the front of her waist being covered with a triangular decoration of bead-work. Watching her with roving, black eyes was Professor Vixley, smoking a vile cigar. His face was sallow, of a predatory mold with a pointed, mangy beard, and sharp, yellow teeth. He wore a soft, striped flannel shirt with a flowing pink tie. From the sleeves of his shiny, cutaway coat, faded to a purplish hue, his thin, tanned, muscular hands showed like the claws of a vulture.