"Now that you have apologized," said she, "I will prove that I have accepted the apology by answering you direct. I am not a fraud. I have been able to afford not to be. Still, I have a little sympathy with those who are. Did you ever consider," she went on, "that no fraud invents anything; that he is only imitating something genuine? Perhaps it may shake whatever faith you have in me if I tell you whatever these people profess to do has been done genuinely and without possibility of fraud." "Even bringing spirits from a cabinet?" he asked. Just as he spoke that question, an electric bell rang somewhere to the rear of the drawing-room. Mrs. Markham sat unmoving for an instant, as though considering either the sound or his question. The bell tinkled no more. After a moment, she smiled again. "You must know more of all these things before I can answer your question. Haven't we talked enough? Wouldn't it be better, in your present condition of suspicion, if I try to see what we can do without seeming any further to inspect you? For you must know that long preliminary conversation is a stock method with frauds and fakirs." Norcross's breath came a little faster, and a curious change passed for a second over his face--a falling of all the masses and lines. Mrs. Markham rose, sat by the table, under the reading-lamp, and shaded her eyes with her hand. She spoke now in a different tone, softer and less inflected. [Illustration: NORCROSS'S BREATH CAME A LITTLE FASTER] "I shall probably not go into trance," she said. "That is rare with me, rare with anyone, though often assumed for effect. Of you, I ask only that you remain quiet and passive. I'd like less light." Norcross shot a glance of quick suspicion at her as he rose, reached for the old-fashioned gas chandelier, and turned the jets down to tiny points. "Oh, dear no!" spoke Mrs. Markham, "not so low as that--this is no dark seance. I merely meant that the lights are too strong for a pair of sensitive eyes. I feel everything when I am in this condition. Would you mind sitting a little further away? Thank you. I think that's right. Please do not speak to me until I speak, and do not be disappointed if I tell you nothing." For five minutes, no sound broke the silence in Mrs. Markham's drawing-room, except the hiss of a light, quick breath and the intake and outgo of a heavier, slower one. And so suddenly, with such smothered intensity, that Norcross started in his seat, Mrs. Markham's voice emitted the first quaver of a musical note. She held it for a moment, before she began to hum over and over three bars of an old tune--"Wild roamed an Indian maid, bright Alfaretta." Thrice she hummed it, still sitting with her hand over her eyes.--"Wild roamed an Indian maid--" Then silence. But now, the breath of Norcross was coming more heavily, and the masses of his face had still further fallen. After an interval, Mrs. Markham spoke, in a low, even tone: "It is Lallie."