"I didn't mean it that way. I respect you very, very much; but you must know Anthony depends on me, and, besides, maybe it _is_ my duty to go on the platform. Father and grandfather both say it is. To them it seems small and selfish of me to want to be happy in my own home while the millions weep uncomforted; but oh, if I could only live my own life _part_ of the time! If I could feel free of this terrible weight one day in seven." Britt, looking into her clear eyes, acquired a new confidence in her. "Tell me, Miss Lambert, do you really believe that your father comes to you in this way?" "I dare not doubt it," she answered, with evasive eyes. "Some of the messages are not specially--" "I know," she acquiesced, with a shudder. "There are evil spirits as well as good, and sometimes the bad ones come. I don't see why grandfather permits them to use me. He says he can't always help it if there are bad people in the circle. That is another reason why I dread this public test--there is no knowing what the evil spirits might make me say or do. If it did not mean so much to Anthony I would refuse--even if grandfather asked it." "I saw Professor Serviss to-day." "Did you?" Her eyes were instantly alight. "Where did you see him? Does he know we are here?" "He didn't know till I told him. I called at his laboratory." "Did you tell him where we are?" "Yes; and he felt as I do, that this is not a good place for you. Pratt has the reputation of entertaining sensational characters, and it will be a miracle if you are not exploited to the press." Her face clouded again. "Oh, I am so tired of having people look at me and shrug and whisper. I am so tired of having this abnormal thing reflected in the eyes of all my visitors. I wish I could become commonplace--without the slightest thing queer about me. Sometimes I feel like taking a dose of poison and ending it all." "Don't do that," Britt replied, soberly. "You mustn't even say such a thing. I wish I could help you, but I see no way so long as your own parents and Clarke himself are your guides; but if at any time you will give me the authority"--here his voice became stern--"I will see that you are not troubled by any outside influence." "You are very kind," she said, but her face expressed only a troubled liking, and he pressed her hand in both of his and silently went away. Young Clinton Ward also came seeking, boyish, eager, contemptuous of any barrier so illusory as the fact of her trances, which she confessed to him. Her words hardly impressed themselves on his mind, and he replied, flippantly: "That cuts no ice with me. You couldn't be anything I wouldn't like. You're living too close and your nerves are sort of frazzled. What you need is a jolly good time. Come back to Boston and forget all about this business. Come, I want folks to meet you. My mother knows how I feel about you, and is crazy to see you." "What would she say if she knew what I have told you?" she asked, bitterly.