“And I say—” began Alice, but paused as the door opened and Nathan entered, accompanied by the light-hearted, fun-loving Donald. “O Don, we just needed you. Every one is so sepulchral here to-night,” cried Lissa. Then she continued in a half-whisper to Mark: “Even Professor Russell has no power over Donald. He did not foretell _his_ coming.” “Mne! I suspect he would have been willing to have excused his absence,” remarked Mrs. Clyne. “You do look a little solemncholy, that’s a fact,” Donald said. “Don’t we? And all because we are going to have a spirit seance to-night.” Nathan started. “How does this happen,” he asked. “I thought that Russell had left the neighborhood.” “He has returned. It’s the old story of the bad penny,” replied Lissa. “Isn’t it the still older story of the serpent in the garden?” suggested Donald. “Yes, I think you’ve hit it, Don,” said Mark. “The cloven hoof is in evidence and he leaves a trail of brimstone behind him.” “That must have been what made this room look so blue when we came in. His excellency must have been here, I take it. Are there not yet blue flames playing in the corners?” “If not there will be, doubtless, before the evening is over. But I must make haste or you two hungry men will not get any supper. Come, sit down and eat before it is cold.” “I, for one, need no second bidding,” said Donald. CHAPTER XVII AN OLD-TIME SEANCE AMIDST OLD-TIME SCENES AND OLD-TIME FOLKS When the tea things had been carried away and stowed with the washed and shining dishes in the cupboard at one side of the room, the floor swept, and the apartments made tidy, Lissa ushered into it, as first to arrive, Mr. Jenkinson and Mrs. Jenkinson and their mother, Mrs. Price. They were English people, and firm converts to spiritism, Mrs. Price being so absorbed in it as to appear of unbalanced mind. Mrs. Jenkinson had a delicate constitution and a nervous temperament, which made her easily excited and wrought upon. Already she figured as a medium. They were soon joined by Solomon Garrett, a stoutly built farmer of the neighborhood, who had, several years before this, come from Scotland with a party of Mormon emigrants. When met by the plural-marriage doctrine he had renounced his faith and refused to continue his journey to Salt Lake City. Subsequently he had located on the Nebraska plain. His conversion to this new creed of spiritism had been recent and half-hearted. With him were the Pemberton twins, two pale, fair-haired young ladies, who looked so exactly alike as to appear one and the same person. No one except their mother could identify them, and it was said that in their childhood she was liable to whip Clementina for the sins of Seraphina.