Victor's heart bounded at the suggestion. "Do you think it possible?" he asked, excitedly. Sill remained unmoved. "She does not respond to any test, I'm sorry to say. Life is extinct." The entrance of Doctor Eberly, a tall, stooping man with deep-set eyes and a sad, worn face, cut short this explanation. Eberly was Mrs. Joyce's family physician, and taking him aside she presented the case. Eberly knew Doctor Sill, and together they returned to Mrs. Ollnee's bedside while Mrs. Joyce kept Victor as far away from their examination as possible. "There have been many cases of this deep trance, Victor, and we must not permit the coroner to come till we are absolutely convinced that your mother has gone out never to return." "She must come back," he cried, huskily. "She did so much for me. I want to do something for her." "You did a great deal for her, my dear boy. It was a great joy and comfort to her to see you growing into manhood. She was a little afraid of you, but she worshiped you all the same. Your letters were an ecstasy to her." "And I wrote so seldom," he groaned. "I was so busy with my games, my studies, I hardly thought of her. If she will only come back to me I will give up everything for her." "She understood you, Victor. She was a wonderful little woman, lovely in her serene, high thought. She lived on a lofty plane." "I begin to see that," he answered, contritely. "I understand her better now." The kindly Mrs. Bowers had slipped away back to her household below, and the men of science were still deep in a low-toned, deliberate discussion, so that Victor and the woman he now knew to be his best friend were left to confront each other in mutual study. He was wondering at her interest in him, and she was weighing his grief and remorse, thinking enviously of his youth and bodily perfection. "I wish you were my son," she uttered, wistfully. Doctor Eberly again approached, walking in that quaint, sidewise fashion which had made him the subject of jocose remark among his pupils at the medical school. Mrs. Joyce was instant in inquiry. "How is she, Doctor?" "Life is extinct," he replied, with fateful precision. "Are you sure?" she demanded. "Reasonably so. One is never sure of anything that concerns the human organism," he replied, wearily. She warned him: "You must remember she was accustomed to these trances." "So I understand. Nevertheless, this is something more than trance. So far as I can determine, this body is without a tenant." "The tenant may come back," she insisted. He looked away. "I know your faith, but I am quite sure all is over. _Rigor mortis_ has set in." She rose emphatically. "I have a feeling that you are both mistaken. Let me see her. Come, Victor, why do you shrink? It is but her garment lying there."