"Oho, you believe in it fast enough when you want to use it?"

But a trial of the occult only brought Blair the advice to beware of a friend who might be at heart an enemy. To be careful of his plans and sketches, for there was some one near who might be guilty of deceit.

All of which Blair knew before.

The sessions which the Cranes held with Madame Parlato increased in importance and interest.

She had succeeded in materializing the face and form of their son to their satisfaction of his ident.i.ty. They told remarkable tales of seeing and hearing Peter Boots, until Julie ran out of the room lest she voice her disapproval too strongly. For Julie Crane, though an absolute unbeliever in Madame Parlato and all her works, was a devoted daughter, and would do nothing to disturb the happiness her parents felt in the _seances_ with the medium.

But one performance fairly staggered the group of listeners to whom the Cranes recounted it.

They returned from the medium's to find the young people sitting round the hospitable Crane fireside. It was mid March and the weather still allowed of the cheerful open fire.

Carlotta was there and Shelby, and Blair and Thorpe, with Julie, of course, made up the little party.

"The most marvelous yet!" Benjamin Crane exclaimed, as he drew near the fire. "Julie, dear, if you don't want to hear, run away, for I must tell about it."

But Julie stayed, and her parents told the story.

It seemed the medium had promised them something very definite by way of proof, and she had certainly kept her promise.

The materialization of Peter had taken place, and, as the spirit form slowly dissolved and faded from their view, there was left behind, lying on the table, an object that had not been there before.

It was a tobacco pouch, old and worn, and bearing Peter's initials.

Julie looked at it with horror-stricken eyes, as her father produced it from his pocket.

"Why," she gasped, "it's the one I gave him on his birthday."

"Not really!" cried Shelby, and both he and Blair leaned eagerly forward to look.

"It's the one he always carried with him in Labrador," Blair said, with an expression of blank wonderment. "How did it get down here?"

"I offer no explanation, save the true one," Benjamin Crane said, seriously. "That is, as you see, a real object. It is Peter's property.

You, Blair, recognize it. Do you, Shelby?"

"I do," Shelby replied, his eyes staring at the thing.

"Julie recognized it at once," went on Crane. "So there's no doubt of its ident.i.ty. Now, I submit that it would be impossible for Madame Parlato to have come by this in any natural way, therefore it is supernatural."

"Supernatural!" McClellan Thorpe exclaimed, with utter scorn in his voice. "How could that be, sir?"

"It was materialized by my son, Peter," Crane returned, looking at Thorpe, calmly. "That may seem incredible to you, but it is not so incredible as any other explanation you may offer. You cannot think my wife or I would misstate what happened, can you? You cannot a.s.sume that Madame Parlato obtained this in any underhanded way, for you cannot conceive of any way in which she _could_ do so. Then, what do you suggest?"

"Anything, but that Peter brought it!" Thorpe cried.

"Ah, yes; anything but the truth. You glibly say 'anything,' but I ask you to suggest what you mean in that 'anything,' and you fail to reply."

"There is nothing to suggest," Blair said; "I confess myself utterly at a loss to suggest anything. To my certain knowledge Peter had that on his person when he died! Why, that morning he had given me a pipeful out of it, and had then returned it to his pocket! My explanation is that Peter is alive!"

"I wish that were the true one," said Benjamin Crane, fervently, "but if you'll think a minute, Gilbert, you'll realize that if Peter were alive he would come to us in the flesh, and not send his tobacco pouch by a medium."

"Indeed, he would!" agreed Carlotta, "much as I'd love to believe Peter alive, this episode contradicts such a belief, not proves it!"

"That's right," said Shelby, thoughtfully; "I, too, can believe anything rather than that the medium caused the materialization of this thing, but----"

"The medium didn't cause it, exactly," broke in Mrs. Crane's gentle voice; "you see, we had begged Peter so hard for a material proof that he promised to try to give it to us. And at last he succeeded. It is miraculous, of course, but no more miraculous than the strange things recorded in the Bible. You see, I hold that the day of miracles is not past."

Shelby said gravely, "You must be right, for there's surely no other explanation. I, too, saw this in Peter's hand that last day we were together. I can't believe he's alive----"

"Of course not!" interrupted Blair, "if he were, he'd have no use for mediums! Whatever is the truth, it's not that Peter's alive! I only wish it might be, but as Carlotta says, this thing contradicts such a theory.

I'm beaten. I see no light at all."

Benjamin Crane smiled. "You boys admit you see no explanation yet you refuse to accept the obvious and only one possible. But I'm not going to try to persuade you, I've no reason to do so. It all means little to you, but it is as the breath of life to me and to Peter's mother. I trust that some day Julie will be convinced of these truths, but that is for her to decide. I shall add this revelation to my book, by way of an appendix. It's too late to incorporate it in the body of the work."

Benjamin Crane's book had been a work of absorbing interest to him if not to his friends. He was entirely obsessed by the whole matter of Spiritism, and his book, following the style of a celebrated work of a similar nature in England, was even now in the publisher's hands.

The book was a memorial to Peter and an account of the experiences of his parents during the sessions with the medium. Crane possessed a pleasant, convincing style, and the book was well written and of a real interest quite apart from the question of the reader's belief in its matter.

When the volume was published, and that was early in April, it became an immediate success. Not the least of the reasons for this was the astounding account of the materialization of the tobacco pouch, detailed exactly as Benjamin Crane had told the story the night of the occurrence.

The book went like wildfire. Edition after edition was sold, and Benjamin Crane found himself famous. The benign old gentleman took his notoriety calmly, and refused to see the people who thronged to his door unless they were personal acquaintances. He had to engage secretaries and other a.s.sistants, but his methodical and efficient mind easily coped with all such matters. Mrs. Crane, too, was serenely indifferent to the publicity of it all, and pursued her simple ways of life undisturbed.

But Julie was angry at it all. Her life, she said, was spoiled by being known as the daughter of a demented monomaniac.

Her father smiled at her and told her she would change her views some day, and her mother scolded her now and then, but mostly ignored the subject when talking with her.

Julie found sympathy in the views of McClellan Thorpe.

Neither of these two would believe in the materialization of the tobacco pouch, yet neither of them could arrive at any satisfactory explanation of the incident.

"Of course, it's Peter's pouch," Julie would say; "but it came to that woman by some natural means. Maybe, somebody found it up there in Labrador and brought it home----"

"No," Thorpe would object, "in that case it would be weather-worn and defaced, and, too, n.o.body would have any reason to find it, bring it home, and give it to Madame Parlato! No, Carly, that won't do."

"Maybe he had two--duplicates," Carly suggested once. But inquiries of the Crane family proved that was not so. It was the very one Julie had given her brother, she was sure of that.

And so that mystery remained unexplained, save by the acceptance of a miracle.

A very material result of the success of Crane's book was a large amount of money that came to him from its royalties. Some of this he decided to use in fitting out an expedition to recover his son's body.

This, he decreed, was to be under the direction of Shelby and Blair, who knew just how it should be conducted. With his usual efficiency, Crane made all the arrangements and then told the young men about what he had done.

They agreed to go, but Shelby advised first that he write to Joshua, their old guide, as to their reception.