"_What_ kind of currents?"

"Psychic."

"Which circle the earth?"

"Exactly. If you want to send a wireless message you hitch on to a current, don't you?--or you tap it--or something. Now, they have discovered that each one of these numberless millions of psychic currents pa.s.ses through two, living, human ent.i.ties of opposite s.e.x; that, for example, all you have got to do to communicate with the person who is on the same psychical current that you are, is to attune your subconscious self to a given intensity and pitch, and it will be like communication by telephone, no matter how far apart you are."

"Brown!"

"What?"

"Did she go to your office to tell you that sort of--of--information?"

"Partly. She was perfectly charming about it. She explained to me that all nature is divided into predestined pairs, and that somewhere, at some time, either here on earth or in some of the various future existences, this predestined pair is certain to meet and complete the universal scheme as it has been planned. Do you understand, Smithy?"

Smith sat silent and reflective for a while, then:

"You say that her theory is that everybody owns one of those psychic currents?"

"Yes."

"I am on a private psychic current whirling around this globe?"

"Sure."

"And some--ah--young girl is at the other end?"

"Sure thing."

"Then if I could only get hold of my end of the wire I could--ah--call her up?"

"I believe that's the idea."

"And--she's for muh?"

"So they say."

"Is--is there any way to get a look at her first?"

"You'd have to take her anyway, sometime."

"But suppose I didn't like her?"

The two young men sat laughing for a few moments, then Brown went on:

"You see, Smith, my interview with her was such a curious episode that about all I did was to listen to what she was saying, so I don't know how details are worked out. She explained to me that The Green Mouse Society has just been formed, not only for the purpose of psychical research, but for applying practically and using commercially the discovery of the psychic currents. That's what The Green Mouse is trying to do: form itself into a company and issue stocks and bonds----"

"What?"

"Certainly. It sounds like a madman's dream at first, but when you come to look into it--for instance, think of the millions of clients such a company would have. As example, a young man, ready for marriage, goes to The Green Mouse and pays a fee. The Green Mouse sorts out, identifies, and intercepts the young man's own particular current, hitches his subconscious self to it, and zip!--he's at one end of an invisible telephone and the only girl on earth is at the other.... What's the matter with their making a quick date for an introduction?"

Smith said slowly: "Do you mean to tell me that any sane person came to you in your office with a proposition to take stock in such an enterprise?"

"She did not even suggest it."

"What did she want, then?"

"She wanted," said Brown, "a perfectly normal, unimaginative business man who would volunteer to permit The Green Mouse Society to sort out his psychic current, attach him to it, and see what would happen."

"She wants to experiment on _you?_"

"So I understand."

"And--you're not going to let her, are you?"

"Why not?"

"Because it's--it's idiotic!" said Smith, warmly. "I don't believe in such things--you don't, either--n.o.body does--but, all the same, you can't be perfectly sure in these days what devilish sort of game you might be up against."

Brown smiled. "I told her, very politely, that I found it quite impossible to believe in such things; and she was awfully nice about it, and said it didn't matter what I believed. It seems that my name was chosen by chance--they opened the Telephone Directory at random and she, blindfolded, made a pencil mark on the margin opposite one of the names on the page. It happened to be my name. That's all."

"Wouldn't let her do it!" said Smith, seriously.

"Why not, as long as there's absolutely nothing in it? Besides, if it pleases her to have a try why shouldn't she? Besides, I haven't the slightest intention or desire to woo or wed anybody, and I'd like to see anybody make me."

"Do you mean to say that you told her to go ahead?"

"Certainly," said Brown serenely. "And she thanked me very prettily.

She's well bred--exceptionally."

"Oh! Then what did you do?"

"We talked a little while."

"About what?"

"Well, for instance, I mentioned that curiously-baffling sensation which comes over everybody at times--the sudden conviction that everything that you say and do has been said and done by you before--somewhere. Do you understand?"

"Oh, yes."

"And she smiled and said that such sensations were merely echoes from the invisible psychic wire, and that repet.i.tions from some previous incarnation were not unusual, particularly when the other person through whom the psychic current pa.s.sed, was near by."

"You mean to say that when a fellow has that queer feeling that it has all happened before, the--the predestined girl is somewhere in your neighborhood?"

"That is what my pretty informant told me."

"Who," asked Smith, "is this pretty informant?"