the nerve to show her face in public after you exposed her as such a fake.”
The applause greeting Conan Doyle’s entrance spared Houdini the necessity of a reply. The front-row crowd reached out. Pausing on the apron, the gracious knight touched their beseeching hands. Hamlin Garland stepped from his position of prominence on the platform and welcomed Sir Arthur.
After a brief introduction from chairman Garland, Conan Doyle began his lecture, his voice measured and calm. Much the same talk he had delivered countless times before; at home, in France, on tour in Australia, and in the United States the previous year. Utterly down-to-earth and without pretense of any kind, he conveyed an absolute and unwavering sincerity.
Sir Arthur spoke to them of the chemist Sir William Crookes, discoverer of the element thallium and the first resident in London to have a house lit by electricity. “A thoroughly practical man, not given to fancies. This eminent scientist used laboratory methods to investigate the Florrie Cook phenomena in 1874 and pronounced the manifestations genuine. Here we have a tangible proof instead of mere wishful speculation.”
Telling the audience of his Catholic upbringing, Sir Arthur described his schism from the Church and eventual atheism. “I could not believe in what I was unable to experience directly.” Gradually, he became converted to spiritism, being led forward by degrees into acceptance through direct communication with loved ones on the Other Side. This contact was always facilitated by the intervention of skilled mediums. “They have something like an ‘ear’ in musicians. They are like telegraph boys bringing messages.”
Sir Arthur went on to detail those instances of spirit contact he had experienced at séances, the many messages coming through from his son, Kingsley, and his brother, Innes, both dead of pneumonia as a result of the war. “Evan Powell is outwardly a simple man, a Welsh coal miner, yet at his best as a medium is at the top of the list. Three years ago, in the darkness at his humble cottage in Merthyr Tydfil, where the windows were ablaze with the flare of a nearby ironworks, my wife and I sat listening to the whispered voices of the dead, voices full of earnest life, and of desperate endeavors to pierce the dull barriers of our senses.”
The sounds of sobbing disturbed the ecclesial hush in the shadow-shrouded auditorium. Sir Arthur’s countenance expressed kindness and sympathy. “There is no shame in weeping for the loss of loved ones,” he said softly. “I wept at Powell’s cottage. But they were tears of joy when I realized that our beloved dead are with us still. Is not this knowledge the supreme comfort for our bereavement?
“My own dear mother, to me always ‘the Ma’am,’ was in life a disbeliever. When she passed over two years ago, my grief was alleviated by the knowledge that contact was possible. Last year, at a sitting in London, the estimable spirit medium Ada Bessinet of Toledo, Ohio, a woman of the first psychic quality, materialized the Ma’am, producing a spirit letter which included her private pet name for me and containing her apology for any skepticism concerning life after death. The Ma’am was there, resurrected before me. I swear by all that’s holy on-earth I looked into her eyes.”
A startled gasp from the balcony produced a further round of sobbing and Sir Arthur suggested a moment of silence and prayer to comfort those who were disconsolate. Suddenly, an unearthly piping pierced the hush like the shriek of a demented banshee.
“There is a spirit manifestation among you, is there not?” called out V. T. Podmord from the platform as a thin, high whistle shrilled in the darkness.
Near-hysteria swept the audience. Sir Arthur pleaded for calm as the panic spread. Far in the back of the hall, an old man rose from his seat. “No … ,” he called in a frail, emaciated voice. “It’s not a spirit. It’s my hearing
The applause greeting Conan Doyle’s entrance spared Houdini the necessity of a reply. The front-row crowd reached out. Pausing on the apron, the gracious knight touched their beseeching hands. Hamlin Garland stepped from his position of prominence on the platform and welcomed Sir Arthur.
After a brief introduction from chairman Garland, Conan Doyle began his lecture, his voice measured and calm. Much the same talk he had delivered countless times before; at home, in France, on tour in Australia, and in the United States the previous year. Utterly down-to-earth and without pretense of any kind, he conveyed an absolute and unwavering sincerity.
Sir Arthur spoke to them of the chemist Sir William Crookes, discoverer of the element thallium and the first resident in London to have a house lit by electricity. “A thoroughly practical man, not given to fancies. This eminent scientist used laboratory methods to investigate the Florrie Cook phenomena in 1874 and pronounced the manifestations genuine. Here we have a tangible proof instead of mere wishful speculation.”
Telling the audience of his Catholic upbringing, Sir Arthur described his schism from the Church and eventual atheism. “I could not believe in what I was unable to experience directly.” Gradually, he became converted to spiritism, being led forward by degrees into acceptance through direct communication with loved ones on the Other Side. This contact was always facilitated by the intervention of skilled mediums. “They have something like an ‘ear’ in musicians. They are like telegraph boys bringing messages.”
Sir Arthur went on to detail those instances of spirit contact he had experienced at séances, the many messages coming through from his son, Kingsley, and his brother, Innes, both dead of pneumonia as a result of the war. “Evan Powell is outwardly a simple man, a Welsh coal miner, yet at his best as a medium is at the top of the list. Three years ago, in the darkness at his humble cottage in Merthyr Tydfil, where the windows were ablaze with the flare of a nearby ironworks, my wife and I sat listening to the whispered voices of the dead, voices full of earnest life, and of desperate endeavors to pierce the dull barriers of our senses.”
The sounds of sobbing disturbed the ecclesial hush in the shadow-shrouded auditorium. Sir Arthur’s countenance expressed kindness and sympathy. “There is no shame in weeping for the loss of loved ones,” he said softly. “I wept at Powell’s cottage. But they were tears of joy when I realized that our beloved dead are with us still. Is not this knowledge the supreme comfort for our bereavement?
“My own dear mother, to me always ‘the Ma’am,’ was in life a disbeliever. When she passed over two years ago, my grief was alleviated by the knowledge that contact was possible. Last year, at a sitting in London, the estimable spirit medium Ada Bessinet of Toledo, Ohio, a woman of the first psychic quality, materialized the Ma’am, producing a spirit letter which included her private pet name for me and containing her apology for any skepticism concerning life after death. The Ma’am was there, resurrected before me. I swear by all that’s holy on-earth I looked into her eyes.”
A startled gasp from the balcony produced a further round of sobbing and Sir Arthur suggested a moment of silence and prayer to comfort those who were disconsolate. Suddenly, an unearthly piping pierced the hush like the shriek of a demented banshee.
“There is a spirit manifestation among you, is there not?” called out V. T. Podmord from the platform as a thin, high whistle shrilled in the darkness.
Near-hysteria swept the audience. Sir Arthur pleaded for calm as the panic spread. Far in the back of the hall, an old man rose from his seat. “No … ,” he called in a frail, emaciated voice. “It’s not a spirit. It’s my hearing
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