was no doubt that Bannerman transfixed the audience when he abandoned the eloquent modulations to speak simply at the end of his address.
‘I do not ask you to give your credence lightly,’ he announced in a soft drawl. ‘There are compulsions beyond us. Beyond our mortal understanding. If we abuse them, they may take vengeance upon us.’
Here he had stopped abruptly and looked over at the quietly seated Sophia.
Conan Doyle at that moment understood where Bannerman received his ballast and belief. It was from the woman.
Everything comes from the woman. Good or bad.
Or is it all an act?
‘If we honour them,’ Bannerman ended his thought, ‘we may be blessed.’
With that he extended his hand towards Sophia and assisted her to mount the stage.
Magnus then took her place at the side, while she sat without fuss and arranged her pale blue dress, a simple cotton affair, accentuating her appearance of innocence and vulnerability.
Her arms were bare and the veil was held in place by a circlet of silver. She looked like something from a fairy tale. A princess waiting for a gallant knight.
All this had happened in the past.
Now, in the present, it seemed there was only Sophia Adler and Arthur Conan Doyle.
He felt a pull from inside as if some force was moving him towards the fragile being on the stage.
As if the complex inner being sheltered behind his massive frame had found harmony of response.
His mother Mary glanced at him from the corner of her eye. She knew her son and his passionate search for a meaning to life. They had both renounced the Catholic faith, the faith of a morbid alcoholic husband and father who now resided in an institution for such lost souls.
But it left an empty space.
And nature abhors a vacuum.
Mrs Roach, meanwhile, laid her dainty cat’s paw upon the dry saurian skin of her husband’s hand and murmured.
‘Robert. Do you not feel the spirits around us?’
Roach closed his eyes as if sensing the afterlife but in reality he was trying to control a knot of oniony wind that had gathered in his lower depths and was whipping about inside like a fireball looking for an exit.
Luckily at that moment Sophia began to utter softly and the attention of all became fixed upon her while Roach gave thanks to whatever spirit had answered his pressing need.
Many of the audience were ready to believe or already converted and some had even experienced séance phenomena.
Ghostly shapes flitting in the dark, raps on the table, musical instruments sounding in their ears, though never a trombone, raising of ponderable bodies, objects falling from the ceiling including lumps of ice, fresh flowers and fruit, which might indicate that the spirits were somewhat eclectic in their shopping; all these events dubious in origin and dependent upon the eyes being distracted or deceived.
Sophia Adler was none of these things.
For a start there were no manifestations; nothing appeared, not even ectoplasm, no oozing smoke from an obliging orifice that writhed into deceitful shapes while the female medium slumped erotically, limbs splayed.
No. That was not on show.
It was merely voices.
Sounds from her throat, soft at first, disjointed, rising and falling in pitch, not even words decipherable, as if filtered through a mesh of static interference.
They tumbled from her mouth and distorted the surface of the veil as if struggling to get free.
At one point she almost toppled from the chair, slowly lurching to the side like a newly felled tree but Bannerman leapt nimbly upon the stage and gently brought her to an upright position where she remained in better balance.
Now words began to form. Phrases. Random, questing, plaintive messages, some of which began to strike home amongst certain of the watching conscious throng.
A child searched for her mother. A wailing lost soul that had died of the fever. A woman called out in pain from the audience. It was her daughter. She named the wraith and there was an agonised
‘I do not ask you to give your credence lightly,’ he announced in a soft drawl. ‘There are compulsions beyond us. Beyond our mortal understanding. If we abuse them, they may take vengeance upon us.’
Here he had stopped abruptly and looked over at the quietly seated Sophia.
Conan Doyle at that moment understood where Bannerman received his ballast and belief. It was from the woman.
Everything comes from the woman. Good or bad.
Or is it all an act?
‘If we honour them,’ Bannerman ended his thought, ‘we may be blessed.’
With that he extended his hand towards Sophia and assisted her to mount the stage.
Magnus then took her place at the side, while she sat without fuss and arranged her pale blue dress, a simple cotton affair, accentuating her appearance of innocence and vulnerability.
Her arms were bare and the veil was held in place by a circlet of silver. She looked like something from a fairy tale. A princess waiting for a gallant knight.
All this had happened in the past.
Now, in the present, it seemed there was only Sophia Adler and Arthur Conan Doyle.
He felt a pull from inside as if some force was moving him towards the fragile being on the stage.
As if the complex inner being sheltered behind his massive frame had found harmony of response.
His mother Mary glanced at him from the corner of her eye. She knew her son and his passionate search for a meaning to life. They had both renounced the Catholic faith, the faith of a morbid alcoholic husband and father who now resided in an institution for such lost souls.
But it left an empty space.
And nature abhors a vacuum.
Mrs Roach, meanwhile, laid her dainty cat’s paw upon the dry saurian skin of her husband’s hand and murmured.
‘Robert. Do you not feel the spirits around us?’
Roach closed his eyes as if sensing the afterlife but in reality he was trying to control a knot of oniony wind that had gathered in his lower depths and was whipping about inside like a fireball looking for an exit.
Luckily at that moment Sophia began to utter softly and the attention of all became fixed upon her while Roach gave thanks to whatever spirit had answered his pressing need.
Many of the audience were ready to believe or already converted and some had even experienced séance phenomena.
Ghostly shapes flitting in the dark, raps on the table, musical instruments sounding in their ears, though never a trombone, raising of ponderable bodies, objects falling from the ceiling including lumps of ice, fresh flowers and fruit, which might indicate that the spirits were somewhat eclectic in their shopping; all these events dubious in origin and dependent upon the eyes being distracted or deceived.
Sophia Adler was none of these things.
For a start there were no manifestations; nothing appeared, not even ectoplasm, no oozing smoke from an obliging orifice that writhed into deceitful shapes while the female medium slumped erotically, limbs splayed.
No. That was not on show.
It was merely voices.
Sounds from her throat, soft at first, disjointed, rising and falling in pitch, not even words decipherable, as if filtered through a mesh of static interference.
They tumbled from her mouth and distorted the surface of the veil as if struggling to get free.
At one point she almost toppled from the chair, slowly lurching to the side like a newly felled tree but Bannerman leapt nimbly upon the stage and gently brought her to an upright position where she remained in better balance.
Now words began to form. Phrases. Random, questing, plaintive messages, some of which began to strike home amongst certain of the watching conscious throng.
A child searched for her mother. A wailing lost soul that had died of the fever. A woman called out in pain from the audience. It was her daughter. She named the wraith and there was an agonised
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