"I have been
ordered not to tell it, but I have resolved that when I should meet a
man to whom I should be moved to speak I would speak."
Now, I felt a very natural emotion of pride. My perception of objects
of interest was a quick and a correct one. "Speak on," I said, "I shall
be very glad to hear what you have to say."
He looked toward the open door. I arose and closed it. When I had
resumed my seat he drew his chair closer to me, leaned toward me, and
said:
"In the first place you should know that I am a materialized spirit."
I sat up, hard pressed against the back of my chair.
"Nay, start not," he said, "I am now as truly flesh and blood as you
are; but a short three weeks ago I was a spirit in the realms of endless
space. I know," he continued, "that my history is a sore thing to
inflict upon any man, and there are few to whom I would have broached
it, but I will make it brief. Three weeks ago these spiritualists held
privately in this town what they call a seance, and at that time I was
impelled, by a power I understood not, to appear among them. After I had
come it was supposed that a mistake had been made, and that I was not
the spirit wanted. In the temporary confusion occasioned by this
supposition, and while the attention of the exhibitors was otherwise
occupied, I was left exposed to the influence of the materializing
agencies for a much longer time than had been intended; so long,
indeed, that instead of remaining in the misty, indistinct form in which
spirits are presented by these men to their patrons, I became as
thoroughly embodied, as full of physical life and energy, and as
complete a mortal man as I was when I disappeared from this earth, one
hundred and two years ago.
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