is a man who speaks German. Does anyone know German?' Sir Basil said: 'I know a little,' and the
control said:
came out of the trance she was greatly depressed and could do no more that day. I didn't get
the idea for a while. Now I wonder, can there be anything the matter with
say nothing to anybody else until I hear from you."
So there it was again; one of those mysterious hints out of the subconscious world. The word
meant Freddi, and it was easy to imagine Tecumseh getting that out of her subconscious mind;
but Beauty had no reason to imagine that Freddi was in trouble. Was it to be supposed that
when Beauty sat in a "circle," her subconscious mind became merged with her son's, and his
worries passed over into hers? Or was it easier to believe that some Socialist had been kicked
or beaten or shot into the spirit world by the Nazis and was now trying to bring help to his
comrade?
Lanny sent a telegram to his mother: "Clarinet music interesting send more if possible." He
decided that here was a way he could pass some time while waiting upon the convenience of
Minister-Prasident Goring. Like Paris and London, Berlin was full of mediums and fortune
tellers of all varieties; it was reported that the Führer himself consulted an astrologer—oddly
enough, a Jew. Here was Lanny, obliged to sit around indefinitely, and with no heart for social
life, for music or books. Why not take a chance, and see if he could get any further hints from
that underworld which had surprised him so many times?
Irma was interested, and they agreed to go separately to different mediums, thus doubling
their chances. Maybe not all the spirits had been Nazified, and the young couple could get ahead
of Goring in that shadowy realm!
IX
So there was Lanny being ushered into the fashionable apartment of one of the most famous
of Berlin's clairvoyants, Madame Diseuse. (If she had been practicing in Paris she would have
been Frau Wahrsagerin.) You had to be introduced by a friend, and sittings were by
appointment, well in advance; but this was an emergency call, arranged by Frau Ritter von
Fiebewitz, and was to cost a hundred marks. No Arabian costumes, or zodiacal charts, or other
hocus-pocus, but a reception-room with the latest furniture of tubular light metal, and an
elegant French lady with white hair and a St. Germain accent. She sometimes produced physical
phenomena, and spoke with various voices in languages of which she claimed not to know a
word. The seance was held in a tiny interior room which became utterly dark when a soft
fluorescent light was turned off.
There Lanny sat in silence for perhaps twenty minutes, and had about concluded that his
hundred marks had been wasted, when he heard a sort of cooing voice, like a child's, saying in
English: "What is it that you want, sir?" He replied: "I want news about a young friend who
may or may not be in the spirit world." After another wait the voice said: "An old gentleman
comes. He says you do not want him."
Lanny had learned that you must always be polite to any spirit. He said: "I am always glad to
meet an old friend. Who is he?"
So came an experience which a young philosopher would retain as a subject of speculation
for the rest of his life. A deep masculine voice seemed to burst the tiny room, declaring: "Men
have forgotten the Word of God:" Lanny didn't have to ask: "Who are you?" for it was just as
if he were sitting in the study of a rather dreary New England mansion with hundred-year-old
furniture, listening to his Grandfather Samuel expounding Holy Writ. Not the feeble old man
with the quavering voice who had said that he would not be there when Lanny came again,
but the grim gunmaker of the World War days who had talked about sin, knowing that Lanny
was a child of sin—but all of us were that in the sight of the Lord God of Sabaoth.
"All the troubles in the world are caused by men ceasing to hear the Word of God,"
announced this surprising voice in the darkness. "They will continue to suffer until they hear
and obey. So is it, world without end, amen."
"Yes, Grandfather," said Lanny, just as he had said many times in the ancestral study.
Wishing to be especially polite, he asked: "Is this really you, Grandfather?"
"All flesh is grass, and my voice is vain, except that I speak the words which God has given to
men. I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his
seed begging bread."
Either that was the late president of Budd Gunmakers, or else a highly skilled actor! Lanny
waited a respectful time, and then inquired: "What is it you wish of me, Grandfather?"
"You have not heeded the Word!" exploded the voice.
Lanny could think of many Words to which this statement might apply; so he waited, and after
