Chapter 19

LEWISHAM'S SOLUTION.

The next morning Lewisham learnt from Lagune that his intuition was
correct, that Ethel had at last succumbed to pressure and consented to
attempt thought-reading. "We made a good beginning," said Lagune,
rubbing his hands. "I am sure we shall do well with her. Certainly she
has powers. I have always felt it in her face. She has powers."

"Was much ... pressure necessary?" asked Lewisham by an effort.

"We had--considerable difficulty. Considerable. But of course--as I
pointed out to her--it was scarcely possible for her to continue as my
typewriter unless she was disposed to take an interest in my
investigations--"

"You did that?"

"Had to. Fortunately Chaffery--it was his idea. I must admit--"

Lagune stopped astonished. Lewisham, after making an odd sort of
movement with his hands, had turned round and was walking away down
the laboratory. Lagune stared; confronted by a psychic phenomenon
beyond his circle of ideas. "Odd!" he said at last, and began to
unpack his bag. Ever and again he stopped and stared at Lewisham, who
was now sitting in his own place and drumming on the table with both
hands.

Presently Miss Heydinger came out of the specimen room and addressed a
remark to the young man. He appeared to answer with considerable
brevity. He then stood up, hesitated for a moment between the three
doors of the laboratory and walked out by that opening on the back
staircase. Lagune did not see him again until the afternoon.

That night Ethel had Lewisham's company again on her way home, and
their voices were earnest. She did not go straight home, but instead
they went up under the gas lamps to the vague spaces of Clapham Common
to talk there at length. And the talk that night was a momentous
one. "Why have you broken your promise?" he said.

Her excuses were vague and weak. "I thought you did not care so much
as you did," she said. "And when you stopped these walks--nothing
seemed to matter. Besides--it is not like _séances_ with spirits ..."

At first Lewisham was passionate and forcible. His anger at Lagune and
Chaffery blinded him to her turpitude. He talked her defences
down. "It is cheating," he said. "Well--even if what _you_ do is not
cheating, it is delusion--unconscious cheating. Even if there is
something in it, it is wrong. True or not, it is wrong. Why don't
they thought-read each other? Why should they want you? Your mind is
your own. It is sacred. To probe it!--I won't have it! I won't have
it! At least you are mine to that extent. I can't think of you like
that--bandaged. And that little fool pressing his