going to finish your lecture and not appear till dinner."
"I was, but I think I'll finish it up to-morrow."
"Bring it down and read us as far as you've got," said Archie. "Jessie won't mind."
"All right. It got a little purplish at the end, and that's why I stopped. I hate purples."
He moved away from the window, and Archie spoke to Jessie.
"Did I say anything?" he asked.
"Yes; I've got it all down."
Archie jumped up.
"Now you'll see," he said. "You won't sauce me again in—in the wicious pride of your youth, as Mr. Venus remarked. I'm sure I got through that time."
It was the knowledge that he had indeed "got through" that Jessie took up to bed with her that night. Word for word Harry had read out at the end of his lecture precisely the sentences that Archie, in that queer dreamy state, had dictated to her, just before Harry had looked out of the window and asked if there was any tea left. There was no room for doubt: even as Archie had said, some piece of his mind had been able to divine exactly what Harry was writing at that moment. In his conscious state he could not know what that was, but according to his own account certain people, of whom he was one, were able to direct not only their conscious selves but also the subconscious self that lay below. It, so he asserted, was practically unfettered by material laws: it could perceive what was happening at a distance, at a spot invisible to it, and it could penetrate as by some X-ray process into other minds. For its free action (in his case at any rate) the conscious self had to be obliterated; by looking at that bright spot on the table-cloth he had been able to put it to sleep, to hypnotize it, thus
