’The sorcerer turned to me and asked who it was that I wished the boy should see.

’"I desire to see the widow Jeanne-Marie Porhoet.”

’The magician put the second and third of the small strips of paper into the chafing-dish, and fresh frankincense was added.  The fumes were painful to my eyes.  The boy began to speak.

’"I see an old woman lying on a bed.  She has a black dress, and on her head is a little white cap.  She has a wrinkled face and her eyes are closed.  There is a band tied round her chin.  The bed is in a sort of hole, in the wall, and there are shutters to it.”

The boy was describing a Breton bed, and the white cap was the coiffe that my mother wore.  And if she lay there in her black dress, with a band about her chin, I knew that it could mean but one thing.

’"What else does he see?” I asked the sorcerer.

’He repeated my question, and presently the boy spoke again.

’"I see four men come in with a long box.  And there are women crying.  They all wear little white caps and black dresses.  And I see a man in a white surplice, with a large cross in his hands, and a little boy in a long red gown.  And the men take off their hats.  And now everyone is kneeling down.”

’"I will hear no more,” I said.  “It is enough.”

’I knew that my mother was dead.

’In a little while, I received a letter from the priest of the village in which she lived.  They had buried her on the very day upon which the boy had seen this sight in the mirror of ink.’

Dr Porhoet passed his hand across his eyes, and for a little while there was silence.

‘What have you to say to that?’ asked Oliver Haddo, at last.

‘Nothing,’ answered Arthur.

Haddo looked at him for a minute with those queer eyes of his which seemed to stare at the wall behind.

‘Have you ever heard of Eliphas Levi?’ he inquired.  ’He is the most celebrated occultist of recent years.  He is thought to have known more of the mysteries than any adept since the divine Paracelsus.’

‘I met him once,’ interrupted Dr Porhoet.  ’You never saw a man who looked less like a magician.  His face beamed with good-nature, and he wore a long grey beard, which covered nearly the whole of his breast.  He was of a short and very corpulent figure.’

‘The practice of black arts evidently disposes to obesity,’ said Arthur, icily.

Susie noticed that this time Oliver Haddo made no sign that the taunt moved him.  His unwinking, straight eyes remained upon Arthur without expression.

’Levi’s real name was Alphonse-Louis Constant, but he adopted that under which he is generally known for reasons that are plain to the romantic mind.  His father was a bootmaker.  He was destined for the priesthood, but fell in love with a damsel fair and married her.  The union was unhappy.  A fate befell him which has been the lot of greater men than he, and his wife presently abandoned the marital roof with her lover.  To console himself he began to make serious researches in the occult, and in due course published a vast number of mystical works dealing with magic in all its branches.’