at spirit you
shall see. Look, I lay this beautiful rose upon this metal plate and
cover it that the heat may be more intense. I consume it with the flame
until the fire devours its shape and leaves only its ashes."

A tense silence fell upon the waiting room, as Ram Juna thrust the
covered rose into the brazier. At last he lifted the cover and displayed
a little gray shapeless heap.

"The rose is dead," he observed quietly. He turned now toward the glass
phial, in the bottom of which lay a few grains of pinkish dust. Into
this he poured the ashes of the burned flower. He lifted it high in air
and surveyed it.

"The rose is dead," he repeated, "but under the right conditions you
shall see what we may call its ghost. See. A gentle warmth. I hold it
not too close to the devouring flame. A gentle warmth."

Those at the back of the room were rising now to peer over the hats of
the more fortunate in front, but the hush remained unbroken. The dark
eyes of the Hindu were bent on the glass before him, and a mystical
smile played about his mouth.

In the bottom of the retort, in the bluish heap, began a movement, as
though something alive were striving to free itself from bonds and rise.
It heaved and struggled in the dusty mass, grew stronger, and instead of
a shapeless writhing there came an upshooting pyramid, which gradually
took upon itself form. A ghostly apparition of stem, of leaves, of a
dusky red rose, grew more and more distinct until it glowed from its
prison of glass, and Ram Juna smiled.

"The rose is dead!" he said for the third time.

A gasp of appreciation and awe passed through the room. The Swami
turned to Dick Percival.

"That which I know, I speak," he said simply.

Then with a sudden abrupt movement he shook the phial away from the
warmth and held it up.

"Now only the poor body of ashes is within," he went on. "The spirit is
truly fled, until it shall find itself another incarnation, and we say
that the flower is for ever dead. What then is this death with which we
play and which plays with us? But I weary you with my too long
discourse. Give me your pardon. I shall no more."

There rose the sound of moving skirts and loosening tongues. The spell
of oriental mysticism was broken and this became but one of many
entertaining things to be chattered about in moods that varied from
credulity to amusement. The ordinary reception atmosphere took
possession, and the tinkle of animated feminine voices