Joan Smith Read Online Free

man, I thought. Definitely as a man. Too many feminine qualities irked me; being coy and dainty, being backward in speaking to strangers, especially male strangers, having to wear skirts and ride sidesaddle. Yes, I would like to be a man, but with my present size and strength. When I tuned back into the conversation of the oldsters, the subject had changed.
    “We shall have a session tomorrow night,” Aunt Loo was saying. “Will you speak to the Franconis for me, Walter, or shall I write them a note?”
    “I am going to the village. I’ll arrange it. What hour would you like to have the sitting?”
    “After dinner, ninish would suit me. If Pierre and Mr. Sinclair are back, they will join us. Pierre is not very good at it, but Mr. Sinclair shows a surprising flair. I am sure Valerie would like to try it as well.”
    A “sitting” conveyed to me having one’s portrait taken, but this was obviously not the sort of sitting being spoken of here. I put the question to Dr. Hill. “A séance , ” he confessed, not without a trace of shame. “Your aunt has taken up an interest in spiritualism. There are a pair in the village who seem to have a knack for it. Franconi is their name—a man and his wife. She is the medium.”
    “Medium what?” I asked, my confusion becoming deeper. Auntie had mentioned spiritualism at home, to explain her funny gowns, but had not expanded on it when she encountered Papa’s scowl and Mama’s dumfounded frown. I thought she had her fortune read from time to time—something of the sort.
    “Medium for contacting Edward,” she told me. “Madam Franconi is trying to get in touch with Edward for me, my late husband, you remember, dear. Such a relief to know I can still talk to him. It is a wonderful thing. Do not judge it out of hand. Just think, if you could talk to your grandmother, or some dear departed one.”
    “I don’t remember Grandma Ford. I don’t have any dear departed ones yet.”
    “How very uninteresting the young are after all,” she said sadly to Walter.
    “But I would like to be reincarnated,” I added, to placate her.
    “Yes, that is an interesting alternative, but there is no saying you would come back as a human being, Valerie. You might very well come back as a mouse or a bird or anything. I wonder if Valerie was not a lion or tiger in her last incarnation, Walter! Doesn’t she have the traces of it still? And Madame was saying just before I left that there will sometimes be a carry-over. She is quite sure Lady Morgan used to be a mouse, for besides looking quite like one, she is petrified of cats. Imagine!”
    Walter smiled sheepishly, for a medical man to be countenancing such unscientific stuff. “There is no harm in it,” he told me. “It amuses us oldsters, who have little enough to keep us occupied.”
    “Never apologize for your beliefs, Walter,” Loo commanded, her brindled head sitting back at a haughty angle, while her blue eyes snapped. “Valerie is a child. We are older, and wiser. She is not required to believe, neither are we required to apologize for believing. Let her try a sitting. If nothing comes of it, she need not try again.”
    “You need not try at all, if it does not interest you,” he told me.
    “I’ll try it. I’ll try anything once,” I answered without hesitation. It was a custom I followed in my life to accept all new experiences that were offered. Whoever would have thought snails or oysters would taste so delicious, for instance, to look at them? Till I jumped into the lake, I never thought I would like swimming either, but I adore it. One would not have believed kissing Arthur Crombie would be at all satisfactory with that moustache, but it was very nice. I am all for trying new things. Except perhaps jumping over the toll-booth. I have still some reservations on that point.
    Dr. Hill prescribed a glass of wine and an early retirement for us after the exhaustion of our travels, then left to allow us to fill the