George Allan England

“ Spinsters, widows, sad and disappointed women, for the most part elderly, unlovely, and frumpily dressed; women who, bereft of much or all in this sorry world, seek contacts with another, where their chances may be better.
Not even the few vague men scattered among the present audience, on the hard, shiny folding chairs, could at all balance that mass of life-worn and sidetracked women. Fear, hope, and disappointment, which sum up all of life, stood written in their faces.
Rodman Wyatt, privily taking notes for an article on “Fakes and Fakers,” surveyed the place with disesteem. ”

“ I SOMETHING of the Boston fog, that S February evening, seemed to have penetrated the blue-painted hall with the cracked ceiling, on Washington Street, where Professor Maximilian Veazie was giving messages from the Great Beyond. The audience—mostly women, as usual—remained foggily unresponsive. ”

“ The spirit of returnity keeps our dear ones ever present!”
“Moratic” and “returnity” you will not find in any dictionary; but Veazie, having coined the words, loved them.
“More bunk!” smiled Wyatt, making record of them. His eyes noted the American flag draped over the platform, the lodge room charters, the fire escape sign. “This is certainly one grand place for spirits to come back to!” he thought.
“A few songs,” directed the professor, “to get harmony for this meeting!” ”