from land in a strong ebb tide, and my body, being carried out to sea,
was never recovered. Being thus put to their wit's end, they determined
to keep the matter privy, and to make the best of it, and the first
necessity was to provide me with clothing, for on my second entrance
into this world I was as totally without apparel as when I first came
into it. They gave me these garments of the ordinary fashion of the day,
but to which I find myself much unaccustomed, and enjoined upon me to
keep silent in regard to what had happened; fearing, as I was made aware
by some unguarded words, that their efforts to dematerialize me might
bring them into trouble."

My professional instincts now came to the front. "That would be murder,"
I said, "and nothing less."

"So I myself told them," he continued, "for I had come to the
determination that I would choose to finish out the life I had broken
off so suddenly. But they paid little heed to my words and continued
their experiments. But, as I have told you, their efforts were without
avail, and they have ceased to make further trial of dematerialization.
As, of course, it would be impossible to keep a full-grown man for any
considerable length of time secluded and unseen, they judged it wise to
permit me to appear as an ordinary human being; and having no other use
to which they could put me, they set me to selling tickets for them, and
in this business I have fared so badly that I shall restore to them
these that are left, and counsel them to seek another agent, I being of
detriment to them rather than profit. What may then happen I do not
know, for, as I told you, I am not my own master."

"I do not understand you," I said. "If you have been, in this
unparalleled manner, restored to your physical existence, surely you are