Arthur & George

that I first saw him clearly and distinctly.’
    ‘He came and stood behind me and encouraged me while I was doing my work.’
    ‘I recognized once more that fine, clear voice of his, which could not be mistaken. He bore himself as a gentleman, as he always did.’
    ‘He is with us all the time, and the barrier between the two worlds is but a temporary one.’
    ‘There is nothing to fear in passing over, and our great champion has proved it by appearing here amongst us tonight.’
    The woman on George’s left leans across the velvet armrest and whispers, ‘He is here.’
    Several people are now on their feet, as if to get a better view of the stage. All are staring fixedly at the empty chair, at Mrs Roberts, at the Doyle family. George feels himself being caught up again in some mass feeling that transcends, that overwhelms the silence. He is no longer seized by the fear he had when he thought his father was coming for him, nor the scepticism when Emily Davison was putting in her appearance. He feels, despite himself, a kind of cautious awe. This is, after all, Sir Arthur they are speaking of, the man who willingly used his detective abilities on George’s behalf, who risked his own reputation to rescue George’s, who helped give him back the life that had been taken from him. Sir Arthur, a man of the highest integrity and intelligence, believed in events of the kind George has just been witnessing; it would be impertinent for George in this moment to deny his saviour.
    George does not think he is losing either his mind, or his common sense. He asks himself: what if there was in the proceedings that mixture of truth and lies he earlier identified? What if some parts of what has happened are charlatanry, but others genuine? What if the theatrical Mrs Roberts, despite herself, was truly bringing news from distant lands? What if Sir Arthur, in whatever form or place he now might be, is obliged, in order to make contact with the material world, to use as a conduit those who also deal in fraud some of the time? Would that not be an explanation?
    ‘He is here,’ the woman on his left repeats, in a normal, conversational voice.
    Then the words are taken up by a man a dozen seats away. ‘He is here.’ Three words spoken in an everyday tone, intended to carry a mere few feet. But such is the charged air in the hall that they seem magically amplified.
    ‘He is here,’ someone up in the gallery repeats.
    ‘He is here,’ responds a woman down in the arena.
    Then a man at the back of the stalls suddenly bellows, in the tone of a revivalist preacher, ‘HE IS HERE!’
    Instinctively, George reaches down at his feet and pulls his binoculars from their case. He crams them to his spectacles and tries to focus on the platform. His finger and thumb nervously twirl past the proper focus in each direction, then finally land on the mid-point. He examines the ecstatic medium, the empty chair, and the Doyle family. Lady Conan Doyle has remained, since the first announcement of Sir Arthur’s presence, fixed in the same attitude: straight-backed, square-shouldered, head up, gazing out with – as George can now see – something resembling a smile on her face. The golden-haired , flirtatious young woman he had briefly met has grown darker-haired and matronly; he has only ever seen her at Sir Arthur’s side, which is where she still claims to be. He moves the glasses back and forth, to the chair, the medium, the widow. He finds his breath coming quickly and harshly.
    There is a touch on his right shoulder. He drops the binoculars. The woman shakes her head and says gently, ‘You cannot see him that way.’
    She is not rebuking him, merely explaining how things are.
    ‘You will only see him with the eyes of faith.’
    The eyes of faith. The eyes Sir Arthur brought with him when they met at the Grand Hotel, Charing Cross. He had believed in George; should George now believe in Sir Arthur? His champion’s words: I do not think, I do not believe, I
know
. Sir Arthur carried with him an enviable, comforting sense of certainty. He knew things. What does he, George, know? Does he finally know anything? What is the sum of knowledge he has acquired in his fifty-four years? Mostly, he has gone through his life learning and waiting to be told. The authority of others has always been important to him; does he have any authority of his own? At fifty-four, he thinks a lot of things, he believes a few, but what can he really claim to