Fifty Years a Medium – Chapter 4, 6/12 by Estelle Roberts

“But how can you possibly know?” The women asked incredulously.
“I know because I was told by the voices of my spirit friends,” I replied. “How else could I know?”

They looked at me in wide-eyed wonder, apprehensive that they should be in the presence of all-seeing spirits whose voices I could hear but they could not.

Many and varied have been the personal possessions of deceased loved ones which their friends have brought to me in the hope that the vibrations of the objects would help me to contact the owners. I recall one old lady who was the unwitting cause of general alarm in the famous Queen’s Hall.

Just before the service a steward came and told me that he believed a member of the audience had come armed with a revolver. He had caught a brief glance of some dull metal gleaming inside a paper bag on the women’s lap. To be on the safe side he had planted a burly steward by her side with instructions to watch for the least suspicious movement.

His anxiety was not quite so alarmist as it might at first seem because there had been an unruly disturbance at a previous meeting when I was threatened from the body of the hall. A man – presumably a Spaniard – leaped to his feet and noisily voiced his displeasure of the “blasphemy” he had witnessed. “In Span”, he bellowed as attendants forcibly escorted him to the door, “we know how to deal with your sort.” Perhaps he had the inquisition in mind for me.

My friend the steward was probably justified in taking precautions. Anyway I went on to the platform shortly afterwards and the service was held without any untoward results. When it was over the steward came and said that the woman with the gun was asking for me. Did I think it wise to see her? I told him I was confident she meant me no harm and requested him to send her to me. It was a funny little woman who hurried in, clutching the brown paper bag.

“Mrs. Roberts,” she said sadly. “I was so hoping for a message from my husband tonight. You see, I thought it might help if I brought his braces.”
She produced the braces from the bag and as she did so the light glinted on the buckles. So that was my steward’s revolver!