Fifty Years a Medium – Chapter 6, 14/14 by Estelle Roberts

“Would you like to tell us what it is all about?” I asked. Again he shrugged his shoulders, as though it did not matter whether he told us or not.

“It’s the usual story,” he said, at last. “Out of work, down and out, broke! It wasn’t too bad while the wife was alive; when there’s two of you, you seem to make out better. But she died a couple of months ago, and somehow it took all the heart out of me. I’ve been trying for the last couple of weeks to pluck up courage to do myself in.

But it isn’t so easy when you come down to it. I thought at first I’d use my old razor. Then one day I spotted this bottle of poison, all nice and handy, so I slipped it in my pocket. It seemed cleaner than a razor, somehow.” He paused, reflecting on the rival merits of acid and steel. The he went on:

“Well, this afternoon while I was on a bench in the park, I decided to use the poison. I was sitting there, thinking out when and where to do it when a newspaper blew across the grass and wrapped itself around my legs. And there across the top of the page were the words, ‘You Can Talk With Your Dead.’”
“It was by Mrs. Shaw Desmond,” I told him.

“Maybe, I don’t know who wrote it, but it said to come here. There wasn’t any charge to come in, it said, so I thought I’d come. I’d nothing to lose, and it’d be warmer inside than sitting around in the park till it got dark enough to drink the poison without some busybody spotting what I was up to.

I reckoned, too, that if I could talk to my wife I could find out if she’s better off up there than I am down here. So there you are. That’s why I am here, and what I’ve told you is God’s truth.”

Neither of us who listened to this sad little story had the least doubt of its truth. Swaffer picked up a hat and began a collection on the spot. Later he took the man under his wing and, with characteristic kindness, continued to help him until he was finally established in a job and firmly on his feet again.

Many times I reflected what forces combined to lead that man to the Queen’s Hall that eventful evening. Perhaps it was simply his wife, watching over him faithfully, as she had always done in the past.