Fifty Years a Medium – Chapter 8, 1/10 by Estelle Roberts

CHAPTER EIGHT,
MATERIALIZATION AND APPORTS

While I was living at Teddington we arranged a special direct-voice sitting in appreciation of the long service given to the circle by one of our members. It was an important occasion to each one of us as the sitting had been organized in collaboration with Red Cloud and we had reason to believe he might show himself.

Our circle comprised nine people, all of considerable psychic experience. The proceedings began with the trumpet becoming most lively, circling the sitters and touching first one and then another. This was followed by an animated conversation lasting some minutes between one of our members and the spirit voice of her father.

Then the trumpet returned to the center of the circle where it remained still, its spots of luminous paint glowing in the darkness. Silence followed, a heavy expectant silence as if everyone knew that what had just passed had been no more than the prelude to the more serious business of the evening.

“Ectoplasm, look at it!” somebody exclaimed, and all eyes turned to a billowing cloud that was becoming slowly more visible as it grew in volume. All watched as the ectoplasm writhed in the still air and slowly brightened.

“There’s a face in it,” one of the sitters said quietly. “Does anyone recognize the face?”
“It’s Donald,” said his mother. “He was a doctor once before, he heals with Red Cloud now.”
As mysteriously as it had come the face faded and was seen no more.

The trumpet came suddenly to life again. It darted swiftly about the room, accompanied by two luminous plaques, and for the first time that evening we heard Red Cloud speak.
“Give me the torch,” he said. “Hold it out that I may take it from you.”

The torch he referred to was an ordinary pocket flashlight, its glass shielded by red cotton material, which I sometimes used in the course of a séance. Iris reached across to pick it up, and held it out at arm’s length. The next instant it was high over the heads of the circle, flashing on and off as though being tested.

Then it switched on, and stayed on. Slowly it moved across the room to where ectoplasm hovered in mid-air and shone its little red light where the cloud was thickest. Again a face appeared, but not the same face. This time it was the strong, cleanly-etched features of Red Cloud. The materialization remained there clearly visible to all for about fifteen seconds.

Then, as the first face had done, it faded. The red flashlight snapped off and the room was again in complete darkness except for the glow from the trumpet and plaques as they followed their apparently aimless courses between floor and ceiling.