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B J Laubscher – Where Mystery dwells

Miss Lily Thomas entered the room while I was sitting in a deep armchair. She had a most pleasant and charming personality with that fresh complexion of the English country dweller. Her kindly eyes and pleasing smile created a sort of sparkling mental atmosphere. There was indeed something psychically immaculate and really trustworthy about her. She was not the sort of person who could be suspected of being artful because there was such a simplicity of innocence in the impression which she unconsciously made on me.

She informed me that it was her custom to say a little prayer before her sittings. I raised no objection and merely nodded. She bowed her head and her lips moved slightly. I heard no words.

When she raised her eyes they were focussed almost beyond me.

They seemed to stand still, caught up in some suspended distant gaze in the midst of nearness. She began speaking in a pleasant voice about a message from a deceased brother of mine.

At this a feeling of annoyance crossed my mind. I thought that she was deceiving me and was guessing and fabricating because I had no knowledge of a deceased brother, and in a family such as mine was it would have been quite impossible for me not to have known about such an event. I thought well I had met with fraud, as I was convinced that no member of my family had died at that time. Whether Miss Thomas sensed my feelings of antipathy I did not know but almost immediately she said that this deceased brother was fully aware that I did not know about his death.

He went on to say that he had been stillborn two years before my birth. He attributed his death to strangulation by means of the umbilical cord, as the doctor only arrived on the scene hours after the delivery had been attended to by a midwife. He reminded me that in those days the doctor had to travel sandy roads by means of a Cape cart drawn by six horses.

The latter was not news to me although they were impressive coming from the lips of Miss Lily Thomas. Nevertheless I could not accept the information that my mother had had a stillborn son before me. I had never heard a word about it and I felt sure that my mother would have told me about such an event. I was always under the impression that we were three sisters and three brothers. I decided however to deny nothing and to wait and see what else my supposed stillborn brother had to say. I did not believe the story.

But again, as if he or Miss Thomas were aware of my inner thoughts he said that I must enquire of my mother upon my return to South Africa and she will corroborate his birth and manner of death. I agreed more to encourage him than in faith in the possible truth. It seemed to me quite impossible that no one in our family had ever mentioned such an event.

He went on to describe how he and I were not only physical but also spiritual brothers.

In fact we were so alike that if he had lived we would have appeared as identical twins. He shared my abstract and philosophical interests, and was often a source of my inspirations and intuitive conceptions. His development on the other side was primarily one of consciousness. Then towards the end of his communication he said : "Don't forget to ask your mother what she prayed for after my birth," and with that the sitting came to an end. I left and have never set eyes on Miss Lily Thomas again.

..... Then came an evening in 1943.I was writing to my mother and as she had not been well, I wrote her a long chatty letter about my children and their doings.

While thus occupied I suddenly felt intruding on my mind a picture of the room in which I had had a sitting with Miss Thomas- I could recall all the details, even the appearance of Miss Thomas and then the communication of the supposed stillborn brother. I experienced a strong urge to write and tell my mother all about it, and to ask her if the story were true, and what she had prayed for after his death. Well what was my surprise when a week later I received a letter from her corroborating in every detail the manner of his death. Mother thought I knew about it, but she could not remember ever having told me. With regard to the question about her prayer, she remembered being somewhat depressed after she lost this child, and that she prayed that she, might have another son who could fulfil in this life what the stillborn one would have done if he had lived.

Two years later I was born. She added that although she did not overtly express a belief in such communications as I had received from Miss Thomas, she felt that what Miss Thomas had told me could not be anything but the truth.