"Where is that little girl whom you remember?
What has become of her ?" "Why, I don't know," replied Ida.

"I suppose she is somewhere in me." "But you don't look like a little girl, or think or act or feel like one.
How can she be in you ?" "Where else could she be ?" replied Ida.
"Oh, there is no lack of room for her," said Paul; "the universe is big enough for all the souls that ever lived in it.

Suppose, now, you believed her to be still alive as a spirit, just as she was, still alive somewhere in the land of spirits, not transformed into the young lady that you are at all, you understand, for that would only be another way of saying that she was dead, but just as she was, a child, with a child's loves, a child's thoughts, a child's feelings, and a child's face--can you suppose such a thing, just as an effort of imagination ?" "Oh, yes!" said Ida; "I can suppose that." "Well, then," said Paul, "suppose also that you remembered this little girl very tenderly, and longed to look on her face again, although knowing that she was a spirit now.

Suppose that you went to a woman having a mysterious power to call up the spirits of the departed, and suppose that she called up the spirit of this child-self of yours, and that you recognized it, and suppose that just at that moment the woman died, and her earthly life was transferred to the spirit of the child, so that instead of being a spirit, she became again a living child, but unable to recognize you who loved her so well, because when she lived on earth, you, of course, had not yet come into existence.

Suppose you brought this child home with you----" "What do you mean ?" interrupted Ida, with dilating eyes.