"mystery fiction" may sometimes subset detective stories in which the emphasis is on the puzzle element and its logical solution (cf. whodunit), as a contrast to hardboiled detective. "mystery may in certain situations refer to a completely different genre, where the focus is on supernatural mystery (even if no crime is involved). This usage was common in the pulp magazines of the 1930s and 1940. I knew, as does every serious investigator of the psychic scene (and I have been one for more than eighteen years) that fraud existed. There was the expose
at Camp Chesterfield in 1960 when infrared film of a materialization seance showed that the “spirits” were staff mediums dressed up in chiffon ectoplasm. I had personally checked out Camp Silver Belle, a spiritualist establishment in Ephrata, Pennsylvania, and Camp Chesterfield, and found rampant fraud. And I had heard of other cases, other exposures.

But with all the whispers, rumors, and suspicions nobody really knew how widespread the fraud was, whether it was organized or haphazard, or whether spiritualist authorities actively connived in it or merely winked at it. What was needed to set us straight was the inside story from someone who knew. And who would know? Only one who had been part of the fraud.

Lamar Keene’s account is supported by a wealth of documentary evidence, which I have examined. I have met and talked with some of those he duped while he was a medium. I have checked out the church of which he formerly was minister-medium. His story is fact, not fiction....

I remember quite clearly saying, “I need to get strong. This is the summer for it.” And Ned agreed.

Then - I saw what I thought was a dog on the dirt road below us. It was a ways off, and there was something odd about it.

I said, “There’s somebody’s dog.”