Well, after that, the once-disinterested crowd was interested again. You can believe that!

Jolted out of a stupefied state by the sound of her sister Shirley’s banana bustle knocking off one of the few remaining shards of glass in the now-less-than-elaborately festooned window of the improbably placed 12th-story ballroom, Joyce suddenly remembered, “Hey wait—I’m still here!”

Mr. Carp heard her thought via his telepathic capacity and said “So am I,” aloud.

Joyce, no believer in the paranormal, reacted with a facial expression verging on the comical. “Did this really occur?” she expressed.