Seated at breakfast, I discussed this letter with Heliobas and Zara, and decided that I would call at the Grand Hotel that morning.
"I wish you would come with me, Zara," I said wistfully.
To my surprise, she answered: "Certainly I will, if you like. But we will attend High Mass at Notre Dame first. There will be plenty of time for the call afterwards."
I gladly agreed to this, and Heliobas added with cheerful cordiality: "Why not ask your friends to dine here to-morrow? Zara's call will be a sufficient opening formality; and you yourself have been long enough with us now to know that any of your friends will be welcome here. We might have a pleasant little party, especially if you add Mr. and Mrs. Challoner and their daughters to the list. And I will ask Ivan."
I glanced at Zara when the Prince's name was uttered, but she made no sign of either offence or indifference.
"You are very hospitable," I said, addressing Heliobas; "but I really see no reason why you should throw open your doors to my friends, unless, indeed, you specially desire to please me."
"Why, of course I do!" he replied heartily; and Zara looked up and smiled.
"Then," I returned, "I will ask them to come. What am I to say about my recovery, which I know is little short of miraculous?"
"Say," replied Heliobas, "that you have been cured by electricity. There is nothing surprising in such a statement nowadays. But say nothing of the HUMAN electric force employed upon you--no one would believe you, and the effort to persuade unpersuadable people is always a waste of time."
An hour after this conversation Zara and I were in the cathedral of Notre Dame. I attended the service with very different feelings to those I had hitherto experienced during the same ceremony. Formerly my mind had been distracted by harassing doubts and perplexing contradictions; now everything had a meaning for me--high, and solemn, and sweet. As the incense rose, I thought of those rays of connecting light I had seen, on which prayers travel exactly as sound travels through the telephone. As the grand organ pealed sonorously through the fragrant air, I remembered the ever youthful and gracious Spirits of Music, one of whom, Aeon, had promised to be my friend. Just to try the strength of my own electric force, I whispered the name and looked up.
There, on a wide slanting ray of sunlight that fell directly across the altar was the angelic face I well remembered!--the delicate hands holding the semblance of a harp in air! It was but for an instant I saw it--one brief breathing- space in which its smile mingled with the sunbeams and then it vanished. But I knew I was not forgotten, and the deep satisfaction of my soul poured itself in unspoken praise on the flood of the "Sanctus! Sanctus!" that just then rolled triumphantly through the aisles of Notre Dame. Zara was absorbed in silent prayer throughout the Mass; but at its conclusion, when we came out of the cathedral, she was unusually gay and elate. She conversed vivaciously with me concerning the social merits and accomplishments of the people we were going to visit; while the brisk walk through the frosty air brightened her eyes and cheeks into warmer lustre, so that on our arrival at the Grand Hotel she looked to my fancy even lovelier than usual.