I went back to the front steps, again sank down, put my arms on my
knees, and let my head fall upon my clasped hands. As I sat there alone,
with the dark house yawning behind me in its emptiness, someone sat down
beside me and laid a warm, strong hand on my interlaced and strained
fingers for just about half a second.
"Please forgive me about the apple dumplings and the hard sauce," a
merry, very lovely voice pleaded.
"I went out to Old Harpeth with you when you asked me; but I loathe
going to church--I haven't been in one since I was strong enough to
rebel--and I'm not going to yours," was the apology I graciously offered
in return for that about the apple dumplings. "But I'd pay fifty
dollars for a tenth row seat to hear you sing Tristan in the
Metropolitan any day if I had to go hungry for a week to pay for it," I
added, as I laughed as softly as he had pleaded. All the sorrow and
strain of the last hours had vanished at the touch of his hand, and I
felt like an impish, teasing child.
"I'll sing some of it for you now, if you'll give fifty cents to Mother
Spurlock for the Children's Day Picnic. And it'll be a bargain you are
getting," was the unexpected offer I encountered.
"And a freezer of vanilla ice cream to boot," I assented, generously.
And then something happened to me the like of which I know never
happened to anybody in all the world, and that could happen only the
once to me. Gregory Goodloe drew a little closer to me and bent his
great gold head until his face was just off my left shoulder, and in his
powerful, rich, fascinating voice, which he muted down in a way that
made it sound as if he were singing through a golden cloud, he sang
Tristan's immortal love agony in a way that shut out all the rest of the
universe and left me alone with him in a space swayed by his pleading
until my mortal body shook in actual pain.
"Don't! I can't stand it!" I gasped, as I seized his wrist in my strong
hands and wrung it. "Stop!"
The last tender note breathed itself into the air that seemed to hold it
in a long caress until it died away, and sobs shook me as I held on
desperately to his wrist. I felt that I must be comforted. And I was!
Again the gentle fingers were laid over mine for a still smaller
fraction of a second, and then again the beautiful, clear voice began to
sing to me, just to me, out of the whole world.
"'Abide with me, fast falls the even tide,'" he chanted, and then waited
while my sobs died away and I let go my drowning grasp on his wrist.