第16章

THE VEIL IS LIFTED

"MISS CHAMPION! Oh, here you are! Your turn next, please.The last item of the local programme is in course of performance, after which the duchess explains Velma's laryngitis--let us hope she will not call it 'appendicitis'--and then I usher you up.Are you ready?"Garth Dalmain, as master of ceremonies, had sought Jane Champion on the terrace, and stood before her in the soft light of the hanging Chinese lanterns.The crimson rambler in his button-hole, and his red silk socks, which matched it, lent an artistic touch of colour to the conventional black and white of his evening clothes.

Jane looked up from the comfortable depths of her wicker chair; then smiled at his anxious face.

"I am ready," she said, and rising, walked beside him."Has it gone well?" she asked."Is it a good audience?""Packed," replied Garth, "and the duchess has enjoyed herself.It has been funnier than usual.But now comes the event of the evening.

I say, where is your score?"

"Thanks," said Jane."I shall play it from memory.It obviates the bother of turning over."They passed into the concert-room and stood behind screens and a curtain, close to the half-dozen steps leading, from the side, up on to the platform.

"Oh, hark to the duchess!" whispered Garth."My NIECE, JANECHAMPION, HAS KINDLY CONSENTED TO STEP INTO THE BREACH--' Which means that you will have to step up on to that platform in another half-minute.Really it would be kinder to you if she said less about Velma.But never mind; they are prepared to like anything.There!

APPENDICITIS! I told you so.Poor Madame Velma! Let us hope it won't get into the local papers.Oh, goodness! She is going to enlarge on new-fangled diseases.Well, it gives us a moment's breathing space.

...I say, Miss Champion, I was chaffing this afternoon about sharps and flats.I can play that accompaniment for you if you like.

No? Well, just as you think best.But remember, it takes a lot of voice to make much effect in this concert-room, and the place is crowded.Now--the duchess has done.Come on.Mind the bottom step.

Hang it all! How dark it is behind this curtain!"Garth gave her his hand, and Jane mounted the steps and passed into view of the large audience assembled in the Overdene concert-room.

Her tall figure seemed taller than usual as she walked alone across the rather high platform.She wore a black evening gown of soft material, with old lace at her bosom and one string of pearls round her neck.When she appeared, the audience gazed at her and applauded doubtfully.Velma's name on the programme had raised great expectations; and here was Miss Champion, who certainly played very nicely, but was not supposed to be able to sing, volunteering to sing Velma's song.A more kindly audience would have cheered her to the echo, voicing its generous appreciation of her effort, and sanguine expectation of her success.This audience expressed its astonishment, in the dubiousness of its faint applause.

Jane smiled at them good-naturedly; sat down at the piano, a Bechstein grand; glanced at the festoons of white roses and the cross of crimson ramblers; then, without further preliminaries, struck the opening chord and commenced to sing.

The deep, perfect voice thrilled through the room.

A sudden breathless hush fell upon the audience.

Each syllable penetrated the silence, borne on a tone so tender and so amazingly sweet, that casual hearts stood still and marvelled at their own emotion; and those who felt deeply already, responded with a yet deeper thrill to the magic of that music.

"The hours I spent with thee, dear heart, Are as a string of pearls to me;I count them over, ev'ry one apart, My rosary,--my rosary."Softly, thoughtfully, tenderly, the last two words were breathed into the silence, holding a world of reminiscence--a large-hearted woman's faithful remembrance of tender moments in the past.

The listening crowd held its breath.This was not a song.This was the throbbing of a heart; and it throbbed in tones of such sweetness, that tears started unbidden.

Then the voice, which had rendered the opening lines so quietly, rose in a rapid crescendo of quivering pain.

"Each hour a pearl, each pearl a prayer, To still a heart in absence wrung;I tell each bead unto the end, and there--A cross is hung!"

The last four words were given with a sudden power and passion which electrified the assembly.In the pause which followed, could be heard the tension of feeling produced.But in another moment the quiet voice fell soothingly, expressing a strength of endurance which would fail in no crisis, nor fear to face any depths of pain;yet gathering to itself a poignancy of sweetness, rendered richer by the discipline of suffering.

"O memories that bless and burn!

O barren gain and bitter loss!

I kiss each bead, and strive at last to learn To kiss the cross...to kiss the cross."Only those who have heard Jane sing THE ROSARY can possibly realise how she sang "I KISS EACH BEAD." The lingering retrospection in each word; breathed out a love so womanly, so beautiful, so tender, that her identity was forgotten--even by those in the audience who knew her best--in the magic of her rendering of the song.

The accompaniment, which opens with a single chord, closes with a single note.