I had left on the music-stand a rough score of my arrangement of that remarkable composition, then newly published in Europe, the music and words of which Colonel Pestal wrote with a link of his fetters on his prison-wall the day before his execution. I had translated the original song, and written it on the same page with the music. What was my astonishment to hear the whole piece,—this new De Profundis, this mortal cry from the depths of a proud, indignant heart,—a cry condensed by music into tones the most apt and fervid,—now reproduced by Estelle with such passionate power, such reality of emotion, that I was struck at once with admiration and with horror.
They were not, then, for Pestal so much as for Estelle,—those utterances of holy wrath and angelic defiance! The words by themselves are simple,—commonplace, if you will.[[18]] But, conveyed to the ear through Pestal’s music and Estelle’s voice, they seemed vivid with the very lightning of the soul. As she sang, the victim towered above the oppressor like an archangel above a fiend. The prison-walls fell outward, and the welcoming heavens opened to the triumphant captive.
I entered the room. She turned suddenly. Her face had not yet recovered from the expression of those emotions which the song had called up. She rose with the air of an avenging goddess. Then, seeing me, she drew up her clasped hands to her bosom with a gesture full of grace and eloquent with deprecation, and said, “Forgive me if I have disturbed your papers.”
“Estelle!” I began. Then, seeing her look of surprise, I said, “Excuse me if the address is too familiar; but I know you by no other name.”
“Estelle is all sufficient,” she replied.
“Well, then, Estelle, you have moved me by your singing as I was never moved before,—so terribly in earnest did you seem! What does it mean?”
“It means,” she replied, “that you have adapted the music to a faithful translation of the words.”
“I have heard you play,” said I, “but why have you kept me in ignorance of your powers as a singer?”
“My powers, such as they are,” she said, “have been rarely used since I left the convent. I can give little time now to music. Indeed, the hour I have given to it this morning was stolen, and I must make up for it. So good by.”
“Stay, Estelle,” said I, seizing her hand. “There is a mystery which hangs over you like a cloud. Tell me what it is. Your eyes look as if a storm of unshed tears were brooding behind them. Your expression is always sad. Can I in any way help you? Can I render a true brother’s service?”