But Franz played on mechanically, with the pang of despair at his heart. Suddenly, half-way in a bar, in the very midst of a single note almost, a sensation of fear came upon him—an overwhelming awe that seemed to lock his muscles and turn his hands into stone. The organ ceased abruptly; he sat motionless as a statue; and a death-like silence reigned throughout the church. Had the same unaccountable awe fallen upon the congregation, too? The whole universe waited.
Out of the profound silence a sound was born, a sound more beautiful than the music of a dream. Soft as a whisper, clear and distinct, it grew, wave upon wave, into a grand volume of harmony, that was not loud, though it seemed as if it reached beyond the church-walls and floated on through endless space. Was it, then, music from that land where the crystal air breathes a perpetual melody? The people by one impulse sprang to their feet, and turned with awe-stricken faces toward the gallery. Grander, more majestic, it swelled into a glad chorus, whose gloria, inspired with praise, rose up into heaven. It was an adoration of sublime joy that seemed too intense to be ascribed to mortal spirit; and the people fell upon their knees while they listened. Over plains, over hills, in the sky, it seemed to reverberate and answer back, sweeter than the sound of silver, vaster than the roll of ocean—the hallelujah of myriad voices, the song as of an innumerable multitude,—
“Glory be to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men—”
Again and again the refrain gathered into a measure more triumphant than the strains of a victorious army. Then, ascending higher and higher, it fainted through infinite distance, and was gone as if it had passed beyond the very portals of eternity.
The spellbound audience hardly moved for a moment, even after the music had died; but when the first stir broke the silence they collected about the organist with eager questions. Franz, still sitting at his instrument, had never turned. Anxious to testify their wild admiration, they were ready almost to bow down before him; but they were obliged to speak several times before he gave the slightest heed. Then he looked up abruptly and said with a strange impatience,—
“Did not you see?”
There was a confused expression in his eyes, as if they might have been blinded by a great light, and their vision not yet wholly recovered. The people looked at him, then at each other in bewilderment, but, as if he had suddenly comprehended their meaning, he went on quickly,—
“It was not I. I did not play a note. It was the music of another world, the music of the first Christmas. Did not you see the host of angels in the sky, and the shepherds that watched their flocks by night upon the plains of Judea? It was the gloria sung at the nativity of Christ by the angels centuries ago, beside the village of Bethlehem!”
Then the people, regarding him with doubtful faces, drew back, and he said, with fierce excitement,—
“If you do not believe, ask the little Alice there. She will tell you.”