Je ne dois plus voir
Ce que j'aime—
Je ne veux plus souffrir le jour!'
She sang the old French melody out into the trees, and the great notes thrilled and echoed through the wood till it was as though they had become an integrant part of the forest. Her voice was truly a woman's voice in the ineffable tenderness and the grand passion of it, but there lay in its tones a depth of strong uncompromising nobility which lives in an organ's notes or in the rich low chords of a violoncello. Truly, as Monsieur Gabriel had said, her voice belonged by right to the shadowy cathedrals, for each note seemed a sacred thing, a homage to God, and itself deserving to be worshipped in reverent devotion. During the song Wilhelmine had not heard the sound of approaching footsteps, nor did she observe how a hand pushed aside some branches not far from where she sat, and a man's head and shoulders appeared. She leaned back on the moss for a moment's rest, and then springing up recommenced to sing. She stood very straight and tall, her hands locked together behind her, like a schoolgirl reciting a lesson; somehow this childlike attitude added by its simplicity to the woman's dignity. Her head was held a little back, chin tilted upwards, and the eyes looked far away as though they beheld a whole world of dreams and lovely melody beyond all save the singer's ken. As she sang the colour mounted slowly to her cheeks, flooding her face with a divine flush; perhaps her very heart's blood rushed to adore the tones which fell from her lips. The man watching held his breath. She finished her song on a clear high note, and as she gave it forth, she flung back her head in an impulsive gesture, glorying in an ecstasy of sound, a magnificence of accomplishment.
When the echo of the last ringing note faded, the man sprang forward, and, throwing himself impetuously on his knees before Wilhelmine, he raised the hem of her gown to his lips in a passionate gesture, though with the adoring reverence that all poets give to great singers.
'Philomèle!' he murmured. 'Ah! Philomèle! Beloved!'
She looked down at him. How strangely natural, necessary, unsurprising it seemed to her that he should be kneeling there, and yet she thought herself in some oft-remembered dream.
'Gentil poète,' she whispered back, and her hand fell on his shoulder. His hand sought hers, he caught it and kissed it with a sort of piety.
'I love you.' He spoke the words like a prayer. She drew away from him.
'Monseigneur,' she said, 'I thought you had forgotten me!' He started at her gesture of repulsion and at the formal word.