The rapture ended suddenly on a note of triumph, and Diana, leaning to me, was looking at me through glistening tears, our hands met and clung and never a word between us; then we glanced up to meet the Ancient Person's keen, smiling glance and his voice was gentle when he spoke.
"God bless you, children! Then hearing, you saw and understood? No true love can be that knows nothing of pain, for pain ennobles love and teaches self-sacrifice and this surely is the noblest good of all. And now, friend Jarvis, I will endeavour to show you something of the soul's upward pilgrimage, the working out of man's salvation as pictured in your verse."
He turned back to the organ and from its quivering pipes rose a series of noble chords, stately and solemn, a hymn-like measure, rolling in awful majesty, shattered all at once by a wild confusion of screaming discords that yet gradually resolved into a wailing melody of passionate despair beneath which I seemed to hear the relentless tramp of countless marching feet with, ever and anon, a far, faint echo of that first grand and stately motive.
And as I listened it seemed I watched the age-old struggle between might and right, the horrors of man's persecution of man, the agonies of flaming cities, of Death and Shame, of dungeon and torment. I seemed to hear the thunder of conflicting hosts, the groans of dying martyrs, to sense all the sweat and blood, the agony and travail of these long and bitter years wherein man wrought and strove through tears and tribulation, onward and up to nobler ideals, working out his own salvation and redemption from his baser self. Suddenly, above this wild and rushing melody, rose a single dulcet voice, soft yet patiently insistent, oft repeated with many variations, like some angel singing a promise of better things to come,—a voice which, as the wailing tumult died, swelled to a chorus of rejoicing, louder and louder, resolving back into that majestic hymn-like measure, but soaring now in joyous triumph, rising, deepening to an ecstasy of praise.
And then I was staring at the slender, shabby figure who sat, hands on knees, glancing down into the Tinker's awed face.
"Well, friend Jarvis?" he questioned, with his kindly smile.
"Ah, sir!" cried the Tinker. "Music can surely say more than words ever will."
"O Peregrine!" sighed Diana under her breath, "has it told you how I love you—all those things that I can never tell you?" And then she was away, to seat herself upon the organ-bench beside our host, while he explained something of the wonders of the noble instrument, its pedals, stops and triple rank of keys.
"Lord, Peregrine!" said the Tinker in my ear. "This is a day to remember, this is a—my soul!" he exclaimed and fell suddenly mute as a gorgeous person in powder and silk stockings entered, bearing tea upon a silver tray; a somewhat nervous and high-strung person he seemed, for catching sudden vision of the grimy Tinker's shock head and my shirt sleeves, his protuberant eyes took on a glassy look, he gulped audibly, his knees bent and he set down his burden with a jingling crash.
The Earl turned sharply; the footman began setting out the tea things.