“I can’t tell you what makes me think it— But—she was there.”
“You only think it because you’re feeling sorry. You must get over it. Go back into the room and play.”
He shook his head and still sat there thinking. Effie did not speak again; she saw that she must let him think.
Presently he got up and went into the drawing-room, shutting the doors behind him.
The Mendelssohn was still on the piano ledge, open at Number Nine. He began to play it. But at the first bars of the melody he stopped, overwhelmed by an agony of regret. He slid down on his knees, with his arms on the edge of the piano and his head bowed on his arms.
His soul cried out in him with no sound.
“Mother—Mother—if only I had you back. If only you would come to me. Come—Come—”
And suddenly he felt her come. From far-off, from her place among the blessed, she came rushing, as if on wings. He heard nothing; he saw nothing; but with every nerve he felt the vibration of her approach, of her presence. She was close to him now, closer than hearing or sight or touch could bring her; her self to his self; her inmost essence was there.
The phantasm of a week ago was a faint, insignificant thing beside this supreme manifestation. No likeness of flesh and blood could give him such an assurance of reality, of contact.
For, more certain than any word of flesh and blood, her meaning flashed through him and thrilled.