It was music. Yes. But it was as though the Soul of Music had freed itself of the bondage and the body of sound and notes and came carrying its unutterable message straight to the soul of the world.
It was only the sisters in their chapel gently hymning the Salve of the Compline to their Queen in Heaven.
Ruth Lansing might have heard the same subdued, sweetly poignant evensong on every other night. Other nights, her mind filled with books and its other business, the music had scarcely reached her. To-night her soul was alive. Her every sense was like a nerve laid bare, ready to be thrilled and hurt by the most delicate pressures.
She did not think of the sisters. She saw the deep rose flush of the windows in the dimly lighted chapel across the court, and knew vaguely, perhaps, that the music came from there. But it carried her beyond all thought.
She did not hear the words of the hymn. Would not have understood them if she had heard. But the lifting of hearts to Our Life, our Sweetness and our Hope caught her heart up into a world where words were never needed.
She heard the cry of the Banished children of Eve. The Mourning and weeping in this vale of tears swept into her soul like the flood-tide of all the sorrow of all the world.
On and upwards the music carried her, until she could hear the triumph, until her soul rang with the glory and the victory of The Promises of Christ.
The music ceased. She saw the light fade from the chapel windows, leaving only the one little blood-red spot of light before the altar. She lay there trembling, not daring to move, while the echo of that unseen choir caught her heartstrings and set them ringing to the measure of the heart of the world.
It was not the unembodied cry of the pain and helplessness but the undying hope of the world that she had heard. It was the cry of the little blind ones of all the earth. It was the cry of martyrs on their pyres. It was the cry of strong 43 men and valiant women crushed under the forces of life. And it was the voice of the Catholic Church, which knows what the soul of the world is saying. Ruth Lansing knew this. She realised it as she lay there trembling.