How often we thank our stars that we have never met the very thing that waits us round the corner! Perhaps that Pharisee who stands immortally thanking the Lord that he was not as other men, found out the same afternoon how very like he was.
The thrall of the theater was so complete upon Forbes that when the sorrowful drone of the shepherd's pipe suddenly turned to joy at the sight of Isolde's ship, Forbes' heart leaped up as if he were witnessing a rescue in actual life.
The hurrying rapture of the music that described Isolde's arrival, and her haste up the cliff, sent his hopes to heaven; but when the delirious Tristan rose from his couch to his staggering feet and began to tear at the bandages about his wound, Forbes felt the stab of fear. He wanted to cry out, "Oh no! no!" He sat with lips parted in anguish, and his hand groping for support.
The left hand of Persis was reaching about in the same gesture of protest against intolerable cruelty. It met the hand of Forbes. Their fingers clutched each other in an instinct for companionship. The two souls were so intent upon the action of the scene, and so swept along by the torrential music, that they hardly knew their hands were joined.
When Tristan fell at Isolde's feet, with one poor wailing "Isolde!" and died before she could clasp him in her arms, it seemed that Forbes' heart broke. A groan escaped him; his hand clenched the hand of Persis with all its might. He heard a little gasp from her, and he thought that her heart had broken with his.
He had bitten into one of the beautiful apples of Hades, and his mouth was filled with ashes. The tears poured down his cheeks, and in his aching throat there was a lump like broken glass.
The noblest song in all music, the "love-death" of Isolde, gave the tragedy nobility; but it was the mad beauty of a grief too great for grieving over. Passion shivered in the air and seemed to come from Forbes' own soul. The harmonies kept climaxing, eternally reaching the last possible thrill, only to find that it led on to one yet higher. The melodies were crowded like the angels climbing Jacob's ladder into the clouds, where every rung seemed heaven, till it disclosed one more.
The music was a love-philter to Forbes and Persis; they could not escape it, had no thought of escape. Their hands swung in a little arc, clenched and unclenched in an utter sympathy of mind and body, in a kind of epic dance.
And then the opera was over, and Forbes began to dread the raising of the lights. He was grateful for the long ovation to the singers, since it kept the house dark till he could shake off the tears he was ashamed to dab with a handkerchief. Time was when greater soldiers than he were proud rather than ashamed of their tears, but Forbes was thankful for the gloom. He applauded and joined the cries of "Bravo!" to prolong the respite.
Mrs. Neff was sniffling as she beat her gloves together.