Cord and Creese Part 56

For Louis Brandon is known to have fallen overboard from the ship Java, during a tremendous monsoon, several hundred miles away from any land.

How could he possibly have escaped death? The Captain, whom Courtenay Despard found out and questioned, said he threw over a hen-coop and a pail. These could not save him. Despard also inquired for months from every ship that arrived from those parts, but could learn nothing. The next ship that came from New South Wales foundered off the coast of Africa. Three pa.s.sengers escaped to Sierra Leone, and thence to England.

Despard learned their names, but they were not Brandon. The information which one of them, named Wheeler, gave to the ship-owners afforded no hope of his having been found by this ship, even if it had been possible. It was simply impossible, however, for the _Falcon_ did not pa.s.s the spot where poor Brandon fell overboard till months had elapsed.

All these things I knew, and they came to my mind. She did not notice my emotion, but after a pause she looked at me again with the same earnestness, and said,

"_My brother Frank is not dead._"

This surprised me as much as the other.

"Are you sure?" said I, reverently.

"I am."

"How did you learn this? All who have inquired say that both of your brothers are dead."

"They told me," said she, "many times. _They_ said that my brothers had not come among them to their own place, as they would have had to come if they had left the earth."

She spoke solemnly and with mysterious emphasis. I said nothing, for I knew not what to say.

On going home and thinking over this, I saw that she believed herself to have the power of communicating with the departed. I did not know whether this intelligence, which she believed she had received, had been gained in her trance, or whether she thought that she had recent interviews with those on high. I went to see her again, and asked this.

She told me that once since her recovery she had fallen into that state, and had been, as she called it, "in her home."

I ventured to ask her more about what she considered a communion with the departed. She tried to speak, but looked like one who could not find words. It was still the same as before. She has in her mind thoughts which can not be expressed by any human language. She will not be able to express them till such a language is obtained. Yet she gave me one idea, which has been in my mind ever since.

She said that the language of those among whom she has been has nothing on earth which is like it except music. If our music could be developed to an indefinite extent it might at last begin to resemble it. Yet she said that she sometimes heard strains here in the Holy Ma.s.s which reminded her of that language, and might be intelligible to an immortal.

This is the idea which she imparted to me, and I have thought of it ever since.

August 23--Great things have happened.

When I last wrote I had gained the idea of transforming music into a language. The thought came to me that I, who thirst for music, and love it and cherish it above all things--to whom it is an hourly comfort and solace--that I might rise to utter forth to her sounds which she might hear. I had already seen enough of her spiritual tone to know what sympathies and emotions might best be acted upon. I saw her several times, so as to stimulate myself to a higher and purer exercise of whatever genius I may have.

I was encouraged by the thought that from my earliest childhood, as I began to learn to speak so I began to learn to sing. As I learned to read printed type so I read printed music. The thoughts of composers in music thus became as legible to me as those of composers in words. So all my life my knowledge has widened, and with that knowledge my love has increased. This has been my one aim in life--my joy and my delight.

Thus it came to pa.s.s that at last, when alone with my Cremona, I could utter all my own thoughts, and pour forth every feeling that was in my heart. This was a language with me. I spoke it, yet there was no one who could understand it fully. Only one had I ever met with to whom I told this besides yourself--she could accompany me--she could understand and follow me wherever I led. I could speak this language to her, and she could hear and comprehend. This one was my Bice.

Now that she had told me this I grasped at the thought. Never before had the idea entered my mind of trying upon her the effect of my music. I had given it up for her sake while she was with me, not liking to cause any sound to disturb her rapt and melancholy mood.

But now I began to understand how it was with her. She had learned the language of the highest places and had heard the New Song. She stood far above me, and if she could not understand my music it would be from the same reason that a grown man can not comprehend the words of a lisping, stammering child. She had that language in its fullness. I had it only in its crudest rudiments.

Now Bice learned my words and followed me. She knew my utterance. I was the master--she the disciple. But here was one who could lead me. I would be the follower and disciple. From her I could learn more than in all my life I could ever discover by my own una.s.sisted efforts.

It was mine, therefore, to struggle to overcome the lisping, stammering utterance of my purely earthly music; to gain from her some knowledge of the mood of that holier, heavenly expression, so that at last I might be able in some degree to speak to this exile the language of the home which she loved; that we, by holding commune in this language, might rise together to a higher spiritual realm, and that she in her solitude might receive at least some a.s.sociate.

So I proposed to her to come back and stay with me again. She consented at once.

Before that memorable evening I purified my heart by fasting and prayer.

I was like one who was seeking to ascend into heaven to take part in that celestial communion, to join in the New Song, the music of the angels.

By fasting and prayer I sought so to ascend, and to find thoughts and fit utterance for those thoughts. I looked upon my office as similar to that of the holy prophets of old. I felt that I had a power of utterance if the Divine One would only inspire.

I fasted and prayed that so I might reduce this grosser material frame, and sharpen and quicken every nerve, and stimulate every fibre of the brain. So alone could I most nearly approach to the commune of spirits.

Thus had those saints and prophets of old done when they had entered upon the search after this communion, and they had received their reward, even the visitation of angels and the vision of the blessed.

A prophet--yes--now, in these days, it is left for the prophet to utter forth his inspiration by no other way than that of music.

So I fasted and prayed. I took up the words from the holy priesthood, and I said, as they say:

Munda cor meum, ac l.a.b.i.a mea, Omnipotens Deus, qui l.a.b.i.a Isaiae prophetae, calculo mundasti ignito!

For so Isaiah had been exalted till he heard the language of heaven, the music of the seraphim.

She, my divinity, my adored, enshrined again in my house, bore herself as before--kind to me and gentle beyond all expression, but with thoughts of her own that placed between us a gulf as wide as that which separates the mortal from the immortal.

On that evening she was with me in the parlor which looks out upon the Northwest Arm. The moon shone down there, the dark, rocky hills on the opposite side rose in heavy ma.s.ses. The servants were away in the city.

We were alone.

Ah, my Cremona! if a material instrument were ever able to utter forth sounds to which immortals might listen, thou, best gift of my father, thou canst utter them!

"You are pale," said she, for she was always kindly and affectionate as a mother with a child, as a guardian angel with his ward. "You are pale.

You always forget yourself for others, and now you suffer anxiety for me. Do not suffer. I have my consolations."

I did not make any reply, but took my Cremona, and sought to lift up all my soul to a level with hers, to that lofty realm where her spirit ever wandered, that so I might not be comfortless. She started at the first tone that I struck forth, and looked at me with her large, earnest eyes.

I found my own gaze fixed on hers, rapt and entranced. Now there came at last the inspiration so longed for, so sought for. It came from where her very soul looked forth into mine, out of the glory of her l.u.s.trous, spiritual eyes. They grew brighter with an almost immortal radiance, and all my heart rose up till it seemed ready to burst in the frenzy of that inspired moment.

Now I felt the spirit of prophecy, I felt the afflatus of the inspired sibyl or seer, and the voice of music which for a lifetime I had sought to utter forth now at last sounded as I longed that it should sound.

I exulted in that sound. I knew that at last I had caught the tone, and from her. I knew its meaning and exulted, as the poet or the musician must always exult when some idea sublimer than any which he has ever known is wafted over his upturned spiritual gaze.

She shared my exaltation. There came over her face swiftly, like the lightning flash, an expression of surprise and joy. So the face of the exile lightens up at the throbbing of his heart, when, in some foreign land, he suddenly and unexpectedly hears the sound of his own language.

So his eyes light up, and his heart beats faster, and even amidst the very longing of his soul after home, the desire after that home is appeased by these its most hallowed a.s.sociations.

And the full meaning of that eloquent gaze of hers as her soul looked into mine became all apparent to me. "Speak on," it said; "sound on, oh strains of the language of my home! Unheard so long, now heard at last."

I knew that I was comprehended. Now all the feelings of the melancholy months came rushing over my heart, and all the holiest ideas which had animated my life came thronging into my mind, bursting forth into tones, as though of their own accord, involuntarily, as words come forth in a dream.

"Oh thou," I said, in that language which my own lips could not utter--"oh thou whom I saved from the tomb, the life to which I restored thee is irksome; but there remains a life to which at last thou shalt attain.

"Oh thou," I said, "whose spirit moves among the immortals, I am mortal yet immortal! My soul seeks commune with them. I yearn after that communion. Life here on earth is not more dear to me than to thee. Help me to rise above it. Thou hast been on high, show me too the way.

"Oh thou," I said, "who hast seen things ineffable, impart to me thy confidence. Let me know thy secret. Receive me as the companion of thy soul. Shut not thyself up in solitude. Listen, I can speak thy language.

"Attend," I cried, "for it is not for nothing that the Divine One has sent thee back. Live not these mortal days in loneliness and in uselessness. Regard thy fellow-mortals and seek to bless them. Thou hast learned the mystery of the highest. Let me be thine interpreter. All that thou hast learned I will communicate to man.

"Rise up," I cried, "to happiness and to labor. Behold! I give thee a purpose in life. Blend thy soul with mine, and let me utter thy thoughts so that men shall hear and understand. For I know that the highest truth of highest Heaven means nothing more than love. Gather up all thy love, let it flow forth to thy fellow-men. This shall be at once the labor and the consolation of thy life."

Now all this, and much more--far more--was expressed in the tones that flowed from my Cremona. It was all in my heart. It came forth. It was apprehended by her. I saw it, I knew it, and I exulted. Her eyes dilated more widely--my words were not unworthy of her hearing. I then was able to tell something which could rouse her from her stupor. Oh, Music!

Divine Music! What power thou hast over the soul!