his
intrusion; and not discourteously she partly closed the door and waited
for him to withdraw. But he was not of a mind to withdraw; on the
contrary, he stood stoutly where he was and explained:

"As I crossed the park this morning I happened to hear a few notes of a
voice that interested me. I train the voice, Madam. I teach certain
kinds of music. I took the liberty of asking the owner of the voice
where he lived, and I have taken the further liberty of coming to see
whether I may speak with you on that subject--about his voice."

This, then, was the stranger of the park whom she believed to have gone
his way after unknowingly leaving glorious words of destiny for her.
Instead of vanishing, he had reappeared, following up his discovery into
her very presence. She did not desire him to follow up his discovery.
She put out one hand and pressed her son back into the room and was
about to close the door.

"I should first have stated, of course," said the visitor, smiling
quietly as with awkward self-recovery, "that I am the choir-master of
the Cathedral of St. John the Divine."

Stillness followed, the stillness in which painful misunderstandings
dissolve. The scene slowly changed, as when on the dark stage of a
theater an invisible light is gradually turned, showing everything in
its actual relation to everything else. In truth a shaft as of celestial
light suddenly fell upon her doorway; a far-sent radiance rested on the
head of her son; in her ears began to sound old words spoken ages ago to
another mother on account of him she had borne. To her it was an
annunciation.

Her first act was to place her hand on the head of the lad and bend it
back until his eyes looked up into hers; his mother must be the first to
congratulate him and to catch from his eyes their flash of delight as he
realized all that this might mean: the fulfilment of life's dream for
him.

Then she threw open the door.

"Will you come in?"

It was a marvelous welcome, a splendor of spiritual hospitality.

The musician took up straightway the purpose of his visit and stated it.

"Will you, then, send him to-morrow and let me try his voice?"

"Yes," she said as one who now must direct with firm responsible hand
the helm of wayward genius, "I will send him."

"And if his voice should prove to be what is wanted," continued the
music-master, though with delicate hesitancy, "would he be--free? Is
there any other person whose consent--"