The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, 9 January 1913, Page 5

The Storyteller

V " —— THE RETURN The opera was * Faust/ and the theatre presented an animated scene, for the whole of official Washington was clamoring at its doors. One would almost doubt the bill-board’s announcement that a new singer was to make her debut and think that some queen of song was to appear. The lines of automobiles and carriages; the crowds about the doors and in the lobby the magnificently gowned women and the faultlessly groomed men all were eloquent proofs of the fact that at the nation’s capital there is one thing equal to fame, namely, the possession of a father holding a high place among the ‘ powers that be.’ From her box near the stage, the mother of Constance Cathro, the young prima donna, watched the gathering of the brilliant audience. She was not torn between the hope and fear that often rob the parent heart of the triumphs of such an occasion. She had heard her daughter sing and was confident of the outcome. All during the tense opening scenes of the opera, with their encompassing by the wily Mephistopheles of the downfall of a human soul, she continued to busy herself with a critical survey of the stately assemblage. _ And what a cosmopolitan gathering it was —foreign diplomats in all the splendor of their official regalia, their ladies bravely upholding in elaborateness of attire their respective countries’ rank a goodly sprinkling of the military element; members of the visiting German fleet, whose lusty applause testified to their national love for music, and in the Persian Minister’s box some distinguished visitors from the Orient. Mrs. Cathro noted with pleasure, well down in the centre of the house, the entire delegation from the State her husband represented—all there to do honor to the girl from home. Without doubt the young songstress would have every stimulus to appear at her best, for the audience, taking its cue from the politically mighty, was ready, if given half a chance, to bestow the spur of its approval.

Toward the close of the second act she appeared, a fleeting vision of youth and beauty that left the spectators, like the lover Faust, pining for another" glimpse of her. When she entered again her voice was greeted with the applause of an assemblage that is re-' serving its opinion, though even here friendship had intruded to add a degree of spontaneity quite unusual. Her enraptured mother felt no dejection in the moderate applause, for she was sure it would be forced to cheers long before the curtain fell. She knew the - girl could sing, even through the awful strain of a first appearance. Moreover, her talent was an inheritance as well as a gift, for the voice, wondrous beauty, and graceful figure of the youthful ‘Marguerite’ were those of her maternal grandmother. With the complete comprehension of this latter fact, the swift passions worked in the face of Mrs, Cathro. She fell suddenly to trembling. It was plain the thought dragged her soaring spirit down. Her breath caught once or twice, and she brushed from her forehead the moisture that had gathered there. - : She felt the need of restoration, and, glancing at her husband, found it in the exultation and pride which covered him like a garment. She was winning, his little girl; singing herself straight into the great, discriminating heart of Washington. -Congratulations were being flung at him from diplomats and statesmen round about, * Such youth, such beauty, and a voice beyond the reach of mortals Senator, you have given us a Marguerite for whose love any Faust would be justified in making any sort of a bargain.’ This from North, the celebrated musical and dramatic critic, left him on the heights. - The curtain went down on the third act amid a storm of applause. Washington never withholds approbation from merit,, and Constance Cathro, as Marguerite, radiant in the joy of success, was called- out again and again. This, together with the influx of friends who sought their box from all parts of the theatre to offer felicitations, laid the ghosts that tortured the interval of retrospection Mrs, Cathro had allowed herself. From the President’s - box came a hastily scribbled note, and Mrs. Cathro looked up from the warm, congratulatory words to meet across the house the kindly bow and smile of the writer, the gracious first lady of the land. Never in all her life had she known a prouder moment. The curtain had gone up again and the young prima donna returned to even greater conquests. Once more her voice, rare and sweet in the Spinning Wheel song, caressed the ears and stirred the hearts of the auditors. During a charged moment, when the great assemblage sat hushed and breathless under the singer’s spell, words spoken in the Italian ambassador’s box reached the mother’s ears. ‘ You have singers, you Americans! To have been here to-night is to have heard one!’ ‘ The tones were excited, those of a person moved to enthusiasm. ‘ She certainly has a divine gift,’ came the answer, ‘ but they say she has no faith, is an atheist.’ ‘What, so lovely a flower without perfume! Impossible ! ’ ‘ It is a pity, for a woman without religion is like what you saya flower without perfume.’ ‘lfit is true, someone is to blame for it. Behind her work is a heritage of religion. Yes, yes, otherwise she could not be so convincing.’ They were applauding now, but Mrs. Cathro heard and saw in a dream. At the remarks of the Italian, the phantoms again walked. She was scarcely conscious of the opera’s shifting scenes. ‘lf it is true, some one is to blame .for it.’ The words burned in her brain like letters of fire. Yes, it was true, and, oh. God, who was to blame for it but herself! She had given up her faith for a worldly marriage, and her husband, who was a materialist, had brought up their child without religion. The fact that her mother had once been a Catholic was carefully kept from her. To-night, in the midst of fulfilled ambitions, remorse threatened to overwhelm- Mrs. Cathro as it had not done since she turned her back on her God.

Her husband, . noticing the change in her, asked in alarm if she were ill. ‘ No, she replied, ‘ just a little worn from excitement. You know my nerves,’ she added, with a slightly forced laugh. ‘I shall feel better shortly.’ The act had reached the terrible church scene and she was suddenly' keenly aware that her daughter’s voice was rising sweet as that of. a seraphim. ‘ Behind her work is a heritage of religion.’ Was he who uttered that truth an accusing angel set there to torture her ? The words seemed to bring the dead to life, and for the moment in her mind’s eye she saw her own mother as a husband’s love had often pictured herdead in the June-time of life, because she would not withhold her beauty and accomplishments from the Church in an hour of need. It was three weeks after the birth of her baby when the sudden illness of an engaged ■soloist made it necessary for her to take the singer’s place or witness the failure of a church undertaking from which great financial results were expected. In spite of her physician’s warning, she decided to sing, and paid for it with her life. Such was f tho religious heritage to which her daughter had proved recreant. Of what avail had been ambition and wealth, when they failed to drown these memories that shrivelled and scorched? Mrs. Cathro cowered in her seat as if shrinking from an avenging spirit. She struggled to shut out the vision of her mother that was so relentlessly bringing her face to face with the consequences of her apostacy. ‘ A flower without perfume.’ At that moment, above tho swelling harmonies of the priest’s chorus, she seemed to hear the words. It was the voice of her own soul shouting its accusation. Startled, she raised her eyes to where Constance poured forth her song for mercy, in throbbing, plaintive notes, like the rhapsody of a nightingale. ‘ A flower without perfume.’ Was that what her weakness and indifference with regard to things spiritual had made of this glorious creature in the eyes of God? She had never before viewed her course in the light of its results upon her child, and as she did so, she felt weakened, stricken. At no point in her tragic journey from love and belief to apathy and renunciation had she been so tormented. Her mother and her child stood up before her to wage battle in her soul. The noise of the conflict was in her ears, its voices clamoring in her heart. Her pulses throbbed and her head ached. Then, suddenly, her whole nature seemed to escape from the leash in which she had held it during the years of her married life, and to rush back to the pastthe past with its passionate love and zealous service of God and the wondrous joy and peace which these gave. An interval in which she knew tho blackness of utter despair followed this with the thought that her child, whom she loved more than her life, might never know the inner beauties and exquisite experiences of the faith which was her heritage. In spirit she sank to her knees. ‘ 0 God/ she prayed, ‘ give her not of the kingdom of this world, only to abandon her to the outer darkness resultant from her mother’s choice for her.’ She shuddered at the jeopardy in which her sin had placed the soul of her gifted child.’ ... And then—just —when her sense of the abject weakness of her own faith and of her utter unworthiness to shake doubt from another soul overwhelmed her, the vision of her mother rose before her. The eyes were no longer accusing and wrathful, but soft and full of light, and she felt suddenly strongstrong to take the journey back, upon which she must not go alone. But, as her soul found strength, her body seemed to weaken. She touched her husband’s arm. Te turned toward her and stared at sight of her face. ‘What is it, Helen?’ he exclaimed. ‘Are you ill?’ ‘Only a little faint,’ she replied. ‘I must get some air.’ He reached for her cloak, and hastily arranging it about her shoulders led her from the box. Inquiring eyes followed them as they made their way out, and solicitude stamped itself on many countenances at sight of the pallor of Mrs. Cathro’s face. Her husband

looked for the air to revive her immediately, and when it failed to do so insisted on taking her home. ‘ Oh, no, indeed, dear/ she remonstrated, ‘ you could not do that and be back in time for the finale. It will be disappointing enough f.or Constance not to have me here, but it you should be absent, too, it would break her heart.’ ‘But'l cannot let you go home alone. You look far from well.’ ‘ It’s simply one of my old heart attacks,* she returned weakly, ‘ and you know they always seem more serious than they really are. James can take me home and bring the car back for you.’ Seeing that. any other arrangement was only likely to disturb her, he made her as comfortable as possible in the machine. It’s just too bad, dear, . that this had to happen/ he said as he kissed her. ‘ Our little girl has had an unparalleled success to-night, and your, absence from any.part of it will dim the laurels for her.’ ‘I know it will, she’s like that. God bless her!’ returned the mother as the car rolled away. The last phrase in his wife’s reply repeated itself unpleasantly in Senator Cathro’s mind. It was one long foreign, to her lips, and her use of it now troubled him and made him doubt the wisdom of having sent her home alone. - ' When he regained his seat the final . curtain was descending amid plaudits that , shook the walls. Greater voices Washington had heard but never a rarer, more perfect ‘ Marguerite.’ And her voice, that took captive the senses, seemed to hold all earth’s sweetest sounds. Of course, there was to be a supper afterward, and, of course, the young prima donna, radiant and joyful in the first flush of her. triumphs, must needs run home for a minute to assure herself that her mother’s indisposition was nothing serious. ‘I shall enjoy myself so much better if I do,’ she said, with a winning firmness that silenced all remonstrances.. . • , When the rush of the big machine was heard in the driveway below, Mrs. Cathro dismissed her maid in order to receive her daughter alone. .She, was mot surprised that she had come. ' Somehow she felt that sho would. The hurry of light footfalls sounded on the stairs, the swish of draperies along the hall, and Constance, her arms full of exquisite floral offerings, stood in tho doorway. ■ ", ? ‘Oh, mother/ she cried, ‘it was a success!’ The flowers dropped to the floor and her strong young arms went round her mother in a rapturous embrace. ‘You are better* now, mother, dear?’ Her clear, dark eyes regarded Mrs, Cathro anxiously. ‘ Yes, Constance, darling, I am better.’ ‘You were satisfied?’, she whispered. ‘ Satisfied ! I was exultant. You were your grandmother over again, except —and here her voice trembled and again her eyes were shadowed with the poignant reflections that had companioned her during the preceding hours ‘ except —that your grandmother was a Catholic.’ Constance stared at her mother with her soul in her eyes. ‘My grandmother —a—Catholic she cried. ‘ And you, mother?’ For the second time that night it seemed to Mrs. Cathro that her own soul rose up to accuse her. ‘I —I sold my'birthright for a mess of pottage/ she moaned. For an instant the turmoil of the girl’s thoughts held her as by a spell. In the interval her brain pieced out the whole sad story and took in the significance of her mother’s sudden illness. Then, with a glance as shining as the flash of a seraph’s wing/ she touched her mother’s arm. ‘ Mother,’ she whispered, ‘ would it please you very much if I would go back to my grandmother’s faith ?’ ~ ' ■. ■ Her mother looked at her curiously, eagerly. Vague hopes gripping her heart set her breathing rapidly. ‘Please me? Why, child, it would open the gates of paradise for me!’ ‘ Then they are already ajar, dearest, for I am to be received into the Church next week. I wanted to wait until to-night should be over. I' knew your prejudice and father’s against the Church, and hoped that

the triumph I looked forward to would help both of you to view my step with some resignation.’ Mrs. Cathro sank back in her chair; her eyes grew moist; her hand trembled against her dress. ‘But what drew you; what influenced you. Constance?’ she finally gasped. ‘My music, mother. From the day I started with Dolmini I began to get glimpses of the old faith that were wonderfully .enlightening. It was like catching the first glimmering ,of what was to be a glorious sunrise. In his artless Catholic way he interpreted the works of the masters for me, and because so much that is best of the masters is the expression of the faith that was in them, consequently he interpreted much of that faith to me. It all gripped me strangely. I know why, now— had a right to the grand old faith.’ She lifed her head proudly with the words. .. Mrs. Cathro’s gaze went straight upward,' as though it would pierce the veil that hides the vision of God’s saints around His throne. Mother, mother,’ she half whispered, it is God’s gift to you, for I could —never have deserved it.’ Constance stooped, and kissing her mother tenderly left her with her new-found happiness while she rushed away to sing her double Te Deum at the festive board that was awaiting her. —Extension Magazine.