He mounted a step,
waved his antennae, there was a great indrawn breath of silence,
and then Sylvia, waiting with agreeable curiosity to hear how a big
orchestra would really sound, gasped and held her breath. The cup of
that vast building suddenly brimmed with a magical flood of pure tone,
coming from everywhere, from nowhere, from her own heart as well as
from outside her body. The immense hall rang to the glorious quality
of this sound as a violin-back vibrates to the drawn bow. It rained
down on her, it surged up to her, she could not believe that she
really heard it.
She looked quickly at her father. His arms were folded tightly across
his chest. He was looking frowningly at the back of the chair in front
of him. It was evident that Sylvia did not exist for him. She was
detached from her wonder at his pale sternness by the assault on her
nerves made by the first of those barbaric outcries of woe, that
sudden, brief clamor of grief, the shouts of despair, the beating upon
shields. Her heart stood still--There rose, singing like an archangel,
the mystic call of the Volsung, then the yearning melody of love; such
glory, such longing for beauty, for life--and then brusquely, again
and again, the screaming, sobbing recollection of the fact of
death....
When it was over, Sylvia's breath was still coming pantingly. "Oh,
Father! How--how wonderful--how--" she murmured.
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