Owen often said that if Evelyn had two more notes in her voice she would have ranked with the finest.  She sang from the low A, and she could take the high C. From B to B every note was clear and full, one as the other; he delighted especially in the middle of her voice; for one whole octave, and more than an octave, her voice was pure and sonorous and as romantic as the finest ’cello.  And the romance of her voice transpired in the beautiful Beethoven-like phrase of Cherubini’s “Ave Maria.”  It was as if he had had her voice singing in his ear while he was writing, when he placed the little grace notes on the last syllable of Maria.  The phrase rose, still remaining well within the medium of her voice, and the same interval happened again as the voice swelled up on the word “plena.”  In the beautiful classical melody her voice was like a ’cello heard in the twilight.  In the music itself there is neither belief nor prayer, but a severe dignity of line, the romance of columns and peristyle in the exaltation of a calm evening.  Very gradually she poured her voice into the song, and her lips seemed to achieve sculpture.  The lines of a Greek vase seemed to rise before the eye, and the voice swelled on from note to note with the noble movement of the bas-relief decoration of the vase.  The harmonious interludes which Sister Mary John played aided the excitement, and the nuns, who knelt in two grey lines, were afraid to look up.  In a remote consciousness they feared it was not right to feel so keenly; the harmonious depth of the voice entered their very blood, summoning visions of angel faces.  But it was an old man with a white beard that Veronica saw, a hermit in the wilderness; she was bringing him vestments, and when the vision vanished Evelyn was singing the opening phrase, now a little altered on the words Santa Maria.

There came the little duet between the voice and the organ, in which any want of precision on the part of Sister Mary John would spoil the effect of the song; but the nun’s right hand answered Evelyn in perfect concord.  And then began the runs introduced in the Amen in order to exhibit the skill of the singer.  The voice was no longer a ’cello, deep and resonant, but a lonely flute or silver bugle announcing some joyous reverie in a landscape at the close of day.  The song closed on the keynote, and Sister Mary John turned from the instrument and looked at the singer.  She could not speak, she seemed overpowered by the music, and like one more dreaming than waking, and sitting half turned round on her seat, she looked at Evelyn.

“You sing beautifully,” she said.  “I never heard singing before.”

And she sat like one stupefied, still hearing Evelyn’s singing in her brain, until one of the sisters advanced close and said, “Sister, we must sing the ‘Tantum ergo.’”

“Of course we must.  I believe if you hadn’t reminded me I should have forgotten it.  Gracious!  I don’t know what it will sound like after singing like that.  But you’ll lead them?”