O where is Love? 
     Where, where is Love? 
     Is it of heavenly birth? 
     Is it a thing of earth? 
     Where, where is Love?

Israel felt himself rooted to the spot, and he stood some time without stirring.  He looked around.  All else was still.  The night was as silent as death.  He listened attentively.  The singing seemed to come from his own house.  Then he thought he must be dreaming still, and he took a step forward.  But he stopped again and covered both his ears.  That was of no avail, for when he removed his hands the voice was there as before.

A shiver ran over his limbs, yet he could not believe what his soul was saying.  The key dropped out of his hand and rang on the stone.  When the clangour was done the voice continued.  Israel bethought him then that his household must be asleep, and it flashed on his mind that if this were a human voice the singing ought to awaken them.  Just at that moment the night guard went by and saluted him.  “God bless your morning!” the guard cried; and Israel answered, “Your morning be blessed!” That was all.  The guard seemed to have heard nothing.  His footsteps were dying away, but the voice went on.

Then a strange emotion filled Israel’s heart, and he reflected that even if it were Ruth she could have come on no evil errand.  That thought gave him courage, and he pushed forward to the door.  As he fumbled the key into the lock he saw that a beggar was crouching by the doorway in the shadow cast by the moonlight.  The man was asleep.  Israel could hear his breathing, and smell his rags.  Also he could hear the thud of his own temples like the beating of a drum in his brain.

At length, as he was groping feebly through the crooked passage, a new thought came to him.  “Naomi,” he told himself in a whisper of awe.  It was she.  By the full flood of the moonlight in the patio he saw her.  She was on the balcony.  Her beautiful white-robed figure was half sitting on the rail, half leaning against the pillar.  The whole lustre of the moon was upon her.  A look of joy beamed on her face.  She was singing her mother’s song with her mother’s voice, and all the air, and the sky, and the quiet white town seemed to listen:—­

     Within my heart a voice
     Bids earth and heaven rejoice
     Sings—­“Love, great Love
     O come and claim shine own,
     O come and take thy throne
     Reign ever and alone,
     Reign, glorious golden Love.”

Then Israel’s fear was turned to rapture.  Why had he not thought of this before?  Yet how could he have thought of it?  He had never once heard Naomi’s voice save in the utterance of single words.  But again, why had he not remembered that before the tongues of children can speak words of their own they sing the words of others?

The singing ended, and then Israel, struggling with his dry throat, stepped a pace forward—­his foot grated on the pavement—­and he called to the singer—­