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Title: The angel that troubled the waters, and other plays
Author: Thornton Wilder
Release date: September 2, 2026 [eBook #79499]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: Coward-McCann, Inc., 1928
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79499
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ANGEL THAT TROUBLED THE WATERS, AND OTHER PLAYS ***
THE ANGEL
THAT TROUBLED
THE WATERS
[Illustration: Decorative fleuron]
_THE ANGEL
THAT TROUBLED
THE WATERS_
AND OTHER PLAYS
BY
THORNTON WILDER
AUTHOR OF
“THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY,”
“THE CABALA,”
ETC.
[Illustration: Decorative colophon]
PUBLISHED IN NEW YORK
BY COWARD-McCANN, INC.
IN THE YEAR MCMXXVIII
COPYRIGHT, 1928
BY COWARD-MCCANN, INC.
[Illustration: Decorative fleuron]
_Second Printing_
TYPOGRAPHY BY S. A. JACOBS
PRINTED AT THE VAN REES PRESS
NEW YORK, N. Y., U. S. A.
¶ All rights in these plays are reserved by the Publishers and no
production of any sort is allowed without authorization from the
Publishers
[Illustration: Decorative fleuron]
[Illustration: Decorative page header]
_CONTENTS_
CHAPTER PAGE
I. FOREWORD xi
II. NASCUNTUR POETÆ 19
III. PROSERPINA AND THE DEVIL 27
IV. FANNY OTCOTT 33
V. BROTHER FIRE 43
VI. THE PENNY THAT BEAUTY SPENT 51
VII. THE ANGEL ON THE SHIP 59
VIII. THE MESSAGE AND JEHANNE 67
IX. CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME 75
X. CENTAURS 83
XI. LEVIATHAN 91
XII. AND THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP ITS DEAD 99
XIII. NOW THE SERVANT’S NAME WAS MALCHUS 107
XIV. MOZART AND THE GRAY STEWARD 117
XV. HAST THOU CONSIDERED MY SERVANT JOB? 129
XVI. THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT 137
XVII. THE ANGEL THAT TROUBLED THE WATERS 145
_FOREWORD_
It is a discouraging business to be an author at sixteen years of age.
Such an author is all aspiration and no fulfillment. He is drunk on
an imaginary kinship with the writers he most admires, and yet his
poor overblotted notebooks show nothing to prove to others, or to
himself, that the claim is justified. The shortest walk in the country
is sufficient to start in his mind the theme, the plan and the title,
especially the title, of a long book; and the shortest hour when he
has returned to his desk is sufficient to deflate his ambition. Such
fragments as he is finally able to commit to paper are a mass of
echoes, awkward relative clauses and conflicting styles. In life and
in literature mere sincerity is not sufficient, and in both realms the
greater the capacity the longer the awkward age. Yet strange lights
cross that confusion, authoritative moments that all the practice of
later maturity cannot explain and cannot recapture. He is visited by
great depressions and wild exhilarations, but whether his depressions
proceed from his limitations in the art of living or his limitations
in the art of writing he cannot tell. An artist is one who knows how
life should be lived at its best and is always aware of how badly he is
doing it. An artist is one who knows he is failing in living and feeds
his remorse by making something fair, and a layman is one who suspects
he is failing in living but is consoled by his successes in golf, or in
love, or in business.
Authors of fifteen and sixteen years of age spend their time drawing
up title-pages and adjusting the tables of contents of works they have
neither the perseverance nor the ability to execute. They compass
easily all the parts of a book that are inessential. They compose
dignified prefaces, discover happy quotations from the Latin and the
French, and turn graceful dedications. This book is what is left of one
of these projects.
The title was to have been _Three-Minute Plays for Three Persons_. I
have lately found one of my early tables of contents for it, written in
the fly-leaves of a First Year Algebra. Quadratics in those days could
be supported only with the help of a rich marginal commentary. Usually
these aids to education took the shape of a carefully planned repertory
for two theaters, a large and a small. Here my longer plays were to
alternate with _The Wild Duck_ and _Measure for Measure_ and were cast
with such a roll of great names as neither money nor loyalty could
assemble. The chapter on Combinations and Permutations ended short by
several inches, and left me sufficient space to draw up a catalogue
of all the compositions I had heard of that were the work of Charles
Martin Loeffler. This list of _Three-Minute Plays_ was drawn up in
Berkeley, California, in the spring of 1915. It contains several that
have since been rejected, two that are in the present volume, “Brother
Fire” and “Proserpina and the Devil”, and the names of many that were
unwritten then and that still, through the charm of their titles, ask
to be written.
Since then I have composed some forty of these plays, for I had
discovered a literary form that satisfied my passion for compression.
Since the time when I began to read I had become aware of the needless
repetition, the complacency in most writing. Who does not know the
empty opening paragraphs, the deft but uninstructive transitions, and
the closing paragraphs that summarize a work and which are unnecessary
to an alert reader? Moreover, their brevity flatters my inability to
sustain a long flight, and the inertia that barely permits me to write
at all. And finally, when I became a teacher, here was the length that
could be compassed after the lights of the House were out and the sheaf
of absurd French exercises corrected and indignantly marked with red
crayon. In time the three minutes and the three persons became a habit,
and no idea was too grandiose--as the reader will see--for me to try
and invest it in this strange discipline.
There were other plans for this book. There was to have been a
series of Footnotes to Biographies, suggested by Herbert Eulenberg’s
_Schattenbilder_, represented here by the Mozart, the Ibsen, and the
St. Francis plays. There were hopes of a still more difficult series.
Dürer’s two sets of woodcuts illustrating the Passion were to serve
as model for a series of plays that would be meditations on the last
days of Our Lord. Two of them are in this book. There was to have been
a series illustrating the history of the stage, and again, two of them
are in this book. How different the practice of writing would be if one
did not permit oneself to be pretentious. Some hands have no choice:
they would rather fail with an oratorio than succeed with a ballad.
During the years that these plays were being written I was reading
widely, and these pages are full of allusions to it. The art of
literature springs from two curiosities, a curiosity about human
beings pushed to such an extreme that it resembles love, and a love
of a few masterpieces of literature so absorbing that it has all the
richest elements of curiosity. I use the word _curiosity_ in the French
sense of a tireless awareness of things. (It is too late to arrest
the deterioration of our greatest English words. We live in an age
where _pity_ and _charity_ have taken on the color of condescensions;
where _humility_ seems to mean an acknowledgment of failure; where
_simplicity_ is foolishness and _curiosity_ is interference. To-day
_hope_, and _faith_ itself, imply a deliberate self-deception.) The
training for literature must be acquired by the artist alone, through
the passionate assimilation of a few masterpieces written from a
spirit somewhat like his own, and of a few masterpieces written from
a spirit not at all like his own. I read all Newman, and then I read
all Swift. The technical processes of literature should be acquired
almost unconsciously on the tide of a great enthusiasm, even syntax,
even sentence-struction; I should like to hope, even spelling. I
am thinking of some words of Renan commenting in the _Souvenirs
d’Enfance et de Jeunesse_ upon his education: “_Pour moi, (je) crois
que la meilleure manière de former des jeunes gens de talent est de
ne jamais leur parler de talent ni de style, mais de les instruire
et d’exciter fortement leur esprit sur les questions philosophiques,
religieuses, politiques, sociales, scientifiques, historiques; en un
mot, de procéder par l’enseignement du fond des choses, et non par
l’enseignement d’une creuse rhétorique._”
The last four plays here have been written within a year and a half.
Almost all the plays in this book are religious, but religious in
that dilute fashion that is a believer’s concession to a contemporary
standard of good manners. But these four plant their flag as boldly as
they may. It is the kind of work that I would most like to do well, in
spite of the fact that there has seldom been an age in literature when
such a vein was less welcome and less understood. I hope, through many
mistakes, to discover the spirit that is not unequal to the elevation
of the great religious themes, yet which does not fall into a repellent
didacticism. Didacticism is an attempt at the coercion of another’s
free mind, even though one knows that in these matters beyond logic,
beauty is the only persuasion. Here the schoolmaster enters again. He
sees all that is fairest in the Christian tradition made repugnant to
the new generations by reason of the diction in which it is expressed.
The intermittent sincerity of generations of clergymen and teachers
have rendered embarrassing and even ridiculous all the terms of the
spiritual life. Nothing succeeds in dampening the aspirations of the
young to-day--who dares use the word “aspiration” without enclosing it,
knowingly, in quotation-marks?--like the names they hear given to them.
The revival of religion is almost a matter of rhetoric. The work is
difficult, perhaps impossible (perhaps all religions die out with the
exhaustion of the language), but it at least reminds us that Our Lord
asked us in His work to be not only as gentle as doves, but as wise as
serpents.
THE DAVIS HOUSE
LAWRENCEVILLE, N. J.
_June, 1928._
_NASCUNTUR POETÆ_ ...
_We are gazing into some strange incomprehensible painting of Piero
di Cosimo; a world of pale blues and greens; of abrupt peaks in
agate and of walled cities; of flying red stags with hounds at
their throats; and of lions in tears beside their crowns. On the
roads are seen traveling companies, in no haste and often lost in
contemplation of the sky. A boy sits on a rock in the foreground.
He is listening to the words of a woman dressed in a chlamys that
takes on the color of the objects about her._
THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS
In a far valley, boy, sit those who in their lifetime have possessed
some special gift of eye or ear or finger. There they sit apart,
choosing their successors. And when on the winds toward birth the souls
of those about to live are borne past them, they choose the brighter
spirits that cry along that wind. And you were chosen.
THE BOY
For what gift, lady, did the choice fall? Am I to mould in clay, or
paint? Shall I sing or mime, lady? What choice fell on me and from what
master?
THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS
It is enough to know that you were chosen.
THE BOY
What further remains to be done? You have poured on my eyes and ears
and mouth the divine ointment; you have laid on my tongue the burning
ember. Why do we delay?
THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS
Be not so eager for life. Too soon you will be shaken by breath; too
soon and too long you will be tossed in the tumult of the senses.
THE BOY
I am not afraid of life. I will astonish it. Why are we delaying?
THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS
My sister is coming now. Listen to her.
[_The woman in the chlamys withdraws and gives place to her
sister whose feet stir not the shells upon the path. She wears
a robe of deep and noble red and bears in her hands a long
golden chain hung about with pendants. Her face is fixed in
concentration and compassion, like the face of one taking part
in a sacrifice of great moment._]
THE BOY
All is ready. What do you come to do?
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
My sister has given you the gifts of pride and of joy. But those are
not all.
THE BOY
What gifts remain? I have been chosen. I am ready.
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
Those gifts are vain without these. He who carries much gold stumbles.
I bring the dark and necessary gifts. This golden chain....
THE BOY
[_With mounting fear._]
Your face is shadowed. Draw back, take back all the gifts, if I must
accept these also.
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
Too late. Too late. You had no choice in this. You must bow your head.
THE BOY
I am trembling. My knees are hot with my tears.
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
Since only tears can give sight to the eyes.
[_She drops the chain about his neck._]
THE BOY
Then am I permitted to know the meaning of these pendants?
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
This is a tongue of fire. It feeds upon the brain. It is a madness that
in a better country has a better name.
THE BOY
These are mysteries. Give them no names.
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
This is a leaf of laurel from a tree not often plucked. You shall know
pride and the shining of the eyes--of that I do not speak now.
THE BOY
And this, lady?
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
That is a staff and signifies the journey that awaits you your life
long; for you are homeless.
THE BOY
And this ... this is of crystal....
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
That is yours alone, and you shall smart for it. It is wonderful and
terrible. Others shall know a certain peace and shall live well enough
in the limits of the life they know; but you shall be forever hindered.
For you there shall be ever beyond the present a lost meaning and a
more meaningful love.
THE BOY
Take back the chain. Take back your gifts. Take back life. For at its
end what can there be that is worth such pain?
THE WOMAN IN DEEP RED
[_Slowly drawing back into the shadow of the wood._]
Farewell, child of the muses, playfellow in the bird-haunted groves.
The life of man awaits you, the light laughter and the misery in the
same day, in the selfsame hour the trivial and the divine. You are to
give it a voice. Among the bewildered and the stammering thousands you
are to give it a voice and to mark its meaning. Farewell, child of the
muses, playfellow in the bird-haunted....
[THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS _returns_.]
THE WOMAN IN THE CHLAMYS
You must go now. Listen to that wind. It is the great fan of time that
whirls on the soul for a season.
THE BOY
Stay a moment. I am not yet brave.
[_She leads him into a grotto and the young soul and his chain are
lost in the profound shade._]
_PROSERPINA AND THE DEVIL_
A PLAY FOR MARIONETTES
_A puppet-show has been set up in Venice_, 1640 A.D. _The characters
of this play are its manager and two manipulators; the puppets
are_ DEMETER, PROSERPINA, HERMES and DÎS.
THE MANAGER
[_Winningly._]
Citizens and little citizens! We are going to give you a delicious
foretaste of our great performance this afternoon, to which the whole
world is coming. This is a pantomime about how a beautiful girl named
Proserpina was snatched away by the Devil; and how her mother searched
for her over all the hills of the world; and how at last she was able
to bring her back to the earth for six months out of every year.
THE FIRST MANIPULATOR
[_Behind the scenes._]
Let go them strings.
THE MANAGER
At our great performance this afternoon this same play will be given
_with words_; and besides it the story of the brave Melusina and her
wanderings when she was driven out of Parma.
THE SECOND MANIPULATOR
[_His voice rising in anger._]
You don’t have to show me!
THE MANAGER
On with the play!--but don’t forget to bring your rich aunts this
afternoon.
[_To the Manipulators._]
Hurry through with it. I’m off for a cup of wine.
[_The curtain rises with indecent haste and shows the underworld.
The rivers Styx and Acheron have been replaced by a circular
piece of cloth, sulphur-colored, with waves delicately
embroidered about the margin. This is the Lake of Wrath and
in it are seen floating arms and legs--all that are left,
alas, of great puppets_, ABRAHAM, PENELOPE _and_ JEPHTHA’S
_daughter_, MIDAS _and_ HARLEQUIN. _Beside the lake_ PROSERPINA
_is straying, robed in bluish black as one anticipating grief_.
PLUTO--_now a medieval Satan--is stealthily approaching her.
Suddenly_ PROSERPINA _throws up her arms, runs to him and
buries her face in his scarlet bosom_. NOAH’S ARK--_mutely
protesting against the part it must play, with all its
Christianized animals within it, of_ CHARON’S _barge--is
lowered from the proscenium and the curtain falls_.]
THE FIRST MANIPULATOR
[_Sotto voce._]
Beard of Medusa! You made her run in the wrong direction: the hussy
courted death. Didn’t I tell you he was to chase her three times around
the lake?
THE SECOND MANIPULATOR
[_Sulkily._]
I don’t care. A person can’t tell which is his right hand and which is
his left in this place.
THE FIRST MANIPULATOR
Here, you let me take her; you take the Devil.--Got the orange?
[_When the puppets are next seen_ PROSERPINA _is exhibiting grief
in pantomime. Her lord with affectionate gestures urges her to
eat of a yellow pomegranate. Sadly she puts it to her mouth.
With an odd recollection of the Garden of Eden, she tempts him
into eating the remaining half. They go out cheerlessly._]
THE FIRST MANIPULATOR
All right for that. Now I’ll take the mother and the Devil. You take
the other fellow and the daughter.
[DEMETER, _a handsome Italian matron in a wide gown of brocade,
enters with her arms outstretched. At her elbow_ HERMES, _the
Archangel Gabriel, guides her through the Lake of Perdition_.
PROSERPINA _and her husband return and throw up their hands in
amazement. Again the frantic girl runs in the wrong direction
and casts herself into the arms of Satan._ DEMETER _tries to
draw her away, but a matter of pins and hooks-and-eyes prevents
her rescue_.]
THE FIRST MANIPULATOR
Oh, you Gazoon! You lack-eyed Silenus! Your hands are nothing but feet.
THE SECOND MANIPULATOR
The Devil take your show and you with it.
[_The altercation behind the scenes grows out of bounds and one
blow knocks down the stage. The Archangel falls upon the
pavement and is cherished by gamins unto the third generation;
the Devil rolls into the Lake_; PROSERPINA _is struck by a
falling cloud, and lies motionless on her face_; DEMETER _by
reason of the stiffness of her brocade stands upright, viewing
with staring eyes the ills of her daughter_.]
_FANNY OTCOTT_
_That great actress_, MRS. OTCOTT, _an actress in the tradition of
the Siddons, the Oldfield, Bracegirdle, O’Neill, is spending a
quiet month in Wales. We do not see the cottage; we do not even
see the mountains, but there is a stretch of lawn on whose gentle
slope there stands an ancient round tower overgrown with ivy. In
the shadow of this Arthurian monument_ MRS. OTCOTT _has placed a
table whereon she is sorting old engravings, playbills, letters,
contracts, ribbons--in short, her past. She is still the handsome,
humorous, Irish soul from whom every item out of the old trunks
exacts its exclamation, its gesture, its renewed indignation or
pleasure. She is attended by a blackamoor boy in livery, half
asleep against a flower-pot._
MRS. OTCOTT
Sampson! Tay!
SAMPSON
[_Springing up._]
Yes, mam. Wid or widout a streak o’ cream?
MRS. OTCOTT
Widout. And Sampson, tell Pence I am not at home. Not even to the one
in the yellow curls, or to the good black beard. And if they seem to
know that I am at home, tell them ... that I have gone up the tower,
or that I have the vapors.
SAMPSON
You wants tea widout, and tell Mrs. Pence you don’t want to see none of
de gentlemen from de Village Inn,--dat you has de vapors.
MRS. OTCOTT
There! Do you see that, Sampson? I wore that the night the King dined
with me on the stage.
SAMPSON
[_His eyes as big as soup-plates._]
King ... James!
MRS. OTCOTT
[_Shuddering._]
No, stupid--Charles.--Go away!--This afternoon I shall devote to
another woman, to another and a different woman and yet to myself, to
myself, to myself.
SAMPSON
I’ll tell Mrs. Pence.
[_He goes out._ MRS. OTCOTT _picks up a packet of letters. One
look, tosses them away, then rises muttering, goes and stamps
on them and laughs. She returns to pick up a playbill and reads
the heading with glistening eyes_: “FANNY OTCOTT _as Faizella
in the ‘Princess of Cathay.’ First time.” She strides about
lost in thought. She almost walks into a gentleman who has
entered through the hedge. He is wearing a black hat and cape,
and has a serious worn face._]
ATCHESON
Your servant, Mrs. Otcott.
MRS. OTCOTT
[_Thunderstruck._]
Why, _no_! Yes! By the garter, it is George Atcheson. Oh! Oh! Oh!
ATCHESON
I do not disturb you, Mrs. Otcott? I ... I came to discuss a thing that
is very serious to me.
MRS. OTCOTT
[_Suddenly very pleased._]
Everything is--sit down, my friend. You always were very serious.
That’s why you made such a bad Hamlet. Delay your serious talk, George,
and tell me about the women you have loved since you loved me, and
confess that I finally made them all unendurable to you.
ATCHESON
You misunderstand me, Mrs. Otcott....
MRS. OTCOTT
[_Loudly._]
Fanny.
ATCHESON
Ah ... Fanny?
MRS. OTCOTT
All you need is a little coaxing. Well, George, a woman drove you on
to the stage when you were preparing for the Church, and a woman drove
you off, and it was my greatest service to the stage. Look, George, you
remember me as Faizella in the _Princess of Cathay_. I never did better
than that. Great Rufus, you played opposite me in it. Look!
ATCHESON
Perhaps you remember.... I lost consciousness....
MRS. OTCOTT
Ah yes! The pale divinity student fainted. Oh! George, you were
the first of my lovers. No, it wasn’t love, perhaps, but it was
beautiful. It was like hawthorn-buds and meadow-larks and Mr. Handel’s
Water-music. And since, I have never ceased searching for love. Perhaps
love strikes the first time or never at all. Then I was too much in
love with my work. And oh, George, how young we were! But you were
very dear to me in the old garret, and I’m sorry to see you’re growing
stout, for it’s one more reminder that I shall probably live and die
without having known the lightning of love.
[_She sits down with a great flow of silken draperies and shakes
her head at him ruefully._]
ATCHESON
I have come to discuss our ... our association....
MRS. OTCOTT
Thunder and Hell! don’t you call that an association!
ATCHESON
... but my view of it is very different.
[_Her shoe commences to mark time nervously on the turf._]
After my retirement from the Stage I resumed my theological studies,
and I am now Bishop of Westholmstead.
[_The shoe is now motionless._]
None of my friends know of that ... that experience in my life, but
it has always remained as a bitter ... as a distressing spot in my
conscience.
MRS. OTCOTT
[_After a pause, very rapidly._]
I see, you want to make a clean breast of the perilous stuff. You want
to make a public confession, probably. You are married?
ATCHESON
Yes.
MRS. OTCOTT
You have several sons probably?
ATCHESON
Yes.
MRS. OTCOTT
And you lie awake nights, saying: Hypocrisy, hypocrisy.
[_Pause._]
Well, make your confession. But why consult me?
ATCHESON
I have followed your course, madam, and seen the growing admiration
your art commands in Court,--I might almost say in the Church.
MRS. OTCOTT
You do not suppose that that revelation would cast any deeper shadow
on the good name of Fanny Otcott, such as it is. Remember, George,
the months you call sinful. It wasn’t love, perhaps, but it was grace
and poetry. The heavens rained odors on us. It was as childlike and
harmless as paintings on fans. I was a girl tragedienne reciting verses
endlessly before a mirror and you were a young student who for the
first time had seen a young girl braid her hair and sing at her work.
Since then you have learned long names from books and heard a great
many sneers from women as old as myself. You have borrowed your ideas
from those who have never begun to live and who dare not.
ATCHESON
[_His head in his hands and his elbows on his knees._]
I do not know what to think. Your reasoning is full of perils.
MRS. OTCOTT
Go away and tell your congregations what you please. I feel as though
you were communicating to my mind some of those pitiable remorses
that have weakened you. I have sinned, but I have not that year on my
conscience. It is that year and my playing of Faizella that will bring
troops of angels to welcome me to Paradise. Go away and tell your
congregations what you please.
ATCHESON
You give me no help in the matter, Mrs. Otcott.
MRS. OTCOTT
Go away. In the name of Heaven, go!
[_Crooked with doubt and hesitation, the Bishop of Westholmstead
goes out through the hedge. For a few moments_ MRS. OTCOTT
_sits on the table, swinging one foot and muttering savagely in
an imaginary conversation_.]
[_Reënter_ SAMPSON _with a tray_.]
SAMPSON
Three gentlemen waited on you from de Village Inn, but Mrs. Pence sent
dem away. She said you was up de tower, mam.
MRS. OTCOTT
[_Showily._]
Go call them back, Sampson. Tell them I have come down from de tower.
Bring up the best box of wine, the one with my picture painted on it. I
shall be young again.
_BROTHER FIRE_
_A hut in the mountains of Northern Italy._ ANNUNZIATA, _a peasant
woman, is preparing the evening meal over the fire. Her daughter_,
ISOLA, _about eight years of age, is playing beside her_.
ANNUNZIATA
Now, now! Not so near. One of these days you’ll be falling into the
fire and there’ll be nothing left to tell us about you but your shoes.
Put them on and get out the bowls for supper.
ISOLA
I like to play with the fire.
ANNUNZIATA
What a thing to say!
ISOLA
I’d like to let my hair into it, gently, gently, gently, gently.
ANNUNZIATA
Don’t you hear me tell you it’s a wicked thing?
ISOLA
Brother Francis says it’s our brother, and one of the best things in
the world.
ANNUNZIATA
Tchk, Tchk! What makes the starling sing in his cage all of a sudden?
ISOLA
It’s Brother Francis himself looking at us.
ANNUNZIATA
Tell him to come in and have some supper.
ISOLA
Come in, my mother says, and have some supper.
[FRANCIS _appears at the door. He blesses the house._]
BROTHER FRANCIS
I can very well go on to my own supper and need not lighten your kettle.
ANNUNZIATA
Come in, Brother Francis. What you take will not even make a new ring
around the kettle. Besides, I see you have been up to the top of the
mountain again. You are cold and wet. Come and sit by the fire.
BROTHER FRANCIS
Yes, I have been up to the very top since yesterday, among the rocks
and the birds in the rocks. Brother Wind was there and Sister Rain was
there, but Brother Fire was not.
ANNUNZIATA
Now you sit by him, Isola, while I get some more wood; but don’t ask
him any questions. Now, Brother, put this fur skin across your knees.
[_She goes out._]
ISOLA
What did you do, Brother Francis?
BROTHER FRANCIS
I watched and waited to see what they would let me see. For a long
while there was nothing; then they nodded to one another, meaning that
it was permitted to me. I watched seven stars closely. Suddenly they
turned and fled inwards, and I saw the Queen of Heaven leading forth
her company before all the shipwrecked seamen of this world.--However,
do not tell thy mother, for she believes in no one’s miracles but her
own.
ISOLA
My mother says the fire is a wicked thing.
BROTHER FRANCIS
[_Turning._]
What, Sister Annunziata, how can you say that?--Why, what would cook
your broth, what would keep you warm? And when you return from the
mountain-tops, what else shines out from all the friendly windows of
the world? Look at its flames, how they lean towards us!
ISOLA
It says: Give me something to eat. Give me something to eat.
BROTHER FRANCIS
[_Excitedly._]
Yes, yes. Its warmth is a kind of hunger. I have a love for all things
in fur, feathers and scales, but I have not less a love for the fire
that warms us.
[_He edges the cloak into the fire._]
Look how it reaches for it. Wicked? Wicked? Never.
ISOLA
But, Brother Francis, it will ... it will....
[_The flames suddenly seize the cloak._ FRANCIS _rises, wrapped in
fire_.]
Brother Francis, you are on fire! Mother, mother!
[_She rushes from the hut and returns with her mother._ ANNUNZIATA
_snatches the fur from_ BROTHER FRANCIS _and throws it into the
hearth_.]
BROTHER FRANCIS
[_Still standing ecstatically with lifted hands._]
Eat, Brother Fire. I knew you wanted this. I knew that you loved me too.
[_He looks about him; then ruefully to_ ANNUNZIATA.]
Sister, you have spoiled his supper.
ANNUNZIATA
[_With somber and averted face._]
I do not know what you mean. Here is your bowl of broth. Sit down and
eat it.
BROTHER FRANCIS
Sister, do not be angry with me.
ANNUNZIATA
[_Breaking out._]
Come now, should we kill everything, the animals for their furs, yes,
and one another, to feed them to the fire? Is it not enough that it
takes our good pine tree by our road? There, that is logic, Brother
Francis.
BROTHER FRANCIS
Bring me not logic, sister. She is the least of the handmaids of Love.
I am often troubled when she speaks.
ANNUNZIATA
Must we give what makes us often warm, for that which makes us warm
only for a moment?
BROTHER FRANCIS
[_Waving his wooden spoon about humorously._]
My mind is strangely light to-night, like the flames that play about
the relics of Saint James. I could wander again through the whole night.
ANNUNZIATA
Where is your mother that she should watch over you? Had I not these
other duties I should leave everything and watch over you myself.
BROTHER FRANCIS
She is in Paradise with a golden crook, leading the flames that died
of hunger in this wicked world. She leads them to pasture on drifts of
dried leaves. Look, Isola, I know that there is flame to burn all evil
in the Lake of the Damned. I do not speak of that now,--but I know also
that fire is at all times useful to the great Blessed. It surrounds
them and they dwell in it. And even now....
[_And so on._]
_THE PENNY THAT BEAUTY SPENT_
_The little heartbreak takes place in a rococo jeweler’s shop in
Paris. The shop is elegantly small and elegantly polished. The few
jewels and the few pieces of brocade are tossed from surface to
surface in a world of glass, from the chandelier to the mirrors
and from the mirrors to the cases. It is Royalty’s own place of
purchase and the great egotistical head is present in bust and in
miniature and on the backs of spoons. The old jeweler, enigmatic
and smiling, is suddenly called to the door by a great clatter.
A girl enters borne on the shoulders of a boy little older than
herself._ LA GRACILE _is thin and pinch-faced, but long penury
has only made her the more elfin. Illness is already writing its
progress in the eyes and on the brow of_ QUINTE, _her husband.
But they are deliciously happy and full of their secrets._ QUINTE
_lifts her onto the counter and draws back_.
LA GRACILE
While you are with me I need never touch the ground. You can carry me
from cushion to cushion.
QUINTE
And on your gravestone will be inscribed: Here lies an exquisite
dancer, she who never touched the ground.
LA GRACILE
And beside mine yours will read: Here lies her husband, the soul of her
life, the sole of her shoes.
THE JEWELER
Mademoiselle is in pain? The feet of Mademoiselle are in pain?
LA GRACILE
[_After she has recovered, with_ QUINTE, _from the whirlwind of
intimate amusement that this preposterous idea has caused
them_.]
No. I am the new dancer. I am La Gracile. Except when I dance I wear
nothing on my feet but little velvet pockets. So when I am not wearing
my practice slippers, my husband carries me about.
THE JEWELER
Oh, you are La Gracile. We have already heard of your great success
last night. The King is delighted with you.
LA GRACILE
[_Shrilly, clapping her hands._]
Yes, yes, yes. I was a great success. Even the King’s favorite, Madame
d’Hautillon, was jealous. She tried to stand on my foot. They call me
the moth of Versailles.
THE JEWELER
And now the King has sent you here to choose a present for yourself.
LA GRACILE
How did you know?
THE JEWELER
The King sends to me for a gift every young lady who pleases him.
Madame d’Hautillon was here last.
LA GRACILE
[_Chattering on._]
I want nothing myself. It is to be for Quinte. A chronometer, please,
that strikes every hour with a gavotte and midnight with a sarabande.
QUINTE
Nothing for me, Claire-Louise. When my cough returns it will shake
every ornament off me, the buttons from my coat, the rings from my thin
fingers. You must have something in pearls.
LA GRACILE
Silly Quinte, I want nothing.
QUINTE
But I suppose.... You must wear something for the King.
LA GRACILE
[_Suddenly under a passing cloud of melancholy, resting her cheek
on his hair, plaintively._]
I do not want a great showy pin on my breast. I want only a little
white daisy from our beloved Brittany, from Grandmother’s field that
had too many stones.
QUINTE
Tell her what you have, Monsieur Jeweler.
THE JEWELER
Mademoiselle will look at this chain? Its art is secret. It is painted
gold, the work of aged nuns in Hamburg.
QUINTE
Oh look, Claire-Louise, this flower for your hair. Many topazes were
splintered to powder on the wheel before this perfect one.
THE JEWELER
Etiquette forbids, Mademoiselle, your buying that; it happens to be the
very thing that Madame d’Hautillon bought for herself.
LA GRACILE
[_Arousing herself, imperiously._]
Have you a little fat chronometer with many jewels in it?
THE JEWELER
[_Proffering a tray._]
The best in Paris.
LA GRACILE
[_Giving one to_ QUINTE.]
That is for you, Quinte, from myself and from the dull King. Like my
thoughts, it will rest on your heart, but long after it is sold as wire
and rust my love will go on in the land where clocks do not mark off
one sad moment from another.
QUINTE
[_With tears._]
Claire-Louise, it can be of no pleasure to me. In a while it will only
please me because it is a little cool in my hot hand.
LA GRACILE
[_Softly, in pain._]
Courage, dearest Quinte, courage.
THE JEWELER
[_Interrupting formally._]
Remember, Mademoiselle, that etiquette demands that you will choose a
present that His Majesty will admire on you.
LA GRACILE
[_Stormily._]
I shall choose what I please.
THE JEWELER
[_Insinuatingly._]
Your life is only to please the King. He has chosen you. By sending you
here he is telling you that.
LA GRACILE
You are mistaken.... But I am only a poor thin dancer that ... that has
worked too hard. Besides, this is my husband.
THE JEWELER
[_Smiling._]
No, Mademoiselle, he is not your husband.
LA GRACILE
[_Jumps down and walks away, weeping bitterly, her little
feet-sacks flopping against the polished floor. She suddenly
turns with blazing eyes._]
I shall run away to Brittany.... I shall scratch his eyes out.
THE JEWELER
[_Smiles at this foolish notion and leans across the counter,
holding towards her a great jewel-encrusted buckle._]
LA GRACILE
[_Wildly._]
Even though all Versailles kill me with steel pins, Quinte shall have
the watch.
[_But he has fallen among the gilt chairs._]
_THE ANGEL ON THE SHIP_
_The fore-deck of the_ NANCY BRAY _lying disabled in mid-ocean. The
figurehead of the ship has been torn from its place and nailed to
the forepost, facing the stern,--back to back, as it were, with
its former position. It is the half-length of an angel bearing
wreaths; she is highly colored and buxom and has flowing yellow
hair. On the deck lie three persons in the last stages of rags and
exhaustion_: MINNA, _the captain’s wife, the remnant of a stout,
coarse woman_; VAN, _the under-cook, a little, sharp youth; and a
fat, old, sleepy member of the crew_, JAMAICA SAM.
VAN
[_Driving the last nail into the figurehead._]
There she is. She’s the new gawd of the Atlantic. It’s only a she-gawd,
but that’s a good enough gawd for a sailor.
MINNA
[_Seated on the deck._]
Us’ll call her Lily. That’s a name like a god’s.
SAM
Youm be quick. Youm say your prayers quick.
MINNA
[_Blubbering._]
Her can’t hear us. Her’s just the old figgerhead we had thirty years.
VAN
Her’s an angel. Her knows everything.
[_He throws himself on his knees and lays his forehead on the
boards. In a hoarse whisper._]
That’s the joss way. We all got t’do it.
[_The others do likewise._]
SAM
Us’ll pray in turns. Us must be quick. There ain’t no more water to
drink, and there ain’t no more sails left to carry us on. Us’ll have to
be quick. Youm begin, Van. Youms a great lad with the words.
VAN
[_With real fanaticism._]
Great Gawd Lily, on the ship “Nancy Bray,” all’s lost with us if you
don’t bring us rain to drink. All the secret water I saved aside is
drunk up, and we got to go over the side with the rest, if you don’t
bring us rain to-day,--or to-morrow. Youm allus been the angel on the
front of this yere ship “Nancy Bray” and you ain’t goin’ to leave us
rot now. I finished my prayer, great gawd Lily. Amen.
MINNA
Great God Lily, I’m the captain’s wife that’s sailed behind you for
twenty years. Many’s the time, great God Lily, that I shined your face
so you’d look spick and span and we sailing into London in the morning,
or into heathen lands. You knows everything, and you knows what I did
to my husband and that I didn’t let him have none of the secret water
that me and Van saved up, and that when he died he knew it and cursed
me and Van to hell. But youms forgiven everything and send us some rain
or bye-and-bye we’ll die and there’ll be no one here prayin’ to you.
This is the end of my prayin’, great God Lily.
VAN
[_Whispers._]
Say Amen.
MINNA
Amen, great God Lily.
SAM
I ain’t goin’ to pray. I’m just a dog that’s been on the sea since I
was born. I don’ know no land eddication.
MINNA
We all got to pray for some rain.
VAN
You got t’say your word, too.
SAM
God forgive me, great God Lily, I’m old Jamaica Sam that don’t never go
ashore. Amen. I’d be drowned, too, only for Van and the captain’s wife
who gave me some of the secret water, so that if they died I could
roll ’em over the side and not leave ’em on the clean deck. Amen. Youms
known my whole life, great God Lily, and how I stole the Portagee’s red
bag, only it was almost empty, and ... and that other thing. Send a lot
of rain and a ship to save us. Amen.
VAN
[_Crawling up beneath the figure and throwing himself full-length,
hysterically._]
You’ve gone and forgiven me everything. Sure you have. I didn’t kill
the captain. The secret water was mine. Save us now, great gawd Lily,
and bring me back to my uncle in Amsterdam and make him leave me his
three coal barges.
MINNA
[_Rocking herself._]
We’m lost. She’ll save Sam, but I’ve done what the gods don’t like.
They’m after me. They’ve got me now.
[_Suddenly staring off the deck._]
Van! Van! Them’s a ship coming to us. Van, look!
[_She falls back crying._]
VAN
Them’s comin’!
SAM
[_Trying to jump up and down._]
It’s the “Maria Theresa Third,” comin’ right at us.
VAN
[_His eye falls on the angel._]
What’ll they say to the figgerhead here?
SAM
[_Sententiously._]
But that’s the great God Lily. Her’s saved us. You ain’t goin’ to do
anything to her?
VAN
[_Starting to beat the angel forward with his hammer._]
They’ll call us heathen, bowin’ down to wood and stone. Get the rope,
Sam. We’ll put her back.
MINNA
[_Frightened._]
But I can’t never forget her and her great starey eyes. Her I’ve prayed
to.
_THE MESSAGE AND JEHANNE_
_The interior of a goldsmith’s shop in the Paris of the Renaissance.
The tops of the windows are just above the level of the street,
and through them we see the procession of shoes, any one of them
a novel or a play or a poem. In the workshop one finds not only
medals and salad forks for prelates, but unexpected things, a
viola d’amore and folios ruled for music._
[TULLIO, _the apprentice, enters from the street and confronts his
master_, CHARLES OF BENICET. TULLIO _stands with his back to
the door and lets his breath out slowly, as one who has just
accomplished a great work_.]
CHARLES
[_Rubbing his hands._]
So you delivered the rings?
TULLIO
Yes, master.
CHARLES
And what did my little brown Jacquenetta say?
TULLIO
She twice read the verse you had written in the ring. Then she looked
at me. Then she looked at the ring. “It is too cold,” she said.
CHARLES
Too cold?
TULLIO
She said: “But ... but I suppose it’s what must go inside a ring!” Then
she kissed the ring and bade me tell you she loved it.
CHARLES
[_Arrested and puzzled._]
Too cold, the verse!--But I’ll make her another. We forget how they
love us. And the other ring? Did you deliver the Graf’s ring to the
Lady Jehanne herself?
TULLIO
Yes, master. Into her very own hand. Her house is very old and in a bad
part of the city. As I crossed the court and stood in the hall a great
German, with fierce eyebrows, came in from the street with me.
CHARLES
Yes, that’s the one she’s to marry.
TULLIO
He asked me loudly what I had there. And I said, a box for the Lady
Jehanne, and that it was for her hand alone, and I ran to the landing
on the stairs. Then she came out herself. He cried out upon her: What
gift was she receiving? And was it from a certain English student at
Padua? And she said: “No, Baron, it is the wedding ring you have sent
me.” And when I gave it to her she went in, very white, and without
speaking to him. Then I went to Jacquenetta’s with the other ring, and
she gave me some supper.
CHARLES
Too cold, the verse! Start putting up the shutters; I must go and see
her.
[_It has been growing darker. Suddenly a pair of shoes, a poem
these, descends from the crowd, and_ TULLIO _opens the door to
a knock. A beautiful lady gives Christian greeting, and a seat
is made for her among the littered chairs. She sits in silence
until_ TULLIO _has lighted the candles and retired_.]
JEHANNE
You are Charles of Benicet, master in precious metals?
CHARLES
_Carolus Benizentius auro argentoque magister_, and composer of music
to God and to such men whose ears He chooses to open.
JEHANNE
You are a composer too?
CHARLES
They are callings like two sisters who have ever their arms about
the other’s neck. When I have made a wedding ring I compose a motet
thereto. The boy who calls to see if the candlesticks are done takes
back with him a Mass.
JEHANNE
[_Without a breath._]
Oh!
CHARLES
Can I serve you with music or with metals?
JEHANNE
You have served me to-day. I am the Lady Jehanne.
CHARLES
Ah, yes! The ring was unsatisfactory? I can make another to-night. I
shall set about it at once.
JEHANNE
No, master. The ring is very beautiful.
CHARLES
[_After a pause, pretending to be embarrassed._]
I am overjoyed that it pleases you.
JEHANNE
[_Suddenly._]
The verses that you put in the rings--where do you find _them_?
CHARLES
Unless there is a special request, my lady, I put in nothing but the
traditional legend: _fidelitas carior vita_.
JEHANNE
[_Without reproach._]
But there are liberties you allow yourself? Master, what meant you when
you wrote within my ring?
CHARLES
My lady!
JEHANNE
[_Giving him the ring._]
Graf Klaus addresses me thus.
CHARLES
[_Reading around the inside of the ring._]
“As the hermit his twilight, the countryman his holiday, the worshiper
his peace, so do I love thee.” It was the wrong ring that was delivered
to you, my lady.
JEHANNE
It has broken my will. I am in flight for Padua. My family are truly
become nothing but sparrows and God will feed them.
_CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME_
_The sun has set over the great marsh, leaving a yellow-brown Flemish
light upon the scene. In the midst of the mire and among the tufts
of iron-grass stands an old round-tower. Its lower narrow door is
of green bronze, scarred with many assaults. Above the door are
two small windows, behind which a gleam seems to come and go._
_In the half-light that hangs over the plain a man in armor stumbles
through the bog to the single step before the door. He is many
times wounded; his blood flows freely to the ground. The knight
blows his horn; the landscape collects itself to listen._
CHILDE ROLAND
I die.... Open the door to me.
[_The landscape laughs, then falls suddenly silent. Presently
its subterranean waters are again heard sucking at buried
tree-trunks._]
I have seen your lights here from a long way off.... You cannot hide
from me now.
[_The marsh becomes animated and fully interested in the stranger.
One of the windows brightens slightly and a girl looks out.
Her voice and manner are strangely detached and impersonal, as
though she had been called away from some absorbing interest,
and were eager to return to it._]
Oh, you are here! Quick, descend to me. All my wounds are flowing. I am
dying of thirst.
THE GIRL
Who are you to issue commands against this tower? Some emperor, surely.
CHILDE ROLAND
My name is written with many another upon the sword of Charlemagne:
that is enough.
THE GIRL
You are some king, perhaps,--driven into the wilderness by your not too
loving subjects?
CHILDE ROLAND
No king, but a friend and soldier of kings.
THE GIRL
Oh! This is some wise counselor. If you are so wise we will quickly
open the door to you.
CHILDE ROLAND
Not wise, but often listened to in grave matters, having a voice equal
with many others.
THE GIRL
[_Utterly untouched, lightly to someone within._]
I do believe this is some sweet singer. Let us bind on our slippers
right quickly and put red wine to his lips, for poets are ever our
delight.
CHILDE ROLAND
I am no singer, but one loving the string and the voice at all times.
Open the door! For the wind is cold on the marsh, and the first
terrible stars are stepping into their chains. Open the door, for my
veins are emptied on your sill.
THE GIRL
[_Leaning far out, while her red hair falls almost to his
shoulders._]
Beat upon the door, Sir Knight. Many things are gained by force.
CHILDE ROLAND
My hands are strengthless.... I am fallen on my knees.... Pity me!
[THE GIRL _laughs pleasantly to her companion within_.]
Reach over the stars to me, Mary, Mother of God. To you I was committed
in my first year, and have renewed yearly my promises. Send from thy
golden mind and thy noiseless might the issue out of this difficulty.
[_A second girl, dark and thoughtful, appears at the other
window._]
THE FIRST GIRL
[_Intimately._]
He is praying now.
THE DARK GIRL
He is a little boy. His thoughts this last hour are returning to his
earliest year.
THE FIRST GIRL
Is it not beautiful that a Knight should think of a little child?
THE DARK GIRL
What brought you here, Knight-at-arms?
CHILDE ROLAND
The battle passed suddenly into the west. This tower was all I could
see. And here I brought my wounds.
THE FIRST GIRL
[_Softly._]
You see he is still able to reason; he reasons very well.
THE DARK GIRL
What led you to think that we could help you?
CHILDE ROLAND
I know your name! All my life I have heard of this tower. They say that
on the outside you are dark and unlovely, but that within every hero
stands with his fellows and the great queens step proudly on the stair.
THE DARK GIRL
And do you believe this?
CHILDE ROLAND
[_After a pause._]
Yes.
[_With sudden fury._]
Open the door! There is a place for me within. Open the door, Death!
THE FIRST GIRL
[_Drawing up her hair languidly._]
He is irresistible, this great man.
CHILDE ROLAND
Oliver! Oliver! Charlemagne! I hear your voices. It is I, Roland,
without, in the dark marsh. My body I cast away for you. My breath I
returned to the sky in your defense. Open the door!...
[_The marsh is a little put out by all this strong feeling. It
lies quiet. The door slowly opens upon a hall full of drifting
violet mists, some of which escape and fade over the marsh. The
girl with the red hair is seen walking away in the hall, her
mocking face looking back over her shoulder. The dark girl,
robed in gray, leans across the threshold extending a chalice
to the Knight’s lips._]
THE DARK GIRL
Take courage, high heart. How slow you have been to believe well of us.
You gave us such little thought while living that we have made this
little delay at your death.
_CENTAURS_
_The usual chattering audience of our theaters is waiting for the
curtains to part on a performance of Ibsen’s_ THE MASTER BUILDER.
_Presently the lights are lowered to a colored darkness, and the
warm glow of the footlights begins again the ancient magic. The
orchestra draws its bows soothingly to a gradual close and files
out gropingly into the rabbit-hutch prepared for it, leaving
perhaps a sentimental viola-player staring upward into the
darkness. Suddenly the curtains are parted by an earnest young
man, who stares into the shadowy audience and starts, with some
difficulty, to address it._
SHELLEY
My name is Shelley. I ... I am told that some of you may have heard
of me, may even know my poems,--or some of my poems. I cannot imagine
what they may seem like to you who live in this world that ... that
is, I have just seen your streets for the first time,--your machines,
your buildings, and especially the machines with which you talk to one
another. My poems must seem very strange in a world of such things.
[_Awkward pause._]
Well, I wanted to say something about this play, but I don’t know how
to put it into words for you. You see, I feel that, in part, I wrote
this play.
[_With sudden relief calling back through the curtains._]
Hilda! Will you help me a moment?
HILDA WANGEL’S VOICE
Yes, I’m coming.
SHELLEY
[_Constrainedly, to the audience._]
A friend of mine.
HILDA
[_Appears in her mountaineering costume of the First Act, carrying
an alpenstock. Vigorously, to the audience._]
He promised to do this by himself, but he has gotten into difficulties.
Have you told them that you wrote it?
SHELLEY
I tried to. It didn’t sound reasonable.
HILDA
Well, you were able to explain it to me. Help me to persuade Papa to
come out here.
[_She disappears._]
SHELLEY
Hendrick, for my sake.
HILDA’S VOICE
There, did you hear that? For his sake, he said. Miss Fosli, will you
kindly push forward the wicker settee from the last act? Thank you.
[_A wicker settee suddenly appears._]
Now, Papa.
[_Hilda reappears leading the dramatist. Ibsen is smiling sternly
through his spectacles and through his fringe of up-curling
white whiskers._]
Now sit down and Shelley will begin again.
IBSEN
Hurry, young man. My beautiful play is ready to begin. The kingdom
is on the table, the nurseries are empty, and this house is full of
unconverted people.
HILDA
[_Touching his shoe with the tip of her alpenstock._]
Hush, Papa. Let him go about it in his own way. Have you told them
about the poem you were about to write when you died?
SHELLEY
No.
[_To the audience._]
Ladies and Gentlemen, on the day I died,--drowned in the
Mediterranean,--I was full of a poem to be called THE DEATH OF A
CENTAUR, that I did not have time to put on paper.
HILDA
You forgot to say that it was a very good poem.
SHELLEY
I couldn’t say that.
HILDA
You said it to me.
[_Turning to the audience._]
You should know that this young man had come to a time when everything
he wrote was valuable. He was as sure to write great poems as a good
apple tree is to give good apples.
SHELLEY
Perhaps it would have been one of the better ones. At all events, it
was never written....
IBSEN
[_Rising excitedly and stamping his feet as though they had snow
on them._]
And I claim that I wrote it. The poem hung for a while above the
Mediterranean, and then drifted up toward the Tyrol and I caught it and
wrote it down. And it is THE MASTER BUILDER.
HILDA
Now you must sit down, Papa, and keep calm. We must reason this out
calmly. In the first place, both are certainly about centaurs. What do
you say, Shelley?
SHELLEY
Well, it is not a strange idea, or a new one, that the stuff of which
masterpieces are made drifts about the world waiting to be clothed
with words. It is a truth that Plato would have understood that
the mere language, the words of a masterpiece are the least of its
offerings. Nay, in the world we have come into now, the languages of
the planet have no value; but the impulse, the idea of “Comus” is a
miracle, even in heaven. Let you remember this when you regret the
work that has been lost through this war that has been laid upon your
treasurable young men. The work they might have done is still with you,
and will yet find its way into your lives and into your children’s
lives.
IBSEN
Enough, enough! You will be revealing all the mysteries soon. Enough
has been said to prove that THE DEATH OF A CENTAUR and THE MASTER
BUILDER are the same poem. Get in with you, children. The play is ready
to start. Solness sits with his head in his hands and the harps are in
the air.
[_He goes behind the curtains. Shelley lingers a moment; a shadow
has fallen across his face._]
HILDA
[_Laying her hand on his arm._]
What is the matter?
SHELLEY
That reminded me ... of another poem ... I did not write down.
_LEVIATHAN_
MID-MEDITERRANEAN. _Sunrise after a night of storm with the sea
swaying prodigiously. A great Venetian argosy has been wrecked
overnight; ships and men have disappeared, leaving only the cargo
spread out upon the waters. Momently new treasures from the ship’s
holds float upward and, reaching the surface, are swept hither and
thither for miles: Persian rugs, great lengths of brocade, boxes
of spice, made from tropical leaves and bound with dried vine; and
an apparently interminable swathe of gray silk unwinding from its
ivory standard._
_In the foreground a mermaid is feeling her way among the stuffs
with considerable distaste. To one used to the shadowed harmonies
of deep-sea color these crimsons and oranges have no attraction._
BRIGOMEÏDÉ _has the green wiry hair of her kind, entangled with
the friendly snail; the iridescent shoulders of all sea-women, and
the gray thin mouth_.
_Suddenly she comes upon_ THE PRINCE. _The royal divan has been
swept from the decks, and while the huge pillows are gradually
soaking up the water and floating away, their Prince lies on them
unconscious. For a moment the mermaid watches him open-mouthed.
She steals nearer and holding on to the tassels of seed-pearls,
leans cautiously over and scans his face long and wonderingly. She
sighs faintly, splashes a little in discontent, and then gazes
upon him again with a frown of concentration._
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
It’s breathing. He has not lost--what they call--the soul. I wonder
where he keeps it. It is the great difference between us; we sea-people
have no soul. I wonder where he keeps it! I have heard that it can be
seen at times, in the eyes. Perhaps if I borrowed it from him while he
slept he would never miss it. No,--I will ask him for it.
[_She claps her hands suddenly to awake him, falling back, at
the same time, into the water. The young man does not stir.
She grows angry. She strikes the water sharply with the palms
of her hands. By quick degrees a circling wind rises; great
fantastic waves rear themselves, robed in silk; they break
over the divan and the Prince stirs. Immediately_ BRIGOMEÏDÉ
_strokes the water to a stillness, and fixes her attention on
the young man_.]
THE PRINCE
My father, take not your hand away. My brothers, why have you ceased
talking? Where am I?--All is lost! _Ave Maris Stella!_
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
[_Watching him intently._]
How could you sleep so--during the storm?
THE PRINCE
You--you are out of a dream. You are out of my fever. Yes, yes--the
storm--you--all this is but the painting of my fever. I shall awake in
Venice with the lute-player fallen asleep by the window. I will call
to him now and he will wake me up: Amedeo!--Lute-player! Shake me out
of this dream!
[_The silence that follows is filled with the crackling noise as
the pith fillings of the heavier cushions become saturated._]
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
[_Harshly._]
Who is it you are calling to? There is no one here, but you and me only.
THE PRINCE
Amedeo!--he does not answer: this is real. But you, you are dream; you
are illusion. _Ave Maris Stella!_
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
[_Indignantly._]
I am not dream. I am not illusion. I am royal among all sea-women--I am
of the Third Order; on the three great tide days I am permitted to bind
my hair with Thetis-Agrandis and wear in my ears the higher Muria.
THE PRINCE
You are out of an old ballad, taught me as a boy, and you have come
back to me in the last hour on the tide of fever. In a moment my dream
will have passed on from you.
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
[_Vehemently._]
You think I am only dream because ... you have heard it said ... we
sea-folk have no souls.
THE PRINCE
Soul nor body.
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
[_More softly._]
Tell me where it is you keep your soul. Have you it always with you?
THE PRINCE
[_As a great pillow floats away from under his hand._]
_Flos undarum!_ Save me! Deliver me! Hear my prayer!
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
Who are you speaking to? Did I not tell you there was no one here but
you and me only?
THE PRINCE
You! Tell me we where is shore. You can swim for days. Draw me to some
island. I will give you great riches ... all you desire.
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
Give me your soul. All my days I have longed for two things, black hair
and a soul. I have not lacked anything else. I will draw you to your
home, if you will give me your soul.
THE PRINCE
[_Violently._]
It cannot be given away. No one has seen it; it cannot be felt with
hands; seen or tasted.
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
And yet they say it is the greatest thing in the world; that without
it life is a cold procession of hours; that it gives all sight to the
eyes, and all hearing to the ears ... you are mocking me! I see in your
face that you have it now!
THE PRINCE
Yes, and am about to lose it.
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
Give it to me, and I will bring up from the bottom of the sea your
father and your brothers. I will return to you all the pearls that have
fallen here, and draw you softly into the narrows of Venice.
THE PRINCE
[_As the water closes over him._]
Amedeo!... Lute-player!
[BRIGOMEÏDÉ _turns away contemptuously_.]
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
It is something you cannot touch or see. What could I do with it so?
[THE PRINCE _rises, dead, entangled in scarves_. BRIGOMEÏDÉ
_stares into his face long and earnestly_.]
It is true! There is something gone ... that lay about his eyes, that
troubled his mouth. The soul, perhaps.
[_She claps her hands. From a great distance a sea-serpent swims
hugely towards her. He is caught in the trailing lengths of
gray brocade._]
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
Gog-etar! There is no longer anything precious in this man. You may
divide him among your young.
LEVIATHAN
It is terrible here, lady. These spices have made the streams
unendurable. By to-morrow morning the waters will be tainted as far as
Africa. Already my young are ill, lady. They lie motionless in the mud,
dear lady. It is terrible to see them so....
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
I do not want to hear your troubles. Take this man away.
LEVIATHAN
Thanks, gracious lady. Perhaps these hateful essences will have made
him endurable....
BRIGOMEÏDÉ
Cease!
[_He drags_ THE PRINCE _away. The frustrated_ BRIGOMEÏDÉ _starts
to comb the shell out of her hair, singing. Suddenly she breaks
her song and adds musingly._]
Perhaps it is better, although your body has passed to Leviathan, still
to have another part of you somewhere about the world.
_AND THE SEA SHALL GIVE UP ITS DEAD_
_The clangor of Judgment Day’s last trumpet dies away in the remotest
pockets of space, and time comes to an end like a frayed ribbon.
In the nave of creation the diaphanous amphitheater is already
building for the trial of all flesh. Several miles below the
surface of the North Atlantic, the spirits of the drowned rise
through the water like bubbles in a neglected wineglass._
A WOMAN
[_To the gray weeds of whose soul still cling the vestiges of
color, some stained purples and some wasted reds._]
At last I could struggle no longer. My head and lungs were under
intense discomfort by reason of the water with which they were filled.
I said to myself: “Only think, Gertruda, you have actually arrived at
the moment of death!” Even then I was unwilling to believe it, though
my lungs were on the point of bursting. One is never really able to
believe that one will die. It is especially difficult for sovereigns
who seldom, if ever, confront inevitable situations. Perhaps you know
that I am Gertruda XXII, Empress of Newfoundland from 2638 to 2698?
A STOUT LITTLE MAN
Your Imperial Highness’s experience is much like mine. I lived about
five hundred years before Your Imperial Highness. I had always dreaded
the moment of extinction, yet mine was less painful than a headache.
THE EMPRESS
We know now that the real pain comes to us in the ages that have
passed since then. Have you too been swinging in mid-ocean, tangled in
a cocoon of seaweed, slowly liberating your mind from the prides and
prejudices and trivialities of a life-time? That is what is painful.
THE LITTLE MAN
I was a Jew and very proud of my race. Living under what I took to be
the aspersions of my neighbors I had nourished the arrogant delusion
that I was notable. It has taken me five hundred years of painful
reflection to disembarrass myself of this notion. I was a theatrical
producer and thought myself important to my time, wise, witty, and
kindly. Each of these ideas I have shed with a hundred times the pain
of losing a limb. Now I am reconciled to the fact that I am naked, a
fool, a child.
THE EMPRESS
In my life I believed fiercely that everything of which I said MY had
some peculiar excellence. It was impossible to imagine a citizen proud
of any country save Newfoundland, or a woman vain of any hair save the
golden. I had a passion for genealogies and antiquities and felt that
such things merely looked forward to myself. Now these many years I
have been wrapped in barnacles, divorcing my soul from all that it once
loved. Even my love for my son and my son’s love for me have vanished
through sheer inconsequence. All this is the second death, and the
one to be dreaded. I was afraid that when I had shed away my royalty
and my beauty and my administrative talent and my pure descent and my
astonishing memory for names, I was afraid that there would be nothing
left. But fortunately, underneath all this litter I have found a tiny
morsel of ... but dare we say the Name?--But what was yours?
THE LITTLE MAN
Horatio Nissem.
THE EMPRESS
Speak to that man who is rising through the water beside you.
HORATIO NISSEM
Who are you, and what particular follies have you laid aside?
A TALL THIN DREAMY MAN
I was a priest of the gospel and a terrible time I have had taking
leave of my sins. I tremble to think how but a few moments ago I still
retained a longing for stupidities. Yes, sir, for the planets. I felt
sure that they had personalities and I looked forward after my death to
hearing their songs. Now I know that sun and moon and stars have fallen
like dust into the lap of their maker. I told myself, also, that after
death I should sit through eternity overhearing the conversation of
Coleridge and Augustine and Our Lord; there I should embrace my loved
ones and my enemies; there I should hear vindicated before the devils
the great doctrines of Infant Baptism and Sacramental Confession.
Only now have I been delivered from these follies. As I swayed in the
meteoric slime I begged God to punish me for certain sins of my youth,
moments I well remembered of rage and pride and shame. But these seemed
of no importance to him: he seemed rather to be erasing from my mind
the notion that my sins were of any consequence. I see now that even
the idea that I was capable of sinning was a self-flattery and an
impertinence. My name was Father Cosroe: now my name is Worm.
THE EMPRESS
We still cling obstinately to our identity, as though there were
something valuable in it. This very moment I feel relics of pleasure in
the fact that I am myself and no one else. Yet in a moment, if there
is a moment, we shall all be reduced to our quintessential matter, and
you, Mr. Nissem, will be exactly indistinguishable from me. God Himself
will not be able to tell the Empress of Newfoundland from the Reverend
Doctor Cosroe.
HORATIO NISSEM
[_In mounting terror._]
I am afraid. I refuse to give myself up.
THE EMPRESS
Do not cry out, fool. You have awakened all my rebellious nature. O
God, do not take away my identity! I do not ask for my title or my
features; do not take away my myself!
HORATIO NISSEM
Do you hear? I refuse to give myself up. O God, let me not be mistaken
for a Gentile.
FATHER COSROE
Your screaming has aroused my madness. Let me keep my particular mind,
O God, my own curious mind with all I have put into it!
[_The three panic-stricken souls reach the surface of the sea. The
extensive business of Domesday is over in a twinkling and the
souls divested of all identification have tumbled, like falling
stars, into the blaze of unicity. Soon nothing exists in space
but the great unwinking eye, meditating a new creation._]
_NOW THE SERVANT’S NAME WAS MALCHUS_
_In his father’s house are many mansions, and it is from the windows
of one of them that he stands looking out upon the clockwork of
the skies. With the precision that is possible only to things dead
in themselves, the stars weave incessantly their interlocking
measures. At intervals the blackest pockets of space give birth to
a nebula, whirling in new anguish, but for the most part the sky
offers only its vast stars, eased in the first gradations of their
cooling, and fulfilling happily and with a faint humming sound the
long loops of their appointment._
[_To him comes_ GABRIEL, _secretary and soldier_.]
GABRIEL
There are some unusually urgent petitions here.... There’s this Colonel
on a raft in the Bengal Sea--Here again is the widow and her two
daughters in Moscow. A lady in Rome.
[_He lays some papers on the table._]
Besides, there is someone outside who wishes to speak to you. He says
he knew you on earth. I think he has something to complain of, even
here.
OUR LORD
Let him wait a moment.
[_There is loud rapping at the door._]
GABRIEL
There he is again.
OUR LORD
Then let him in.
[GABRIEL _admits_ MALCHUS _and goes out_.]
MALCHUS
Please, sir, excuse me being so hasty, but I had to speak to you about
something.
OUR LORD
You are displeased with Heaven?
MALCHUS
Oh no, sir--except for one thing.
OUR LORD
We will talk about it in a minute. Come by the window and look. Can you
tell me which of those stars is mine?
MALCHUS
Lord, all are yours, surely.
OUR LORD
No, only one is mine, for only one bears living things upon it. And
where there is no life I have no power. All the stars save one are
lifeless; not even a blade of grass pushes through their powder or
their flame. But one of them is so crowded with event that Heaven
itself is scarcely able to attend to its needs.--But you are not
interested?
MALCHUS
Oh, sir, it was so long ago that I was there that I cannot be expected
to.... Even my children’s children have long since left it. I cannot be
very interested. Since I am so happy here,--except for one thing. But I
should like to see it again. Which is it, sir?
OUR LORD
There, see! See where it floats for a moment out of a green mist. If
your ears were accustomed to it as mine are, you would hear what I
hear: the sigh as it turns. Now what is it you want of me?
MALCHUS
Well, as you know I was the High Priest’s servant in the garden when
you were taken. Sir, it’s hardly worth mentioning.
OUR LORD
No, no. Speak out.
MALCHUS
And one of your fellows took out his sword and cut off my ear.
OUR LORD
Yes.
MALCHUS
It’s ... it’s hardly worth mentioning. Most of the time, Lord, we’re
very happy up here and nothing disturbs us at our games. But whenever
someone on earth thinks about us we are aware of it, pleasantly or
unpleasantly. A sort of something crosses our mind. And because I’m in
your book someone is always reading about me and thinking about me for
a moment, and in the middle of my games I feel it. Especially at this
season when your death is celebrated, no moment goes by without this
happening. And what they think is, that I’m ridiculous.
OUR LORD
I see. And you want your name to be erased from the book?
MALCHUS
[_Eagerly._]
Yes, sir. I thought you could just make the pages become blank at that
place.
OUR LORD
Now that you have come here everything that you wish is granted to you.
You know that.
MALCHUS
Yes, sir; thank you, sir.
OUR LORD
But stay a minute. At this season, Malchus, a number of people are
thinking of me, too.
MALCHUS
Yes, Lord, but as good, as great....
OUR LORD
But, Malchus, I am ridiculous too.
MALCHUS
Oh, no, no!
OUR LORD
Ridiculous because I suffered from the delusion that after my death I
could be useful to men.
MALCHUS
They don’t say that!
OUR LORD
And that my mind lay under a malady that many a doctor could cure. And
that I have deceived and cheated millions and millions of souls who in
their extremity called on me for the aid I had promised. They did not
know that I died like any other man and their prayers mounted into vain
air, for I no longer exist. My promises were so vast that I am either
divine or ridiculous.
[_Pause._]
Malchus, will you stay and be ridiculous with me?
MALCHUS
Yes, sir, I’ll stay. I’m glad to stay. Though in a way I haven’t any
right to be there. I wasn’t even the High Priest’s servant; I only
held his horse every now and then. And ... and I used to steal a
little,--only you’ve forgiven me that. Sure, I’m glad to stay.
OUR LORD
Thank you, Malchus.
MALCHUS
[_Smiling._]
It isn’t even true in the book. It was my left ear and not my right.
OUR LORD
Yes, the book isn’t always true about me, either.
MALCHUS
Excuse my troubling you, sir. Good day.
OUR LORD
Good day, Malchus.
[MALCHUS _goes out_. GABRIEL _enters discreetly and lays down some
more papers_.]
GABRIEL
[_In a low voice._]
The raft has capsized, sir, on the Bengal Sea, and the Colonel will be
here at once. The woman in Moscow....
_MOZART AND THE GRAY STEWARD_
MOZART _is seated at a table in a mean room in Vienna orchestrating
the “Magic Flute.” Leaves of ruled paper are strewn about the
floor. His wife enters in great excitement._
CONSTANZE
There’s someone come to see you, someone important. Pray God, it’s a
commission from Court.
MOZART
[_Unmoved._]
Not while Salieri’s alive.
CONSTANZE
Put on your slippers, dear. It’s some one dressed all in gray, with a
gray mask over his eyes, and he’s come in a great coach with its coat
of arms all covered up with gray cloth. Pray God, it’s a commission
from Court for a _Te Deum_ or something.
[_She tidies up the room in six gestures._]
MOZART
Not while Salieri’s alive.
CONSTANZE
But, now, do be nice, ’Gangl, please. We must have some money, my
treasure. Just listen to him and say “yes” and “thank you” and then
you and I’ll talk it over after he’s gone.
[_She holds his coat._]
Come, put this on. Step into your slippers.
MOZART
[_Sighing._]
I’m not well. I’m at home. I’m at work. There’s not a single visitor in
the whole world that could interest me. Bring him in.
CONSTANZE
[_Adjusting his stock._]
Now don’t be proud. Just accept.
[_She hurries out and presently reënters preceding the visitor.
The visitor is dressed from head to foot in gray silk. His
bright eyes look out through the holes in a narrow gray silk
mask. He holds to his nose a gray perfumed handkerchief. One
would say: an elegant undertaker._]
THE GRAY STEWARD
Kappelmeister Mozart, _servus_. Gracious lady, _servus_.
MOZART
_Servus._
THE GRAY STEWARD
Revered and noble master, wherever music reigns, wherever genius is
valued, the name of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart is....
MOZART
Sir, I have always been confused by compliments and beg you to spare me
that mortification by proceeding at once to the cause of your visit ...
the ... the honor of your visit.
THE GRAY STEWARD
Revered master, before I lay my business before you, may I receive your
promise that--whether you accept my commission or not--you both will....
MOZART
I promise you our secrecy, unless our silence would prove dishonorable
to me or injurious to some one else. Pray continue.
THE GRAY STEWARD
Know then, gracious and revered genius, that I come from a prince who
combines all the qualities of birth, station, generosity and wisdom.
MOZART
Ha! a European secret.
THE GRAY STEWARD
His Excellency moreover has just sustained a bitter misfortune. He has
lately lost his wife and consort, a lady who was the admiration of her
court and the sole light of her bereaved husband’s life. Therefore,
his Excellency, my master, commissions you to compose a Requiem Mass
in honor of this lady. He asks you to pour into it the height of your
invention and that wealth of melody and harmony that have made you the
glory of our era. And for this music he asks leave to pay you the sum
of four hundred crowns,--two hundred now, and the second two hundred
crowns when you deliver the first four numbers.
MOZART
Well, Constanze, I must not be proud.
THE GRAY STEWARD
There is but one proviso.
MOZART
Yes, I heard it. The work must represent the height of my invention.
THE GRAY STEWARD
That was an easy assumption, master. The proviso is this: You shall
let his Excellency have this music as an anonymous work, and you shall
never by any sign, by so much as the nod of your head, acknowledge that
the work is yours.
MOZART
And his Excellency is not aware that the pages I may compose at the
height of my invention may be their own sufficient signature?
THE GRAY STEWARD
That may be. Naturally my master will see to it that no other composer
will ever be able to claim the work as his.
MOZART
Quick, give me your paper and I will sign it. Leave your two hundred
crowns with my wife at the foot of the stairs. Come back in August and
you will have the first four numbers. _Servus. Servus._
THE GRAY STEWARD
[_Backing out._]
_Servus_, master. _Servus_, madame.
[CONSTANZE _returns in a moment and looks anxiously towards her
husband_.]
CONSTANZE
A visit from Heaven, ’Gangl. Now you can go into the country. Now you
can drink all the Bohemian water in the world.
MOZART
[_Bitterly._]
Good. And just at a time when I was contemplating a Requiem Mass. But
for _myself_. However, I must not be proud.
CONSTANZE
[_Trying to divert him._]
Who can these people be? Try and think.
MOZART
Oh, there’s no mystery about that. It’s the Count von Walsegg. He
composes himself. But for the most part he buys string quartets from
us; he erases the signatures and has them played in his castle. The
courtiers flatter him and pretend that they have guessed him to be the
composer. He does not deny it. He tries to appear confused. And now he
has succeeded in composing a Requiem. But that will reduce my pride.
CONSTANZE
You know he will only be laughed at. The music will speak for itself.
Heaven wanted to give us four hundred crowns--
MOZART
And Heaven went about it humorously.
CONSTANZE
What was his wife like?
MOZART
Her impudences smelt to Heaven. She dressed like a page and called
herself Cherubin. Her red cheeks and her black teeth and her sixty
years are in my mind now.
CONSTANZE
[_After a pause._]
We’ll give back the money. You can write the music, without writing it
for them.
MOZART
No, I like this game. I like it for its very falseness. What does it
matter who signs such music or to whom it is addressed?
[_He flings himself upon the sofa and turns his face to the wall._]
For whom do we write music?--for musicians? Salieri!--for patrons? Von
Walsegg!--for the public? The Countess von Walsegg! I shall write this
Requiem, but it shall be for myself, since I am dying.
CONSTANZE
My beloved, don’t talk so! Go to sleep.
[_She spreads a shawl over his body._]
How can you say such things? Imagine even thinking such a thing! You
will live many years and write countless beautiful pages. We will
return the money and refuse the commission. Then the matter will be
closed. Now go to sleep, my treasure.
[_She goes out, quietly closing the door behind her._ MOZART, _at
the mercy of his youth, his illness and his genius, is shaken
by a violent fit of weeping. The sobs gradually subside and he
falls asleep. In his dream_ THE GRAY STEWARD _returns_.]
THE GRAY STEWARD
Mozart! Turn and look at me. You know who I am.
MOZART
[_Not turning._]
You are the steward of the Count von Walsegg. Go tell him to write his
own music. I will not stain my pen to celebrate his lady, so let the
foul bury the foul.
THE GRAY STEWARD
Lie then against the wall, and learn that it is Death itself that
commissions....
MOZART
Death is not so fastidious. Death carries no perfumed handkerchief.
THE GRAY STEWARD
Lie then against the wall. Know first that all the combinations of
circumstance can suffer two interpretations, the apparent and the real.
MOZART
Then speak, sycophant, I know the apparent one. What other reading can
this humiliation bear?
THE GRAY STEWARD
It is Death itself that commands you this Requiem. You are to give a
voice to all those millions sleeping, who have no one but you to speak
for them. There lie the captains and the thieves, the queens and the
drudges, while the evening of their earthly remembrance shuts in, and
from that great field rises an eternal _miserere nobis_. Only through
the intercession of great love, and of great art which is love, can
that despairing cry be eased. Was that not sufficient cause for this
commission to be anonymous?
MOZART
[_Drops trembling on one knee beside the couch._]
Forgive me.
THE GRAY STEWARD
And it was for this that the pretext and mover was chosen from among
the weakest and vainest of humans. Death has her now, and all her folly
has passed into the dignity and grandeur of her state. Where is your
pride now? Here are her slippers and her trinkets. Press them against
your lips. Again! Again! Know henceforth that only he who has kissed
the leper can enter the kingdom of art.
MOZART
I have sinned, yet grant me one thing. Grant that I may live to finish
the Requiem.
THE GRAY STEWARD
No! No!
[_And it remains unfinished._]
_HAST THOU CONSIDERED MY SERVANT JOB?_
_Now it came to pass on the day when the sons of God came to present
themselves before_ SATAN _that_ CHRIST _also came among them. And_
SATAN
[_Said unto_ CHRIST.]
_Whence comest Thou?_
CHRIST
[_Answered_ SATAN _and said_]
_From going to and fro in the earth, and from walking up and down in
it._
[_And_]
SATAN
[_Said unto_ CHRIST]
_Hast Thou considered my servant Judas? For there is none like him in
the earth, an evil and a faithless man, one that feareth me and turneth
away from God._
[_Then_]
CHRIST
[_Answered_ SATAN _and said_]
_Doth Judas fear thee for naught? Hast thou not made a hedge about him,
and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? But
draw back thy hand now and he will renounce thee to thy face._
[_And_]
SATAN
[_Said unto_ CHRIST]
_Behold, all that he hath is in thy power._
[_So_ CHRIST _went forth from the presence of_ SATAN.]
* * * * *
[_He descended to the earth. Thirty-three years are but a moment
before_ SATAN _and before_ GOD, _and at the end of this moment_
CHRIST _ascends again to His own place. He passes on this
journey before the presence of the adversary._]
SATAN
You are alone! Where is my son Judas whom I gave into your hands?
CHRIST
He follows me.
SATAN
I know what you have done. And the earth rejected you? The earth
rejected you! All Hell murmurs in astonishment. But where is Judas, my
son and my joy?
CHRIST
Even now he is coming.
SATAN
Even Heaven, when I reigned there, was not so tedious as this waiting.
Know, Prince, that I am too proud to show all my astonishment at your
defeat. But now that you are swallowing your last humiliation, now that
your failure has shut the mouths of the angels, I may confess that for
a while I feared you. There is a fretfulness in the hearts of men. Many
are inconstant, even to me. Alas, every man is not a Judas. I knew even
from the beginning that you would be able, for a season, to win their
hearts with your mild eloquence. I feared that you would turn to your
own uses this fretfulness that visits them. But my fears were useless.
Even Judas, even when my power was withdrawn from him, even Judas
betrayed you. Am I not right in this?
CHRIST
You are.
SATAN
You admitted him into your chosen company. Is it permitted to me to ask
for how much he betrayed you?
CHRIST
For thirty pieces of silver.
SATAN
[_After a pause._]
Am I permitted to ask to what rôle he was assigned in your company?
CHRIST
He held its money-bags.
SATAN
[_Dazed._]
Does Heaven understand human nature as little as that? Surely the
greater part of your closest companions stayed beside you to the end?
CHRIST
One stayed beside me.
SATAN
I have overestimated my enemy. Learn again, Prince, that if I were
permitted to return to the earth in my own person, not for thirty
years, but for thirty hours, I would seal all men to me and all the
temptations in Heaven’s gift could not persuade one to betray me. For
I build not on intermittent dreams and timid aspirations, but on the
unshakable passions of greed and lust and self-love. At last this is
made clear: Judas, Judas, all the triumphs of Hell await you. Already
above the eternal pavements of black marble the banquet is laid.
Listen, how my nations are stirring in new hope and in new joy. Such
music has not been lifted above my lakes and my mountains since the day
I placed the apple of knowledge between the teeth of Adam.
[_Suddenly the thirty pieces of silver are cast upward from the
revolted hand of_ JUDAS. _They hurtle through the skies,
flinging their enormous shadows across the stars and continue
falling forever through the vast funnel of space._
[_Presently_ JUDAS _rises, the black stains about his throat and
the rope of suicide_.]
SATAN
What have they done to you, my beloved son? What last poor revenge have
they attempted upon you? Come to me. Here there is comfort. Here all
this violence can be repaired. The futile spite of Heaven cannot reach
you here. But why do you not speak to me? My son, my treasure!
[JUDAS _remains with lowered eyes_.]
CHRIST
Speak to him then, my beloved son.
JUDAS
[_Still with lowered eyes, softly, to_ SATAN.]
Accursed be thou, from eternity to eternity.
[_These two mount upward to their due place and_ SATAN _remains to
this day, uncomprehending, upon the pavement of Hell_.]
_THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT_
_From time to time there are auctions of the fittings that made up the
old Dime Museums, and at such an auction you should be able to
pick up a revolving cyclorama of the Holy Land and Egypt, which is
the scenery for this piece. Turn down the gas-lights, for it is
night in Palestine, and introduce a lady and a child on a donkey.
They are accompanied by an old man on foot. The Donkey’s name is_
HEPZIBAH.
HEPZIBAH
[_For the tenth time._]
I’m tired.
OUR LADY
I know, I know.
HEPZIBAH
I’m willing to carry you as far and as fast as I can, but within reason.
ST. JOSEPH
If you didn’t talk so much you’d have more strength for the journey.
HEPZIBAH
It’s not my lungs that are tired, it’s my legs. When I talk I don’t
notice how tired I am.
OUR LADY
Do as you think best, Hepzibah, but do keep moving. I can still hear
Herod’s soldiers behind us.
[_Noise of ironmongery in the wings, right._]
HEPZIBAH
Well, I’m doing my best.
[_Silence. The Tigris passes on the cyclorama._]
We must talk or I’ll have to halt. We talked over the Romans and the
whole political situation, and I must say again that I and every
thinking person can only view such a situation with alarm, with real
alarm. We talked over the village, and I don’t think there’s anything
more to say about that. Did I remember to tell you that Issachar’s
daughter’s engagement had been broken?
OUR LADY
Yes.
HEPZIBAH
Well, there’s always ideas. I hope I can say honestly that I am at home
in ideas of all sorts. For instance, back in the yard I’m the leader of
a group. Among the girls. Very interesting religious discussions, I can
tell you. Very helpful.
ST. JOSEPH
[_As some more iron is heard falling in Judæa; the Euphrates
passes._]
Can’t you hurry a bit?
HEPZIBAH
I always say to the girls: Girls, even in faith we are supposed to use
our reason. No one is intended to swallow hook, line and sinker, as the
saying is. Now take these children that Herod is killing. Why were they
born, since they must die so soon? Can any one answer that? Or put it
another way: Why is the little boy in your arms being saved while the
others must perish?
ST. JOSEPH
Is it necessary to stop?
HEPZIBAH
I was stopping for emphasis.--Mind you, it’s not that I doubt. Honest
discussion does not imply doubt necessarily.--What was that noise?
OUR LADY
I beg of you to make all the haste you can. The noise you hear is that
of Herod’s soldiers. My child will be slain while you argue about
Faith. I beg of you, Hepzibah, to save him while you can.
HEPZIBAH
I assure you I’m doing the best I can, and I think I’m moving along
smartly. I didn’t mean that noise, anyway; it was a noise ahead. Of
course, your child is dearer to you than others, but _theologically
speaking_, there’s no possible reason why you should escape safely into
Egypt while the others should be put to the sword, as the Authorized
Version has it. When the Messiah comes these things will be made clear,
but until then I intend to exercise my reasoning faculty. My theory is
this....
OUR LADY
Hepzibah, we shall really have to beat you if you stop so often.
Hepzibah, don’t you remember me? Don’t you remember how you fell on
your knees in the stable? Don’t you remember my child?
HEPZIBAH
What? What! Of course!
OUR LADY
Yes, Hepzibah.
HEPZIBAH
Let me stop just a moment and look around. No, I don’t dare to stop.
Why didn’t I recognize you before! Really, my lady, you should have
spoken more sharply to me. I didn’t know I could run like this; it’s a
pleasure. Lord, what a donkey I was to be arguing about reason while my
Lord was in danger.
[_A pyramid flies by._]
Do you see the lights of the town yet? That’s the Sphinx at the right,
madam, yes, 3655 B.C. Well, well, it’s a queer world where the survival
of the Lord is dependent on donkeys, but so it is. Why didn’t you tell
me before, my lady?
ST. JOSEPH
We thought you could carry us forward on your own merit.
HEPZIBAH
Oh, forgive me, madam; forgive me, sir. You don’t hear any more
soldiers now, I warrant you. Please don’t direct me so far--excuse
me--to the right, madam. That’s the Nile, and there are crocodiles. My
lady, may I ask one question now that we’re safe?
OUR LADY
Yes, Hepzibah.
HEPZIBAH
It’s this matter of faith and reason, madam. I’d love to carry back to
our group of girls whatever you might say about it....
OUR LADY
Dear Hepzibah, perhaps some day. For the present just do as I do and
bear your master on.
[_More pyramids fly by; Memnon sings; the Nile moves dreamily
past, and the inn is reached._]
_THE ANGEL THAT TROUBLED THE WATERS_
_The Pool.--A vast gray hall with a hole in the ceiling open to the
sky. Broad stone steps lead up from the water on its four sides.
The water is continuously restless and throws blue reflections
upon the walls. The sick, the blind and the malformed are lying on
the steps. The long stretches of silence and despair are broken
from time to time when one or another groans and turns in his
rags, or raises a fretful wail or a sudden cry of exasperation at
long-continued pain. A door leads out upon the porch where the
attendants of the sick are playing at dice, waiting for the call
to fling their masters into the water when the angel of healing
stirs the pool. Beyond the porch there is a glimpse of the fierce
sunlight and the empty streets of an oriental noonday._
_Suddenly the_ ANGEL _appears upon the top step. His face and robe
shine with a color that is both silver and gold, and the wings of
blue and green, tipped with rose, shimmer in the tremulous light.
He walks slowly down among the shapeless sleepers and stands
gazing into the water that already trembles in anticipation of its
virtue._
[_A new invalid enters._]
THE NEWCOMER
Come, long-expected love. Come, long-expected love. Let the sacred
finger and the sacred breath stir up the pool. Here on the lowest
step I wait with festering limbs, with my heart in pain. Free me,
long-expected love, from this old burden. Since I cannot stay, since I
must return into the city, come now, renewal, come, release.
[_Another invalid wakes suddenly out of a nightmare, calling: “The
Angel! The Angel has come. I am cured.” He flings himself into
the pool, splashing his companions. They come to life and gaze
eagerly at the water. They hang over the brink and several
slide in. Then a great cry of derision rises: “The Fool! Fool!
His nightmare again. Beat him! Drive him out into the Porch.”
The mistaken invalid and his dupes drag themselves out of the
water and lie dripping disconsolately upon the steps._]
THE MISTAKEN INVALID
I dreamt that an angel stood by me and that at last I should be free of
this hateful place and its company. Better a mistake and this jeering
than an opportunity lost.
[_He sees the NEWCOMER beside him and turns on him plaintively._]
Aïe! You have no right to be here, at all events. You are able to walk
about. You pass your days in the city. You come here only at great
intervals, and it may be that by some unlucky chance you might be the
first one to see the sign. You would rush into the water and a cure
would be wasted. You are yourself a physician. You have restored my own
children. Go back to your work and leave these miracles to us who need
them.
THE NEWCOMER
[_Ignoring him; under his breath._]
My work grows faint. Heal me, long-expected Love; heal me that I may
continue. Renewal, release; let me begin again without this fault that
bears me down.
THE MISTAKEN INVALID
I shall sit here without ever lifting my eyes from the surface of the
pool. I shall be the next. Many times, even since I have been here,
many times the Angel has passed and has stirred the water, and hundreds
have left the hall leaping and crying out with joy. I shall be the next.
THE ANGEL
[_Kneels down on the lowest step and meditatively holds his finger
poised above the shuddering water._]
Joy and fulfilment, completion, content, rest and release have been
promised.
THE NEWCOMER
Come, long-expected Love.
THE ANGEL
[_Without turning makes himself apparent to the_ NEWCOMER _and
addresses him_.]
Draw back, physician, this moment is not for you.
THE NEWCOMER
Angelic visitor, I pray thee, listen to my prayer.
THE ANGEL
Healing is not for you.
THE NEWCOMER
Surely, surely, the angels are wise. Surely, O, Prince, you are not
deceived by my apparent wholeness. Your eyes can see the nets in
which my wings are caught; the sin into which all my endeavors sink
half-performed cannot be concealed from you.
THE ANGEL
I know.
THE NEWCOMER
It is no shame to boast to an Angel of what I might yet do in Love’s
service were I but freed from this bondage.
THE MISTAKEN INVALID
Surely the water is stirring strangely to-day! Surely I shall be whole!
THE ANGEL
I must make haste. Already the sky is afire with the gathering host,
for it is the hour of the new song among us. The earth itself feels the
preparation in the skies and attempts its hymn. Children born in this
hour spend all their lives in a sharper longing for the perfection that
awaits them.
THE NEWCOMER
Oh, in such an hour was I born, and doubly fearful to me is the flaw
in my heart. Must I drag my shame, Prince and singer, all my days more
bowed than my neighbor?
THE ANGEL
[_Stands a moment in silence._]
Without your wound where would your power be? It is your very remorse
that makes your low voice tremble into the hearts of men. The very
angels themselves cannot persuade the wretched and blundering children
on earth as can one human being broken on the wheels of living. In
Love’s service only the wounded soldiers can serve. Draw back.
[_He swiftly kneels and draws his finger through the water. The
pool is presently astir with running ripples. They increase and
a divine wind strikes the gay surface. The waves are flung upon
the steps. The_ MISTAKEN MAN _casts himself into the Pool, and
the whole company lurches, rolls, or hobbles in. The servants
rush in from the porch. Turmoil. Finally the no longer_
MISTAKEN INVALID _emerges and leaps joyfully up the steps. The
rest, coughing and sighing, follow him. The_ ANGEL _smiles for
a moment and disappears_.]
THE HEALED MAN
Look, my hand is new as a child’s. Glory be to God! I have begun again.
[_To the_ NEWCOMER.]
May you be the next, my brother. But come with me first, an hour only,
to my home. My son is lost in dark thoughts. I--I do not understand
him, and only you have ever lifted his mood. Only an hour ... my
daughter since her child has died, sits in the shadow. She will not
listen to us....
Transcriber’s Notes
❧ Italics represented with surrounding _underscores_.
❧ Small caps converted to ALL CAPS.
❧ Duplicate chapter titles removed in the text version.
❧ Obvious typographic errors silently corrected.
❧ Variations in hyphenation kept as in the original.
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