A Blot in the 'scutcheonA Tragedy( 1 8 4 3 )Dramatis PersonsMildred Tresham Guendolen TreshamThorold, Earl Tresham Austin TreshamHenry, Earl Mertoun
¶GERARD, and other retainers of Lord Tresham
Time, iy—Act I
¶SCENE I.—The Interior of a Lodge in Lord Tresham's Parl^. Many Retainers crowded at the window, supposed to command a view of the entrance to his Mansion.
GERARD, the Warrener, his bac\ to a table onwhich are flagons, etc.
¶First RetainerA Y , do! push, friends, and then you'll push down melZJk —What for? Does any hear a runner's footA. . m . Or a steed's trample or a coach-wheel's cry ?Is the Earl come or his least poursuivant?But there's no breeding in a man of youSave Gerard yonder: here's a half-place yet,Old Gerard!Gerard. Save your courtesies, my friend. Here is my place.Second Retainer. Now , Gerard, out with it!What makes you sullen, this of all the daysI' the year? To-day that young rich bountifulHandsome Earl Mertoun, whom alone they matchWith our Lord Tresham through the country-side,[360]Is coming here in utmost braveryTo ask our master's sister's hand ?Gerard. What then?Second Retainer. What then? Why , you, she speaks to,she meetsYour worship, smiles on as you hold apartThe boughs to let her through her forest walks,You, always favourite for your no-deserts,You've heard, these three days, how Earl Mertoun suesTo lay his heart and house and broad lands tooAt Lady Mildred's feet: and while we squeezeOurselves into a mousehole lest we missOne congee of the least page in his train,You sit o' one side—"there's the Earl," say I—"What then?" say you!Third Retainer. I'll wager he has letBoth swans he tamed for Lady Mildred swimOver the falls and gain the river!Gerard. Ralph,Is not to-morrow my inspecting-dayFor you and for your hawks ?Fourth Retainer. Let Gerard be!He's coarse-grained, like his carved black cross-bow stock.Ha, look now, while we squabble with him, look!Well done, now—is not this beginning, now,To purpose ?First Retainer. Our retainers look as fine—That's comfort. Lord, how Richard holds himselfWith his white staff! Will not a knave behindPrick him upright?Fourth Retainer. He's only bowing, fool!The Earl's man bent us lower by this much.First Retainer. That's comfort. Here's a very cavalcade!Third Retainer. I don't see wherefore Richard, and his trcOf silk and silver varlets there, should findTheir perfumed selves so indispensableOn high days, holidays! Would it so disgrace[361]Our family, if I, for instance, stood—In my right hand a cast of Swedish hawks,A leash of greyhounds in my left ?—Gerard. —With HughThe logman for supporter, in his rightThe bill-hook, in his left the brushwood-shears!Third Retainer. Out on you, crab! What next, what next?The Earl!First Retainer. Oh Walter, groom, our horses, do theymatchThe Earl's? Alas, that first pair of the six—They paw the ground—Ah Walter! and that bruteJust on his haunches by the wheel!Sixth Retainer. Ay—ay!You, Philip, are a special hand, I hear,At soups and sauces: what's a horse to you?D'ye mark that beast they've slid into the midstSo cunningly?—then, Philip, mark this further;No leg has he to stand on !First Retainer. No ? that's comfort.Second Retainer. Peace, Cook! The Earl descends. Well,Gerard, seeThe Earl at least! Come, there's a proper man,I hope! Why , Ralph, no falcon, Pole or Swede,Has got a starrier eye.Third Retainer. His eyes are blue:But leave my hawks alone!Fourth Retainer. So young, and yetSo tall and shapely!Fifth Retainer. Here's Lord Tresham's self!There now—there's what a nobleman should be!He's older, graver, loftier, he's more likeA House's head.Second Retainer. But you'd not have a boy— And what's the Earl beside?—possess too soonThat stateliness?First Retainer. Our master takes his hand—[362]Richard and his white staff are on the move—Back fall our people—(tsh!—there's TimothySure to get tangled in his ribbon-ties,And Peter's cursed rosette's a-coming off!)—At last I see our lord's back and his friend's;And the whole beautiful bright companyClose round them—in they go! [Jumping down from the
window-bench, and making for the table and its jugs.]
¶Good health, long life,Great joy to our Lord Tresham and his House!Sixth Retainer. My father drove his father first to court,After his marriage-day—ay, did he!Second Retainer. God blessLord Tresham, Lady Mildred, and the Earl!Here, Gerard, reach your beaker!Gerard. Drink, my boys!Don't mind me—all's not right about me—drink!Second Retainer [aside]. He's vexed, now, that he let theshow escape![ To GERARD.] Remember that the Earl returns this way.Gerard. That way?Second Retainer. Just so.Gerard. Then my way's here. [Goes.Second Retainer. Old GerardWill die soon—mind, I said it! He was usedTo care about the pitifullest thingThat touched the House's honour, not an eyeBut his could see wherein: and on a causeOf scarce a quarter this importance, GerardFairly had fretted flesh and bone awayIn cares that this was right, nor that was wrong,Such point decorous, and such square by rule—He knew such niceties, no herald more:And now—you see his humour: die he will!Second Retainer. God help him! Who's for the great servants' hallTo hear what's going on inside! They'd follow[363]Lord Tresham into the saloon.Third Retainer. I I —Fourth Retainer. I!—Leave Frank alone for catching, at the door,Some hint of how the parley goes inside!Prosperity to the great House once more!Here's the last drop!First Retainer. Have at you! Boys, hurrah!
¶SCENE II.—A Saloon in the Mansion
Enter LORD TRESHAM, LORD MERTOUN, AUSTIN, and GUENDOLEN
¶Tresham. I welcome you, Lord Mertoun, yet once more,To this ancestral roof of mine. Your name—Noble among the noblest in itself,Yet taking in your person, fame avers,New price and lustre,—(as that gem you wear,Transmitted from a hundred knightly breasts,Fresh chased and set and fixed by its last lord,Seems to re-kindle at the core)—your nameWould win you welcome!—Mertoun. Thanks!Tresham. —But add to that,The worthiness and grace and dignityOf your proposal for uniting bothOur Houses even closer than respectUnites them now—add these, and you must grantOne favour more, nor that the least,—to thinkThe welcome I should give;—'tis given! My lord,My only brother, Austin: he's the king's.Our cousin, Lady Guendolen—betrothedTo Austin: all are yours.Mertoun. I thank you—lessFor the expressed commendings which your seal,And only that, authenticates—forbids[364]My putting from me . . . to my heart I takeYour praise . . . but praise less claims my gratitude,Than the indulgent insight it impliesOf what must needs be uppermost with oneWho comes, like me, with the bare leave to ask,In weighed and measured unimpassioned words,A gift, which, if as calmly 'tis denied,He must withdraw, content upon his cheek,Despair within his soul. That I dare askFirmly, near boldly, near with confidenceThat gift, I have to thank you. Yes, Lord Tresham,I love your sister—as you'd have one loveThat lady . . . oh more, more I love her! Wealth,Rank, all the world thinks me, they're yours, you know,To hold or part with, at your choice—but grantMy true self, me without a rood of land,A piece of gold, a name of yesterday,Grant me that lady, and you . . . Death or life?Guendolcn {apart to AUSTIN ] . Why , this is loving, Austin!Austin. He's so young!Guendolen. Young? Old enough, I think, to half surmiseHe never had obtained an entrance here,Were all this fear and trembling needed.Austin. Hush!He reddens.Guendolen. Mark him, Austin; that's true love!Ours must begin again.Tresham. We'll sit, my lord.Ever with best desert goes diffidence.I may speak plainly nor be misconceivedThat I am wholly satisfied with youOn this occasion, when a falcon's eyeWere dull compared with mine to search out faults,Is somewhat. Mildred's hand is hers to giveOr to refuse.Mertoun. But you, you grant my suit?I have your word if hers?[365]Tresham. My best of wordsIf hers encourage you. I trust it will.Have you seen Lady Mildred, by the way ?Mertoun. I . . . I . . . our two demesnes, remember, touch,I have been used to wander carelesslyAfter my stricken game: the heron rousedDeep in my woods, has trailed its broken wingThro' thicks and glades a mile in yours,—or elseSome eyass ill-reclaimed has taken flightAnd lured me after her from tree to tree,I marked not whither. I have come uponThe lady's wondrous beauty unaware,And—and then . . . I have seen her.Guendolen [aside to AUSTIN ] . Note that modeOf faltering out that, when a lady passed,He , having eyes, did see herl You had said—"On such a day I scanned her, head to foot;Observed a red, where red should not have been,Outside her elbow; but was pleased enoughUpon the whole." Let such irreverent talkBe lessoned for the future!Tresham. What's to sayMay be said briefly. She has never knownA mother's care; I stand for father too.Her beauty is not strange to you, it seems—You cannot know the good and tender heart,Its girl's trust and its woman's constancy,How pure yet passionate, how calm yet kind,How grave yet joyous, how reserved yet freeAs light where friends are—how imbued with loreThe world most prizes, yet the simplest, yetThe . . . one might know I talked of Mildred—thusWe brothers talk!Mertoun. I thank you.Tresham. In a word,Control's not for this lady; but her wishTo please me outstrips in its subtlety[366]My power of being pleased: herself createsThe want she means to satisfy. My heartPrefers your suit to her as 'twere its own.Can I say more?Mertoun. No more—thanks, thanks—no more!Tresham. This matter then discussed . . .Mertoun. —We'll waste no breathOn aught less precious. I'm beneath the roofWhich holds her: while I thought of that, my speechTo you would wander—as it must not do,Since as you favour me I stand or fall.I pray you suffer that I take my leave!Tresham. With less regret 'tis suffered, that againWe meet, I hope, so shortly.Mertoun. We ? again?—Ah yes, forgive me—when shall . . . you will crownYour goodness by forthwith apprising meWhen . . . if . . . the lady will appoint a dayFor me to wait on you—and her.Tresham. So soonAs I am made acquainted with her thoughtsOn your proposal—howsoe'er they lean—A messenger shall bring you the result.Mertoun. You cannot bind me more to you, my lord.Farewell till we renew . . . I trust, renewA converse ne'er to disunite again.Tresham. So may it prove!Mertoun. You, lady, you, sir, takeMy humble salutation!Guendolen and Austin. ThankslTresham. Within there![Servants enter. TRESHAM conducts MERTOUN tothe door. Meantime AUSTIN remarks,Well,Here I have an advantage of the Earl,Confess now! I'd not think that all was safeBecause my lady's brother stood my friend![367]Why , he makes sure of her—"do you say yes—She'll not say, no,"—what comes it to beside?I should have prayed the brother, "speak this speech,For Heaven's sake urge this on her—put in this—Forget not, as you'd save me, t'other thing,—Then set down what she says, and how she looks,And if she smiles, and" (in an under breath)"Only let her accept me, and do youAnd all the world refuse me, if you dare!"Guendolen. That way you'd take, friend Austin? What ashameI was your cousin, tamely from the firstYour bride, and all this fervour's run to waste!Do you know you speak sensibly to-day?The Earl's a fool.Austin. Here's Thorold. Tell him so!Tresham [returning]. Now , voices, voices! 'St! the lady'sfirst!How seems he?—seems he not . . . come, faith give fraudThe mercy-stroke whenever they engage!Down with fraud, up with faith! How seems the Earl?A name! a blazon! if you knew their worth,As you will never! come—the Earl?Guendolen. He's young.Tresham. What's she? an infant save in heart and brain.Young! Mildred is fourteen, remark! And you . . .Austin, how old is she?Guendolen. There's tact for you!I meant that being young was good excuseIf one should tax him . . .Tresham. Well?Guendolen. — With lacking wit.Tresham. He lacked wit? Where might he lack wit, soplease you?Guendolen. In standing straighter than the steward's rodAnd making you the tiresomest harangue,Instead of slipping over to my side[368]And softly whispering in my ear, "Sweet lady,Your cousin there will do me detrimentHe little dreams of: he's absorbed, I see,In my old name and fame—be sure he'll leaveMy Mildred, when his best account of meIs ended, in full confidence I wearMy grandsire's periwig down either cheek.I'm lost unless your gentleness vouchsafes" . . .Tresham . . . "To give a best of best accounts, yourself,Of me and my demerits." You are right!He should have said what now I say for him.Yon golden creature, will you help us all ?Here's Austin means to vouch for much, but you—You are . . . what Austin only knows! Come up,All three of us: she's in the libraryNo doubt, for the day's wearing fast. Precede!Guendolen. Austin, how we must—!Tresham. Must what? Must speak truth,Malignant tongue! Detect one fault in him!I challenge you!Guendolen. Witchcraft's a fault in him,For you're bewitched.Tresham. What's urgent we obtainIs, that she soon receive him—say, to-morrow—Next day at furthest.Guendolen. Ne'er instruct me!Tresham. Come!—He's out of your good graces, since forsooth,He stood not as he'd carry us by stormWith his perfections! You're for the composedManly assured becoming confidence!—Get her to say, "to-morrow," and I'll give you . . .I'll give you black Urganda, to be spoiledWith petting and snail-paces. Will you? Come!
p. 369¶SCENE III.—MILDRED'S Chamber. A Painted Window overlooks the Park
MILDRED and GUENDOLEN
¶Guendolen. Now , Mildred, spare those pains. I have not leftOur talkers in the library, and climbedThe wearisome ascent to this your bowerIn company with you,—I have not dared . . .Nay, worked such prodigies as sparing youLord Mertoun's pedigree before the flood,Which Thorold seemed in very act to tell—Or bringing Austin to pluck up that mostFirm-rooted heresy—your suitor's eyes,He would maintain, were grey instead of blue—I think I brought him to contrition!—Well,I have not done such things, (all to deserveA minute's quiet cousin's talk with you,)To be dismissed so coolly.Mildred. Guendolen!What have I done? what could suggest . . .Guendolen. There, there!Do I not comprehend you'd be aloneTo throw those testimonies in a heap,Thorold's enlargings, Austin's brevities,With that poor silly heartless Guendolen'sIll-time misplaced attempted smartnesses—And sift their sense out ? now, I come to spare youNearly a whole night's labour. Ask and have!Demand, be answered! Lack I ears and eyes?Am I perplexed which side of the rock-tableThe Conqueror dined on when he landed first,Lord Mertoun's ancestor was bidden take—The bow-hand or the arrow-hand's great meed?Mildred, the Earl has soft blue eyes!Mildred. My brother—Did he . . . you said that he received him well?Guendolen. If I said only "well" I said not much.Oh, stay—which brother ?[370]Mildred. Thorold! who—who else?Guendolen. Thorold (a secret) is too proud by half,—Nay, hear me out—with us he's even gentlerThan we are with our birds. Of this great HouseThe least retainer that e'er caught his glanceWould die for him, real dying—no mere talk:And in the world, the court, if men would citeThe perfect spirit of honour, Thorold's nameRises of its clear nature to their lips.But he should take men's homage, trust in it,And care no more about what drew it down.He has desert, and that, acknowledgment;Is he content ?Mildred. You wrong him, Guendolen.Guendolen. He's proud, confess; so proud with broodingo'erThe light of his interminable line,An ancestry with men all paladins,And women all . . .Mildred. Dear Guendolen, 'tis late!When yonder purple pane the climbing moonPierces, I know 'tis midnight.Guendolen. Well, that ThoroldShould rise up from such musings, and receiveOne come audaciously to graft himselfInto this peerless stock, yet find no flaw,No slightest spot in such an one . . .Mildred. Who findsA spot in Mertoun?Guendolen. Not your brother; therefore,Not the whole world.Mildred. I am weary, Guendolen.Bear with me!Guendolen. I am foolish.Mildred. Oh no, kind!But I would rest.[371]Guendolen. Good night and rest to you!I said how gracefully his mantle layBeneath the rings of his light hair ?Mildred. Brown hair.Guendolen. Brown? why, it is brown: how could you knowthat?Mildred. How ? did not you—Oh, Austin 'twas, declaredHis hair was light, not brown—my head!—and look,The moon-beam purpling the dark chamber! Sweet,Good night!Guendolen. Forgive me—sleep the soundlier for me![Going, she turns suddenly.Mildred!Perdition! all's discovered! Thorold finds—That the Earl's greatest of all grandmothersWas grander daughter still—to that fair dameWhose garter slipped down at the famous dance! [Goes.Mildred. Is she—can she be really gone at last?My heart! I shall not reach the window. NeedsMust I have sinned much, so to suffer.
[She lifts the small lamp which is suspended before
¶the Virgin's image in the window, and places it bythe purple pane.There![She returns to the seat in front.Mildred and Mertoun! Mildred, with consentOf all the world and Thorold, Mertoun's bride!Too late! 'Tis sweet to think of, sweeter stillTo hope for, that this blessed end soothes upThe curse of the beginning; but I knowIt comes too late: 'twill sweetest be of allTo dream my soul away and die upon. [A noise without.The voice! Oh why, why glided sin the snakeInto the paradise Heaven meant us both?[The window opens softly. A low voice sings.
p. 372¶There's a woman like a dew-drop, she's so purer than the
¶purest;
¶And her noble heart's the noblest, yes, and her sure faith's the
¶surest:
¶And her eyes are dark and humid, like the depth on depth of
¶lustre
¶Hid i' the harebell, while her tresses, sunnier than the wild-
¶grape cluster,
¶Gush in golden tinted plenty down her neck's rose-misted
¶marble:
¶Then her voice's music . . . call it the well's bubbling, the bird's warble!
¶[A figure wrapped in a mantle appears at the window. And this woman says, "My days were sunless and my nights
¶were moonless,
¶Parched the pleasant April herbage, and the lark's heart's out
¶break tuneless.
¶If you loved me not!" And I who—(ah, for words of flame!)
¶adore her,
¶Who am mad to lay my spirit prostrate palpably before her—
¶[He enters, approaches her seat, and bends over her. I may enter at her portal soon, as now her lattice takes me,
¶And by noontide as by midnight make her mine, as hers she mafes me!
¶[The EARL throws off his slouched hat and long cloak-
¶Mertoun. 'Tis mine.
¶Mertoun. Happiness
¶Such as the world contains not.
¶Mildred. That is it.
¶Our happiness would, as you say, exceed
p. 373¶The whole world's best of blisses: we—do weDeserve that? Utter to your soul, what mineLong since, Beloved, has grown used to hear,Like a death-knell, so much regarded once,And so familiar now; this will not be!Mertoun. Oh, Mildred, have I met your brother's face?Compelled myself—if not to speak untruth,Yet to disguise, to shun, to put asideThe truth, as—what had e'er prevailed on meSave you to venture? Have I gained at lastYour brother, the one scarer of your dreams,And waking thoughts' sole apprehension too?Does a new life, like a young sunrise, breakOn the strange unrest of our night, confusedWith rain and stormy flaw—and will you seeNo dripping blossoms, no fire-tinted dropsOn each live spray, no vapour steaming up,And no expressless glory in the East ?When I am by you, to be ever by you,When I have won you and may worship you,Oh, Mildred, can you say "this will not be"?Mildred. Sin has surprised us, so will punishment.Mertoun. No — me alone, who sinned alone!Mildred. The nightYou likened our past life to—was it stormThroughout to you then, Henry ?Mertoun. Of your lifeI spoke—what am I, what my life, to wasteA thought about when you are by me?—youIt was, I said my folly called the stormAnd pulled the night upon. 'Twas day with me —Perpetual dawn with me.Mildred. Come what, come will,You have been happy: take my hand!
Mertoun [after a pause]. How good
¶Your brother is! I figured him a cold -Shall I say, haughty man ?[374]Mildred. They told me alLI know all.Mertoun. It will soon be over.Mildred. Over?Oh, what is over ? what must I live throughAnd say, " 'us over" ? Is our meeting over ?Have I received in presence of them allThe partner of my guilty love—with browTrying to seem a maiden's brow—with lipsWhich make believe that when they strive to formReplies to you and tremble as they strive,It is the nearest ever they approachedA stranger's . . . Henry, yours that stranger's . . . lip—With cheek that looks a virgin's, and that is . . .Ah God, some prodigy of thine will stopThis planned piece of deliberate wickednessIn its birth even! some fierce leprous spotWill mar the brow's dissimulating! IShall murmur no smooth speeches got by heart,But, frenzied, pour forth all our woeful story,The love, the shame, and the despair—with themRound me aghast as round some cursed fountThat should spirt water, and spouts blood. I'll not. . . Henry, you do not wish that I should drawThis vengeance down ? I'll not affect a graceThat's gone from me—gone once, and gone for ever!Mertoun. Mildred, my honour is your own . I'll shareDisgrace I cannot suffer by myself.A word informs your brother I retractThis morning's offer; time will yet bring forthSome better way of saving both of us.Mildred. I'll meet their faces, Henry!Mertoun. When ? to-morrow!Get done with it!Mildred. Oh, Henry, not to-morrow!Next day! I never shall prepare my words[375]And looks and gestures sooner.—How you mustDespise me IMertoun. Mildred, break it if you choose,A heart the love of you uplifted—stillUplifts, thro' this protracted agony,To heaven! but Mildred, answer me,—first paceThe chamber with me—once again—now, sayCalmly the part, the . . . what it is of meYou see contempt (for you did say contempt)—Contempt for you in! I would pluck it offAnd cast it from me!—but no—no, you'll notRepeat that?—will you, Mildred, repeat that?Mildred. Dear Henry!Mertoun. I was scarce a boy—e'en nowWhat am I more? And you were infantineWhen first I met you; why, your hair fell looseOn either side! My fool's-cheek reddens nowOnly in the recalling how it burnedThat morn to see the shape of many a dream—You know we boys are prodigal of charmsTo her we dream of—I had heard of one,Had dreamed of her, and I was close to her,Might speak to her, might live and die her own ,Who knew? I spoke. Oh, Mildred, feel you notThat now, while I remember every glanceOf yours, each word of yours, with power to testAnd weigh them in the diamond scales of pride,Resolved the treasure of a first and lastHeart's love shall have been bartered at its worth,—That now I think upon your purityAnd utter ignorance of guilt—your ownOr other's guilt—the girlish undisguisedDelight at a strange novel prize—(I talkA silly language, but interpret, you!)If I, with fancy at its full, and reasonScarce in its germ, enjoyed you secrecy,[376]If you had pity on my passion, pityOn my protested sickness of the soulTo sit beside you, hear you breathe, and watchYour eyelids and the eyes beneath—if youAccorded gifts and knew not they were gifts—If I grew mad at last with enterpriseAnd must behold my beauty in her bowerOr perish—(I was ignorant of evenMy own desires—what then were you?) if sorrow—Sin—if the end came—must I now renounceMy reason, blind myself to light, say truthIs false and lie to God and my own soul?Contempt were all of this!Mildred. Do you believe . . .Or, Henry, I'll not wrong you—you believeThat I was ignorant. I scarce grieve o'erThe past. We'll love on; you will love me still.Mertoun. Oh, to love less what one has injured! Dove.Whose pinion I have rashly hurt, my breast—Shall my heart's warmth not nurse thee into strength?Flower I have crushed, shall I not care for thee?Bloom o'er my crest, my fight-mark and device!Mildred, I love you and you love me.Mildred. Go!Be that your last word. I shall sleep to-night.Mertoun. This is not our last meeting?Mildred. One night more.Mertoun. And then—think, then!Mildred. Then, no sweet courtship-days,No dawning consciousness of love for us,No strange and palpitating births of senseFrom words and looks, no innocent fears and hopes,Reserves and confidences: morning's over!Mertoun. How else should love's perfected noontide follow?All the dawn promised shall the day perform.Mildred. So may it be! but—You are cautious, Love?[377]Are sure that unobserved you scaled the walls?Mertoun. Oh, trust me! Then our final meeting's fixedTo-morrow night?Mildred. Farewell! stay, Henry . . . wherefore?His foot is on the yew-tree bough; the turfReceives him: now the moonlight as he runsEmbraces him—but he must go—is gone.Ah, once again he turns—thanks, thanks, my Love!He's gone. Oh, I'll believe him every word!I was so young, I loved him so, I hadNo mother, God forgot me, and I fell.There may be pardon yet: all's doubt beyond!Surely the bitterness of death is past.
Act II
¶SCENE.—The LibraryEnter LORD TRESHAM, hastilyTresham. This way! In, Gerard, quick![As GERARD enters, TRESHAM secures the door.Now speak! or, wait—I'll bid you speak directly. [Seats himself.Now repeatFirmly and circumstantially the taleYou just now told me; it eludes me ; eitherI did not listen, or the half is goneAway from me. How long have you lived here?Here in my house, your father kept our woodsBefore you?Gerard. — As his father did, my lord.I have been eating, sixty years almost,Your bread.Tresham. Yes, yes. You ever were of allThe servants in my father's house, I know,The trusted one. You'll speak the truth.
Gerard. I'll speak
¶God's truth. Night after night . . .
p. 378¶Tresham. Since when?Gerard. At leastA month—each midnight has some man accessTo Lady Mildred's chamber.Tresham. Tush, "access"—No wide words like "access" to me!Gerard. He runsAlong the woodside, crosses to the South,Takes the left tree that ends the avenue . . .Tresham. The last great yew-tree ?Gerard. You might stand uponThe main boughs like a platform. Then he . . .Tresham. Quick!Gerard. Climbs up, and, where they lessen at the top,—I cannot see distinctly, but he throws,I think—for this I do not vouch—a lineThat reaches to the lady's casement—Tresham. —WhichHe enters not! Gerard, some wretched foolDares pry into my sister's privacy!When such are young, it seems a precious thingTo have approached,—to merely have approached,Got sight of the abode of her they setTheir frantic thoughts upon. He does not enter?Gerard ?Gerard. There is a lamp that's full i' the midst,Under a red square in the painted glassOf Lady Mildred's . . .Tresham. Leave that name out! Well?That lamp ?Gerard. Is moved at midnight higher upTo one pane—a small dark-blue pane; he waitsFor that among the boughs: at sight of that,I see him, plain as I see you, my lord,Open the lady's casement, enter there . . .Tresham.—And stay?Gerard. An hour, two hours.[379]Tresham. And this you sawOnce ?—twice ?—quick!Gerard. Twenty times.Tresham. And what brings youUnder the yew-trees ?Gerard. The first night I leftMy range so far, to track the stranger stagThat broke the pale, I saw the man.Tresham. Yet sentNo cross-bow shaft through the marauder?Gerard. ButHe came, my lord, the first time he was seen,In a great moonlight, light as any day,From Lady Mildred's chamber.Tresham [after a pause]. You have no cause— Who could have cause to do my sister wrong?Gerard. Oh, my lord, only once—let me this onceSpeak what is on my mind! Since first I notedAll this, I've groaned as if a fiery netPlucked me this way and that—fire if I turnedTo her, fire if I turned to you, and fireIf down I flung myself and strove to die.The lady could not have been seven years oldWhen I was trusted to conduct her safeThrough the deer-herd to stroke the snow-white fawnI brought to eat bread from her tiny handWithin a month. She ever had a smileTo greet me with—she . . . if it could undoWhat's done, to lop each limb from off this trunk . . .All that is foolish talk, not fit for you—I mean, I could not speak and bring her hurtFor Heaven's compelling. But when I was fixedTo hold my peace, each morsel of your foodEaten beneath your roof, my birth-place too,Choked me. I wish I had grown mad in doubtsWhat it behoved me do. This morn it seemedEither I must confess to you or die:[380]Now it is done, I seem the vilest wormThat crawls, to have betrayed my lady.
Tresham. No —
¶No , Gerard!Gerard. Let me go!Tresham. A man, you say:What man ? Young ? Not a vulgar hind ? What dress ?Gerard. A slouched hat and a large dark foreign cloakWraps his whole form; even his face is hid;But I should judge him young: no hind, be sure!Tresham. Why ?Gerard. He is ever armed: his sword projectsBeneath the cloak.Tresham. Gerard,—I will not sayNo word, no breath of this!Gerard. Thanks, thanks, my lord![Goes.Tresham [paces the room. After a pause]. Oh, thoughtsabsurd!—as with some monstrous factWhich , when ill thoughts beset us, seems to giveMerciful God that made the sun and stars,The waters and the green delights of earth,The lie! I apprehend the monstrous fact—Yet know the maker of all worlds is good,And yield my reason up, inadequateTo reconcile what yet I do behold—Blasting my sense! There's cheerful day outside:This is my library, and this the chairMy father used to sit in carelesslyAfter his soldier-fashion, while I stoodBetween his knees to question him: and hereGerard our grey retainer,—as he says,Fed with our food, from sire to son, an age,—Has told a story—I am to believe!That Mildred . . . oh, no, no! both tales are true,Her pure cheek's story and the forester's!Would she, or could she, err—much less, confound[381]All guilts of treachery, of craft, of . . . HeavenKeep me within its hand!—I will sit hereUntil thought settle and 1 see my course.Avert, oh God, only this woe from me!
[As he sin\s his head between his arms on the table,
¶GUENDOLEN'S voice is heard at the door.Lord Tresham! [She knockj.\ Is Lord Tresham there ?[TRESHAM, hastily turning, pulls down the firstbook above him and opens it.Tresham. Come in! [She enters.Ha, Guendolen!—good morning.Guendolen. Nothing more?Tresham. What should I say more?Guendolen. Pleasant question! more?This more. Did I besiege poor Mildred's brainLast night till close on morning with "the Earl,""The Earl"—whose worth did I asseverateTill I am very fain to hope that . . . Thorold,What is all this? You are not well!Tresham. Who, I?You laugh at me.Guendolen. Has what I'm fain to hope,Arrived then? Does that huge tome show some blotIn the Earl's 'scutcheon come no longer backThan Arthur's time?Tresham. When left you Mildred's chamber?Guendolen. Oh, late enough, I told you! The main thingTo ask is, how I left her chamber,—sure,Content yourself, she'll grant this paragonOf Earls no such ungracious . . .Tresham. Send her here!Guendolen. Thorold?Tresham. I mean—acquaint her, Guendolen,—But mildly!Guendolen. Mildly?[382]Tresham. Ah, you guessed aright!I am not well: there is no hiding it.But tell her I would see her at her leisure—That is, at once! here in the library!The passage in that old Italian bookWe hunted for so long is found, say, found—And if I let it slip again . . . you see,That she must come—and instantly!
Guendolen. I'll die
¶Piecemeal, record that, if there have not gloomedSome blot i' the 'scutcheon!Tresham. Go! or, Guendolen,Be you at call,—with Austin, if you choose,—In the adjoining gallery! There, go! [GUENDOLEN goes.Another lesson to me! You might bidA child disguise his heart's sore, and conductSome sly investigation point by pointWith a smooth brow, as well as bid me catchThe inquisitorial cleverness some praise.If you had told me yesterday, "There's oneYou needs must circumvent and practise with,Entrap by policies, if you would wormThe truth out: and that one is—Mildred!" There,There—reasoning is thrown away on it!Prove she's unchaste . . . why. you may after proveThat she's a poisoner, traitress, what you will!Where I can comprehend nought, nought's to say,Or do, or think. Force on me but the firstAbomination,—then outpour all plagues,And I shall ne'er make count of them.
¶Enter MILDREDMildred. What bookIs it I wanted, Thorold? GuendolenThought you were pale; you are not pale. That book?That's Latin surely.Tresham. Mildred, here's a line,(Don't lean on me : I'll English it for you)[383]"Love conquers all things." What love conquers them ?What love should you esteem—best love?Mildred. True love.Tresham. I mean, and should have said, whose love isbestOf all that love or that profess to love?Mildred. The list's so long: there's father's, mother's,husband's . . .Tresham. Mildred, I do believe a brother's loveFor a sole sister must exceed them all.For see now, only see! there's no alloyOf earth that creeps into the perfect'st goldOf other loves—no gratitude to claim;You never gave her life, not even aughtThat keeps life—never tended her, instructed,Enriched her—so, your love can claim no rightO'er her save pure love's claim: that's what I callFreedom from earthliness. You'll never hopeTo be such friends, for instance, she and you,As when you hunted cowslips in the woods,Or played together in the meadow hay.Oh yes—with age, respect comes, and your worthIs felt, there's growing sympathy of tastes,There's ripened friendship, there's confirmed esteem:—Much head these make against the newcomer!The startling apparition, the strange youth—Whom one half-hour's conversing with, or, say,Mere gazing at, shall change (beyond all changeThis Ovid ever sang about) your soul. . . Her soul, that is,—the sister's soul! With her'Twas winter yesterday; now, all is warmth,The green leaf's springing and the turtle's voice,"Arise and come away!" Come whither?—farEnough from the esteem, respect, and allThe brother's somewhat insignificantArray of rights! All which he knows before,Has calculated on so long ago!I think such love, (apart from yours and mine,)[384]Contented with its little term of life,Intending to retire betimes, awareHow soon the background must be placed for it,—I think, am sure, a brother's love exceedsAll the world's love in its unworldliness.Mildred. What is this for?Tresham. This, Mildred, is it for!Or, no, I cannot go to it so soon!That's one of many points my haste left out—Each day, each hour throws forth its silk-slight filmBetween the being tied to you by birth,And you, until those slender threads composeA web that shrouds her daily life of hopesAnd fears and fancies, all her life, from yours:So close you live and yet so far apart!And must I rend this web, tear up, break downThe sweet and palpitating mysteryThat makes her sacred ? You—for you I mean,Shall I speak, shall I not speak ?Mildred. Speak!Tresham. I will.Is there a story men could—any manCould tell of you, you would conceal from me ?I'll never think there's falsehood on that lip.Say "There is no such story men could tell,"And I'll believe you, though I disbelieveThe world—the world of better men than I,And women such as I suppose you. Speak![After a pause.] Not speak? Explain then! Clear it up then!MoveSome of the miserable weight awayThat presses lower than the grave. Not speak ?Some of the dead weight, Mildred! Ah, if ICould bring myself to plainly make their chargeAgainst you! Must I, Mildred? Silent still?[After a pause.] Is there a gallant that has night by nightAdmittance to your chamber?[385][After a pause.] Then, his name!Till now, I only had a thought for you:But now,—his name!Mildred. Thorold, do you deviseFit expiation for my guilt, if fitThere be! 'Tis nought to say that I'll endureAnd bless you,—that my spirit yearns to purgeHer stains off in the fierce renewing fire:But do not plunge me into other guilt!Oh, guilt enough! I cannot tell his name.Tresham. Then judge yourself! How should I act?Pronounce!Mildred. Oh, Thorold, you must never tempt me thus!To die here in this chamber by that swordWould seem like punishment: so should I glide,Like an arch-cheat, into extremest bliss!'Twere easily arranged for me : but you—What would become of you ?Tresham. And what will nowBecome of me? I'll hide your shame and mineFrom every eye; the dead must heave their heartsUnder the marble of our chapel-floor;They cannot rise and blast you. You may wedYour paramour above our mother's tomb;Our mother cannot move from 'neath your foot.We too will somehow wear this one day out:But with to-morrow hastens here—the Earl!The youth without suspicion. Face can comeFrom Heaven and heart from . . . whence proceed suchhearts?I have dispatched last night at your commandA missive bidding him present himselfTo-morrow—here—thus much is said; the restIs understood as if 'twere written down —"His suit finds favor in your eyes." Now dictateThis morning's letter that shall countermandLast night's—do dictate that![386]Mildred. But, Thorold—ifI will receive him as I said ?Tresham. The Earl?Mildred. I will receive him.Tresham [starting up]. Ho there! Guendolen!
¶GUENDOLEN and AUSTIN enterAnd, Austin, you are welcome, tool Look there!The woman there!Austin and Guendolen. How ? Mildred?Tresham. Mildred onceNow the receiver night by night, when sleepBlesses the inmates of her father's house,—I say, the soft sly wanton that receivesHer guilt's accomplice 'neath this roof which holdsYou, Guendolen, you, Austin, and has heldA thousand Treshams—never one like her!No lighter of the signal-lamp her quickFoul breath near quenches in hot eagernessTo mix with breath as foul! no loosenerO' the lattice, practised in the stealthy tread,The low voice and the noiseless come-and-go!Not one composer of the bacchant's mienInto—what you thought Mildred's, in a word!Know her!Guendolen. Oh, Mildred, look to me, at least!Thorold—she's dead, I'd say, but that she standsRigid as stone and whiter!Tresham. You have heard . . .Guendolen. Too much! You must proceed no further.Mildred. Yes -Proceed! All's truth. Go from me!Tresham. All is truth,She tells you! Well, you know, or ought to know,All this I would forgive in her. I'd conEach precept the harsh world enjoins, I'd takeOur ancestors' stern verdicts one by one,[387]I'd bind myself before them to exactThe prescribed vengeance—and one word of hers,The sight of her, the bare least memoryOf Mildred, my one sister, my heart's prideAbove all prides, my all in all so long,Would scatter every trace of my resolve.What were it silently to waste awayAnd see her waste away from this day forth,Two scathed things with leisure to repent,And grow acquainted with the grave, and dieTired out if not at peace, and be forgotten ?It were not so impossible to bear.But this—that, fresh from last night's pledge renewedOf love with the successful gallant there,She calmly bids me help her to entice,Inveigle an unconscious trusting youthWho thinks her all that's chaste and good and pure,—Invites me to betray him . . . whoso fitAs honour's self to cover shame's arch-deed ?—That she'll receive Lord Mertoun—(her own phrase)This, who could bear ? Why , you have heard of thieves,Stabbers, the earth's disgrace, who yet have laughed,"Talk not to me of torture—I'll betrayNo comrade I've pledged faith to!"—you have heardOf wretched women—all but Mildreds—tiedBy wild illicit ties to losels vileYou'd tempt them to forsake; and they'll reply"Gold, friends, repute, I left for him, I findIn him, why should I leave him then, for gold,Repute or friends?"—and you have felt your heartRespond to such poor outcasts of the worldAs to so many friends; bad as you please,You've felt they were God's men and women still,So, not to be disowned by you. But sheThat stands there, calmly gives her lover upAs means to wed the Earl that she may hideTheir intercourse the surelier: and, for this,[388]I curse her to her face before you all.Shame hunt her from the earth! Then Heaven do rightTo both! It hears me now—shall judge her then![As MILDRED faints and falls, TRESHAM rushes out.Austin. Stay, Tresham, we'll accompany you!
Guendolen. We?
¶What, and leave Mildred? We ? Why , where's my placeBut by her side, and where yours but by mine?Mildred—one word! Only look at me, then!Austin. No , Guendolen! I echo Thorold's voice.She is unworthy to behold . . .Guendolen. Us two?If you spoke on reflection, and if IApproved your speech—if you (to put the thingAt lowest) you the soldier, bound to makeThe king's cause yours and fight for it, and throwRegard to others of its right or wrong,—If with a death-white woman you can help,Let alone sister, let alone a Mildred,You left her—or if I, her cousin, friendThis morning, playfellow but yesterday,Who said, or thought at least a thousand times,"I'd serve you if I could," should now face roundAnd say, "Ah, that's to only signifyI'd serve you while you're fit to serve yourself:So long as fifty eyes await the turnOf yours to forestall its yet half-formed wish,I'll proffer my assistance you'll not need—When every tongue is praising you, I'll joinThe praisers' chorus—when you're hemmed aboutWith lives between you and detraction—livesTo be laid down if a rude voice, rash eye,Rough hand should violate the sacred ringTheir worship throws about you,—then indeed,Who'll stand up for you stout as I?" If soWe said, and so we did,—not Mildred thereWould be unworthy to behold us both,[389]But we should be unworthy, both of us.To be beheld by—by—your meanest dog,Which, if that sword were broken in your faceBefore a crowd, that badge torn off your breast,And you cast out with hooting and contempt,—Would push his way thro' all the hooters, gainYour side, go off with you and all your shameTo the next ditch you choose to die in! Austin,Do you love me? Here's Austin, Mildred,—here'sYour brother says he does not believe half—No , nor half that—of all he heard! He says,Look up and take his hand!Austin. Look up and takeMy hand, dear Mildred!Mildred. I—I was so young!Beside, I loved him, Thorold—and I hadNo mother; God forgot me : so, I fell.Guendolen. Mildred!Mildred. Require no further! Did I dreamThat I could palliate what is done ? All's true.Now , punish me! A woman takes my hand?Let go my hand! You do not know, I see.I thought that Thorold told you.Guendolen. What is this?Where start you to?Mildred. Oh, Austin, loosen me!You heard the whole of it—your eyes were worse,In their surprise, than Thorold's! Oh, unlessYou stay to execute his sentence, looseMy hand! Has Thorold gone, and are you here?Guendolen. Here, Mildred, we two friends of yours willwait.Your bidding; be you silent, sleep or muse!Only, when you shall want your bidding done,How can we do it if we are not by ?Here's Austin waiting patiently your will!One spirit to command, and one to love[390]And to believe in it and do its best,Poor as that is, to help it—why, the worldHas been won many a time, its length and breadth,By just such a beginning!Mildred. I believeIf once I threw my arms about your neckAnd sunk my head upon your breast, that IShould weep again.Guendolen. Let go her hand now, Austin!Wait for me. Pace the gallery and thinkOn the world's seemings and realities,Until I call you. [ AUSTIN goes.Mildred. No — I cannot weep.No more tears from this brain—no sleep—no tears!0 Guendolen, I love you!Guendolen. Yes: and "love"Is a short word that says so very much!It says that you confide in me.Mildred. Confide!Guendolen. Your lover's name, then! I've so much to learn,Ere I can work in your behalf IMildred. My friend,You know I cannot tell his name.Guendolen. At leastHe is your lover? and you love him too?Mildred. Ah, do you ask me that,—but I am fallenSo low!Guendolen. You love him still, then?Mildred. My sole propAgainst the guilt that crushes me! I say,Each night ere I lie down, "I was so young—I had no mother, and I loved him so!"And then God seems indulgent, and I dareTrust him my soul in sleep.Guendolen. How could you let usE'en talk to you about Lord Mertoun then?Mildred. There is a cloud around me.[391]Guendolen. But you saidYou would receive his suit in spite of this?Mildred. I say there is a cloud • . .Guendolen. No cloud to me!Lord Mertoun and your lover are the same!Mildred. What maddest fancy . . .Guendolen [calling aloud]. Ausdn! (spare your pains—When I have got a truth, that truth I keep)—Mildred. By all you love, sweet Guendolen, forbear!Have I confided in you . . .Guendolen. Just for this!Austin!—Oh, not to guess it at the first!But I did guess it—that is, I divined,Felt by an instinct how it was: why elseShould I pronounce you free from all that heapOf sins which had been irredeemable?I felt they were not yours—what other wayThan this, not yours? The secret's wholly mine!Mildred. If you would see me die before his face . . .Guendolen. I'd hold my peace! And if the Earl returnsTo-night ?Mildred. Ah Heaven, he's lost!Guendolen. I thought so. Austin!
¶Enter AUSTINOh, where have you been hiding?Austin. Thorold's gone,I know not how, across the meadow-land.I watched him till I lost him in the skirtsO' the beech-wood.Guendolen. Gone? All thwarts us.Mildred. Thorold too?Guendolen. I have thought. First lead this Mildred to herroom.Go on the other side; and then we'll seekYour brother: and I'll tell you, by the way,The greatest comfort in the world. You said[392]There was a clue to all. Remember, Sweet,He said there was a clue! I hold it. Come!
Act III
¶SCENE I.—The end of the Yew-tree Avenue under MILDRED'S Window.
A light seen through a central red pane
¶Enter TRESHAM through the treesTresham. Again here! But I cannot lose myself.The heath—the orchard—I have traversed gladesAnd dells and bosky paths which used to leadInto green wild-wood depths, bewilderingMy boy's adventurous step. And now they tendHither or soon or late; the blackest shadeBreaks up, the thronged trunks of the trees ope wide,And the dim turret I have fled from, frontsAgain my step; the very river putIts arm about me and conducted meTo this detested spot. Why then, I'll shunTheir will no longer: do your will with me!Oh, bitter! To have reared a towering schemeOf happiness, and to behold it razed,Were nothing: all men hope, and see their hopesFrustrate, and grieve awhile, and hope anew.But I . . . to hope that from a line like oursNo horrid prodigy like this would spring,Were just as though I hoped that from these oldConfederates against the sovereign day,Children of older and yet older sires,Whose living coral berries dropped, as nowOn me, on many a baron's surcoat once,On many a beauty's whimple—would proceedNo poison-tree, to thrust, from hell its root,Hither and thither its strange snaky arms.Why came I here? What must I do? \A bell strides.]A bell?[393]Midnight! and 'tis at midnight . . . Ah , I catch—Woods, river, plains, I catch your meaning now,And I obey you! Hist! This tree will serve.[He retires behind one of the trees. After a pause,enter MERTOUN cloaked as before.Mertoun. Not time! Beat out thy last voluptuous beatOf hope and fear, my heart! I thought the clockI' the chapel struck as I was pushing throughThe ferns. And so I shall no more see riseMy love-star! Oh , no matter for the past!So much the more delicious task to watchMildred revive: to pluck out, thorn by thorn,All traces of the rough forbidden pathMy rash love lured her to! Each day must seeSome fear of hers effaced, some hope renewed:Then there will be surprises, unforeseenDelights in store. I'll not regret the past.[The light is placed above in the purple pane.And see, my signal rises, Mildred's star!I never saw it lovelier than nowIt rises for the last time. If it sets,'Tis that the re-assuring sun may dawn.[As he prepares to ascend the last tree of the avenue,TRESHAM arrests his arm.Unhand me—peasant, by your grasp! Here's gold.'Twas a mad freak of mine. I said I'd pluckA branch from the white-blossomed shrub beneathThe casement there. Take this, and hold your peace.Tresham. Into the moonlight yonder, come with me !Out of the shadow!Mertoun. I am armed, fool!Tresham. Yes,Or no? You'll come into the light, or no?My hand is on your throat—refuse!—Mertoun. That voice!Where have I heard . . . no—that was mild and slow.I'll come with you. [They advance.[394]Tresham. You're armed: that's well. DeclareYour name: who are you?Mertoun. (Tresham!—she is lost!)Tresham. Oh , silent? Do you know, you bear yourselfExactly as, in curious dreams I've hadHow felons, this wild earth is full of, lookWhen they're detected, still your kind has looked 1The bravo holds an assured countenance,The thief is voluble and plausible,But silently the slave of lust has crouchedWhen I have fancied it before a man.Your name!Mertoun. I do conjure Lord Tresham—ay,Kissing his foot, if so I might prevail—That he for his own sake forbear to askMy name! As heaven's above, his future wealOr woe depends upon my silence! Vain!I read your white inexorable face.Know me, Lord Tresham! \He throws off his disguises.Tresham. Mertoun![After a pause.] Draw now!Mertoun. Hear meBut speak first!Tresham. Not one least word on your life!Be sure that I will strangle in your throatThe least word that informs me how you liveAnd yet seem what you seem! No doubt 'twas youTaught Mildred still to keep that face and sin.We should join hands in frantic sympathyIf you once taught me the unteachable,Explained how you can live so and so lie.With God's help I retain, despite my sense,The old belief—a life like yours is stillImpossible. Now draw!Mertoun. Not for my sake,Do I entreat a hearing—for your sake,And most, for her sake!Tresham. Ha, ha, what should I[395]Know of your ways? A miscreant like yourself,How must one rouse his ire? A blow?—that's prideNo doubt, to him! One spurns him, does one not?Or sets the foot upon his mouth, or spitsInto his face! Come! Which, or all of these?Mertoun. 'Twixt him and me and Mildred, Heaven bejudge!Can I avoid this? Have your will, my lord![He draws and, after a few passes, falls.Tresham. You are not hurt?Mertoun. You'll hear me now!Tresham. But rise!Mertoun. Ah , Tresham, say I not "you'll hear me now!"And what procures a man the right to speakIn his defence before his fellow man,But—I suppose—the thought that presentlyHe may have leave to speak before his GodHis whole defence?Tresham. Not hurt ? It cannot be!You made no effort to resist me. WhereDid my sword reach you? Why not have returnedMy thrusts? Hurt where?Mertoun. My lord—Tresham. How young he is!Mertoun. Lord Tresham, I am very young, and yetI have entangled other lives with mine.Do let me speak, and do believe my speech!That when I die before you presently,—Tresham. Can you stay here till I return with help?Mertoun. Oh, stay by me! When I was less than boyI did you grievous wrong and knew it not—Upon my honour, knew it not! Once known,I could not find what seemed a better wayTo right you than I took: my life—you feelHow less than nothing were the giving youThe life you've taken! But I thought my wayThe better—only for your sake and hers:And as you have decided otherwise,[396]Would I had an infinity of livesTo offer you! Now say—instruct me—think!Can you, from the brief minutes I have left,Eke out my reparation? Oh think—think!For I must wring a partial—dare I say,Forgiveness from you, ere I die?Tresham. I doForgive you.Mertoun. Wait and ponder that great word!Because, if you forgive me, I shall hopeTo speak to you of—Mildred!Tresham. Mertoun, hasteAnd anger have undone us. 'Tis not youShould tell me for a novelty you're young,Thoughtless, unable to recall the past.Be but your pardon ample as my own !Mertoun. Ah, Tresham, that a sword-stroke and a dropOf blood or two, should bring all this about!Why , 'twas my very fear of you, my loveOf you—(what passion like a boy's for oneLike you?)—that ruined me! I dreamed of you—You, all accomplished, courted everywhere,The scholar and the gentleman. I burnedTo knit myself to you: but I was young,And your surpassing reputation kept meSo far aloof! Oh, wherefore all that love?With less of love, my glorious yesterdayOf praise and gentlest words and kindest looks,Had taken place perchance six months ago.Even now, how happy we had been! And yetI know the thought of this escaped you, Tresham!Let me look up into your face; I feel'Tis changed above me : yet my eyes are glazed.Where? where?[As he endeavours to raise himself, his eye catches thelamp.Ah, Mildred! What will Mildred do?Tresham, her life is bound up in the life[397]That's bleeding fast away! I'll live—must live,There, if you'll only turn me I shall liveAnd save her! Tresham—oh, had you but heard!Had you but heard! What right was yours to setThe thoughtless foot upon her life and mine,And then say, as we perish, "Had I thought,All had gone otherwise"? We've sinned and die;Never you sin, Lord Tresham! for you'll die,And God will judge you.Tresham. Yes, be satisfied!That process is begun.Mertoun. And she sits thereWaiting for me! Now , say you this to her—You, not another—say, I saw him dieAs he breathed this, "I love her"—you don't knowWhat those three small words mean! Say, loving herLowers me down the bloody slope to deathWith memories . . . I speak to her, not you,Who had no pity, will have no remorse,Perchance intend her . . . Die along with me,Dear Mildred! 'tis so easy, and you'll 'scapeSo much unkindness! Can I lie at rest,With rude speech spoken to you, ruder deedsDone to you ?—heartless men shall have my heart,And I tied down with grave-clothes and the worm,Aware, perhaps, of every blow—oh God!—Upon those lips—yet of no power to tearThe felon stripe by stripe! Die, Mildred! LeaveTheir honourable world to them! For GodWe're good enough, though the world casts us out.T Tresham. Ho , Gerard I L T i r- J i L \A whistle is heard.Enter GERARD, AUSTIN and GUENDOLEN, with lightsNo one speak! You see what's done!I cannot bear another voice.Mertoun. There's light—Light all about me, and I move to it.Tresham, did I not tell you—did you not[398]Just promise to deliver words of mineTo Mildred?Tresham. I will bear those words to her.Mertoun. Now ?Tresham. Now . Lift you the body, and leave meThe head.[As they have half raised MERTOUN, he turns suddenly.Mertoun. I knew they turned me : turn me not from her!There! stay you! there! [Dies.Guendolen [after a pause]. Austin, remain you hereWith Thorold until Gerard comes with help:Then lead him to his chamber. I must goTo Mildred.Tresham. Guendolen, I hear each wordYou utter. Did you hear him bid me giveHis message? Did you hear my promise? I,And only I, see Mildred.Guendolen. She will die.Tresham. Oh no, she will not die! I dare not hopeShe'll die. What ground have you to think she'll die?Why , Austin's with you!Austin. Had we but arrivedBefore you fought!Tresham. There was no fight at all.He let me slaughter him—the boy! I'll trustThe body there to you and Gerard—thus!Now bear him on before me.Austin. Whither bear him?Tresham. Oh , to my chamber! When we meet there next,We shall be friends.[ They bear out the body of MERTOUN.Will she die, Guendolen?Guendolen. Where are you taking me ?Tresham. He fell just here.Now answer me. Shall you in your whole life—You who have nought to do with Mertoun's fate,Now you have seen his breast upon the turf,[399]Shall you e'er walk this way if you can help?When you and Austin wander arm-in-armThrough our ancestral grounds, will not a shadeBe ever on the meadow and the waste—Another kind of shade than when the nightShuts the woodside with all its whispers up?But will you ever so forget his breastAs carelessly to cross this bloody turfUnder the black yew avenue? That's well!You turn your head: and I then?—Guendolen. What is doneIs done. My care is for the living. Thorold,Bear up against this burden: more remainsTo set the neck to!Tresham. Dear and ancient treesMy fathers planted, and I loved so well!What have I done that, like some fabled crimeOf yore, lets loose a Fury leading thusHer miserable dance amidst you all ?Oh, never more for me shall winds intoneWith all your tops a vast antiphony,Demanding and responding in God's praise!Hers ye are now, not mine! Farewell—farewell!
SCENE II.—MILDRED'S Chamber
¶MILDRED alone
¶Mildred. He comes not! I have heard of those who seemedResourceless in prosperity,—you thoughtSorrow might slay them when she listed; yetDid they so gather up their diffused strengthAt her first menace, that they bade her strike,And stood and laughed her subtlest skill to scorn.Oh, 'us not so with me! The first woe fell,And the rest fall upon it, not on me :Else should I bear that Henry comes not?—failsJust this first night out of so many nights ?[400]Loving is done with. Were he sitting now,As so few hours since, on that seat, we'd loveNo more—contrive no thousand happy waysTo hide love from the loveless, any more.I think I might have urged some little pointIn my defence, to Thorold; he was breathlessFor the least hint of a defence: but no,The first shame over, all that would might fall.No Henry! Yet I merely sit and thinkThe morn's deed o'er and o'er. I must have creptOut of myself. A Mildred that has lostHer lover—oh, I dare not look uponSuch woe! I crouch away from it! 'Tis she,Mildred, will break her heart, not I! The worldForsakes me : only Henry's left me—left?When I have lost him, for he does not come,And I sit stupidly . . . Oh Heaven, break upThis worse than anguish, this mad apathy,By any means or any messenger!Tresham [without], Mildred!Mildred. Come in! Heaven hears me![Enter TRESHAM . ] You? alone?Oh, no more cursing!Tresham, Mildred, I must sit.There—you sit!Mildred. Say it, Thorold—do not lookThe curse! deliver all you come to say!What must become of me ? Oh, speak that thoughtWhich makes your brow and cheeks so pale!Tresham. My thought?Mildred. All of it!Tresham. How we waded years — ago -After those water-lilies, till the plash,I know not how, surprised us; and you daredNeither advance nor turn back: so, we stoodLaughing and crying until Gerard came—Once safe upon the turf, the loudest too,[401]For once more reaching the relinquished prizelHow idle thoughts are, some men's, dying men'slMildred,—Mildred. You call me kindlier by my nameThan even yesterday: what is in that?Tresham. It weighs so much upon my mind that IThis morning took an office not my own !I might . . . of course, I must be glad or grieved,Content or not, at every little thingThat touches you. I may with a wrung heartEven reprove you, Mildred; I did more:Will you forgive me?Mildred. Thorold ? do you mock ?Oh no . . . and yet you bid me . . . say that word!Tresham. Forgive me, Mildred!—are you silent, Sweet?Mildred [starting up]. Why does not Henry Mertoun cometo-night ?Are you, too, silent?
[Dashing his mantle aside, and pointing to his scabbard,
¶which is empty.Ah, this speaks for you!You've murdered Henry Mertoun! Now proceed!What is it I must pardon? This and all?Well, I do pardon you—I think I do.Thorold, how very wretched you must be!Tresham. He bade me tell you . . .Mildred. What I do forbidYour utterance of! So much that you may tellAnd will not—how you murdered him . . . but, no!You'll tell me that he loved me, never moreThan bleeding out his life there: must I say"Indeed," to that? Enough! I pardon you.Tresham. You cannot, Mildred! for the harsh words, yes:Of this last deed Another's judge: whose doomI wait in doubt, despondency and fear.Mildred. Oh, true! There's nought for me to pardon! True!You loose my soul of all its cares at once.[402]Death makes me sure of him for ever! YouTell me his last words? He shall tell me them,And take my answer—not in words, but readingHimself the heart I had to read him late,Which death . . .Tresham. Death? You are dying too? WellOf Guendolen! I dared not hope you'd die:But she was sure of it.Mildred. Tell GuendolenI loved her, and tell Austin . . .Tresham. Him you loved:And me ?Mildred. Ah, Thorold! Was't not rashly doneTo quench that blood, on fire with youth and hopeAnd love of me — whom you loved too, and yetSuffered to sit here waiting his approachWhile you were slaying him? Oh, doubtlesslyYou let him speak his poor confused boy's-speech— Do his poor utmost to disarm your wrathAnd respite me!—you let him try to giveThe story of our love and ignorance,And the brief madness and the long despair—You let him plead all this, because your codeOf honour bids you hear before you strike:But at the end, as he looked up for lifeInto your eyes—you struck him down!
Tresham. No! No!
¶Had I but heard him—had I let him speakHalf the truth—less—had I looked long on himI had desisted! Why , as he lay there,The moon on his flushed cheek, I gathered allThe story ere he told it: I saw throughThe troubled surface of his crime and yoursA depth of purity immovable,Had I but glanced, where all seemed turbidestHad gleamed some inlet to the calm beneath;I would not glance: my punishment's at hand.[403]There, Mildred, is the truth! and you—say on —You curse me ?Mildred. As I dare approach that HeavenWhich has not bade a living thing despair,Which needs no code to keep its grace from stain,But bids the vilest worm that turns on itDesist and be forgiven,—I—forgive not,But bless you, Thorold, from my soul of souls!{Falls on his nec\.There! Do not think too much upon the past!The cloud that's broke was all the same a cloudWhile it stood up between my friend and you;You hurt him 'neath its shadow: but is thatSo past retrieve? I have his heart, you know ;I may dispose of it: I give it you!It loves you as mine loves! Confirm me, Henry! [Dies.Tresham. I wish thee joy, Beloved! I am gladIn thy full gladness!Guendolen {without]. Mildred! Tresham!{Entering with AUSTIN . ] Thorold,I could desist no longer. Ah , she swoons!That's well.Tresham. Oh, better far than that!Guendolen. She's dead!Let me unlock her arms!Tresham. She threw them thusAbout my neck, and blessed me, and then died:You'll let them stay now, Guendolen!Austin. Leave herAnd look to him! What ails you, Thorold?Guendolen. WhiteAs she, and whiter! Austin! quick—this side!Austin. A froth is oozing through his clenched teeth;Both lips, where they're not bitten through, are black:Speak, dearest Thorold!Tresham. Something does weigh downMy neck beside her weight: thanks: I should fall[404]But for you, Austin, I believe!—there, there,'Twill pass away soon!—ah,—I had forgotten:I am dying.Guendolen. Thorold—Thorold—why was this?Tresham. I said, just as I drank the poison off,The earth would be no longer earth to me,The life out of all life was gone from me.There are blind ways provided, the fore-doneHeart-weary player in this pageant-worldDrops out by, letting the main masque defileBy the conspicuous portal: I am through—Just through!Guendolen. Don't leave him, Austin! Death is close.Tresham. Already Mildred's face is peacefuller!I see you, Austin—feel you; here's my hand,Put yours in it—you, Guendolen, yours too!You're lord and lady now—you're Treshams; nameAnd frame are yours: you hold our 'scutcheon up.Austin, no blot on it! You see how bloodMust wash one blot away: the first blot cameAnd the first blood came. To the vain world's eyeAll's gules again: no care to the vain world,From whence the red was drawn!Austin. No blot shall come!Tresham. I said that: yet it did come. Should it come,Vengeance is God's, not man's. Remember me! [Dies.Guendolen [letting jail the pulseless arm]. Ah, Thorold,we can but—remember you!