The Duchess of Padua Part 21

[throws herself on her knees]

Then slay me now! I have spilt blood to-night, You shall spill more, so we go hand in hand To heaven or to h.e.l.l. Draw your sword, Guido.

Quick, let your soul go chambering in my heart, It will but find its master's image there.

Nay, if you will not slay me with your sword, Bid me to fall upon this reeking knife, And I will do it.

GUIDO

[wresting knife from her]

Give it to me, I say.

O G.o.d, your very hands are wet with blood!

This place is h.e.l.l, I cannot tarry here.

I pray you let me see your face no more.

d.u.c.h.eSS

Better for me I had not seen your face.

[GUIDO recoils: she seizes his hands as she kneels.]

Nay, Guido, listen for a while: Until you came to Padua I lived Wretched indeed, but with no murderous thought, Very submissive to a cruel Lord, Very obedient to unjust commands,

As pure I think as any gentle girl Who now would turn in horror from my hands - [Stands up.]

You came: ah! Guido, the first kindly words I ever heard since I had come from France Were from your lips: well, well, that is no matter.

You came, and in the pa.s.sion of your eyes I read love's meaning; everything you said Touched my dumb soul to music, so I loved you.

And yet I did not tell you of my love.

'Twas you who sought me out, knelt at my feet As I kneel now at yours, and with sweet vows, [Kneels.]

Whose music seems to linger in my ears, Swore that you loved me, and I trusted you.

I think there are many women in the world Who would have tempted you to kill the man.

I did not.

Yet I know that had I done so, I had not been thus humbled in the dust, [Stands up.]

But you had loved me very faithfully.

[After a pause approaches him timidly.]

I do not think you understand me, Guido: It was for your sake that I wrought this deed Whose horror now chills my young blood to ice, For your sake only. [Stretching out her arm.]

Will you not speak to me?

Love me a little: in my girlish life I have been starved for love, and kindliness Has pa.s.sed me by.

GUIDO

I dare not look at you: You come to me with too p.r.o.nounced a favour; Get to your tirewomen.

d.u.c.h.eSS

Ay, there it is!

There speaks the man! yet had you come to me With any heavy sin upon your soul, Some murder done for hire, not for love, Why, I had sat and watched at your bedside All through the night-time, lest Remorse might come And pour his poisons in your ear, and so Keep you from sleeping! Sure it is the guilty, Who, being very wretched, need love most.

GUIDO

There is no love where there is any guilt.

d.u.c.h.eSS

No love where there is any guilt! O G.o.d, How differently do we love from men!

There is many a woman here in Padua, Some workman's wife, or ruder artisan's, Whose husband spends the wages of the week In a coa.r.s.e revel, or a tavern brawl, And reeling home late on the Sat.u.r.day night, Finds his wife sitting by a fireless hearth, Trying to hush the child who cries for hunger, And then sets to and beats his wife because The child is hungry, and the fire black.

Yet the wife loves him! and will rise next day With some red bruise across a careworn face, And sweep the house, and do the common service, And try and smile, and only be too glad If he does not beat her a second time Before her child!--that is how women love.

[A pause: GUIDO says nothing.]

I think you will not drive me from your side.

Where have I got to go if you reject me? - You for whose sake this hand has murdered life, You for whose sake my soul has wrecked itself Beyond all hope of pardon.

GUIDO

Get thee gone: The dead man is a ghost, and our love too, Flits like a ghost about its desolate tomb, And wanders through this charnel house, and weeps That when you slew your lord you slew it also.

Do you not see?

d.u.c.h.eSS

I see when men love women They give them but a little of their lives, But women when they love give everything; I see that, Guido, now.

GUIDO

Away, away, And come not back till you have waked your dead.

d.u.c.h.eSS

I would to G.o.d that I could wake the dead, Put vision in the glazed eves, and give The tongue its natural utterance, and bid The heart to beat again: that cannot be: For what is done, is done: and what is dead Is dead for ever: the fire cannot warm him: The winter cannot hurt him with its snows; Something has gone from him; if you call him now, He will not answer; if you mock him now, He will not laugh; and if you stab him now He will not bleed.

I would that I could wake him!

O G.o.d, put back the sun a little s.p.a.ce, And from the roll of time blot out to-night, And bid it not have been! Put back the sun, And make me what I was an hour ago!

No, no, time will not stop for anything, Nor the sun stay its courses, though Repentance Calling it back grow hoa.r.s.e; but you, my love, Have you no word of pity even for me?

O Guido, Guido, will you not kiss me once?

Drive me not to some desperate resolve: Women grow mad when they are treated thus: Will you not kiss me once?

GUIDO

[holding up knife]

I will not kiss you Until the blood grows dry upon this knife, [Wildly] Back to your dead!

d.u.c.h.eSS

[going up the stairs]

Why, then I will be gone! and may you find More mercy than you showed to me to-night!

GUIDO

Let me find mercy when I go at night And do foul murder.

d.u.c.h.eSS

[coming down a few steps.]

Murder did you say?

Murder is hungry, and still cries for more, And Death, his brother, is not satisfied, But walks the house, and will not go away, Unless he has a comrade! Tarry, Death, For I will give thee a most faithful lackey To travel with thee! Murder, call no more, For thou shalt eat thy fill.

There is a storm Will break upon this house before the morning, So horrible, that the white moon already Turns grey and sick with terror, the low wind Goes moaning round the house, and the high stars Run madly through the vaulted firmament, As though the night wept tears of liquid fire For what the day shall look upon. Oh, weep, Thou lamentable heaven! Weep thy fill!

Though sorrow like a cataract drench the fields, And make the earth one bitter lake of tears, It would not be enough. [A peal of thunder.]