ACT II
A Hall. Early morning. Enter Thoas.
Thoas.
I will and must have further parley with him.
To think what I’ve been forced to hear this night!
Heaven knows I went not out to catch the talk,
Yet home I come as packed as though I were
The wandering ear o’ the bloodiest of tyrants
And scarce had faith I’d see my Lord again.
Rebellion, imminent raid of sudden foemen,
Yea, a new choice of King! Is’t possible?
I dreaded much, but dreaded not so much.
Hist, hist! Are those not footfalls? Yes! Why, who
Is out of bed with greybeards ere the morn?
The youthful Gyges! Ho! but if you knew
What I now know you’d have no droop i’ the gait!
[He retires. Enter Gyges.
Gyges.
And once again I’m here! What will I here?
I sicken in the fresh of heaven. With scent
The air’s besprent, so leaden and sense-steeping
’Twould seem that every flower with one accord
Were opened, that the lungs of men be stifled,
And Earth herself outgasped her latest breath.
Thoas.
So gay and early, Karna? Pardon, I took you,
Lord, for another. You not yet in bed?
I trow the taste of fame bans sleep—oho!
Gyges.
The taste of fame?
Thoas.
Why, look at all the garlands
You carried off——
Gyges.
So that the laurel-tree
Need never fear me more! My wish was merely
To prove that bones may be inside a man
And marrow in those bones, although that man
Snap not a zither’s strings to tattered shreds
At the first touch. Now not a soul but knows it
Whate’er the doubt he may till now have had;
And that is good.
Thoas.
But why then take no sleep?
Gyges.
Why do you take no drink?
Thoas.
I guess you rose
Once ere this.
Gyges.
If I went to bed, why yes!
Thoas.
Just what I’d like to know; for if he’s heard
What I have heard—Pooh! no—I’ll vow he can’t have.
[Slowly retires.
Gyges.
She slumbers still! O blest, who dares to wake her!
’Tis dared by the nightingale that even now
Still half in dream sweet orison begins;
’Tis dared—He comes! What can he think of me?
[Enter Kandaules.
She wakes, and yet she offers show of sleeping.
Kan.
Gyges! So soon? Or should I ask you—still?
But no, I have your word.
Gyges.
Here is the ring!
Kan.
So early and so hasty?
Gyges.
’Tis your own.
Kan.
You trust yourself no longer to retain it?
Gyges.
Why not? And yet why should I? Take the thing!
Kan.
This tells me even more than what your sigh
Already told i’ the night.
Gyges.
Forgive it, Sire!
Kan.
Why, what a thing you say! It was my triumph!
Gyges.
And did you only hear it then?
Kan.
Oh no—
She started up, she shrieked—and did all that
So fully slip your eyes? No further then
I need to ask if I am conqueror.
Gyges.
It did not slip my eyes.
Kan.
Keep on—deny
Your wits were all a pother. Nay, I have
Still better proof to clinch the thing—you went
So far to turn the ring and know it not!
Gyges.
And know it not!
Kan.
She trembled, and when she
Grew ’ware o’ the noise, she cried, “Arise, Arise!
I’ the corner lurks a man! It is his will
Thy bane to be, or mine! Where is thy sword?”
I made pretence I felt her fear, and did so—
When lo, revealed stood—you, before me there,
Sharp outlined by the lamp’s intensest beam.
Is that enough? Now are you dumb to me?
Gyges.
My will was to be seen.
Kan.
You say that now
To rob my victory of its edge. Had I
Not stepped between to shut you from her glances
Or ere they lit on you, I had been forced
To strike you dead.
Gyges.
Sire, this I knew right well,
And just because I’d force you to the action
I turned the ring around with hasty twitch.
Kan.
What, Gyges?
Gyges.
Yes, it shocked the sight of heaven
This boldness—yes, I felt it.
Kan.
I allowed it.
Gyges.
But in the stifling closeness of that moment,
It seemed as though you had no right thereto,
And I would punish you with me; for fain
You had not been to strike me dead.
Kan.
You varlet!
Gyges.
And even now a shudder thrills my soul
As though some ugly thing I had committed
For which ’tis true the lip may lack a name
But not the conscience the implanted sense.
Yea, if I held that trash, that Dead Man’s Ring
Thrust on my hand by you, nor yet in wrath
Pitched it before your feet; and if instead
I used its power once more for speedy flight,
What checked the act was shame I felt for her,
For her I’d spare the shocked recoil, for her
The eternal crypt of shadow round her Being,
Not you—forgive my fevered wish—the deed.
Kan.
You are a fool!
Gyges.
A fool! It drove me forth
As though, if still I tarried there, a sense,
A newer, purer, must in her awaken,
The self-same sense that woke in Artemis
Before Actaeon’s scan, that must betray
To woman, as to goddess, what had passed.
I’ll flee not after murder in such mind.
Kan.
Murder—Nay, nay!
Gyges.
Who knows? The gods’ aversion
Is on polluted heads. Oh, what if now
The golden Aphrodite, deep-offended,
Were forced t’ avert her from her dearest daughter,
Because a stranger eye had ’filed the pure!
She’s loath to do’t; she lingers, for she hopes
The swoop of retribution follows on.
Goddess, remit no smile! I bring the due!
Kan.
There spake the Grecian!
Gyges.
Sire, vouchsafe to me
A last request.
Kan.
A thousand, if you will,
But not the last request; that comes too soon.
Gyges.
Take me as sacrifice! I make you gift
Of my young life—turn not the gift away!
Still many a splendid year I count as mine
And every one will swell your own if you
Will but accept them at Zeus’ altar-stone.
Then follow; let me hold to you one hand
In the firm grip of pact, and with the other
Thrust me clean through by custom’s holy ordinance;
With rapture, yea, with smiles it shall be done.
Kan.
I almost rue the deed! Here rant and rave,
Within suspicion—Bah!
Gyges.
Why vacillate?
How oft have young men in free-willed devotion
Libated their own blood to some war-chief
What time death’s shadow merely fringed his peril,
How oft been spent for some stark maniac’s rage!
Why not this once then for a happy soul,
Why not for you, whereby long time to come
You may be blest and blessing among men?
You rob me nowise. What have I, what can I
Accomplish? Speak! But you win much indeed,
For envious are the gods, and it may chance
The snipping shears o’ the jealous-minded Parcae
May sever all too soon life’s golden cord
The while their malice stretches out my span.
Outstrip their will; give joy the unbroken length
She meant should cling to pain. Do it forthwith!
Kan.
No more of this! You know your worth to me,
And if I turned a greybeard on the spot
With drouthy lips and wither in my veins
I’d borrow not the newer glow from you.
Gyges.
Nay, e’en in this your prime the bid were fruitless,
For if my blood with yours could be immingled,
For all its heat ’twere left but what it is.
Kan.
At this late hour you’re shaken in the mind
And know not what you say and what you do.
Gyges.
Forgive me, Sire!
Kan.
Good faith, I chide you not!
Mere reel of head like that from winy fumes,
A cooling breath of morn will blow it hence!
(As he goes) Such is at least my hope, and such I’ll see.
[Exit.
Gyges.
Why did I let the ring go back? I should have
Evanished, nevermore be seen of men;
Thus could I ever be about her, thus
Could see her as the gods alone may see her;
For this or that they hold as private hoard,
One charm of beauty to herself unknown,
One brightness in the deepest solitude,
One last, one utter mystery of spell
That lives for them and now would live for me.
’Tis true I would not cheat them of revenge
Should I take stolen sippings from the chalice
That for them only brims and sparkles o’er;
The air with sudden bruit would soon be ringing
And Helios, at the inciting beckon of flame
From wrathful Aphrodite all afired,
Would launch on me the most unerring arrow
Of all the unerring store his quiver bears.
Then would I reel from life, but that were naught,
For with the rattle at throat I’d clasp the ring,
Once more to turn it, abject at her feet;
And all her soul, as mine sank to its ebbing,
I’d suck into my parched self from her glances,
Upyielding thus my latest gasp of breath.
[Thoas enters with Lesbia, who is veiled.
Thoas.
The King sends Gyges, as his honoured favourite,
The beauteous slave that pleases him right well.
Gyges.
The King will have me for his mirth; such usage
I’ve earned not at his hands, nor will endure.
Thoas.
’Tis true the gift is rich and of the rarest,
But doubt not of the King’s sincere intent.
Gyges.
Peace, densest loon among all densest loons,
The King’s “sincere intent” is grossest mock.
Thoas.
Open your mouth, my girl, and say’t yourself
If he can’t trust me when I open mine.
Gyges (to Lesbia).
Girl, girl—no word!
Thoas.
You spurn the gift o’ the King?
Gyges.
Yes!
Thoas.
Gyges! Well, well, you know what you do!
Gyges.
The King kills me, and now to pay the body
For life, he thrusts a jewel in its hand!
Thoas.
I know not what you mean, and will announce
What I have heard. (To Lesbia.) So come you back with me.
Lesbia (to Gyges).
You’ll see me not a second time. Forgive
That I have spoken, though indeed it sounds
So roughly in your ears.
Gyges.
Nay, sweetest child,
But place yourself behind yon platanus
And speak as now—some love-lorn boy will cry,
“A nightingale that speaks as well as sings!”
Lesbia.
You are no boy.
Gyges.
Nay, nay, I’m not so much;
You see that well. ’Tis true I had a notion,
A thought I’m not the weakest hand at weapons,
That I’d done thus and thus, and none could ever
Get nipping at my ears without his buffet;
And, if by just the twist of luck a better
Were absent, I’d be called in danger’s hour.
But those are boyish dreams—the lash to the booby
For tippling wine i’ the night!
Lesbia.
First bring to me
A bough of laurel-tree, then will I lash you
And after weave for you the wreath.
Gyges.
And so
You shared my dream? Maybe then it was true,
And yet the mock!
Lesbia.
The mock? Where is the mock?
Gyges.
Stand you not there?
Lesbia.
Oh, cruel!
Gyges.
Not so, not so,
In truth not so!
Lesbia.
You’ve killed ere now a many;
Have you e’er brought one to his re-awakening?
Gyges.
You are most fair—Ay, verily, a blend
Of lily and of rose that in their plot
Make variant weft of hues, by pranksome winds
In such a juggling mingle set to swaying
There’s not an eye can sift the shades apart.
Now you are red, now pale—and lo, you’re neither,
You’re both at once!
Lesbia.
What know you, then, of me?
That was your dream; I look far otherwise—
See and recoil!
[She offers to unveil herself.
Gyges (preventing her).
No, no.
Lesbia (to Thoas).
Back to the Queen!
(To Gyges.) She gave me not away in joy, she’ll take
Me gladly back again.
Gyges.
Then say to her
I have not cast one look upon your face.
Lesbia.
Oh, insult!
Gyges.
Nay, you know I spied at you
How often yesterday; till then I ne’er
Had seen you.
Lesbia.
Then, it seems, I ever
Was at some childish trick. Oh, I am ashamed
I marked it not till now; and yet the others
Deserve the blame for all their teasing pranks.
Gyges.
I only saw what charmed me.
Lesbia.
Surely so,
For that which charms we love beneath a veil.
Come, come, old man!
Gyges.
And wherefore hasten so?
I am your lord, but tremble not at me;
I ask of you one service, only one,
Which granted you may leave.
Lesbia (to THOAS).
Then go alone.
Gyges.
Stay, stay! But no. Present the King my thanks.
I take his present; how I do it honour
I’ll give him proof.
Thoas.
’Tis good.
[Exit.
Lesbia.
And now the service?
Gyges.
You’ll tarry long enough to make your smiling
Come back to you.
Lesbia.
That will not happen soon.
Gyges.
And meantime while the hour in talk with me.
You tend the Queen’s own person—there’s no taste
No faintest in the peach you have not brought,
Tell me of her.
Lesbia.
Of her?
Gyges.
I only mean——
Well, if you will, of something else—the garden
In which she wanders—or about the flowers
She loves the most to pluck—of yourself too;
I’m fain to hear’t—Where are you like each other?
Tell me at once and win my smiles at once!
In stature? Nay, not quite; far less in form,
But, for amends, your hair is black like hers
But not so full—hers creeps about her face,
Fringing it as the night the evening star.
What else have you of hers?
[Lesbia makes an involuntary movement.
Nay, nay—stand still.
In gait she’s none but she; when you go stepping
’Tis seen your trend is hitherward or thither,
You swerve to the lure o’ the date or else the spring;
But when she moves we cast our upward eyes
Upon the Heaven, to see if Helios
Will set the golden sun-car earthward dipping
To lift her in, and companied with her
Trample his path through all Eternity!
Lesbia.
Yes, she is fair.
Gyges.
And why the downward eyelids?
Come, pretty maid, uplift them, for methinks
They rain her very fire.
Lesbia (with a dry sobbing laugh).
That well may be
In such an hour!
Gyges.
My words have caused you pain?
Lesbia.
I laughed, I think—and now have leave to go.
Gyges.
But not without a gift; yes, sweetest child,
I’d have you think on Gyges still with loving,
I own he’s rough and deals the unwary wound
Full oft, and not least often with the tongue,
But never has he left one yet unhealed.
[Enter Kandaules.
Kan.
Well?
Gyges.
Sire, your coming fits the nick of time.
Kan.
Then here must be two happy souls to find.
Gyges.
Not yet, but soon; (to Lesbia) I pray you, give your hand!
How tender ’tis, how hard of grain is mine,
How scarry-seamed from sword and dart! To match them—
Fie, an ill thought! On this a rose’s leaf,
A crumpled nothing, must imprint a pang,
On mine the sharpest thorn goes bent and blunt;
Yours twitches as a gyve were smithied round it.
Child, have no fear! I do not grip you thus
Because I wish to stay you. The King knows
I grasp not merely his express word’s meaning,
I’m quick as well i’ the uptake of his hint.
He saw with pain that Nature has for you
So much achieved, and naught that hussy Luck;
He bids me succour you and fill Luck’s office.
I do so (releasing her) and herewith declare you free!
Lesbia.