ACT II
Scene 1
The Castle on Zion. Alexandra’s Apartments. Alexandra. Sameas.
Alexandra.
You know it now.
Sameas.
It gives me no surprise.
No, in a Herod nothing gives surprise
Who once as stripling on the Sanhedrim
Declared a war: who with his gleaming weapon
Strode up before his judge and dropped the hint
That he himself was Headsman and the Headsman
Upon himself no sentence executes,
He may as man—Ha, I can see him now
As, front to front opposing the High Priest,
He leaned against a column ’mid a ring
Of his hired bravos, who in robber-hunting
Turned robber too—strange metamorphosis!
And took our total tally, head for head,
As though he stood before a thistle patch
And summed in mind a way to weed it clean.
Alex.
Yes, yes, that was an hour of hours for him,
A moment he may proudly call to mind.
A boyish madcap, scarce in his twentieth year,
He stands arraigned before the Sanhedrim,
Because in stark presumptuous sacrilege
He’d arrogated violence on the law;
Because his hand unsanctioned executed
A death-decree you had not yet pronounced.
The dead man’s widow, as he treads the threshold,
Counters him with her curse: within there sits
All in Jerusalem that’s old and grey.
But since he comes not sackclothed, and no ashes
Bestrew his head, you get a sag in the heart:
You think no more with punishment to greet him,
You think no more with threatenings to tame him!
You say him naught, he laughs you off and goes.
Sameas.
I spoke!
Alex.
Yes, when too late!
Sameas.
And had I done it
Before that moment it had been too soon.
Through reverence for the High Priest I was silent.
He was the eldest and the youngest I.
Alex.
No matter. Had you courage at that moment
To prove you held the simple heart of duty
The larger mood would not be urgent now.
Then look to’t well if you—Ho, ho! I see
Another loophole yet remains if you
Scarce relish combat with him, and in truth
’Twere risky play. Best ’ware him. So you’ll enter
For a mild bout with lions and with tigers
In this brute-battle that he now ordains.
Sameas.
What mean these words?
Alex.
You know the fighting-games
Of Rome? What, no?
Sameas.
Thank God I know them not.
I count it for no jot of gain to know
About the heathen but what Moses tells us.
Down go my eyelids every single time
I see a Roman soldier cross my path,
And then I bless my father in his grave
That he ne’er gave me tutoring in their tongue.
Alex.
And so you do not know that savage beasts
Are shipped by them from Africa to Rome
In hundreds?
Sameas.
No indeed, I know it not.
Alex.
Not know that there in a stone-built arena
They drive them at each other, and that slaves
Are hounded on them, who for life or death
Must face them in the fight, and they the while
Circled around upon high benches sit
All jubilant when wounds of death are gaping
And when the red blood spurts on sprinkled sand?
Sameas.
Such things the wildest fancy of my dreaming
Ne’er showed me; but it joys my very soul
If such they do. It fits the breed o’ them!
(With raised hands.) Lord, Thou art great; and though Thy will vouchsafe
The heathen life, he must requite the gift
By payment to Thee of a gruesome tribute.
Thou dost chastise him as he uses others.
Such games I could well see!
Alex.
Your wish will find
Fruition soon as Herod comes again.
He plans to introduce them.
Sameas.
Never, never!
Alex.
That’s what I said to you. Why not? We have
Lions enough for sure. The mountain herd
Will be rejoiced to see their tale diminished
By saving many kine and many calves.6
Sameas.
To raise no other point, where would he find
The fighters? In our folk there are no slaves
Bound to his beck and call for life or death.
Alex.
The first I see before me.
Sameas.
What?
Alex.
For sure!
You will, as now, twist up your angry face,
Forget yourself, perhaps, and clench the fists,
Set eyes at rolling and the teeth at gnashing
If spared to witness that high day on which,
August, as Solomon of yore the Temple,
He consecrates the heathenish arena.
This will not slip his eyes, and for reward
He passes you a signal that you enter
And show to the assembled folk your powers
When you stand face to face against a lion
Who’d been whole days before made sharp with hunger.
But since among our folk there’s lack of slaves,
The death-devoted criminals must needs
Supply their place; and who’s more death-devoted
Than he who openly defies the King?
Sameas.
He may——
Alex.
Dispel your doubts! It would go ill
If he should lose his head before his time.
There would be projects nipped along with him
That Pompey, who with brazen heathendom
Dared the approach unto the Holy of Holies,
Himself might——
Sameas (breaking out).
Antony, if thou’lt but grip him;
A whole year’s space I vow I will not curse thee!
And if thou dost it not—then good, we’re ready!
Alex.
He says that if our folk were not ordained
To mix with others, then had we this earth-ball
From God received for our sole dwelling-portion.
Sameas.
He says so?
Alex.
But since Fate has other will
There rises need the dam-walls to unbarrier
Which long have shut us, like a stagnant mere
Locked from the sea, away from other peoples,
And there’s no other method but that we
In use and custom mould us to their fashion.
Sameas.
In use and—(to Heaven) Lord, if I break not in raving
Send me Thy sign how such a churl shall die,
Sign of some death which every other death
Sucks of its horrors, and proclaim to me
That it is Herod for whose sake ’tis done.
Alex.
Be you then the Death-Angel?
Sameas.
Or for him
Or for myself! I swear’t! Can I not hinder
This ghastly plan, my impotence I’ll punish
With murder of myself (with a gesture towards his breast) ere that day comes,
The day that he shall first befleck with mire.
There is a binding oath that a misdeed
Will wring from me if for a hero-deed
I prove unfit. Who ever swore a greater?
Alex.
Good! But forget not this; if your own arm
Be over-weak to dash your foemen downwards,
A stranger’s arm must not then be contemned.
Sameas.
And such a stranger?
Alex.
You may arm with ease.
Sameas.
Speak plainer language!
Alex.
Who created Herod
A King?
Sameas.
Why, Antony; who otherwise?
Alex.
And wherefore did it?
Sameas.
While it pleased him so;
Perhaps, too, just because it pleased not us.
When had a heathen ever better grounds?
Alex.
And, further, what maintains him on the throne?
Sameas.
Not the folk’s blessing! Maybe ’tis its curse.
Who can say that?
Alex.
I! Nothing but his trick
Of sending every year ere reckoning-day
The tax that we are forced to pay the Romans,
Ay, and the same of his own will to double
If some new war has broken into blaze.
The Roman wants our gold and nothing more,
He leaves to us our Faith, he leaves our God,
Would even help to do Him reverence,
And, niched with Jupiter and Ops and Isis,
Grant Him a corner in the Capitol
That has been let lie vacant till to-day
If only He, as they, were made of stone.
Sameas.
If it be so, alas! and it is so,
What have you then to hope of Antony?
In this regard, yourself has said it, Herod
Yields each punctilious tittle. Why, I’ve seen
The tribute-panniers carried. One mule broke
His backbone ere it reached the city-gate.
For every drop of blood within his veins
He renders up to him an ounce of gold.7
Think you on your account he’ll send it back?
Alex.
’Twere bootless, if I steered my cause myself,
But Cleopatra does the deed for me,
And, so I hope, will Mariamne too.
Amazed? Fail not my meaning. Not in person;
In such a case she’d rather turn on me.
But through her picture, and not even through that,
No, through another close resembling her.
For as a wild wood harbours not alone
The lion, but his foe as well, the tiger,
So in the hot-bed of this Roman’s heart
Ennests itself a wormy brood of passions
Wrestling each other for the dominant place.
And thus, if Herod builds upon the first
I build upon the second, and I think
That mine’s a lustier wrestler than its fellow.
Sameas.
You are——
Alex.
No Hyrcan, tho’ I be his daughter.
But, lest you should misprise what I have done,
I am not Mariamne either. If,
To pave his way towards her, Antony
Destroys the man that has her in possession,
She still is mistress of herself and can
Enwrap her in eternal widow-weeds.
But this I hold for certain, that by now
He’s laid his hand on sword and if not yet
He’s drawn it, one sole point of pause detains him
That this luck-minion among soldiers, Herod,
Stands good to Romans for the iron ring
That all things here with us together clamps.
But once you furnish him with opposite proof,
Rouse insurrection, stir the flaccid peace,
And he will draw’t.
Sameas.
I’ll furnish easy proof!
The folk’s already struck him dead in thought,
They rumour that——
Alex.
Impress your seal thereon!
Then swiftly open his last testament;
You know the contents now, the fighting-games
Stand at the head, and then when every man
Believes him shortened of a hundred stripes
Through Herod’s death, or of the torture-cross,
Then each believes what he can dare believe.
For there are things that loom o’er Israel
Will wring from many a heart in its despair
The wish of agony that the Red Sea
Had gulfed the whole folk deep into its maw
And the twelve holy Tribes and Moses first.
Sameas.
I go, and ere the midday comes——
Alex.
I know
What you can work if you but take the sack-cloth
And thread the lanes with wailing-cry of “woe!”
As were your forebear Jonah here again.
And you will find there’s service in the knack
Of paying a chance visit to the Fisher
And sharing Goodman Gaffer’s bite and sup
From what he grants himself since no one buys it.
Sameas.
And you will find that all we Pharisees
Have not forgot the stigma that we suffered,
As you would seem to reckon. Hear then now
What only through the deed was meant to reach you—
We have been sworn against him long ere now,
We’ve dug our burrows under all Judaea,
And in Jerusalem, that you may see
How sure the count we have upon the folk,
There’s even a blind adherent to our band!
Alex.
What boots he?
Sameas.
Naught. He knows as much himself,
But he’s so crammed with hate, so grim with grudge,
That he’ll be joined with us in our emprise
And rather perish if it should miscarry
Than drag his life in such a world as this.
I have a notion that’s a promising sign!
[Exit.
Scene 2
Alexandra alone.
Alex.
The folk’s already struck him dead in thought!
I know, I know! and by that token see
How sore the wish that he no more returns.
A lucky juncture that the locust-swarm
Settled on him as he went forth! It stands
For omen that it is no futile wish.
It may be, too, by now an actual thing
That, less his head—Not that! Speak as you think!
No eavesdrop Pharisee’s before the door.
An Antony is sure an Antony,
Ay, but a Roman, and a Roman gives
His verdict slow as the fulfilment’s swift.
Prisoner he may be though he sit not yet
Within the dungeon: and a coaxing deft
Can lead it further. Therefore it is good
If now rebellion come, albeit I know
What in itself’s its import, and not less
What aftermath it trammels up if he
Return in Fate’s despite. If! It can happen!
Think well upon’t! He sent you as he left
A severed head for a farewell-reminder.
That shows you—Pah! I speak just like my father!
It shows me that he’s swift to the deed, as tyrants
Are wont; and further that he’s fain to fright me.
The one I long have known, the other shall
Slip his intent; and if the worst should come,
If all o’erleap its target and if he,
Spite his infatuate love for Mariamne
Which sooner mounts than falls and which protects me,
Should dare his fellest once her will is won—
What of it? On revenge is all my stake
And that revenge would follow me in death,
Revenge on him who did it and on her
Who let it happen. Never would the folk
And never Rome look on indulgent-slack,
And then, what touches me myself, I would
In an event so bloody all the better
Be mated with my forebears. They were forced,
The greater number of my stem, th’ Eld-Mothers
As the Eld-Fathers, to forsake the world
Short of a head because they would not bend it.
I would but share their fate; what were it more?
Scene 3
Alexandra. Mariamne.
Alexandra (aside).
She comes! Ah, could she be decoyed from him
And yield consent to follow me to Rome,
Then—but she hates and loves him at a breath!
Dare I arouse a last storm? To the deed!
[Hastening towards Mariamne.
You seek for comfort where it may be found!
Come to my heart!
Mar.
Comfort?
Alex.
You need it not?
Then I have known you ill! Yet I had grounds
To judge you for the woman you are not.
You have been slandered to me!
Mar.
I? to you?
Alex.
I have been told of arms enlinked and kisses
Bestowed upon a brother-murdering consort
Hot on the deed by—Pardon! I had no right
To give it credence.
Mar.
None?
Alex.
No! ever No!
And No, on more than one ground. Could you even
Begrudge the bloody shadow of your brother,
All heartless, the atonement of revenge
Sisters should sacrifice, revenge that not
Through Judith’s sword and not through Rahab’sB nail,
No, merely through a notion of the mouth
And merely through still folding of the arms
Were better wreaked and to the Dead devoted,
Then he, the very murderer, had not dared
To come anear you, for you’re like the Dead One:
And you could hurt his sight as ’twere the corse
Of Aristobulus tricked in woman’s paint;
He would have turned him from you shuddering.
Mar.
He did not do the one, nor I the other.
Alex.
Then be——But no, perchance a doubt still lingers
Touching his guilt. Will you then have the proof?
Mar.
I need it not.
Alex.
You need——
Mar.
’Twere bootless to me.
Alex.
Then—but I hold the curse even now in check,
I see another one has lighted on you!
You still walk in the fetters of a love
That never shed a lustre——
Mar.
Yet I thought
I had not picked a consort for myself,
I had but yoked my neck beneath the doom
That you and Hyrcan with a pious care
Had hung above a daughter and a grandchild.
Alex.
Not I! My coward father sealed the bond.
Mar.
And by that deed he pleased you ill?
Alex.
Not that!
Or else I had outstripped him with our flight.
I had a refuge open down in Egypt.
I only say the thing was clinched by him,
By him, the first High Priest without a spine!
And I but battled down the first repugnance
With which I took his meaning. Yet I did it
Because I found the coward’s tradesman-traffic
Good in the main, and gave for Edom’s sword
The Pearl of Zion, when he pressed me hard.
Yea, had the serpent had a poisoned fang
When it was dug that time in Cleopatra,
Or had a lucky chance brought Antony
Toward these regions when upon his march,
I had said no! but, as it was, said yes!
Mar.
Yet in despite of that——
Alex.
I hoped of you
That you’d not fritter off the bargain-price,
And touching Herod, that you——
Mar.
Ah, I know!
It was my part, for every kiss I gave
To haggle in advance for any head
That had mispleased you, and at last when none
Was left to cross you but his own, to spur him
To his self-slaughter; or if that should fail,
To couch and spy a chance in the still night
And subtly second Judith’s catlike deed.
Then would you have been proud to call me child!
Alex.
Prouder than now, I give it no denial.
Mar.
I chose to be a wife unto the husband
To whom your hands had led me, and for him
Forget the Maccabean to the measure
In which he should forget the King for me.
Alex.
And yet it seems in Jericho that she
Caused you a second thought: at all events
You were the first to break in lamentation
When I myself still held my wailings back
To prove you. Was’t not so?
Mar.
In Jericho
The hideous hap had dizzied all my mind.
It came too swift—From board to bath, from bath
To grave—a brother! Whirlwinds swept my brain!
But if against my sovereign and my husband
I barred the door, slant-thoughted and stone-hearted,
I rue it now, and only can condone it
Because ’twas done as though in fever’s heat.
Alex.
In fever’s heat?
Mar. (in a semi-aside).
I’d not have done it either
Were he not come to me in mourning-garments!
In red, dark red, I could have borne to see him,
But——
Alex.
Ha! He found them quick! Before the deed
He had them ordered, just as other murderers,
Where possible, draw water ere they murder—
Mar.
Mother, forget not!
Alex.