A BLOT IN THE 'SCUTCHEON

By Robert Browning

Contents

Transcriber's comments

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

A BLOT IN THE 'SCUTCHEON

ACT I

ACT II

ACT III

Transcriber's comments on the preparation of this e-text:

Closing brackets i.e. "]" have been added to some of the stage directions.

Leading blanks are reproduced from the printed text. Eg.:

     GUENDOLEN.  Where are you taking me?
     TRESHAM.                              He fell just here.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

ROBERT BROWNING stands, in respect to his origin and his career, in marked contrast to the two aristocratic poets beside whose dramas his "Blot in the 'Scutcheon" is here printed. His father was a bank clerk and a dissenter at a time when dissent meant exclusion from Society; the poet went neither to one of the great public schools nor to Oxford or Cambridge; and no breath of scandal touched his name. Born in London in 1812, he was educated largely by private tutors, and spent two years at London University, but the influence of his father, a man of wide reading and cultivated tastes, was probably the most important element in his early training. He drew well, was something of a musician, and wrote verses from an early age, though it was the accidental reading of a volume of Shelley which first kindled his real inspiration. This indebtedness is beautifully acknowledged in his first published poem, "Pauline" (1833).

Apart from frequent visits to Italy, there is little of incident to chronicle in Browning's life, with the one great exception of his more than fortunate marriage in 1846 to Elizabeth Barrett, the greatest of English poetesses.

Browning's dramatic period extended from 1835 to the time of his marriage, and produced some nine plays, not all of which, however, were intended for the stage. "Paracelsus," the first of the series, has been fairly described as a "conversational drama," and "Pippa Passes," though it has been staged, is essentially a poem to read. The historical tragedy of "Strafford" has been impressively performed, but "King Victor and King Charles," "The Return of the Druses," "Colombe's Birthday," "A Soul's Tragedy," and "Luria," while interesting in many ways, can hardly be regarded as successful stage-plays. "A Blot in the 'Scutcheon" was performed at Drury Lane, but its chances of a successful run were spoiled by the jealousy of Macready, the manager.

The main cause of Browning's weakness as a playwright lay in the fact that he was so much more interested in psychology than in action. But in the present tragedy this defect is less prominent than usual, and in spite of flaws in construction, it reaches a high pitch of emotional intensity, the characters are drawn with vividness, and the lines are rich in poetry.

A BLOT IN THE 'SCUTCHEON

A TRAGEDY

(1843)

     DRAMATIS PERSONAE
     MILDRED TRESHAM.
     GUENDOLEN TRESHAM.
     THOROLD, Earl Tresham.
     AUSTIN TRESHAM.
     HENRY, Earl Mertoun.
     GERARD, and other retainers of Lord Tresham.

     Time, 17--

ACT I

          SCENE I.--The Interior of a Lodge in Lord Tresham's Park.
          Many Retainers crowded at the window, supposed to command
          a view of the entrance to his Mansion.

          GERARD, the Warrener, his back to a table on which are flagons,
          etc.

     FIRST RETAINER.  Ay, do! push, friends, and then you'll push down me!
     --What for?  Does any hear a runner's foot
     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 you
     Save 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 days
     I' the year?  To-day that young rich bountiful
     Handsome Earl Mertoun, whom alone they match
     With our Lord Tresham through the country-side,
     Is coming here in utmost bravery
     To ask our master's sister's hand?

     GERARD.                             What then?

     SECOND RETAINER.  What then?  Why, you, she speaks to, if she meets
     Your worship, smiles on as you hold apart
     The boughs to let her through her forest walks,
     You, always favourite for your no-deserts,
     You've heard, these three days, how Earl Mertoun sues
     To lay his heart and house and broad lands too
     At Lady Mildred's feet:  and while we squeeze
     Ourselves into a mousehole lest we miss
     One 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 let
     Both swans he tamed for Lady Mildred swim
     Over the falls and gain the river!

     GERARD.                             Ralph,
     Is not to-morrow my inspecting-day
     For 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 himself
     With his white staff!  Will not a knave behind
     Prick 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 troop
     Of silk and silver varlets there, should find
     Their perfumed selves so indispensable
     On high days, holidays!  Would it so disgrace
     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 Hugh
     The logman for supporter, in his right
     The 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 they match
     The Earl's?  Alas, that first pair of the six--
     They paw the ground--Ah Walter! and that brute
     Just 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 midst
     So 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, see
     The 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 yet
     So 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 like
     A House's head.

     SECOND RETAINER.  But you'd not have a boy
     --And what's the Earl beside?--possess too soon
     That stateliness?

     FIRST RETAINER.  Our master takes his hand--
     Richard and his white staff are on the move--
     Back fall our people--(tsh!--there's Timothy
     Sure 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 company
     Close 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 bless
     Lord 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 the show 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 Gerard
     Will die soon--mind, I said it!  He was used
     To care about the pitifullest thing
     That touched the House's honour, not an eye
     But his could see wherein:  and on a cause
     Of scarce a quarter this importance, Gerard
     Fairly had fretted flesh and bone away
     In 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' hall
     To hear what's going on inside!  They'd follow
     Lord Tresham into the saloon.

     THIRD RETAINER.                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 name
     Would win you welcome!--

     MERTOUN.                  Thanks!

     TRESHAM.                           --But add to that,
     The worthiness and grace and dignity
     Of your proposal for uniting both
     Our Houses even closer than respect
     Unites them now--add these, and you must grant
     One favour more, nor that the least,--to think
     The welcome I should give;--'tis given!  My lord,
     My only brother, Austin:  he's the king's.
     Our cousin, Lady Guendolen--betrothed
     To Austin:  all are yours.

     MERTOUN.                    I thank you--less
     For the expressed commendings which your seal,
     And only that, authenticates--forbids
     My putting from me... to my heart I take
     Your praise... but praise less claims my gratitude,
     Than the indulgent insight it implies
     Of what must needs be uppermost with one
     Who 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 ask
     Firmly, near boldly, near with confidence
     That gift, I have to thank you.  Yes, Lord Tresham,
     I love your sister--as you'd have one love
     That 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 grant
     My 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?

     GUENDOLEN.  [apart to AUSTIN].  Why, this is loving,
     Austin!

     AUSTIN.    He's so young!

     GUENDOLEN.  Young?  Old enough, I think, to half surmise
     He 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 misconceived
     That I am wholly satisfied with you
     On this occasion, when a falcon's eye
     Were dull compared with mine to search out faults,
     Is somewhat.  Mildred's hand is hers to give
     Or to refuse.

     MERTOUN.     But you, you grant my suit?
     I have your word if hers?

     TRESHAM.                   My best of words
     If 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 beer used to wander carelessly
     After my stricken game:  the heron roused
     Deep in my woods, has trailed its broken wing
     Thro' thicks and glades a mile in yours,--or else
     Some eyass ill-reclaimed has taken flight
     And lured me after her from tree to tree,
     I marked not whither.  I have come upon
     The lady's wondrous beauty unaware,
     And--and then... I have seen her.

     GUENDOLEN [aside to AUSTIN].  Note that mode
     Of faltering out that, when a lady passed,
     He, having eyes, did see her!  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 enough
     Upon the whole."  Let such irreverent talk
     Be lessoned for the future!

     TRESHAM.                     What's to say
     May be said briefly.  She has never known
     A 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 free
     As light where friends are--how imbued with lore
     The world most prizes, yet the simplest, yet
     The... one might know I talked of Mildred--thus
     We brothers talk!

     MERTOUN.           I thank you.

     TRESHAM.                         In a word,
     Control's not for this lady; but her wish
     To please me outstrips in its subtlety
     My power of being pleased:  herself creates
     The want she means to satisfy.  My heart
     Prefers 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 breath
     On aught less precious.  I'm beneath the roof
     Which holds her:  while I thought of that, my speech
     To 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 again
     We meet, I hope, so shortly.

     MERTOUN.                      We? again?--
     Ah yes, forgive me--when shall... you will crown
     Your goodness by forthwith apprising me
     When... if... the lady will appoint a day
     For me to wait on you--and her.

     TRESHAM.                         So soon
     As I am made acquainted with her thoughts
     On 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, renew
     A converse ne'er to disunite again.

     TRESHAM.  So may it prove!

     MERTOUN.                    You, lady, you, sir, take
     My humble salutation!

     GUENDOLEN and AUSTIN.    Thanks!

     TRESHAM.                          Within there!
          [Servants enter.  TRESHAM conducts MERTOUN to the door.
           Meantime AUSTIN remarks,]
                                                      Well,
     Here I have an advantage of the Earl,
     Confess now!  I'd not think that all was safe
     Because my lady's brother stood my friend!
     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 you
     And all the world refuse me, if you dare!"

     GUENDOLEN.  That way you'd take, friend Austin?  What a shame
     I was your cousin, tamely from the first
     Your 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's first!
     How seems he?--seems he not... come, faith give fraud
     The 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 excuse
     If one should tax him...

     TRESHAM.                  Well?

     GUENDOLEN.                       --With lacking wit.

     TRESHAM.  He lacked wit?  Where might he lack wit, so please you?

     GUENDOLEN.  In standing straighter than the steward's rod
     And making you the tiresomest harangue,
     Instead of slipping over to my side
     And softly whispering in my ear, "Sweet lady,
     Your cousin there will do me detriment
     He little dreams of:  he's absorbed, I see,
     In my old name and fame--be sure he'll leave
     My Mildred, when his best account of me
     Is ended, in full confidence I wear
     My 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 library
     No 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 obtain
     Is, 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 storm
     With his perfections!  You're for the composed
     Manly assured becoming confidence!
     --Get her to say, "to-morrow," and I'll give you...
     I'll give you black Urganda, to be spoiled
     With petting and snail-paces.  Will you?  Come!

          SCENE III.
          --MILDRED'S Chamber.  A Painted Window overlooks the Park

          MILDRED and GUENDOLEN

     GUENDOLEN.  Now, Mildred, spare those pains.  I have not left
     Our talkers in the library, and climbed
     The wearisome ascent to this your bower
     In company with you,--I have not dared...
     Nay, worked such prodigies as sparing you
     Lord Mertoun's pedigree before the flood,
     Which Thorold seemed in very act to tell
     --Or bringing Austin to pluck up that most
     Firm-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 deserve
     A 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 alone
     To throw those testimonies in a heap,
     Thorold's enlargings, Austin's brevities,
     With that poor silly heartless Guendolen's
     Ill-time misplaced attempted smartnesses--
     And sift their sense out? now, I come to spare you
     Nearly a whole night's labour.  Ask and have!
     Demand, he answered!  Lack I ears and eyes?
     Am I perplexed which side of the rock-table
     The 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?

     MILDRED.                  Thorold! who--Who else?

     GUENDOLEN.  Thorold (a secret) is too proud by half,--
     Nay, hear me out--with us he's even gentler
     Than we are with our birds.  Of this great House
     The least retainer that e'er caught his glance
     Would die for him, real dying--no mere talk:
     And in the world, the court, if men would cite
     The perfect spirit of honour, Thorold's name
     Rises 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 brooding o'er
     The 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 moon
     Pierces, I know 'tis midnight.

     GUENDOLEN.                      Well, that Thorold
     Should rise up from such musings, and receive
     One come audaciously to graft himself
     Into this peerless stock, yet find no flaw,
     No slightest spot in such an one...

     MILDRED.                             Who finds
     A 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.

     GUENDOLEN.         Good night and rest to you!
     I said how gracefully his mantle lay
     Beneath the rings of his light hair?

     MILDRED.                              Brown hair.

     GUENDOLEN.  Brown? why, it IS brown:  how could you know that?

     MILDRED.  How? did not you--Oh, Austin 'twas, declared
     His 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 grandmothers
     Was grander daughter still--to that fair dame
     Whose 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.  Needs
     Must 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 by the purple pane.]
                                             There!
          [She returns to the seat in front.]
     Mildred and Mertoun!  Mildred, with consent
     Of all the world and Thorold, Mertoun's bride!
     Too late!  'Tis sweet to think of, sweeter still
     To hope for, that this blessed end soothes up
     The curse of the beginning; but I know
     It comes too late:  'twill sweetest be of all
     To dream my soul away and die upon.
          [A noise without.]
     The voice!  Oh why, why glided sin the snake
     Into the paradise Heaven meant us both?
          [The window opens softly.  A low voice sings.]

       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 outbreak
         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 makes me!

          [The EARL throws off his slouched hat and long cloak.]

     My very heart sings, so I sing, Beloved!

     MILDRED.  Sit, Henry--do not take my hand!

     MERTOUN.                                    'Tis mine.
     The meeting that appalled us both so much
     Is ended.

     MILDRED.   What begins now?

     MERTOUN.                     Happiness
     Such as the world contains not.

     MILDRED.                         That is it.
     Our happiness would, as you say, exceed
     The whole world's best of blisses:  we--do we
     Deserve that?  Utter to your soul, what mine
     Long 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 aside
     The truth, as--what had e'er prevailed on me
     Save you to venture?  Have I gained at last
     Your brother, the one scarer of your dreams,
     And waking thoughts' sole apprehension too?
     Does a new life, like a young sunrise, break
     On the strange unrest of our night, confused
     With rain and stormy flaw--and will you see
     No dripping blossoms, no fire-tinted drops
     On 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 night
     You likened our past life to--was it storm
     Throughout to you then, Henry?

     MERTOUN.                        Of your life
     I spoke--what am I, what my life, to waste
     A thought about when you are by me?--you
     It was, I said my folly called the storm
     And 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?

     MILDRED.                   They told me all.
     I know all.

     MERTOUN.     It will soon be over.

     MILDRED.                            Over?
     Oh, what is over? what must I live through
     And say, "'tis over"?  Is our meeting over?
     Have I received in presence of them all
     The partner of my guilty love--with brow
     Trying to seem a maiden's brow--with lips
     Which make believe that when they strive to form
     Replies to you and tremble as they strive,
     It is the nearest ever they approached
     A 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 stop
     This planned piece of deliberate wickedness
     In its birth even! some fierce leprous spot
     Will mar the brow's dissimulating!  I
     Shall murmur no smooth speeches got by heart,
     But, frenzied, pour forth all our woeful story,
     The love, the shame, and the despair--with them
     Round me aghast as round some cursed fount
     That should spirt water, and spouts blood.  I'll not
    ...Henry, you do not wish that I should draw
     This vengeance down?  I'll not affect a grace
     That's gone from me--gone once, and gone for ever!

     MERTOUN.  Mildred, my honour is your own.  I'll share
     Disgrace I cannot suffer by myself.
     A word informs your brother I retract
     This morning's offer; time will yet bring forth
     Some 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
     And looks and gestures sooner.--How you must
     Despise me!

     MERTOUN.     Mildred, break it if you choose,
     A heart the love of you uplifted--still
     Uplifts, thro' this protracted agony,
     To heaven! but Mildred, answer me,--first pace
     The chamber with me--once again--now, say
     Calmly the part, the... what it is of me
     You see contempt (for you did say contempt)
     --Contempt for you in!  I would pluck it off
     And cast it from me!--but no--no, you'll not
     Repeat that?--will you, Mildred, repeat that?

     MILDRED.  Dear Henry!

     MERTOUN.               I was scarce a boy--e'en now
     What am I more?  And you were infantine
     When first I met you; why, your hair fell loose
     On either side!  My fool's-cheek reddens now
     Only in the recalling how it burned
     That morn to see the shape of many a dream
     --You know we boys are prodigal of charms
     To 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 not
     That now, while I remember every glance
     Of yours, each word of yours, with power to test
     And weigh them in the diamond scales of pride,
     Resolved the treasure of a first and last
     Heart's love shall have been bartered at its worth,
     --That now I think upon your purity
     And utter ignorance of guilt--your own
     Or other's guilt--the girlish undisguised
     Delight at a strange novel prize--(I talk
     A silly language, but interpret, you!)
     If I, with fancy at its full, and reason
     Scarce in its germ, enjoined you secrecy,
     If you had pity on my passion, pity
     On my protested sickness of the soul
     To sit beside you, hear you breathe, and watch
     Your eyelids and the eyes beneath--if you
     Accorded gifts and knew not they were gifts--
     If I grew mad at last with enterprise
     And must behold my beauty in her bower
     Or perish--(I was ignorant of even
     My own desires--what then were you?) if sorrow--
     Sin--if the end came--must I now renounce
     My reason, blind myself to light, say truth
     Is 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 believe
     That I was ignorant.  I scarce grieve o'er
     The 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 sense
     From 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?
     Are sure that unobserved you scaled the walls?

     MERTOUN.  Oh, trust me!  Then our final meeting's fixed
     To-morrow night?

     MILDRED.          Farewell! stay, Henry... wherefore?
     His foot is on the yew-tree bough; the turf
     Receives him:  now the moonlight as he runs
     Embraces 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 had
     No 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 Library

          Enter LORD TRESHAM, hastily

     TRESHAM.  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 repeat
     Firmly and circumstantially the tale
     You just now told me; it eludes me; either
     I did not listen, or the half is gone
     Away from me.  How long have you lived here?
     Here in my house, your father kept our woods
     Before you?

     GERARD.      --As his father did, my lord.
     I have been eating, sixty years almost,
     Your bread.

     TRESHAM.  Yes, yes.  You ever were of all
     The 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...

     TRESHAM.                            Since when?

     GERARD.                                          At least
     A month--each midnight has some man access
     To Lady Mildred's chamber.

     TRESHAM.                    Tush, "access"--
     No wide words like "access" to me!

     GERARD.                             He runs
     Along the woodside, crosses to the South,
     Takes the left tree that ends the avenue...

     TRESHAM.  The last great yew-tree?

     GERARD.                             You might stand upon
     The 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 line
     That reaches to the lady's casement--

     TRESHAM.                               --Which
     He enters not!  Gerard, some wretched fool
     Dares pry into my sister's privacy!
     When such are young, it seems a precious thing
     To have approached,--to merely have approached,
     Got sight of the abode of her they set
     Their frantic thoughts upon.  Ha does not enter?
     Gerard?

     GERARD.  There is a lamp that's full i' the midst.
     Under a red square in the painted glass
     Of Lady Mildred's...

     TRESHAM.              Leave that name out!  Well?
     That lamp?

     GERARD.  Is moved at midnight higher up
     To one pane--a small dark-blue pane; he waits
     For 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.

     TRESHAM.                                    And this you saw
     Once?--twice?--quick!

     GERARD.                Twenty times.

     TRESHAM.                              And what brings you
     Under the yew-trees?

     GERARD.               The first night I left
     My range so far, to track the stranger stag
     That broke the pale, I saw the man.

     TRESHAM.                             Yet sent
     No cross-bow shaft through the marauder?

     GERARD.                                   But
     He 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 once
     Speak what is on my mind!  Since first I noted
     All this, I've groaned as if a fiery net
     Plucked me this way and that--fire if I turned
     To her, fire if I turned to you, and fire
     If down I flung myself and strove to die.
     The lady could not have been seven years old
     When I was trusted to conduct her safe
     Through the deer-herd to stroke the snow-white fawn
     I brought to eat bread from her tiny hand
     Within a month.  She ever had a smile
     To greet me with--she... if it could undo
     What'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 hurt
     For Heaven's compelling.  But when I was fixed
     To hold my peace, each morsel of your food
     Eaten beneath your roof, my birth-place too,
     Choked me.  I wish I had grown mad in doubts
     What it behoved me do.  This morn it seemed
     Either I must confess to you or die:
     Now it is done, I seem the vilest worm
     That 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 cloak
     Wraps 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 projects
     Beneath the cloak.

     TRESHAM.            Gerard,--I will not say
     No word, no breath of this!

     GERARD.                      Thank, thanks, my lord!
          [Goes.]

     TRESHAM [paces the room.  After a pause].
     Oh, thoughts absurd!--as with some monstrous fact
     Which, when ill thoughts beset us, seems to give
     Merciful 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, inadequate
     To reconcile what yet I do behold--
     Blasting my sense!  There's cheerful day outside:
     This is my library, and this the chair
     My father used to sit in carelessly
     After his soldier-fashion, while I stood
     Between his knees to question him:  and here
     Gerard 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
     All guilts of treachery, of craft, of... Heaven
     Keep me within its hand!--I will sit here
     Until thought settle and I see my course.
     Avert, oh God, only this woe from me!
          [As he sinks his head between his arms on the table,
           GUENDOLEN'S voice is heard at the door.]

     Lord Tresham!
           [She knocks.]
                    Is Lord Tresham there?

          [TRESHAM, hastily turning, pulls down the first book
           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 brain
     Last night till close on morning with "the Earl,"
     "The Earl"--whose worth did I asseverate
     Till 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 blot
     In the Earl's 'scutcheon come no longer back
     Than Arthur's time?

     TRESHAM.             When left you Mildred's chamber?

     GUENDOLEN.  Oh, late enough, I told you!  The main thing
     To ask is, how I left her chamber,--sure,
     Content yourself, she'll grant this paragon
     Of Earls no such ungracious...

     TRESHAM.                        Send her here!

     GUENDOLEN.  Thorold?

     TRESHAM.              I mean--acquaint her, Guendolen,
     --But mildly!

     GUENDOLEN.     Mildly?

     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 book
     We 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 gloomed
     Some 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 bid
     A child disguise his heart's sore, and conduct
     Some sly investigation point by point
     With a smooth brow, as well as bid me catch
     The inquisitorial cleverness some praise.
     If you had told me yesterday, "There's one
     You needs must circumvent and practise with,
     Entrap by policies, if you would worm
     The truth out:  and that one is--Mildred!"  There,
     There--reasoning is thrown away on it!
     Prove she's unchaste... why, you may after prove
     That 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 first
     Abomination,--then outpour all plagues,
     And I shall ne'er make count of them.

          Enter MILDRED

     MILDRED.                               What book
     Is it I wanted, Thorold?  Guendolen
     Thought 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)
     "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 is best
     Of 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 love
     For a sole sister must exceed them all.
     For see now, only see! there's no alloy
     Of earth that creeps into the perfect'st gold
     Of other loves--no gratitude to claim;
     You never gave her life, not even aught
     That keeps life--never tended her, instructed,
     Enriched her--so, your love can claim no right
     O'er her save pure love's claim:  that's what I call
     Freedom from earthliness.  You'll never hope
     To 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 worth
     Is 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 change
     This 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?--far
     Enough from the esteem, respect, and all
     The brother's somewhat insignificant
     Array of rights!  All which he knows before,
     Has calculated on so long ago!
     I think such love, (apart from yours and mine,)
     Contented with its little term of life,
     Intending to retire betimes, aware
     How soon the background must be placed for it,
     --I think, am sure, a brother's love exceeds
     All 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 film
     Between the being tied to you by birth,
     And you, until those slender threads compose
     A web that shrouds her daily life of hopes
     And 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 down
     The sweet and palpitating mystery
     That 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 man
     Could 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 disbelieve
     The 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!  Move
     Some of the miserable weight away
     That presses lower than the grave.  Not speak?
     Some of the dead weight, Mildred!  Ah, if I
     Could bring myself to plainly make their charge
     Against you!  Must I, Mildred?  Silent still?
          [After a pause.]
     Is there a gallant that has night by night
     Admittance to your chamber?
          [After a pause.]
                                  Then, his name!
     Till now, I only had a thought for you:
     But now,--his name!

     MILDRED.  Thorold, do you devise
     Fit expiation for my guilt, if fit
     There be!  'Tis nought to say that I'll endure
     And bless you,--that my spirit yearns to purge
     Her 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 sword
     Would 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 now
     Become of me?  I'll hide your shame and mine
     From every eye; the dead must heave their hearts
     Under the marble of our chapel-floor;
     They cannot rise and blast you.  You may wed
     Your 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 come
     From Heaven and heart from... whence proceed such hearts?
     I have dispatched last night at your command
     A missive bidding him present himself
     To-morrow--here--thus much is said; the rest
     Is understood as if 'twere written down--
     "His suit finds favor in your eyes."  Now dictate
     This morning's letter that shall countermand
     Last night's--do dictate that!

     MILDRED.                        But, Thorold--if
     I will receive him as I said?

     TRESHAM.                       The Earl?

     MILDRED.  I will receive him.

     TRESHAM [starting up].         Ho there!  Guendolen!
          GUENDOLEN and AUSTIN enter
     And, Austin, you are welcome, too!  Look there!
     The woman there!

     AUSTIN and GUENDOLEN.  How?  Mildred?

     TRESHAM.                               Mildred once!
     Now the receiver night by night, when sleep
     Blesses the inmates of her father's house,
     --I say, the soft sly wanton that receives
     Her guilt's accomplice 'neath this roof which holds
     You, Guendolen, you, Austin, and has held
     A thousand Treshams--never one like her!
     No lighter of the signal-lamp her quick
     Foul breath near quenches in hot eagerness
     To mix with breath as foul! no loosener
     O' the lattice, practised in the stealthy tread,
     The low voice and the noiseless come-and-go!
     Not one composer of the bacchant's mien
     Into--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 stands
     Rigid 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 con
     Each precept the harsh world enjoins, I'd take
     Our ancestors' stern verdicts one by one,
     I'd bind myself before then to exact
     The prescribed vengeance--and one word of hers,
     The sight of her, the bare least memory
     Of Mildred, my one sister, my heart's pride
     Above all prides, my all in all so long,
     Would scatter every trace of my resolve.
     What were it silently to waste away
     And see her waste away from this day forth,
     Two scathed things with leisure to repent,
     And grow acquainted with the grave, and die
     Tired out if not at peace, and be forgotten?
     It were not so impossible to bear.
     But this--that, fresh from last night's pledge renewed
     Of love with the successful gallant there,
     She calmly bids me help her to entice,
     Inveigle an unconscious trusting youth
     Who thinks her all that's chaste and good and pure,
     --Invites me to betray him... who so fit
     As 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 betray
     No comrade I've pledged faith to!"--you have heard
     Of wretched women--all but Mildreds--tied
     By wild illicit ties to losels vile
     You'd tempt them to forsake; and they'll reply
     "Gold, friends, repute, I left for him, I find
     In him, why should I leave him then, for gold,
     Repute or friends?"--and you have felt your heart
     Respond to such poor outcasts of the world
     As 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 she
     That stands there, calmly gives her lover up
     As means to wed the Earl that she may hide
     Their intercourse the surelier:  and, for this,
     I curse her to her face before you all.
     Shame hunt her from the earth!  Then Heaven do right
     To 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 place
     But 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 I
     Approved your speech--if you (to put the thing
     At lowest) you the soldier, bound to make
     The king's cause yours and fight for it, and throw
     Regard 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, friend
     This morning, playfellow but yesterday,
     Who said, or thought at least a thousand times,
     "I'd serve you if I could," should now face round
     And say, "Ah, that's to only signify
     I'd serve you while you're fit to serve yourself:
     So long as fifty eyes await the turn
     Of 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 join
     The praisers' chorus--when you're hemmed about
     With lives between you and detraction--lives
     To be laid down if a rude voice, rash eye,
     Rough hand should violate the sacred ring
     Their worship throws about you,--then indeed,
     Who'll stand up for you stout as I?"  If so
     We said, and so we did,--not Mildred there
     Would be unworthy to behold us both,
     But we should be unworthy, both of us.
     To be beheld by--by--your meanest dog,
     Which, if that sword were broken in your face
     Before a crowd, that badge torn off your breast,
     And you cast out with hooting and contempt,
     --Would push his way thro' all the hooters, gain
     Your side, go off with you and all your shame
     To the next ditch you choose to die in!  Austin,
     Do you love me?  Here's Austin, Mildred,--here's
     Your 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 take
     My hand, dear Mildred!

     MILDRED.                I--I was so young!
     Beside, I loved him, Thorold--and I had
     No mother; God forgot me:  so, I fell.

     GUENDOLEN.  Mildred!

     MILDRED.              Require no further!  Did I dream
     That 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, unless
     You stay to execute his sentence, loose
     My hand!  Has Thorold gone, and are you here?

     GUENDOLEN.  Here, Mildred, we two friends of yours will wait
     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
     And to believe in it and do its best,
     Poor as that is, to help it--why, the world
     Has been won many a time, its length and breadth,
     By just such a beginning!

     MILDRED.                   I believe
     If once I threw my arms about your neck
     And sunk my head upon your breast, that I
     Should weep again.

     GUENDOLEN.          Let go her hand now, Austin!
     Wait for me.  Pace the gallery and think
     On 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!
     O 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!

     MILDRED.                        My friend,
     You know I cannot tell his name.

     GUENDOLEN.                        At least
     He is your lover? and you love him too?

     MILDRED.  Ah, do you ask me that,--but I am fallen
     So low!

     GUENDOLEN.  You love him still, then?

     MILDRED.                               My sole prop
     Against 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 dare
     Trust him my soul in sleep.

     GUENDOLEN.                   How could you let us
     E'en talk to you about Lord Mertoun then?

     MILDRED.  There is a cloud around me.

     GUENDOLEN.                             But you said
     You 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.] Austin! (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 else
     Should I pronounce you free from all that heap
     Of sins which had been irredeemable?
     I felt they were not yours--what other way
     Than 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 returns
     To-night?

     MILDRED.    Ah Heaven, he's lost!

     GUENDOLEN.                         I thought so.  Austin!
          Enter AUSTIN
     Oh, 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 skirts
     O' the beech-wood.

     GUENDOLEN.          Gone?  All thwarts us.

     MILDRED.                                    Thorold too?

     GUENDOLEN.  I have thought.  First lead this Mildred to her room.
     Go on the other side; and then we'll seek
     Your brother:  and I'll tell you, by the way,
     The greatest comfort in the world.  You said
     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 trees

     Again here!  But I cannot lose myself.
     The heath--the orchard--I have traversed glades
     And dells and bosky paths which used to lead
     Into green wild-wood depths, bewildering
     My boy's adventurous step.  And now they tend
     Hither or soon or late; the blackest shade
     Breaks up, the thronged trunks of the trees ope wide,
     And the dim turret I have fled from, fronts
     Again my step; the very river put
     Its arm about me and conducted me
     To this detested spot.  Why then, I'll shun
     Their will no longer:  do your will with me!
     Oh, bitter!  To have reared a towering scheme
     Of happiness, and to behold it razed,
     Were nothing:  all men hope, and see their hopes
     Frustrate, and grieve awhile, and hope anew.
     But I... to hope that from a line like ours
     No horrid prodigy like this would spring,
     Were just as though I hoped that from these old
     Confederates against the sovereign day,
     Children of older and yet older sires,
     Whose living coral berries dropped, as now
     On me, on many a baron's surcoat once,
     On many a beauty's whimple--would proceed
     No 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 strikes.]
                                        A bell?
     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 beat
     Of hope and fear, my heart!  I thought the clock
     I' the chapel struck as I was pushing through
     The ferns.  And so I shall no more see rise
     My love-star!  Oh, no matter for the past!
     So much the more delicious task to watch
     Mildred revive:  to pluck out, thorn by thorn,
     All traces of the rough forbidden path
     My rash love lured her to!  Each day must see
     Some fear of hers effaced, some hope renewed:
     Then there will be surprises, unforeseen
     Delights 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 now
     It 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 pluck
     A branch from the white-blossomed shrub beneath
     The 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.]

     TRESHAM.             You're armed:  that's well.  Declare
     Your name:  who are you?

     MERTOUN.                  (Tresham!--she is lost!)

     TRESHAM.  Oh, silent?  Do you know, you bear yourself
     Exactly as, in curious dreams I've had
     How felons, this wild earth is full of, look
     When they're detected, still your kind has looked!
     The bravo holds an assured countenance,
     The thief is voluble and plausible,
     But silently the slave of lust has crouched
     When 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 ask
     My name!  As heaven's above, his future weal
     Or 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 me
     But speak first!

     TRESHAM.          Not one least word on your life!
     Be sure that I will strangle in your throat
     The least word that informs me how you live
     And yet seem what you seem!  No doubt 'twas you
     Taught Mildred still to keep that face and sin.
     We should join hands in frantic sympathy
     If 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 still
     Impossible.  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
     Know of your ways?  A miscreant like yourself,
     How must one rouse his ire?  A blow?--that's pride
     No doubt, to him!  One spurns him, does one not?
     Or sets the foot upon his mouth, or spits
     Into his face!  Come!  Which, or all of these?

     MERTOUN.  'Twixt him and me and Mildred, Heaven be judge!
     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 speak
     In his defence before his fellow man,
     But--I suppose--the thought that presently
     He may have leave to speak before his God
     His whole defence?

     TRESHAM.            Not hurt?  It cannot be!
     You made no effort to resist me.  Where
     Did my sword reach you?  Why not have returned
     My thrusts?  Hurt where?

     MERTOUN.  My lord--

     TRESHAM.             How young he is!

     MERTOUN.  Lord Tresham, I am very young, and yet
     I 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 boy
     I did you grievous wrong and knew it not--
     Upon my honour, knew it not!  Once known,
     I could not find what seemed a better way
     To right you than I took:  my life--you feel
     How less than nothing were the giving you
     The life you've taken!  But I thought my way
     The better--only for your sake and hers:
     And as you have decided otherwise,
     Would I had an infinity of lives
     To 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 do
     Forgive you.

     MERTOUN.      Wait and ponder that great word!
     Because, if you forgive me, I shall hope
     To speak to you of--Mildred!

     TRESHAM.                      Mertoun, haste
     And anger have undone us.  'Tis not you
     Should 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 drop
     Of blood or two, should bring all this about
     Why, 'twas my very fear of you, my love
     Of you--(what passion like a boy's for one
     Like you?)--that ruined me!  I dreamed of you--
     You, all accomplished, courted everywhere,
     The scholar and the gentleman.  I burned
     To knit myself to you:  but I was young,
     And your surpassing reputation kept me
     So far aloof!  Oh, wherefore all that love?
     With less of love, my glorious yesterday
     Of praise and gentlest words and kindest looks,
     Had taken place perchance six months ago.
     Even now, how happy we had been!  And yet
     I 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 the lamp.]
                    Ah, Mildred!  What will Mildred do?
     Tresham, her life is bound up in the life
     That's bleeding fast away!  I'll live--must live,
     There, if you'll only turn me I shall live
     And save her!  Tresham--oh, had you but heard!
     Had you but heard!  What right was yours to set
     The 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 there
     Waiting for me!  Now, say you this to her--
     You, not another--say, I saw him die
     As he breathed this, "I love her"--you don't know
     What those three small words mean!  Say, loving her
     Lowers me down the bloody slope to death
     With 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 'scape
     So much unkindness!  Can I lie at rest,
     With rude speech spoken to you, ruder deeds
     Done 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 tear
     The felon stripe by stripe!  Die, Mildred!  Leave
     Their honourable world to them!  For God
     We're good enough, though the world casts us out.
          [A whistle is heard.]

     TRESHAM.  Ho, Gerard!
          Enter GERARD, AUSTIN and GUENDOLEN, with lights
                            No 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
     Just promise to deliver words of mine
     To Mildred?

     TRESHAM.     I will bear those words to her.

     MERTOUN.  Now?

     TRESHAM.        Now.  Lift you the body, and leave me
     The 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 here
     With Thorold until Gerard comes with help:
     Then lead him to his chamber.  I must go
     To Mildred.

     TRESHAM.  Guendolen, I hear each word
     You utter.  Did you hear him bid me give
     His 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 hope
     She'll die.  What ground have you to think she'll die?
     Why, Austin's with you!

     AUSTIN.                  Had we but arrived
     Before you fought!

     TRESHAM.            There was no fight at all.
     He let me slaughter him--the boy!  I'll trust
     The 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,
     Shall you e'er walk this way if you can help?
     When you and Austin wander arm-in-arm
     Through our ancestral grounds, will not a shade
     Be ever on the meadow and the waste--
     Another kind of shade than when the night
     Shuts the woodside with all its whispers up?
     But will you ever so forget his breast
     As carelessly to cross this bloody turf
     Under the black yew avenue?  That's well!
     You turn your head:  and I then?--

     GUENDOLEN.                          What is done
     Is done.  My care is for the living.  Thorold,
     Bear up against this burden:  more remains
     To set the neck to!

     TRESHAM.             Dear and ancient trees
     My fathers planted, and I loved so well!
     What have I done that, like some fabled crime
     Of yore, lets loose a Fury leading thus
     Her miserable dance amidst you all?
     Oh, never more for me shall winds intone
     With 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

     He comes not!  I have heard of those who seemed
     Resourceless in prosperity,--you thought
     Sorrow might slay them when she listed; yet
     Did they so gather up their diffused strength
     At her first menace, that they bade her strike,
     And stood and laughed her subtlest skill to scorn.
     Oh, 'tis 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?--fails
     Just this first night out of so many nights?
     Loving is done with.  Were he sitting now,
     As so few hours since, on that seat, we'd love
     No more--contrive no thousand happy ways
     To hide love from the loveless, any more.
     I think I might have urged some little point
     In my defence, to Thorold; he was breathless
     For the least hint of a defence:  but no,
     The first shame over, all that would might fall.
     No Henry!  Yet I merely sit and think
     The morn's deed o'er and o'er.  I must have crept
     Out of myself.  A Mildred that has lost
     Her lover--oh, I dare not look upon
     Such woe!  I crouch away from it!  'Tis she,
     Mildred, will break her heart, not I!  The world
     Forsakes me:  only Henry's left me--left?
     When I have lost him, for he does not come,
     And I sit stupidly... Oh Heaven, break up
     This 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 look
     The curse! deliver all you come to say!
     What must become of me?  Oh, speak that thought
     Which 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 dared
     Neither advance nor turn back:  so, we stood
     Laughing and crying until Gerard came--
     Once safe upon the turf, the loudest too,
     For once more reaching the relinquished prize!
     How idle thoughts are, some men's, dying men's!
     Mildred,--

     MILDRED.  You call me kindlier by my name
     Than even yesterday:  what is in that?

     TRESHAM.  It weighs so much upon my mind that I
     This morning took an office not my own!
     I might... of course, I must be glad or grieved,
     Content or not, at every little thing
     That touches you.  I may with a wrung heart
     Even 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 come to-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 forbid
     Your utterance of!  So much that you may tell
     And will not--how you murdered him... but, no!
     You'll tell me that he loved me, never more
     Than 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 doom
     I 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.
     Death makes me sure of him for ever!  You
     Tell me his last words?  He shall tell me them,
     And take my answer--not in words, but reading
     Himself the heart I had to read him late,
     Which death...

     TRESHAM.        Death?  You are dying too?  Well said
     Of Guendolen!  I dared not hope you'd die:
     But she was sure of it.

     MILDRED.                 Tell Guendolen
     I loved her, and tell Austin...

     TRESHAM.                         Him you loved:
     And me?

     MILDRED.  Ah, Thorold!  Was't not rashly done
     To quench that blood, on fire with youth and hope
     And love of me--whom you loved too, and yet
     Suffered to sit here waiting his approach
     While you were slaying him?  Oh, doubtlessly
     You let him speak his poor confused boy's-speech
     --Do his poor utmost to disarm your wrath
     And respite me!--you let him try to give
     The story of our love and ignorance,
     And the brief madness and the long despair--
     You let him plead all this, because your code
     Of honour bids you hear before you strike:
     But at the end, as he looked up for life
     Into your eyes--you struck him down!

     TRESHAM.                              No!  No!
     Had I but heard him--had I let him speak
     Half the truth--less--had I looked long on him
     I had desisted!  Why, as he lay there,
     The moon on his flushed cheek, I gathered all
     The story ere he told it:  I saw through
     The troubled surface of his crime and yours
     A depth of purity immovable,
     Had I but glanced, where all seemed turbidest
     Had gleamed some inlet to the calm beneath;
     I would not glance:  my punishment's at hand.
     There, Mildred, is the truth! and you--say on--
     You curse me?

     MILDRED.       As I dare approach that Heaven
     Which 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 it
     Desist and be forgiven,--I--forgive not,
     But bless you, Thorold, from my soul of souls!
          [Falls on his neck.]
     There!  Do not think too much upon the past!
     The cloud that's broke was all the same a cloud
     While it stood up between my friend and you;
     You hurt him 'neath its shadow:  but is that
     So 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 glad
     In 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 thus
     About my neck, and blessed me, and then died:
     You'll let them stay now, Guendolen!

     AUSTIN.                               Leave her
     And look to him!  What ails you, Thorold?

     GUENDOLEN.                                 White
     As 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 down
     My neck beside her weight:  thanks:  I should fall
     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-done
     Heart-weary player in this pageant-world
     Drops out by, letting the main masque defile
     By 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; name
     And fame are yours:  you hold our 'scutcheon up.
     Austin, no blot on it!  You see how blood
     Must wash one blot away:  the first blot came
     And the first blood came.  To the vain world's eye
     All'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 fall the pulseless arm].
     Ah, Thorold, we can but--remember you!

     The End