 | Cyrano de Bergerac: A Play in Five Acts |  |
Scene X.
Cyrano, Christian.CYRANO
Embrace me now!
CHRISTIAN
Sir. . .
CYRANO
You are brave.
CHRISTIAN
Oh! but. . .
CYRANO
Nay, I insist.
CHRISTIAN
Pray tell me. . .
CYRANO
Come, embrace! I am her brother.
Whose brother?
CYRANO
Hers i' faith! Roxane's!
CHRISTIAN
(rushing up to him)
O heavens! Her brother. . .?
CYRANO
Cousin--brother!. . .the same thing!
CHRISTIAN
And she has told you. . .?
CYRANO
All!
CHRISTIAN
She loves me? say!
CYRANO
Maybe!
CHRISTIAN
(taking his hands)
How glad I am to meet you, Sir!
CYRANO
That may be called a sudden sentiment!
CHRISTIAN
I ask your pardon. . .
CYRANO
(looking at him, with his hand on his shoulder)
True, he's fair, the villain!
Ah, Sir! If you but knew my admiration!. . .
CYRANO
But all those noses?. . .
CHRISTIAN
Oh! I take them back!
CYRANO
Roxane expects a letter.
CHRISTIAN
Woe the day!
CYRANO
How?
CHRISTIAN
I am lost if I but ope my lips!
CYRANO
Why so?
CHRISTIAN
I am a fool--could die for shame!
CYRANO
None is a fool who knows himself a fool. And you did not attack me like a fool.
CHRISTIAN
Bah! One finds battle-cry to lead th' assault! I have a certain military wit, But, before women, can but hold my tongue. Their eyes! True, when I pass, their eyes are kind. . .
And, when you stay, their hearts, methinks, are kinder?
CHRISTIAN
No! for I am one of those men--tongue-tied, I know it--who can never tell their love.
CYRANO
And I, meseems, had Nature been more kind, More careful, when she fashioned me,--had been One of those men who well could speak their love!
CHRISTIAN
Oh, to express one's thoughts with facile grace!. . .
CYRANO
. . .To be a musketeer, with handsome face!
CHRISTIAN
Roxane is precieuse. I'm sure to prove A disappointment to her!
CYRANO
(looking at him)
Had I but Such an interpreter to speak my soul!
CHRISTIAN
(with despair)
Eloquence! Where to find it?
CYRANO
(abruptly)
That I lend, If you lend me your handsome victor-charms; Blended, we make a hero of romance!
How so?
CYRANO
Think you you can repeat what things I daily teach your tongue?
CHRISTIAN
What do you mean?
CYRANO
Roxane shall never have a disillusion! Say, wilt thou that we woo her, double-handed? Wilt thou that we two woo her, both together? Feel'st thou, passing from my leather doublet, Through thy laced doublet, all my soul inspiring?
CHRISTIAN
But, Cyrano!. . .
CYRANO
Will you, I say?
CHRISTIAN
I fear!
CYRANO
Since, by yourself, you fear to chill her heart, Will you--to kindle all her heart to flame-- Wed into one my phrases and your lips?
CHRISTIAN
Your eyes flash!
CYRANO
Will you?
Will it please you so? --Give you such pleasure?
CYRANO
(madly)
It!. . .
(Then calmly, business-like)It would amuse me! It is an enterprise to tempt a poet. Will you complete me, and let me complete you? You march victorious,--I go in your shadow; Let me be wit for you, be you my beauty!
CHRISTIAN
The letter, that she waits for even now! I never can. . .
CYRANO
(taking out the letter he had written)
See! Here it is--your letter!
CHRISTIAN
What?
CYRANO
Take it! Look, it wants but the address.
CHRISTIAN
But I. . .
CYRANO
Fear nothing. Send it. It will suit.
CHRISTIAN
But have you. . .?
Oh! We have our pockets full, We poets, of love-letters, writ to Chloes, Daphnes--creations of our noddle-heads. Our lady-loves,--phantasms of our brains, --Dream-fancies blown into soap-bubbles! Come! Take it, and change feigned love-words into true; I breathed my sighs and moans haphazard-wise; Call all these wandering love-birds home to nest. You'll see that I was in these lettered lines, --Eloquent all the more, the less sincere! --Take it, and make an end!
CHRISTIAN
Were it not well To change some words? Written haphazard-wise, Will it fit Roxane?
CYRANO
'Twill fit like a glove!
CHRISTIAN
But. . .
CYRANO
Ah, credulity of love! Roxane Will think each word inspired by herself!
CHRISTIAN
My friend!
(He throws himself into Cyrano's arms. They remain thus.)
| Cyrano de Bergerac: A Play in Five Acts | |