University of Virginia Library

SCENE I

A very squalid, little street, giving on to the Tiber. It is low tide; some few stars are coming out. A masked figure seats itself on the remains of an old barge, tilted up.
Children peep from their play: then one of them whispers to his companions: they flee.
A few Bargemen come up and observe the Mask; one shakes his head.
BARGEMAN.

Better be absent! No, no! Do not observe him, Bernardo.
If you hear nothing, see nothing, contain nothing,
you cannot be hanged.

ANOTHER.
Do not cringe; haul in those nets. 'Tis safer so.

[They set to work; an oar drops with noise. One or two salute the Mask, but, at the slow turning of his head, they go away.
[Two Cardinals land from the opposite bank; they pause, then shuffle into the night.
[The Mask shifts his posture.
THE MASK.
My lusts are heavy in me,
Heavy and idle. I have poisoned Rome;
It gasps and wriggles: not an ounce of flesh
In all this Rome but quivers in my shadow.
And what is next to do? And who will fall?
They dream all fixed
Within this brain—and I am but an eagle
Moving subservient to the ranker air.
[Another masked figure advances stealthily.
Eigh, Michelotto!

MICHELOTTO.
[In a whisper.]
Caught, gagged—those false Albanians!

CESARE.
Shall I sentence
A troop of tetchy mercenaries? Ho,
Boon fellow, have I brought you here to-night,
By this dim waterside, to give me tidings
Of a few minnows trapped, that should be landed
Unconscious in the haul?
I have seen burthen
Of princes on this back; I have seen their jewels
Dangling from belt and chains. What sights
I have beheld ....

MICHELOTTO.
And shall, if you will trust me with your hopes.

CESARE.
Uncertain!
[They are silent.
Hopes—a hollow!
Slaughter the flocks of Ajax!

MICHELOTTO.
Stay!
God's health, you have your plans, or I am palsied!

CESARE.
[Pulling Michelotto's ear-ring.
Fondling, I have my plans: but not as God
Hovers His hand among the elements
To pick His missile; rather as Olympus,
Blustering and fickle, backs the game at Troy.
[After a pause.]
I am tense and weary;
I dream too much—the fever of my dreaming
Strikes me at head of hosts,
And some in Spanish armour, some in French,
Innumerable hosts ....

[Michelotto scans him anxiously; then rises, shaking himself.
MICHELOTTO.
Come with me, come eaves-dropping! Ho, my wits
Were never nimbler; to each blood-caprice
I will give satisfaction, as a mistress
Stirs to appease her lord's carnality.

CESARE.
[In the same tone.]
I watched you strangling Trocchio ... but my father
Wept with shut eyes his trusted secretary
Fled from his table to betray our dealings
With Spain to France. The Vatican is dull!
Scruples are there and injuries and age ....
[On his feet.]
Why, like a hawk in ringing flight, I harassed
The creature for an hour to find if secret
From France we had cut off his treachery:
And in the Papagallo
My father wept! Ho, Trocchio swings out now
Where all can see him from Sant' Angelo—
His master and the Curia and the people.
My father wept .... At noon was he not merry
When Cardinal Michele's death assured us
One hundred fifty thousand ducats? Ecco!
I did not sing my cantarella's praise.
Dull at the Vatican!
And what to do?
Join Spain and join Gonsalvo, a commander
Even of my wing, the conqueror of Naples;
Or hold obsequious in my tethered hand
The Gallic fleur-de-luce?
Unpleasant gulfs,
Shoals! ... And to poise before the Balances
Watching their poise!

MICHELOTTO.
But you regret no action?

CESARE.
[Stalking to the edge of the water.]
I do not weep by graves! . . .
Looking across the cities that I love,
Across the sheepfolds and the little cities ....
[His voice trembles and he laughs.]
Pastoral! And for cause Vicarius sum
Sanctae Ecclesiae! ... Good Michelotto,
Hire me a boat, and row me down the stream.