 | The Father's Tragedy |  |
Scene III.
—The same. A Hall. Enter Albany.Albany.
My son and grandsons in a vision bowed
Their heads before me, and my phantom-hand
Let fall the hungry steel upon their necks.
My sin, my sin was executioner,
For I myself was dead as midnight ghost.—
All this is fever; yet within the lines
Of sane and irreproachable surmise
My fear attains to danger; for my son
Is feeble, indolent,—a man of peace,
Unworthy of my loins; he'll lose my gain,
Drop what I've damned my soul to lay on him.
Then is there James. ... Would he might share
His brother's grave! A like captivity
Shall wither him—
[Enter an Attendant.]
Attendant.
Your grace, Sir John is dead.
Albany.
Ramorgny? He hath lived
A white and staring life these many days.
How ended it?
Attendant.
He hung against the wall
Within a dusty corner.
Albany.
Self-undone.
'Twas melancholia!—Attend my charge
115
Here is a purse.—Rest not, until you lay
Its sealèd sheet within his royal hand.
Attendant.
My bounteous lord, this opportunity
To do you service—
Albany.
Speak not; but begone.
[Exit Attendant.
O Opportunity!—
My soul, self-murdered, rots beneath the stake
That pointed her direction. Now again
She glimmers on the crooked, deep-cut way
Of treachery, and I will follow her.
She is the fleeting guide that draws my life
Through all its paths of darkness; she's the star
That leads ambition forth! My letter greets
The King of England, tells him how the seas
Are bringing James to France, sets down the points
Where he will touch on English ground, and when.
The lure will take; my last impediment
Find, like my first, a prison. I am blessed.
Would that the pardon came, and that I felt
Less sick at banquets, and saw less of dreams.
[Exit.
| The Father's Tragedy | |