University of Virginia Library

Scene II

Masada, by the Dead Sea
Alexandra and Mariamne.
Mariamne is sitting listless. Alexandra approaches her with jewels
Mariamne.
I will not give him pleasure.

Alexandra.
Child,
He is parting from you; he may not return.
[Mariamne stares fixedly in a mirror.
What is it?
A bloom is on your beauty like the dew.
What is it?

[Queen Alexandra looks into the mirror.
Mariamne.
You behold!

Alexandra.
My beauty, my heart's fashioning, my jewel . . .
A little pale, fairer about the eyes—
My daughter!

Mariamne.
No—your son, your murdered son.
He beckons me each time I face the mirror;
He comes up from the water through the metal;
He shines distorted . . .

Alexandra
(clasping Mariamne).
Hush!

Mariamne.
He comes to me . . .
For we are children, for we love each other.
He tells me all his secrets; I have this.
My heart is with him. How can you forget?

Alexandra.
Child, you must come to take the scent of blood
As simply as it were the scent of roses.
Grow winsome to your husband, give him pleasure:
All sullenness in woman is defeat. . . .
[She draws her daughter again to her side.
How can you see down to the heart of things?
You must have many secrets yielded up,
Not one, if you would move soft-footedly
About the world and sway it to your will.
Listen a little. . . . You are hard, you took
No heed of Herod at the funeral. . . .

Mariamne.
That he should weep! He moved you by his weeping.
It is the ghosts that move me, and the ghosts
Alone that I can comfort. They are helpless
As children, and they cry to me; the old
Cry to me as the young—my grandfather
Murdered by Herod and my brother murdered.

Alexandra.
Child, you are very deaf to human sounds;
You are yourself a ghost, a mystery,
Almost to me who bore you, a dismay.
What would you have—revenge?

[Mariamne shakes her head.
Mariamne.
There, mother, deck me
With these long chains and chains.
[Alexandra adorns her with ropes of pearls and amethysts; Mariamne looks up at her mother and smiles.
How do men love?

Alexandra.
They love a little while: they love but beauty.

Mariamne
(gazing into the mirror).
Oh, then, I have no fear: I am eternal.

[Queen Alexandra's face glows as Mariamne rises. Herod enters.
Herod.
Mariamne!

[He pauses, bowing profoundly to Queen Alexandra.
Alexandra.
Son, I have dressed her for you, have perfumed
And dressed her.

Herod.
You have dressed her as a queen,
Queen Mariamne.

Alexandra
(with deep obeisance).
I yield now my place;
And blessing on you, blessing!

[Herod bows again and watches the Queen retire, staring blankly as in a trance.
Herod.
Mariamne,
I have been musing. . . . How shall I bid farewell?
You are shaken. Speak!
If I died from you . . . and to Antony
I pass, to my extremest foe, to peril
Of my fortune and my life—say, can you live?
[Mariamne is silent.
(Softly, in her ear.)
My flower! death may be painless, sudden, joyous,
A wafting into bliss.

Mariamne
(speaking as if from sleep).
There is drowning. . . . No,
I would not drown myself;
I would not you should order me that death.

Herod.
My flower!—your death?
I am thinking of my death and of your tears.
Mariamne, would you live
When my great love to you is dumb?

Mariamne.
I love
The dead so dearly!

Herod.
Could you mourn me, then,
Life-long, shut in this fortress of Masada?
Could you make all its walls a lamentation?

Mariamne.
I never shall lament the dead—my days
Were a long mourning if I mourned the dead.

Herod.
Beloved, my bitter-herbs, my sacred feast,
Be not too bitter!

Mariamne.
I have many tears:
My mother says that I must dry my tears.

Herod.
A smile, that is the shadow of a bird
In a deep pool—but still a smile!
Blest be your mother; I will leave you with her.

Mariamne.
She hates you: do not leave me with my mother.

Herod.
I will leave you with my sister, for she loves me.

Mariamne.
Salome? Does she love you?

Herod.
Sweetness of flowering vineyards on your voice!
My wine in flower, are you but flower? A dream?
[With a gesture toward the plain of the Dead Sea.
Desert acacias, desert spring!
O Mariamne!

[Round every hill and cranny the words are murmured in confusing mockery, until distinct in every syllable they are returned. Mariamne comes up to him and takes the fringes of his robe in her hand.
Mariamne.
Yea, my lord?

Herod.
Mariamne,
Your touch—my cheek, my neck!
You shall not finger
The tassels of my tunic as a slave.
[Laying her head back on his arm.
O my Judæa,
I fable to your people I was born
Of Jewish race from Babylon—I fable!
Here, in the austere country of my fathers,
And with your tendrilled face upon my arm,
I do not juggle. I am a son of Esau,
Who has snatched back again his riven blessing
From Israel. O garden of your land!
If I should die . . .
I have never spared . . . Mariamne,
Can I spare? . . .
O garden of your land, is this surrender?
Is this thyself? Abandnoment of love!—
A swoon! . . . Salome!
Re-enter Queen Alexandra with Joseph
She is gone!

Alexandra.
You have killed her?

Herod.
No.

Alexandra.
Lift the pearls back from her throat.
(To Joseph.)
Fetch cordials.
[Exit Joseph.
What have you done?

Herod.
'Midmost of my caress
She sank my arm . . .
Revive her, bring her back!

Alexandra.
Lift her, and let me take her to my lap.

Herod
(snatching a phial from Joseph's hand).
Dew on her, dew!

[He wildly scatters the cordial over her as if scattering incense.
Alexandra.
Let her not wake and see your face. My daughter
Is fragile, your embraces,
Herod, too fervent. See, her colour comes.
Kiss her as you would kiss a babe asleep . . .
Rise softly, very softly step aside.

[Herod kisses Mariamne, and then withdraws to the entrance of the room, where he whispers to his brother-in-law.
Herod.
Joseph, you are her guardian. You reply
For her as would a common sentinel;
And as I have commanded be it done.

Joseph.
To the extreme of your commands, my lord
And brother. God be with you!

Herod.
God with her!

[Exit.