University of Virginia Library

Scene II

Jerusalem. The evening of the next day. An apartment facing west, in the king's house. It gives on the columns of a vestibule.
Cypros and Salome
Cypros.
Do you hear him—hear my son; his ceaseless treading
As the creatures tread at night?

Salome.
I hear him, mother;
He is stepping out her doom.

Cypros.
You hear his treading,
Soft on the carpet, struck against the marble?
Would she were dead, who hated him to death!
Why does he place a guard, as round a city,
Deep round the women's chambers of the palace,
As strong a guard as he besieged a city?

Salome.
Had he but looked on her,
Those mournful, sable eyes and lids in shadow
Under the pearl-laced crown, that brow in shadow,
And the obdurate mouth had been a charm
To honour as to fortitude. But, mother,
She strives to send no message; she is silent
As trophies or cold statues.

Cypros.
Listen, listen!
Is he not treading nearer? But I fear it,
As when the heel of thunder clangs at hand. . . .
I will run the other way. To-morrow!

[Exit.
Salome.
Ay—
To-morrow for the mother and the son. . . .
Our time is now, Herod's and mine!
(Looking out.)
Day fills its arc; and there is quietness
From heat and sunlight—there are shadows.
Enter Herod
Herod,
My brother . . .

Herod.
Do not stop me with your words.

Salome.
Stay but a little . . .
(She catches his hand.)
See,
How cooler and more dark it is!

Herod.
More dark!

Salome.
A daylight blue without the sun—and quiet
About the buildings. . . .
You are with me now.

Herod.
. . . Salome, out beyond
The Dead Sea there is country where the lions,
The terrible wild beasts upon the tracks,
Sicken of fever every other day,
Sicken, or else they would destroy the world. . . .
Sicken of fever in the tracks . . .
The hunters told me when I was a boy.
[He throws himself down on some cushions.
Salome, have you met
And passed a lion on his path? They told me
A man should never turn his eyes
To watch the lion, for that would waken anger,
Though he were sick. . . . You did not set your eyes
On mine. . . . Salome, every one has hurried
Before me after gazing; but no faintness
Of heart is in you, and no rage in me,
Only this freezing fever.

[He begins to shiver.
Salome.
Take my stole.
[She goes to the door and calls.
Bring wine, with grain of pepper-corns.
[She comes back to him; an attendant brings a cordial and goes out.
Drink, drink!

Herod
(after drinking).
Salome . . .
O God of Israel, God of my Temple,
The stories of my childhood!
In a heathen,
Untrammelled fever of my soul, Salome,
I even could pray
Thul Kholsa, the old idol of our fathers,
Patron of safety in affairs of peace,
Patron of safety in affairs of bloodshed;
And cast a sheaf of arrows at his feet
For consultation, watching, for my omen,
The figures made upon the ground, as fall
The arrows. . . . I, so deft in archery—
I would be safe, I would be safe—
Cast arrows
To know myself secure. . . .

Salome.
Hush! Are you mad
Indeed? Why?

[He rises and moves toward the sunset, so that he has his back to Salome.
Herod.
I have thoughts
Of respite and reprieve. . . .

Salome.
Herod!

Herod.
Of respite
And of reprieve—not from a tomb, but death;
Not from her burial, from immolation,
Banishment to the void and from the air!
Not so escape! But there are fortresses—
Masada by the Dead Sea coast;
There I could bury her as in a coffin,
Each sigh of wind a death-song over her.
Were not that best? A tower her monument,
Yet she not dead, not out of all account,
Still mortal, still not absolutely lost;
Coffered, not coffined—not inanimate,
Held in the jaws of her sarcophagus,
Unseen of living nature, but alive . . .
With the cloud eyes of her, the silken cheek,
Even the voice of rough-edged undertone,
Enamouring offence. There none would love her,
None! But my treasury
Would have sealed riches, not a destitute,
Defaulting cave. Among the coins and jewels,
Locked-up regalia and spoil—a queen. . . .
The difference! . . .
There in the rusty gloom accessible.
The difference! I think she shall not die.
I think of fortresses—
Masada by the Dead Sea coast.
I ponder not to kill her, but immure.

Salome.
Surfeit your hatred
Upon my love! Brother, the feast be full!
But listen, while you feed upon your hatred,
And I will play, in love, Love's instruments
Against your ear. Listen! This Jewess—listen!
Does she not make you opposite in nature
To your own self? You have won honour, Herod;
Your people called you Great!
Imperial Rome
Has found your brow incapable except
Of one adornment that was given, a crown.
Will you, who won Arabian wars and settled
Your crown on you by siege and battlefield,
Be made so tender by a cruel wanton,
That when her spite would murder you your blood
Claims not her blood's atonement?
You that hold
The Romans as true governors of earth,
The judges—the firm lips and brains!—you summon
A Council, you demand a sentence passed,
Your will her condemnation; and you shiver
With feverous weakness and unsay the sentence
The law pronounced and the king ratified!
Oh, is this man worthy a Roman ensign,
Worthy an eagle in the air above him,
Worthy the friendship of the lords of earth?

[A Eunuch stands at the door.
Eunuch.
Rabbi Shemaiah prays to see the king.

Salome.
Will you receive him? Send him back—he is
An enemy within the Sanhedrin.

Herod.
I will receive him.

Salome.
Herod, you are ragged
And lank, not in your majesty.

Herod.
The king
Will hear Rabbi Shemaiah.

[Exit Eunuch.
[Herod and Salome keep silent: she kneels down on her cushion and looks at the sundown till Shemaiah enters, when she turns and watches her brother.
Shemaiah.
O lord king,
Grant your forgiveness that I speak the words
Of many at your feet; temper your wisdom
With mercy; press not with intemperance
Of haste against the Asmonean lady,
Your queen condemned—but while the proofs are dark
Against her shining as your wife, remove her
To solitude of prison, and awhile
Hold back from her the final penalty
On which no light can shine. My voice is many
A voice in prayer.

Herod.
We turn not from our sentence.

Shemaiah.
Turn not, but linger
Awhile the days before it be fulfilled.

Herod.
My wrath is on you, Rabbi, and on those
Who would turn back from their own judgment: never
Will I, the judge, turn so. Remorselessly
Our God effects for justice, and remorseless
Before men's fear should be that governor
Who holds him to his rulership—his sentence
Shall be of doom, shall stand, shall domineer.

Shemaiah.
The Jews have loved her.

Herod.
Have they?

Shemaiah.
Their deliverance
By Judas and his brethren, as rich spice
In wine, has glorified her stately blood;
They would not see it shed save for such guilt
As many days have looked upon with strictness
Of light and argument.

Herod.
My wrath is on you.
Old man, I am the judge, I am the king—
There will not be a queen: I am her husband.
The voices you would have me listen to
Are low down, far behind, far off—the croaking
Of frogs at night-time . . . There is night for me,
And dawn to come and sliding day. . . .
Go back,
Far off!—Bid those that sit and croak with you
Remember how august the Sanhedrin
Would rule the sons of Jacob. Say the king
Will turn not from his sentence for an hour.

Shemaiah.
God save you!

[Exit.
Salome.
Herod—

Herod.
I shall stay here, Salome; not with you,
But not alone. . . . There is no track for sleep
To wander after me; I shall not sleep,
Not at the hour when night is dead asleep.
Send Nicholas to read his History,
To read it on and on, and by my hearing
Tangle my fancy that I may not image
The heaved sword and the eyes'
Last kindness to the light—
The hollow in them at the severance
Of the adored head from its bodily form
And appertaining stature . . .
[He begins to wander backward and forward.
If I listen
To Nicholas it will be as a sea—
What men have done and suffered—as a sea
Pouring upon my ears; and it will tangle
Imagination that it shall not raise me
My bridal chamber at Samaria,
The adored head on my bosom, the young body
Loving me close, in very oneness, flesh
Even of my flesh—our bridal a flower's heart
Of balsam, and our secrecy . . . To-morrow
The people watch her to her death.
Salome,
Call Nicholas . . .
I shall stay here, for dawn
Comes on the other side: the sun
Comes on the other side.
Send Nicholas!