University of Virginia Library

Scene V

A chamber at Tintagel. It is grown dark
Gradually Iseult is seen seated on one of two thrones upon a dais. She is looking out to sea. Sudden gleams from the low sunset strike in.
King Mark enters and sits beside her
Mark.
You keep your state,
Queen, to a wailing wind.

Iseult.
I had not missed you.
I keep my place perpetual by your throne
Enthroned. It is your pleasure.

Mark.
You look out?

Iseult.
Is that forbidden? If there be a sail
This winter time the sea-gull stretches it.

Mark.
Iseult!

Iseult.
I know
There is a feast to-night.

Mark.
The gallery
Will crowd with minstrels.

Iseult.
I would hear no music—
No harping more! . . .
The small brown-feathered birds,
Flecked, of flecked song—the siskin and the merle,
The intimate warm creatures of the wood
That peck at blossoms! . . . Hide your face from me!

Mark.
Why do you love the forest? Is it sweet—
Give me your hands and press mine as you speak—
Is it that there your heart was innocent?
You grip my hands. Ah, then I can forgive.

Iseult.
I never can forgive.

Mark
(with sudden passion).
Then hear my news—
Tristan is married. Do you smile, Iseult?
So those a battle smites will blanch and smile.
Tristan is married and at Arundel
Lives with his wife, Iseult of the White Hands—
Why do you lay yours forth upon your robe?—
In love and honour, for men say this woman
Is chaste and of great faithfulness.

Iseult.
Say more,
Tell all . . . not with your comment, with detail . . .
What feast was made for Tristan, what the wine,
And who was drunken; with what wreath of myrtle
Or flower or fruit his bride enlaced her hair;
What largesse was outpoured and how he kissed her
Before the people? You shall have my pardon
If you will give me regal entertainment,
And sting my interest in the tale you tell.
I have lived far from ballads, quite shut off
From any minstrel. I should love a story
Of Tristan and Iseult.
My hands are fresh,
And shine across the blood in them as shells.
More of the story!
[Falling back.
But it has no power;
Not in the rumour,
Not in the vision, for you cannot frame it
To haunt me even: it but flits along,
A thin and wasted fancy on your voice.
Ha, ha! You would provoke a little mirth,
A little laughter from me. Mark, remember,
While I am laughing, how as Tristan is
So is Iseult of Ireland, so King Mark—
Married as Tristan. We are married, Mark.
[He supports her head. After closing her eyes for a while, she uncloses them.
A dream! A dream!
Why should you tell me of your dreams? So Tristan
Has won a wife? Have you no other dream?

Mark.
Yea, verily I have another dream.
Tristan is married: you are desolate.
But I have loved you night and day and night
Again. Now you are fallen, still I love you,
I see you fair. Beloved,
If I might suck you up, even as the sea
Sucks up some crazy little bark that tears
Against its waves, to haven it below
In its unfathomed waters!

[Iseult slowly rises and disengages herself from Mark.
Iseult.
Peace! No more!
Let all the dreams be mine! Away!—No more!
[He leaves her with a heavy sigh.
That I might drink of death! Death has the secrets
That grow from the roots of sleep:
Would I might drink
Before the wedded woman, drink, and dash
The goblet at her feet. Iseult!—He dare not
Mellow the tempest of that name, with magic
Of his low voice, to her. Iseult! Iseult!
[Perceiving Brangaena at the doorway.
Ho, I am calling to myself, Brangaena;
My name is like some awful monument,
Some temple on the sands I cannot pass,
And yet it is no use to me. I can
But pray that it will crush me with its stones.
Iseult!
[She laughs again.
I often heard my mother tell
Of the immense, wide Afric gods, and wondered
If they had wrought the worlds . . .
But I forget!
Tristan is married.

Brangaena.
Yea.

Iseult.
Then Mark has blabbed?

Brangaena
(shaking her head).
I heard it on the shore.

Iseult.
News, news! A vessel
Over the waves under the walls? Brangaena,
Is Tristan married?

Brangaena.
There are merchant-men
Hid in the shingle-cave. They offer silks . . .
If presently
They may bring in their wares!
[Iseult motions they may enter.
It is a vessel—
Think but of that. If I have any craft
In secret it shall speed you to Sir Tristan.
O child, the sailing! You shall see his face.

[Exit.
Iseult.
It is a dream. I take it up again
With slumbering senses. Tristan—does he come?
Is he a merchant-man? Disguise, disguise!
Tristan once more. O Love, but straight and clear
Let him come to me—Tristan!
Re-enter Brangaena with Kahedin and others disguised as merchant-men
These are strangers.
Unroll your silks. It is an empty hour.
Unroll, display your trafficking.

[Sheets of silk, tinted in beautiful colours, are opened by two merchant-men and laid before her. Kahedin lifts up a goblet and shows Tristan's ring on his hand.
Kahedin.
Of Tours!

Iseult
(seizing his wrist).
You have a message.

Kahedin
(terror-struck).
Noble Queen, believe
We come here very humble, in distress,
With silks, with treasure, and with many riches.

Iseult.
You come here with my ring. Then he is dead,
Tristan is dead?
It is a goodly cup
You lifted in that glittering hand—of Tours,
You said, a cup of Tours. Is this the message?
And did he drink of it, your lord, Sir Tristan?
Has he bequeathed it to me? For I know,
I have known all the day that he is dead.

Kahedin.
Dying, great Queen, and dying for your love.

Iseult.
O merchant-man, you have a vulgar tongue!
Be dumb at least, give no interpretation.
If you are charged to yield the jewel up,
Lay it aside . . . and put with it the goblet,
These Spanish things, the silk. I will weigh down
Your vessel with their price: it is my message.
Brangaena, give him gold . . .
And for this wine
To crown the cup with.

Kahedin.
Lady you mistake.
I am no merchant; I am Kahedin,
And brother to Sir Tristan.

Iseult.
You would say
That you are brother to Sir Tristan's wife,
Iseult of the White Hands?

Kahedin.
I had forgotten
Sir Tristan has a wife, or I a sister
That may be called Iseult. You have the name,
You breathe it. O fair blondeness of the land,
My lord Sir Tristan is laid nigh to death:
But have compassion of his singing eyes,
That sing for you across the western sea.

Iseult.
What help is in the sea—so alien
It is, so bitter and so girding cold?
Has he forgotten—

Kahedin.
All that is not you.
Rejecting tendance, as the tide flows in,
Borne on a litter to the beach, he waits
For hours and counts the waves as they were hours,
And sees them ebb away, nor will he miss
In any wind the rushing of these waves
That rush from Cornwall.

Iseult.
Wherefore should he die?

Kahedin.
Lady, this is my grief. He perilled life
Guarding a tower wherein I met my love:
Her husband slew him with a poisoned arrow . . .
Except you heal him he will surely die.

Iseult.
Is this the message?

Kahedin.
Of the golden hours
He bade me to remind you, of your love,
Of his first sickness, of your mother's love,
And of a magic draught upon the sea:
Also he bade me to salute this maiden,
If she is named Brangaena.

Iseult.
All the magic,
All, all the spoiling of the magic rests
With this Brangaena.
Take the maid with you;
She knows my mother's simples, is a nurse,
And will recover you your lord.
O Boy,
Why do you stand there trembling at my feet?

Kahedin.
He said
Nothing that I have said—that was in sleep
Or wandering fever, with his eyes bent on me
Fading and darkening slowly as they faded:
That was in weakness—
[He goes to the table, takes the ring, kisses it, and repeats.
‘Greet her: all the greetings
I have I send to her. I keep back nothing
Of comfort to myself.’

Iseult
(settling the ring on her finger).
Brangaena, take
The brightest of the silks,
That one, the vermeil-gold.
This is your sail,
Sir Kahedin. We will unclose these eyes
Of your sheathed falcon—gallantly will steer
Into your port. Your ship shall burn like fire,
Like sunrise on the waves.

Kahedin.
My lord will live.

Iseult.
For I shall bear to him such joy, such tidings;
For we will take this cup,
And all the vintage back. The wine is strong
For dying lips—no matter!
[She laughs as she unrolls and lifts in her arms a sheet of the red-gold silk).
Hoist the sail!