 | The Sin of David |  |
51
ACT III
Time.—Five years laterScene.—A room in a house on the outskirts of the town of Wakefield. At back a window looks out on the open country. On its right a door communicates with the outer courtyard; on the left another opens into the sleeping rooms of the house.
Four years are supposed to have elapsed since ACT II. Lisle discovered, seated, with papers before him; on one side Ratcliffe, on the other two officers in attendance.
Lisle.
Old Ratcliffe, ask my wife to come to me.
Stay! She was hushing up the child to sleep,
Low singing over him; say, will she come
If he is sleeping now.
[Exit Ratcliffe.
52
Three years of seeming peace; yet here I hold
Letters in Fairfax' hand; he apprehends
In Kent and Essex disaffection; speaks
Of imminent trouble. What of Wakefield then
And all this region; see you any cause
Here for disquiet?
Officer.
None, sir, save from bands
Roaming in indolent undiscipline,
Hither and thither, plundering purposeless.
Lisle.
No smouldering mischief then?
Officer.
None visible.
Enter Miriam with child. Officers retire
Miriam.
Hubert—he will not sleep, but must put on
His sword and strut with it. Ah! let him stay.
Lisle.
Well—well! thy sword already girded on,
Yet, sir, they tell me that no peril threatens.
[To Miriam.]
How straight he stands! His colour too not bright
Nor dull; but with a blander glow of blood.
I think that he hath more of me than thee.
Miriam.
No, Hubert, no.
Lisle.
His eyes! Those are my eyes.
53
Only in colour! but that way they ope
Wide at the world, that is all mine.
Lisle.
Perhaps.
Miriam.
Then, too, his mouth?
Lisle.
Mine, mine in every curve.
Miriam.
If you had watched him smile as close as I
You would not say that; all his smile is mine.
I grant that when he frets, his mouth will drop
Like to his father's.
Lisle.
So! from thee his joy,
From me his sadness.
Miriam.
Hubert, no! when he
Doth sadden, that same dimness o'er him comes
As upon me.
Lisle.
Will you claim all of him?
His eyes, his mouth, his sad hour and his bright?
His hair, now, see that curl behind the ear.
Come, you must yield me that.
Miriam.
O, that perhaps.
Lisle.
Will you not leave me any part in him?
Miriam.
Oh, yes! his cry when he would fight off sleep.
54
[laughing.]
Well, well, sweet, we will quarrel over him
No longer; he is fair and strong and bright.
How his young face hath mellowed our first passion.
What flamed then is a glow more beautiful.
Yet is thy love of me not less?
Miriam.
How—less?
Lisle.
The former fury hath gone out of it,
The pulsing life, the blinding dance of blood.
Miriam.
The child hath brought a tremble into it.
I am grown fearful for the sake of him;
I dread the rustle of angels in his room.
Lisle.
And now doth he divide what once was mine
Wholly.
Miriam.
Ah no; he hath enriched that love.
Once did it live upon thy look, thy voice,
Thy strength, thy courage, and thy conqueror soul,
This was enough, God knows. But, Hubert, now
We two together to behold our boy,
That we have reared and planted sunward, grow,
55
And all our tears fall down on him like rain.
I thought thou never couldst be more to me;
But now is added to that rapturous fire
Much that perhaps of men is not esteemed,
But to a woman meaneth half her life.
To hold our sweet night council o'er his day,
To exchange bright understandings silently
At little words of his; to bend, we two,
Over him dreaming while thy hand on mine
Tightens a moment; then to watch together
Some little way of thee or me appear
Sudden in him; to feel our daily life
Grow solemn at his voice: to see our spirits,
Close though they met in kiss and breathèd word,
Visibly here commingled and made flesh.
Lisle.
Now blows the future sweet into our eyes,
And even peril treadeth upon grass.
Enter Ratcliffe
Ratcliffe.
A sudden messenger from Pomfret ridden.
Enter messenger, hurriedly
Messenger.
Sir, all the country around Pomfret walls
56
We foraging without, found no return.
They signal for relief; and one even now
Behind me rideth furiously, I fear
Bringing worse news.
Lisle.
[To Ratcliffe.]
Bid Arlington prepare
With all our horsemen instantly to spur
For Pomfret; then if he who rides behind
Bear us worse tidings, I myself will lead.
[Exit Ratcliffe with messenger.
Miriam.
[To child, who falls back on her shoulder.]
Ah, darling!
Lisle.
How, what ails the child?
Miriam.
There, there,
Is thy head heavy? On my bosom then.
Lisle.
Now, Hubert, little Hubert, draw thy sword!
[Child attempts, but fails to draw sword.
See thus! [Drawing his own.]
Not even a smile! Why he would laugh
And leap at this an hour since.
Miriam.
He is heavy.
Hush! do not speak to him.
57
[Bending over him.]
What dreams I have
For thee.
Miriam.
What dost thou dream?
Lisle.
He shall be tall.
Miriam.
No taller than thyself.
Lisle.
I'd have him shoot
Beyond me both in inches and in deeds.
Miriam.
A soldier?
Lisle.
No! when he shall grow a man
The land will cry for rest. I see him then
A healer and a closer up of wounds.
His task shall be to obliterate and soothe;
To bind, not break; to mingle, not to mar;
His counsel breathing over England balm.
This labour more than battle asks a man.
Miriam.
It is a noble dream.
Lisle.
And shall come true.
Or he shall build in new lands over sea
Some virgin commonwealth.
Ratcliffe.
[Entering hastily.]
A horseman, sir.
Spurred sweating to the gate.
Lisle.
Summon him in!
58
Soldier.
From Pomfret, sir, where we are hard beset.
The town may fall each moment, totters now;
And only in the sight of thee is hope.
Lisle.
[To Miriam.]
Dear, I must go.
[To soldier.]
Tell Colonel Arlington
That I myself will lead; let all stand by.
Ratcliffe, a breastplate and a helm enough!
[Ratcliffe hastily arms him.
Old man, why do thy fingers fumble thus,
Or have thine eyes dimmed suddenly? Apace!
Ratcliffe.
Oh, sir, this very night-time, five years flown,
Thus armed I my old master, when he fell
By Castle Bolingbroke.
Lisle.
This very night?
Ratcliffe.
This night; when I did leave the holy Book
Unlocked for you to search it.
Lisle.
I remember.
Ratcliffe.
Again the night is here! My fingers fumble
About the straps as then. Pray God this night
May not see dawn like that!
59
Leave me—enough.
[Exit Ratcliffe.
[Aside.]
I sent him then! Now I myself must go.
Miriam.
[To child, with whom she is walking to and fro.]
Now thou art hot, now cold.
Lisle.
Art thou, dead man,
Urging me down that road where thee I sped?
Miriam.
[Bringing child to Lisle.]
Hubert, his face!
Lisle.
[Suddenly, gazing on child.]
Or, or—give me the child.
Miriam.
What's this?
Lisle.
[To child.]
Close, close, your arms about my neck.
No peril visible or invisible
Shall touch you so enfolded.
Miriam.
Why so fearful—
So on a sudden?
Lisle.
Is our son watch'd o'er?
Guarded each instant?
Miriam.
Hubert!
Lisle.
Wife, I speak not
Of common perils, but—of the approach
Of malice superhuman. Ah! forgive me.
There came a little cloud upon my brain.
60
He is ever within call. Then send him here
That I may speak with him.
[Kissing child and looking after them.
[Exit Miriam with child.
Why on this night
Doth the child sicken suddenly? Ah, folly!
Childhood is quickly sick and quickly well.
[A pause.
Or do the dead remember still? Perhaps
The spirit of the murdered fresh in wrath
Leaps out upon his murderer, but in vain;
Baffled by loss of corporal faculty.
May he not then a spirit vengeance seek,
A vengeance not of hands, and learn to blight
And cripple; and perhaps the matin chill
Can use, and all the fatal airs of night,
And can direct the wandering malady
Whither he will? If he then whom I slew
Is aiming in such vengeance at the child?—
Wilt thou revenge thee on bright curls and cheeks,
And wilt thou lunge, grey swordsman, at a babe?
61
Now, doctor, now! How is't with him?
Doctor.
He lies
In some mysterious languor, and my art
Reaches him not.
Lisle.
Is then the malady
To human healers new?
Doctor.
To me at least.
Lisle.
Is it not written in thy category?
Doctor.
I cannot reach the seat and fount of it.
Lisle.
Stands it not on the list, the cause, the cure?
Doctor.
Show me the cause; then will I find the cure.
Lisle.
What symptom hath he? Or what certain sign?
Doctor.
No spot hath he, nor fever rash; yet fever.
Lisle.
Doth he cry out? or lies he silent still?
Doctor.
He makes no cry, yet struggles as he lies.
Lisle.
With what doth the child struggle? how beset?
62
He seems to fend a something from his throat.
Lisle.
[With a cry.]
Thou dead man, take thy fingers from his throat;
He is a young thing and a little—ah!
Back to him, doctor, linger not—yet stay;
Think you that heaven doth ever intervene
With special sickness, and for some rank fault
In us, doth strike us there where most we love?
Doctor.
'Tis our presumption to imagine it.
We fancy those regardless-rolling orbs,
Themselves inhabited, tremendous worlds,
Night-lights to reassure us in the dark.
We colour with our trespasses the eclipse;
And hear paternal anger in the storm;
Impute to sickness wrath, vengeance to death,
And memory to unrecording Nature.
Lisle.
Perhaps—back to his bed.
Doctor.
What man can do
I'll do.
[Exit doctor.
Lisle.
[With uplifted hands.]
O, Thou that sittest in Thy heavens,
Mine was the sin; be mine the punishment,
But let him live. End me with lightning, or
In fever let me burn down to the grave,
63
Take from me every hope—but let him live!
Strike here, here, and not otherwhere! Or if
I may not look for mercy, yet must she,
Who of that murder goeth innocent,
Walk with me hand in hand into this fire?
By our two souls that anchor on his life,
O, wilt Thou smite where all is holiest,
Smite at the very fount of hope and faith,
And wring the spirit for the fault of flesh?
Or if with mine her doom entangled be,
What hath he done that he must pay the price?
What crime committed save the being born?
Then must my sin cancel for him the light,
Put out the recent sunbeam, and make blank
The murmurs and the splendours of the world?
O Father, by that hour, when Thou wast dimmed
To human in the clouds on Calvary!
[Enter soldier, suddenly.]
I come, but to a phantom conflict there;
I leave behind the real battle here.
[Exit Lisle.
[After a pause, Ratcliffe slowly enters and puts out the lights one by one, and goes
64
65
Ratcliffe.
Your news? But soft, in whisper.
Soldier.
Victory!
Pomfret relieved—Sir Hubert from hot fight
Returning—well-nigh home—already. Listen.
[Far off is heard the sound of the Puritan hymn of victory. It grows louder and louder. There is a sound of commotion without, and enter Lisle, casting aside his armour as he comes, followed by certain captains.
Lisle.
How is it with the child?
[The woman and Ratcliffe motion him to silence.
66
Hush, sir, be still.
The moment is approaching and the struggle.
Lisle.
Let me go in to him. Hold me not back.
[He rushes to door, but is met by nurse, with finger on lip. She stands before the door.
Nurse.
Hist! do not now disturb him. Now is come
The moment when he wakes or sleeps for ever.
[Lisle signs to officers to withdraw, which they do in silence with bowed heads, and stealthily followed by Ratcliffe. Nurse and the woman retire within, silently. Lisle, left alone, goes to window at back, and, holding up his hands, causes the chanting of the soldiers, which has come nearer and nearer, to subside and cease. He comes down to the door and stands by it, breathing heavily.
Lisle.
God! God!
Reënter doctor, who stands with bowed head at door, unnoticed at first by Lisle, who at length sees him.
The child is dead?
67
The child is dead.
[Exit back into room.
Lisle.
The sin of David mine, and mine the doom!
Would I had found the death I sought with passion,
There in the storm of swords round Pomfret wall!
Yet she—'tis she whom now I must remember;
She is alone with him, and makes no cry.
No! She is very silent, most she needs
My arm supporting, and upholding words.
With her must I abide, lift, and sustain her.
Enter Miriam, she stands alone by the door
Miriam.
What have I done, that God hath taken my child?
Lisle.
[Hesitatingly and tenderly.]
How should thy deed bereave him of his breath?
Miriam.
[Slowly recognising Lisle.]
And thou! thou wast his father, wast thou not?
Lisle.
And am thy husband upon whom to lean.
Miriam.
How have I sinned? I do not understand.
Lisle.
O, Miriam—
68
Wherefore was he dangled bright
Before my eyes a moment—then withdrawn?
He had just learned to run alone; and I
Had taught him a few words—and he is gone.
Lisle.
How can I help you but a little, tell me?
Miriam.
The causeless theft; I say it were relief
To feel that here I paid for some far sin.
Sooner heaven's ire than heaven's indifference!
O, Hubert, yes—on me this doom has fallen.
Lisle.
On thee! Why thee?
Miriam.
I rushed into thy arms
In headlong passion and in frenzied blood,
And recked not of my husband, nor of law.
This is my punishment!
Lisle.
Why charge thyself?
Shall we accuse us of the frozen bird,
Plead guilty to the fallen buds of spring?
Miriam.
That bud was mine; and I have cankered it:
And though my boy came from me without spot,
And though his body from the scythe of Death
Lieth as sweet as mown grass in the even,
Yet on his soul were deep transmitted stains,
And telltale scars, to spirits visible.
69
Peace!
Miriam.
I am held unworthy, as who should say—
“She is unclean: ah, trust her not with babes.”
Sir, I was no fit mother for your child.
Lisle.
Miriam!
Miriam.
A mother? No! not even a nurse.
I had known too much to dare undress thy babe.
Where lived I ere I came into your service?
Had you made close enquiry—you had straight
Discharged me.
Lisle.
Wife!
Miriam.
Yet there where he is gone,
There's none so pure could tend on him as I,
So brood above his opening eyes at dawn.
When was I wanting found? When, for one instant?
When was I caught a sentinel asleep?
What flash of absence, lightning of repose,
Is urged against me? Why, I did behold
And hear the coming hours approach like foes,
The night a thief, the stars with poised spears,
The sun like an incendiary rushed.
Lisle.
Belovèd!
70
Yet that madness all outweighs,
In blind blood have I sinned, and he is struck.
And you! I have made you suffer! You'll not speak.
Yet the gripped hand, the soldier silence tell.
Mercy, mercy, my lord!
[She casts herself at his feet.
Lisle.
In mercy rise!
Cling not about my feet! Loose you my knees!
I will not see you suffer or abased!
Shudder away from me! Mine was the sin.
I, I alone have brought this vengeance down.
Miriam.
Ah!
Lisle.
He that was your husband—
Miriam.
What of him?
Lisle.
Fell in the wild assault of Bolingbroke.
Miriam.
Yes, yes!
Lisle.
Yet died he by no accident.
Miriam.
Hubert, this is all dark!
Lisle.
Who'er should lead
That desperate onslaught, he must surely die.
I sent your husband.
Miriam.
Knowing this?
71
Because
I knew it. I'll not spare myself; I'll bare
This traitor heart unto your eyes at last.
I am no common murderer, Miriam.
I slew not in the open, nor in haste,
Nor wracked with jealousy: I trapped him to it,
Beguiled him with some common conference,
Then wrote a letter marking him for death,
And watched him ride, dying, into the night.
Miriam.
Therefore wast thou so cold, and could'st not kiss me.
Away!
Lisle.
He stood between us,
Miriam.
Touch me not!
Lisle.
The path to you across his body lay.
Miriam.
Blood is upon you!
Lisle.
Yet—yet!
Miriam.
Not his blood,
O murderer!
Lisle.
And if murderer I be,
Then for thy sake am I a murderer.
Miriam.
No! not of him.
Lisle.
Of whom then?
Miriam.
Of my child.
72
That which I did, I did with reeling sense!
I see the moon still on thy tumbled hair,
That smile that made a mist of the great world.
Miriam.
O will you dare to make me your accomplice?
'Twas I that set you on, I beckoned you?
Lisle.
No! but thy moonlit beauty maddened me.
Miriam.
Ah! will you speak of beauty at this moment?
This beauty! and my boy so close and cold,
I sicken through all my body. Then these eyes
That still shine, and these lips that dare to speak,
This bosom, very snow from hills of Hell,
This flesh which still I wear, whispered you on?
This body was the bait then and the lure
That woo'd you to that murder—and, my God,
This—this conceived my darling! Dead is he?
When was he ever otherwise than dead?
As soon as quickened, sentenced, judged already,
Long, long ere he was born.
Lisle.
I, I alone
Am stained.
73
[In frenzy.]
I'll mar this body—loose your hold.
Grasp not my wrists—this poison-tree I'll cleave.
Lisle.
On me thy fury! Me! Here is thy aim!
I only have sinned!
Miriam.
[With gradual calm.]
Yet this did lure thee on.
Now on the wild night-festival of sense
The spirit morning dawneth—or is't perhaps
Merely the drunkard's morning penitence—
A misery matutinal? All our marriage
Had from the first this taint on it. No more
We'll meet, nor ever touch hands, nor for a moment
Glance in each other's eyes, for here I see
God's finger fallen.
[With a certain weary sweetness.]
Hubert—it is past,
My wrath with thee—but let us fly each other.
Between, an angel stands with flaming sword,
And at his feet the body of our babe.
Quickly! Apart! Let water roll between us!
Away, like those first parents out of Eden!
Fiery behind us gates of Paradise!
74
Yet was her hand in his for all the wrath.
Still, still you love me? Tell me this at least!
Miriam.
Yes, but our love is as a thing accursed.
Lisle.
Woman, I grope to find you, but I cannot.
O, is there no way to you, and no path,
No winding path?
Miriam.
No way for thee to me.
Lisle.
Dear, have I lost you utterly?
Miriam.
For ever!
Lisle.
God, can thy sea divide as does this sea,
O God, what is Thy severing grave to this?
[A pause; then, approaching her wistfully.]
The child did you resemble in his smile,
Yet me about the brow a little.
Miriam.
Hush!
Lisle.
Leave me not utter darkness, give me some
Gleam of a far-off meeting ere we die,
Somewhere at last, at last in a strange land,
Or shingle at the ending of the world!
Miriam.
I am utterly a-cold and without hope.
I would creep in beside the dead for warmth.
75
Being so cold, love, whither will you wander?
Miriam.
Away! To live with all dumb things that yearn,
I'll nest with thee, thou mother bird returned,
I feel thy dreadful circlings in my blood.
I'll be the friend of the robbed lioness
Above me, lo! the unhindered desert moon!
O, I am stone to human life henceforth
Yet, if I feel, I feel we two must part.
Lisle.
[After a struggle.]
Come, then. Good-bye. Give me your hand once.
Miriam.
[Turning and seeing him.]
Ah!
Why did you turn his eyes upon me then?
I cannot go a moment.
Lisle.
[Coming close to her.]
Why at all?
Miriam, it seems that now for the first time
We two are joined together, man and wife,
[She makes to go.]
No, listen! Then go from me if you will.
Our former marriage, though by holy bell
And melody of lifted voices blest,
Was yet in madness of the blood conceived,
And born of murder: therefore is the child
Withdrawn, that we might feel the sting of flesh
76
Folded upon the bosom of the Father,
Hath joined us in a marriage everlasting.
[She raises her head.]
Marriage at last of spirit, not of sense,
Whose ritual is memory and repentance,
Whose sacrament this deep and mutual wound,
Whose covenant the all that might have been.
[Solemnly.]
And to this troth majestic shadows throng,
And stand about us in dumb sympathy.
In presence of these silent witnesses,
And one perchance that carrieth now a babe,
I take in mine thy hand and call thee wife—
Wife, wife, till the grave-shattering trumpet!
Miriam.
Yet
I want the little hands and feet of him.
Lisle.
Dear, in a deeper union are we bound
Than by the earthly touch of him, or voice
Human, or little laughters in the sun.
We by bereavement henceforth are betrothed,
Folded by aspirations unfulfilled,
And clasped by irrecoverable dreams:
[She falls with a cry on his heart, where he holds her fast.]
77
That though the child shall not return to us,
Yet shall we two together go to him.
Miriam.
[Slowly taking his hand to lead him.]
Will you come in with me and look at him?
[Exeunt slowly, with bowed heads.
THE END
| The Sin of David | |