 | The Crown Jewel |  |
Scene. 2.
—A Wood.(Enter Inora and Gonseres.)
Inora.
Success is on thy brow. My bold and brave one!
These tell-tale eyes flash triumphs, and the cheek
That yesterday proclaimed thee by its chills
To have renounced hope, is warm and radiant—
How fares thy noble master?
Gon.
Prosperously.—
The drowning mariner clutches at a straw,
(To use a current phrase) so, when I made
In jesting tones allusion to our project,
As if it were a fancy of my own,
Boyish, unshaped and inconsiderate,
At once, he caught at it, “Say you, Gonseres,”
These were his words, “but this is treason, lad,—
Ungrateful treason and a breach of trust.
To patch my fortunes by such desperate means
I have no liking. True, the jewels avail not,
And may as well enrich their native mines
As lie barred up, unhonoured and disused,
In cage of State.” No more, for a short space,
He said, but into moody silence lapsed.
At length, the harboured tenor of his thoughts
Betrayed itself in curt soliloquies.
“Three hundred thousand crowns!”; he spake their value,
“That rascal Zachary;” The usurer's bond
Laden with interests hung upon the beam—
Debts, obligations, his fair ward's estate,
All were compressed into the spiteful term,—
All weighed against the back of lavish fortune.
Inora.
So guessed you, boy? The Baron was not wont
To drivel thus.
Gon.
His dotage is upon him,
Misfortune and old age are feeble-tongued
And frail of purpose; were it otherwise,
Sinewed with that strong sense of loyalty
Which courtiers, more than life, esteem and cherish,
The Lord Soartes, had a whisper fallen
Counselling treason to his noble office,
On the swift instant, would have stayed th'offence
In the life's blood of him who uttered it—
Nay! but a year ago, (so suddenly
Adversity hath changed him) to have perilled
A jest within his hearing on this matter,
Were dangerous—now—
At such a standstill hast thou left our emprise?
Then needest thou the heels of Mercury
Wherewith to baffle the blood-hounds of justice.
Gon.
Patience, good mother, I have boldly spoken
Without reserve or niggard caution,
He is our own—to our high daring sworn—
The right hand of our purpose. Nay, look not
Incredulous. More strange things have occurred
Than a perplexed, distressed, unhonoured noble—
The jaundice in his eye, surrendering
His disarmed heart to strong expediency.
A tithe of this rich booty will suffice
To reinstate Soartes, mend his fortunes,
Recal his friends, prop up his drooping credit,
To the best graces of the world restore him
Hushing all rumours of his guardianship,—
How, to the injury of his niece's interests,
He hath discharged its duties; such amend,
One stone, and that not costliest in renown,
Of the rich hoard which to its kingly uses
No eye of living man hath seen applied,
Will render him.
Inora.
On these sore points to intrude
And offend not, requires a skilful tongue,
Licensed by usage, eloquent by nature,
Winning as music, yet, discreet as silence.
Gon.
Oh! You mistake; no theme more welcome to him
Than his home sorrows—none so simply dealt with,
A garrulous old man finds arguments
In the mere look and bearing of his audience,
And is entreated more by his own prate
Than by the sage lips of a counsellor.
To give Soartes rein upon this matter
Is to economise my own blunt speech
And shift the peril of incautious words
To his more fitting shoulders.
Inora.
A rare youth!
And of good promise—yet, have care, Gonseres,
Old foxes are more crafty than their cubs.
Gon.
I have not been the Baron's confidant
(Servitor call it, or some baser term,)
All to no purpose. From my boyhood upward,
Each feature of the man I've made my study;
In every varying and conjunction—
His mirth and melancholy—smile and frown—
His virtues and his failings—how to move
His gusty nature and again allay it,
Lulling the storm with timeous flattery—
How to adjust him to a hundred fancies
And his whole heart attune and modulate.
Inora.
This cannot be the noble Baron Soartes?
Thou facest me with falsehood, daring boy!
To such a depth of degradation
He is not fallen that was my bosom's lord?
Unsay thy words that I may yet regard him
In my mind's eye a valorous nobleman,
Without a rival in accomplishments—
One fit to league with us in this design
And do it honour—not the wretch thou picturest,
So facile and made ready to our purpose.
Nay—move me not to pity
But say what chances aid our enterprise—
How thrives thy love suit with the Baron's niece?
Gon.
As love-suits thrive where one heart beats for both,
The Lady Meranie is all attuned
To the soft zephyrs of persuasion,
And her formed ear recoils from my rude wooing.
Inora.
Of this I warned thee; fix no blame on me,
But should thy gusty passion be allayed
By such reception, 'tis auspicious.
Than a career of love thou hast before thee
A loftier course; leave simple souls to love!
Its stratagems are all of vulgar sort
Which the most lowly of capacities
May compass. Of what purpose is't to urge
Thy scorned suit upon a scornful heart,
When in the time thus fritter'd, thou could'st build
Thy claim upon her hand? The ward's consent
Is bound up in the guardian's iron will—
That gained, thou hast a more availing key
To this fair fortress and its stubborn gates,
Than the slow siege of love,
Gon.
Now, I give credit
To the strange tale of yesterday. That thus
You do foresay my fix'd expedient
Argues our kindred more than solemn oaths,
Good mother!
Inora.
If thou hast, Gonseres,
On thy aspiring passion laid this curb,
So to acquit thyself betokens thee
A man of purpose. By such strong resolves,
Triumphs are made secure and unknown names
Enslave the winds to carry them abroad.
Now, at this moment, thou'rt a surer gainer—
The prize more safe than were thy love requited.
Proceed—say, by what subtle leading strings
Toward our project thou hast drawn Soartes—
The measure, tell, of his entanglement
And what retreat is left him.
Gon.
To have moved
The proud old noble by a mere suggestion,
Drop't artfully in seeming artlessness,
Of this, I reckon lightly. Poverty,—
The estrangement of his friends—the pressing claims
Of creditors, but chiefly, (for brave men
Dare browbeat fortune when their hands are stainless)
Threat'ning dishonour have so wrought on him
That in this desperate state, no remedy
Too desperate is, not to engage his fancy.
In such apt humour is the tended soil,
A child may sow the seeds of disaffection.
Inora.
At such a standstill hast thou left our emprise?
Then needest thou the heels of Mercury
Wherewith to baffle the blood-hounds of justice.
Gon.
Patience, good mother, I have boldly spoken
Without reserve or niggard caution,
He is our own—to our high daring sworn—
The right hand of our purpose. Nay, look not
Incredulous. More strange things have occurred
I feared it all. Some inexpedient craze
O'ertakes you, mother. To ennoble thus
Into a valiant and renowning feat,
Needful of men of spirit and great aims
This burglar's enterprise, is out of question.
As mover in it, take thy fill of credit,
But now, that I am part in the design,
I will be leader or throw up all part in't.
Nay! look not so incredulous of my speech
Or my unfilial temper think to sway
By motherly advice, or threat or scorn.
If, toward Soartes you have such contempt
Because adversity hath sharpened him
Into a tool for traitrous purposes,
The less occasion you shall have to hold
Gonseres at the same drawback of credit.
Inora.
That thou betray'st thyself a child of shame
More than thy mother's son, thy father's bastard,
I make no boast of. Go and prosper, boy;
All claims to thy success I now renounce,
If shame be thy reward, take what is due thee,
If riches and the safety of thy neck,
Thou wilt need both and yet have shift to live.
[Exit.
Gon.
Oh mother! whom as witch I did regard,
Pregnant with direful maledictions,
Until the day thou did'st disclose thyself;
This is the jargon of thy cast-off trade,
No foreign devil doth inspire thee to't.
Much less a truthful angel! 'Tis at random
Thou venturest thy shafts upon the wind:
For one that strikes, a thousand fall abroad.
Good bye! Take thanks for the suggestion
That builds my fortunes! I have faith in thee,
Because the ark of my unformed life
Was thy warm womb. Thou would'st not slay with blab
What on the inauspicious day of birth
Escaped thy hands unstrangled? Good bye, mother!
[Exit.
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