 | Cyrano de Bergerac: A Play in Five Acts |  |
Scene VI.
Christian, Cyrano, two pages.CHRISTIAN
Come to my aid!
CYRANO
Not I!
CHRISTIAN
But I shall die, Unless at once I win back her fair favor.
CYRANO
And how can I, at once, i' th' devil's name, Lesson you in. . .
CHRISTIAN
(seizing his arm)
Oh, she is there!
(The window of the balcony is now lighted up.)
(moved)
Her window!
CHRISTIAN
Oh! I shall die!
CYRANO
Speak lower!
CHRISTIAN
(in a whisper)
I shall die!
CYRANO
The night is dark. . .
CHRISTIAN
Well!
CYRANO
All can be repaired. Although you merit not. Stand there, poor wretch! Fronting the balcony! I'll go beneath And prompt your words to you. . .
CHRISTIAN
But. . .
CYRANO
Hold your tongue!
THE PAGES
(reappearing at back--to Cyrano)
Ho!
CYRANO
Hush!
(He signs to them to speak softly.)
(in a low voice)
We've played the serenade you bade To Montfleury!
CYRANO
(quickly, in a low voice)
Go! lurk in ambush there, One at this street corner, and one at that; And if a passer-by should here intrude, Play you a tune!
SECOND PAGE
What tune, Sir Gassendist?
CYRANO
Gay, if a woman comes,--for a man, sad!
(The pages disappear, one at each street corner. To Christian)Call her!
CHRISTIAN
Roxane!
CYRANO
(picking up stones and throwing them at the window)
Some pebbles! wait awhile!
ROXANE
(half-opening the casement)
Who calls me?
CHRISTIAN
I!
ROXANE
Who's that?
Christian!
ROXANE
(disdainfully)
Oh! you?
CHRISTIAN
I would speak with you.
CYRANO
(under the balcony--to Christian)
Good. Speak soft and low.
ROXANE
No, you speak stupidly!
CHRISTIAN
Oh, pity me!
ROXANE
No! you love me no more!
CHRISTIAN
(prompted by Cyrano)
You say--Great Heaven! I love no more?--when--I--love more and more!
ROXANE
(who was about to shut the casement, pausing)
Hold! 'tis a trifle better! ay, a trifle!
CHRISTIAN
(same play)
Love grew apace, rocked by the anxious beating. . . Of this poor heart, which the cruel wanton boy. . . Took for a cradle!
(coming out on to the balcony)
That is better! But An if you deem that Cupid be so cruel You should have stifled baby-love in's cradle!
CHRISTIAN
(same play)
Ah, Madame, I assayed, but all in vain This. . .new-born babe is a young. . .Hercules!
ROXANE
Still better!
CHRISTIAN
(same play)
Thus he strangled in my heart The. . .serpents twain, of. . .Pride. . .and Doubt!
ROXANE
(leaning over the balcony)
Well said! --But why so faltering? Has mental palsy Seized on your faculty imaginative?
CYRANO
(drawing Christian under the balcony, and slipping into his place)
Give place! This waxes critical!. . .
ROXANE
To-day. . . Your words are hesitating.
(imitating Christian--in a whisper)
Night has come. . . In the dusk they grope their way to find your ear.
ROXANE
But my words find no such impediment.
CYRANO
They find their way at once? Small wonder that! For 'tis within my heart they find their home; Bethink how large my heart, how small your ear! And,--from fair heights descending, words fall fast, But mine must mount, Madame, and that takes time!
ROXANE
Meseems that your last words have learned to climb.
CYRANO
With practice such gymnastic grows less hard!
ROXANE
In truth, I seem to speak from distant heights!
CYRANO
True, far above; at such a height 'twere death If a hard word from you fell on my heart.
ROXANE
(moving)
I will come down. . .
CYRANO
(hastily)
No!
(showing him the bench under the balcony)
Mount then on the bench!
CYRANO
(starting back alarmed)
No!
ROXANE
How, you will not?
CYRANO
(more and more moved)
Stay awhile! 'Tis sweet,. . . The rare occasion, when our hearts can speak Our selves unseen, unseeing!
ROXANE
Why--unseen?
CYRANO
Ay, it is sweet! Half hidden,--half revealed-- You see the dark folds of my shrouding cloak, And I, the glimmering whiteness of your dress I but a shadow--you a radiance fair! Know you what such a moment holds for me? If ever I were eloquent. . .
ROXANE
You were!
CYRANO
Yet never till to-night my speech has sprung Straight from my heart as now it springs.
ROXANE
Why not?
Till now I spoke haphazard. . .
ROXANE
What?
CYRANO
Your eyes Have beams that turn men dizzy!--But to-night Methinks I shall find speech for the first time!
ROXANE
'Tis true, your voice rings with a tone that's new.
CYRANO
(coming nearer, passionately)
Ay, a new tone! In the tender, sheltering dusk I dare to be myself for once,--at last!
(He stops, falters)What say I? I know not!--Oh, pardon me-- It thrills me,--'tis so sweet, so novel. . .
ROXANE
How? So novel?
CYRANO
(off his balance, trying to find the thread of his sentence)
Ay,--to be at last sincere; Till now, my chilled heart, fearing to be mocked. . .
ROXANE
Mocked, and for what?
For its mad beating!--Ay, My heart has clothed itself with witty words, To shroud itself from curious eyes:--impelled At times to aim at a star, I stay my hand, And, fearing ridicule,--cull a wild flower!
ROXANE
A wild flower's sweet.
CYRANO
Ay, but to-night--the star!
ROXANE
Oh! never have you spoken thus before!
CYRANO
If, leaving Cupid's arrows, quivers, torches, We turned to seek for sweeter--fresher things! Instead of sipping in a pygmy glass Dull fashionable waters,--did we try How the soul slakes its thirst in fearless draught By drinking from the river's flooding brim!
ROXANE
But wit?. . .
CYRANO
If I have used it to arrest you At the first starting,--now, 'twould be an outrage, An insult--to the perfumed Night--to Nature-- To speak fine words that garnish vain love-letters! Look up but at her stars! The quiet Heaven Will ease our hearts of all things artificial; I fear lest, 'midst the alchemy we're skilled in The truth of sentiment dissolve and vanish,--
ROXANE
But wit? I say. . .
CYRANO
In love 'tis crime,--'tis hateful! Turning frank loving into subtle fencing! At last the moment comes, inevitable,-- --Oh, woe for those who never know that moment! When feeling love exists in us, ennobling, Each well-weighed word is futile and soul-saddening!
ROXANE
Well, if that moment's come for us--suppose it! What words would serve you?
CYRANO
All, all, all, whatever That came to me, e'en as they came, I'd fling them In a wild cluster, not a careful bouquet. I love thee! I am mad! I love, I stifle! Thy name is in my heart as in a sheep-bell, And as I ever tremble, thinking of thee, Ever the bell shakes, ever thy name ringeth! All things of thine I mind, for I love all things; I know that last year on the twelfth of May-month, To walk abroad, one day you changed your hair-plaits! I am so used to take your hair for daylight That,--like as when the eye stares on the sun's disk, One sees long after a red blot on all things-- So, when I quit thy beams, my dazzled vision Sees upon all things a blonde stain imprinted.
(agitated)
Why, this is love indeed!. . .
CYRANO
Ay, true, the feeling Which fills me, terrible and jealous, truly Love,--which is ever sad amid its transports! Love,--and yet, strangely, not a selfish passion! I for your joy would gladly lay mine own down, --E'en though you never were to know it,--never! --If but at times I might--far off and lonely,-- Hear some gay echo of the joy I bought you! Each glance of thine awakes in me a virtue,-- A novel, unknown valor. Dost begin, sweet, To understand? So late, dost understand me? Feel'st thou my soul, here, through the darkness mounting? Too fair the night! Too fair, too fair the moment! That I should speak thus, and that you should hearken! Too fair! In moments when my hopes rose proudest, I never hoped such guerdon. Naught is left me But to die now! Have words of mine the power To make you tremble,--throned there in the branches? Ay, like a leaf among the leaves, you tremble! You tremble! For I feel,--an if you will it, Or will it not,--your hand's beloved trembling Thrill through the branches, down your sprays of jasmine!
(He kisses passionately one of the hanging tendrils.)
Ay! I am trembling, weeping!--I am thine! Thou hast conquered all of me!
CYRANO
Then let death come! 'Tis I, 'tis I myself, who conquered thee! One thing, but one, I dare to ask--
CHRISTIAN
(under the balcony)
A kiss!
ROXANE
(drawing back)
What?
CYRANO
Oh!
ROXANE
You ask. . .?
CYRANO
I. . .
(To Christian, whispering)Fool! you go too quick!
CHRISTIAN
Since she is moved thus--I will profit by it!
CYRANO
(to Roxane)
My words sprang thoughtlessly, but now I see-- Shame on me!--I was too presumptuous.
(a little chilled)
How quickly you withdraw.
CYRANO
Yes, I withdraw Without withdrawing! Hurt I modesty? If so--the kiss I asked--oh, grant it not.
CHRISTIAN
(to Cyrano, pulling him by his cloak)
Why?
CYRANO
Silence, Christian! Hush!
ROXANE
(leaning over)
What whisper you?
CYRANO
I chid myself for my too bold advances; Said, 'Silence, Christian!'
(The lutes begin to play)Hark! Wait awhile,. . . Steps come!
(Roxane shuts the window. Cyrano listens to the lutes, one of which plays a merry, the other a melancholy, tune)Why, they play sad--then gay--then sad! What? Neither man nor woman?--oh! a monk!
(Enter a capuchin friar, with a lantern. He goes from house to house, looking at every door.)
| Cyrano de Bergerac: A Play in Five Acts | |