The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 52

Is it accomplished?

MARZIO: What?

OLIMPIO: Did you not call?

BEATRICE: When?

OLIMPIO: Now.

BEATRICE: I ask if all is over?

OLIMPIO: We dare not kill an old and sleeping man; His thin gray hair, his stern and reverend brow, _10 His veined hands crossed on his heaving breast, And the calm innocent sleep in which he lay, Quelled me. Indeed, indeed, I cannot do it.

NOTE: _10 reverend]reverent all editions.

MARZIO: But I was bolder; for I chid Olimpio, And bade him bear his wrongs to his own grave _15 And leave me the reward. And now my knife Touched the loose wrinkled throat, when the old man Stirred in his sleep, and said, 'G.o.d! hear, O, hear, A father's curse! What, art Thou not our Father?'

And then he laughed. I knew it was the ghost _20 Of my dead father speaking through his lips, And could not kill him.

BEATRICE: Miserable slaves!

Where, if ye dare not kill a sleeping man, Found ye the boldness to return to me With such a deed undone? Base palterers! _25 Cowards and traitors! Why, the very conscience Which ye would sell for gold and for revenge Is an equivocation: it sleeps over A thousand daily acts disgracing men; And when a deed where mercy insults Heaven... _30 Why do I talk?

[s.n.a.t.c.hING A DAGGER FROM ONE OF THEM, AND RAISING IT.]

Hadst thou a tongue to say, 'She murdered her own father!'--I must do it!

But never dream ye shall outlive him long!

OLIMPIO: Stop, for G.o.d's sake!

MARZIO: I will go back and kill him.

OLIMPIO: Give me the weapon, we must do thy will. _35

BEATRICE: Take it! Depart! Return!

[EXEUNT OLIMPIO AND MARZIO.]

How pale thou art!

We do but that which 'twere a deadly crime To leave undone.

LUCRETIA: Would it were done!

BEATRICE: Even whilst That doubt is pa.s.sing through your mind, the world Is conscious of a change. Darkness and h.e.l.l _40 Have swallowed up the vapour they sent forth To blacken the sweet light of life. My breath Comes, methinks, lighter, and the jellied blood Runs freely through my veins. Hark!

[ENTER OLIMPIO AND MARZIO.]

He is...

OLIMPIO: Dead!

MARZIO: We strangled him that there might be no blood; _45 And then we threw his heavy corpse i' the garden Under the balcony; 'twill seem it fell.

BEATRICE [GIVING THEM A BAG OF COIN]: Here, take this gold, and hasten to your homes.

And, Marzio, because thou wast only awed By that which made me tremble, wear thou this! _50 [CLOTHES HIM IN A RICH MANTLE.]

It was the mantle which my grandfather Wore in his high prosperity, and men Envied his state: so may they envy thine.

Thou wert a weapon in the hand of G.o.d To a just use. Live long and thrive! And, mark, _55 If thou hast crimes, repent: this deed is none.

[A HORN IS SOUNDED.]

LUCRETIA: Hark, 'tis the castle horn: my G.o.d! it sounds Like the last trump.

BEATRICE: Some tedious guest is coming.

LUCRETIA: The drawbridge is let down; there is a tramp Of horses in the court; fly, hide yourselves! _60

[EXEUNT OLIMPIO AND MARZIO.]

BEATRICE: Let us retire to counterfeit deep rest; I scarcely need to counterfeit it now: The spirit which doth reign within these limbs Seems strangely undisturbed. I could even sleep Fearless and calm: all ill is surely past. _65

[EXEUNT.]

SCENE 4.4: ANOTHER APARTMENT IN THE CASTLE.

ENTER ON ONE SIDE THE LEGATE SAVELLA, INTRODUCED BY A SERVANT, AND ON THE OTHER LUCRETIA AND BERNARDO.

SAVELLA: Lady, my duty to his Holiness Be my excuse that thus unseasonably I break upon your rest. I must speak with Count Cenci; doth he sleep?

LUCRETIA [IN A HURRIED AND CONFUSED MANNER]: I think he sleeps; Yet, wake him not, I pray, spare me awhile, _5 He is a wicked and a wrathful man; Should he be roused out of his sleep to-night, Which is, I know, a h.e.l.l of angry dreams, It were not well; indeed it were not well.

Wait till day break...

[ASIDE.]

Oh, I am deadly sick! _10

NOTE: _6 a wrathful edition 1821; wrathful editions 1819, 1839.

SAVELLA: I grieve thus to distress you, but the Count Must answer charges of the gravest import, And suddenly; such my commission is.

LUCRETIA [WITH INCREASED AGITATION]: I dare not rouse him: I know none who dare...

'Twere perilous;...you might as safely waken _15 A serpent; or a corpse in which some fiend Were laid to sleep.

SAVELLA: Lady, my moments here Are counted. I must rouse him from his sleep, Since none else dare.

LUCRETIA [ASIDE]: O, terror! O, despair!

[TO BERNARDO.]

Bernardo, conduct you the Lord Legate to _20 Your father's chamber.

[EXEUNT SAVELLA AND BERNARDO.]

[ENTER BEATRICE.]

BEATRICE: 'Tis a messenger Come to arrest the culprit who now stands Before the throne of unappealable G.o.d.

Both Earth and Heaven, consenting arbiters, Acquit our deed.

LUCRETIA: Oh, agony of fear! _25 Would that he yet might live! Even now I heard The Legate's followers whisper as they pa.s.sed They had a warrant for his instant death.

All was prepared by unforbidden means Which we must pay so dearly, having done. _30 Even now they search the tower, and find the body; Now they suspect the truth; now they consult Before they come to tax us with the fact; O, horrible, 'tis all discovered!

BEATRICE: Mother, What is done wisely, is done well. Be bold _35 As thou art just. 'Tis like a truant child To fear that others know what thou hast done, Even from thine own strong consciousness, and thus Write on unsteady eyes and altered cheeks All thou wouldst hide. Be faithful to thyself, _40 And fear no other witness but thy fear.

For if, as cannot be, some circ.u.mstance Should rise in accusation, we can blind Suspicion with such cheap astonishment, Or overbear it with such guiltless pride, _45 As murderers cannot feign. The deed is done, And what may follow now regards not me.