The Goddess of Reason 38
No more!
DE VARDES
How long have we been friends! And now—
THE MARQUISE
And now!—
DE VARDES
My friend, my friend!
THE MARQUISE
Alas! Alas, ‘tis true
We are good friends—in life and death good friends!
‘Tis much—though there are lovers too in Nantes,
And when one loves ‘tis not so hard to die!
Or so I’ve heard, monsieur.
DE VARDES
O destiny!
THE MARQUISE
The jasmine is my flower—a luckless bloom!
Wear not the too-sweet jasmine flower,
For then one loves, but is not loved again!
DE VARDES
No, no! the rose—
THE MARQUISE
The rose unloved! Ay, ay!
Last night I dreamed of roses and of lights,
Beside a water still they burned and bloomed—
Lit candles and pale roses with gold hearts,
Like those that bloomed within my garden once,
When you rode by, when you rode by, my friend!
DE VARDES
Alas!
THE MARQUISE
They’re dead, my garden roses, dead!
They’ll bloom no more, nor wilt thou ride that way;
Nor, Sieur de Morbec, dost thou love the rose.
For once thou said’st to me upon a day
When I did find the Morbec roses fair,
“I better love the heartsease at thy feet.”
The peasant flower! Rememb’rest thou that day?
‘Twas Saint John’s Eve—
DE VARDES
Would I remembered not!
THE MARQUISE
The heartsease—
DE VARDES
The heartsease withered.
[_A roar from the square._ DE L’ORIENT _turns from
the window_.
DE L’ORIENT
Ah!
COUNT LOUIS
What do you see?
DE L’ORIENT
Too much!
[_A turnkey laughs._
THE TURNKEY
Carrier! Lalain!
Oh, they judge quickly! _Vive la République!_
THE MARQUISE
It was a summer day when first we met,
And now we part within a prison here,
And never shall we see each other more!
DE VARDES
Oh, briefer than the fairest summer day
The little hour before we meet again!
Soon, soon I’ll follow thee, and all of these!
The reaper hath his sickle in the corn.
He is a madman, but the field is God’s,
And God will garner up the fallen ears,
And in another life we two shall meet!
THE MARQUISE
And wilt thou love me then? Ah, no! Ah, no!
DE VARDES
Thou art a lady brave and fair—
THE MARQUISE
Alas!
GRÉGOIRE
The Nun Benôite, an Ursuline!
[_A nun rises from her knees, makes the sign of the
cross, and passes out between the soldiers._
THE MARQUISE
Ah me!
The unknown land, just guessed at and no more,
To which this loud wind sends my cockle boat!—
Where are my beads? Lost, lost with all things else!
Jewels and gold and friends and lovers too!—
Ah, short my shrift with Grégoire glowering there.
My hatred of Madame la Maréchale,
I’m sorry for’t. The Captal de Montgis
Once did me wrong. Well, well, I can forgive!—
Sieur de Morbec, where’s she that flung us down,
Lifted her finger and behold us here!
Her face is fair—ah, very fair her face.
She was your mistress, yes?
DE VARDES
No!
THE MARQUISE
What then?
DE VARDES
Cold that I warmed, and hunger that I fed.
THE MARQUISE
O strike her, Frost! O Hunger, with her wed!
DE VARDES
Ah, curse her not! She knew not what she did!
THE MARQUISE
Alas! Alas!
GRÉGOIRE
The Citoyenne L’Esparre!
THE MARQUISE
The women go—He’ll call my name! Ah, look!
The purple saints within the windows there,
See how they wave their palms and smile at me!
They wave their palms, they strike their golden harps,
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