The Goddess of Reason 49
Enter_ SÉRAPHINE.
SÉRAPHINE
I’ve sought her here, I’ve sought her there, in vain!
And perilous it is to seek one here!
YVETTE
Séraphine!
SÉRAPHINE
Yvette!
YVETTE
Where is monseigneur?
SÉRAPHINE (_weeping_)
I know not, I!—Saint Lazaire and Saint Jean!
I nursed thee ere thou wast so high!
YVETTE
Poor Séraphine! Dear Séraphine!
SÉRAPHINE
Alack!
They’re watching there!
YVETTE
Oh, then away!
‘Tis death to weep for one who dies! Away!
SÉRAPHINE (_weeping_)
Oh, oh! When thou wast but a little thing
Thou hadst the coaxing ways! Alack! Alack!
YVETTE
Poor Séraphine!
SÉRAPHINE
Dost mind the sunny path
Up the steep cliff to chapel in the woods?
YVETTE
I mind—I mind—To thy warm hand I clung,
A little child. Now I must walk alone!
SÉRAPHINE
Oh, oh! And thou wast Goddess yesterday,
The fairest Goddess ever seen, they say!
YVETTE
Speak not of that!
A VOICE (_calling_)
Séraphine! Séraphine!
YVETTE
It warns, that voice! Adieu, adieu, adieu!
Thou must begone!
SÉRAPHINE
If I do look at thee
I’ll stay forever here! Adieu! Adieu!—
Oh well-a-day! Oh well, oh well-a-day!
[_Exit_ SÉRAPHINE.
YVETTE
So late it grows, so long I’ve waited here!
I feel the morning air!—Will he not come?
O God! what if they’ve slain him otherwhere?
Ha! Death is busy far and near to-night!
They may have shot him yonder by the sea!
He may have sunk above, below this place!
Though Grégoire swore to me it would be here,
Here where they brought me would they bring him too,
And ere the set of moon we would be gone!—
O God! The cries of drowning men I’ve heard,
But not his voice among them! No, no, no!
He’ll make no moan, he will die loftily!—
Ah, God! only to see him ere I drown!
THE VOICES
Miséricorde!
SOLDIERS
Prenez garde! Halte là!
A MAN’S VOICE
I die who fought for France in bloody fields;
At Lille I fought, at Bordeaux, Avignon!
YVETTE
A soldier!
[_Another voice sings hoarsely._
THE VOICE
_Tremblez, tyrans! et vous perfides,
L’opprobre de tous les partis!
Tremblez, vos projets parricides
Viennent enfin recevoir leur prix!
Tout est soldat pour vous combattre—_
[_The voice dies._
YVETTE
A soldier!
ANOTHER VOICE
Diantre! A whiff of grapeshot now,
A sabre-cut, or e’en a trampling charge!
But this cold death—
[_The voice dies._
YVETTE
A soldier!
ANOTHER VOICE
Baste! I’ll tell
The Duc de Biron—
YVETTE
All soldiers!
_Enter_ DE VARDES _and_ GRÉGOIRE.
GRÉGOIRE
I tell you truth, monsieur—
DE VARDES
So dense the throng
I have looked up and down for this long hour,—
This hour so long, this hour so fatal short,
Seeing it is my latest hour of life,
And that I cannot find her whom I seek!
GRÉGOIRE
She is not dead, monsieur!
DE VARDES
So many are!
GRÉGOIRE
I would have known.
DE VARDES
Some æons past thou wast
A serviceable fellow! Get thee gone!
And if thou findest her, I’ll give thee thanks,
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