Chapter X: Act V (1)

A room in the garden house. The door in the background leads out-doors. There are windows at both sides of the door and also in the right wall. They all look out upon the garden, but are draped with long, heavy curtains. On the left a door leads into the bedroom. On the same side farther back a tile stove. A divan, table and chair, very near the stove. Bookshelves along the walls. The general impression is that of simple comfort.

It is evening, a short time after the preceding act. A lamp is burning on the table and lights up the no more than fair-sized cozy room.

INSPECTOR ZINDEL appears in the open door at the background. Before him stands PAUL.

PAUL. As I was saying, have the bay saddled in case I should still want to take a ride.

INSPECTOR ZINDEL. Very well, sir! Immediately?

PAUL. In about thirty minutes.

INSPECTOR ZINDEL. Shall the coachman bring out the bay or will you come to the stable?

PAUL. Have it brought out! Good-by. (He comes back into the room.)

INSPECTOR ZINDEL. Good night, sir! (He withdraws and closes the door behind him.)

[PAUL walks up and down excitedly several times. He seems to be
in a violent struggle with himself, sometimes listens for
something outside, shakes his head, groans deeply, finally throws
himself on the divan and crosses his arms under his head. Short
pause.]

HELLA (opens the door in the background, enters and looks around). Are you here, Paul? (She has thrown a shawl around her.)

PAUL (jumps up, disappointed). Hella, you? (Sits down.)

HELLA (approaches). Yes, it is I, Hella! Who else? Were you expecting some one else?

PAUL (painfully). Why do you still insist upon coming? Don't make it unnecessarily hard for both of us.

HELLA (calmly). I am waiting for an explanation from you. Since you will not give it to me of your own accord, I am compelled to get it. It seems to me I have a right to claim it.

PAUL. You certainly have.

HELLA (with folded arms). Please, then!

PAUL. Hella, what is the purpose of this? You do know everything now!

HELLA. I know nothing. I should like to find out from you.

PAUL (gets up). Very well, then I will tell you.

HELLA. I assume that the Polish woman is mixed up in this affair.

PAUL. So you do know! Why in the world are you going to the trouble of asking me?

HELLA. So it's really true? I am to stand aside for a little goose from the country!

PAUL (starts up). A little goose from the country?... Hella, control your tongue!

HELLA (walks up and down). If it were not so ridiculous, it would be exasperating!

PAUL. The woman under discussion is not a little goose from the country, my dear, just as little as you are one from the city.

HELLA. Thank you for your flattering comparison.

PAUL. That woman has had her struggles and trials as much as you have, and in spite of it has remained a woman, which _you_ have _not_!

HELLA (scornfully). Well, well. Are you now asserting your real nature? Are you throwing off the mask? Go on! Go on!

PAUL (controls himself with an effort). That is all! I am only standing up for one who is dear to me!

HELLA. Ha, ha! Dear! Today and tomorrow!

PAUL. You are mistaken, Hella! I believe in Antoinette, and I shall not swerve from that.

HELLA (with a sudden inspiration). Antoinette ... Antoinette ... Why that name ...

PAUL. Let me assist you, Hella. Antoinette is the friend of my youth ...

HELLA (nonplussed). The friend of your youth?

PAUL, Indeed, Hella, I have known her longer than I have known you.

HELLA. The one whom you were to marry once upon a time? Is it she?

PAUL (sadly). Whom I was to marry, whom I refused on your account, Hella.

HELLA. You met _her_ again here?

PAUL. As Mrs. von Laskowski, yes, Hella!

HELLA (starts for him, with a savage expression). And you kept that from me?

PAUL. Why you did not give me a chance to speak, when I tried to tell you.

HELLA. So that was the confidence you had! Well, of course, then, of course!

PAUL. Oh, my confidence, Hella! Don't mention that. That had died long before!

HELLA. To be deceived so shamefully.

PAUL. Blame yourself! You have killed it systematically!

HELLA. I? What else, pray tell!

PAUL. Yes, by forever considering only yourself and never me! That could not help but stifle all my feelings in time. I fought against it as long as I could, Hella, but it had to come to an end some time.

HELLA. And I went about without misgivings, while behind my back a conspiracy was forming ...

PAUL (shrugging his shoulders). Who conspired?

HELLA. All of you! This whole owl's nest of a house was in league against me! You had conspired against me, you and your ilk, simply because I was superior to you, that's the reason why you wanted to shoulder me off! Do you suppose I don't realize that? Very well, let baseness prevail! I am willing to retreat!

PAUL. It always has been your trick, Hella, to play the part of offended innocence! It is well that you are reminding me of that in this hour! You are making the step easier for me than I had hoped.

HELLA. This is the thanks!

PAUL. Thanks!... How in the world could you expect thanks?

HELLA (with infuriated hatred). Because I made a _human being_ of you!

PAUL (starting up). Hella, you are making use of _words_!

HELLA (beside herself). Yes, made a _human_ being of you. I will repeat it ten times over!

PAUL. Won't you kindly call in the whole estate with your shrieking.

HELLA. The whole world, for all I care! What were you when you came into my hands? A crude student, utterly helpless, whom I directed into the proper channels, _I_, single handed! Without me you would have gone to the dogs or you might have become one of those novelists whom no one reads! I was the first one to put sound ideas in your head, roused your talent and pointed out to you all that is really _demanded_. Through me you attained a name and reputation, and now that you are fortunate enough to be that far along, you go and throw yourself away upon a Polish goose, you ... you?

PAUL (as if under a lash). There are limits to all things, Hella, even to consideration for your sex! Do not assume that you still have me in your power. It has lasted fifteen years. It is over today. Do you suppose I ought to thank you for sapping everything from me, my will-power, my strength, my real talents, all the faith in love and beauty that was once in me, which you have systematically driven out with your infernal leveling process? Where shall I ever find a trace of all that again? I might seek for a hundred years and not strike that path again! I might have become an artist, at life or art itself, who cares! And you have made me a beggar, a machine, that reels off its uniform sing-song day after day! You have cheated me out of my life, you imp!... Give it back to me! (He stands before her, breathing heavily, struggling for air.)

HELLA (has become quite calm). Why did you _allow_ yourself to be cheated. It's your own fault!

PAUL (suddenly calm, but sad and resigned). That is a profound word, Hella! Why have you ... _allowed_ ... yourself to be cheated!

HELLA. You had your will-power just as I had mine. Why did you not make use of it?

PAUL. _You_, with your ideas, would say _that_, Hella?

HELLA. Yes, _one_ or the other is stronger, of course! Why should we women not be stronger?

PAUL (turns away). That is sufficient, Hella. We are through with each other. There is nothing more to say.

HELLA. As you may decide. So it is really all over between us?

PAUL (stands in deep thought and murmurs to himself). Why did you _allow_ yourself to be cheated? Terrible! Terrible! Why must this conviction come too late?

HELLA (in a lurking manner). I suppose you are going to the other woman now?

PAUL (breathes a deep sigh of relief). We are going together!

HELLA (with a sudden inspiration). If I _release_ you, you mean!

PAUL (quite calmly). I suppose you will be _compelled_ to!

HELLA (triumphantly). Who can compel me?

PAUL (starts up). Hella, then ... Then ...

HELLA. Well? Then?

PAUL (controls himself, with a strange expression). Then we shall see who is the stronger. (The door in the background has been opened.)

ANTOINETTE (has entered quickly, starts at seeing HELLA, stops in the background and sags, in a subdued voice). Paul!

PAUL (turns around frightened, exclaims passionately). Antoinette! (He rushes up to her, about to embrace her. She turns him aside gently and looks at HELLA. The two press each other's hands firmly and look into each other's eyes.)

ANTOINETTE (softly). I am here, Paul.

PAUL. Thank you, thank you, dear!

HELLA (has recovered from her astonishment and starts for Antoinette, savagely). Who _are_ you, and what do you want here?

PAUL (steps between them, very seriously). Hella ... If you please ...

ANTOINETTE (restrains PAUL, with a quiet, distinguished bearing). I am not afraid, Paul. Just continue, madam.

HELLA (furiously). Who has given you the right to intrude here?

[PAUL has retreated a little in response to ANTOINETTE'S
entreating glance.]

ANTOINETTE. Ask yourself, madam. Who was here earlier, you or I?

HELLA (turns away abruptly). I shall not quarrel with you, I shall simply show you the door!

PAUL. Well, well. We are standing on _my_ soil now, Hella! Remember that!

HELLA (infuriated). Oh, I suppose you are insisting upon your rights!

PAUL, Why I simply must. You are forcing me to do so!

HELLA. Very well. I am doing that very thing!

PAUL (clenches his fists). Really now! You will not change your mind?

HELLA. I will not change my mind. I shall not release you. Now do as you please!

PAUL. You will not release me?

HELLA. No!

PAUL, (beside himself). You!... You!...

ANTOINETTE. Be quiet, dear! No mortal can interfere with us.

HELLA. How affectionate! You probably suppose that you have him _already_? That I shall simply go and your happiness is complete! Don't deceive yourself! You shall not enjoy happiness when I am compelled to battle.

ANTOINETTE. Did I not battle?

HELLA. Your little battle. Simply because you did not happen to get the man that you wanted! We have had battles of quite other dimensions!

ANTOINETTE. Do not believe for a moment that you have a right to look down upon me! I shall pick up your gauntlet in the things that really count.

HELLA. You? My gauntlet? Ha, ha!

ANTOINETTE. You _too_ are only a woman, just as I am, and although you may rate yourself ever so much higher, you will remain a woman nevertheless!

HELLA. Woman or not! I shall show you with whom you have to deal! I shall not retreat and that settles it! Under the law, you shall never get each other. Now show your courage.

ANTOINETTE. I shall show you my courage!

HELLA. Dare to do so without the law! Bear the consequences! Suffer yourself to be cast out by all the world! Have them point their fingers at you! That is the absconded wife who is living with a run-away husband! Take that ban upon you! Do you see now? _I_ should. I should scorn the whole world! Can you do the same?

[ANTOINETTE bows her head and is silent.]

HELLA (triumphantly). You can't do that! I knew it very well.

ANTOINETTE (composed). What I can and what I cannot do is in the hand of God. That is all that I have to say to you.

HELLA. That is all I need to know! I wish you a happy life!

PAUL (has been restraining himself, steps up to HELLA). Hella, one last word!

HELLA. It has been spoken!

PAUL. Do you remember what we agreed to do once upon a time?

HELLA. I don't remember anything now!

PAUL. Hella, remember! On our wedding day we agreed, if either one of us, from an honest conviction, should demand his freedom, he should have it, our compact should be ended. That occasion is here. Remember!

HELLA. I don't remember a thing now. _You_ certainly do not.

ANTOINETTE. Don't say another word, dear!

HELLA. It would certainly do no good! Good-by! As for the rest, we shall see!

PAUL. We shall.

[HELLA goes out with head erect and closes the door behind her.
Pause. PAUL and Antoinette stand face to face for a moment and
look into each other's eyes.]

PAUL (morosely). Now the bridges are burned behind us!

ANTOINETTE. They are, dear. Do you realize it?

PAUL. What now? What now?

ANTOINETTE (sinks upon his breast). Paul! My Paul!

PAUL (embraces her, presses her to him fervently. They embrace in silence, then he draws her down beside him on the divan, and looks at her affectionately). It was a long time before you came, Toinette.

ANTOINETTE. But now I am here, and shall leave you no more.

PAUL. You will not leave me, beloved?

ANTOINETTE. I shall never leave you.

PAUL. And I shall not leave you.

ANTOINETTE. And you will not leave me. (They embrace each other.)

PAUL (straightens up). Why did you stay so long, Toinette?

ANTOINETTE. Much was to be set in order, dear.

PAUL. I was almost beginning to doubt you.

ANTOINETTE. You wicked man. Then I should have been forced to go alone.

PAUL. Alone? Where would you have gone, you poor, helpless, little soul

ANTOINETTE. Do not think that! I have the thing that will help me. That is why I am so late!

PAUL (shrinking). Antoinette!

ANTOINETTE (smiling). Don't be frightened, dear! Two drops and all is over.

PAUL (has risen). You would?

ANTOINETTE (gently). Yes, I will. Are you going with me?

PAUL. Toinette! Toinette! (Walks through the room excitedly.)

ANTOINETTE. Think of her words, she will not release you!

PAUL. Is Hella right? You _haven't_ the courage?

ANTOINETTE (passionately). Courage I have, Paul. To the very end!

PAUL. Very well, then we shall undertake it in spite of them all.

ANTOINETTE (excited). The absconded wife! The runaway husband! Did you forget those words? Those terrible words! They keep on ringing in my ears. Are we to live in the scorn of people. I cannot, Paul.

PAUL. You do not _want_ to.

ANTOINETTE. No, I _do_ not want to! I do not care to descend into the mire! I have hated it all of my life. They shall not be able to reproach us for anything.

PAUL (in passionate excitement). Is it to be? Is it to be? (ANTOINETTE nods silently).

PAUL (suddenly overcome with emotion, falls upon his knees before ANTOINETTE and presses his head to her bosom). Kiss me, kiss me, beloved!

ANTOINETTE (puts her arms around him). Here on your brow, my lover! Are you content? (She kisses his brow.)

PAUL. Content in life or death. (He gets up, sits down beside ANTOINETTE and looks at her). Are you weeping, sweetheart?

ANTOINETTE (lowers her head, gently). Why, you are, too, Paul!

PAUL (passes his hand over his eyes). All over! Tell me what you think now, dear!

ANTOINETTE (also controlling her tears). It is this, dear, our time is short. I rode away from my husband! He was riding ahead of me in the sleigh. I had told him that I would follow and I mounted my horse and came to you.

PAUL (puts his arms around her). Courageous soul! Rode through the forest?

ANTOINETTE. Right on through the forest. The sun was already going down, when I set out.

PAUL. The sun of New Year's Eve ... Did _you_ see it too?

ANTOINETTE. When it was down, the gloaming afforded me light, and later the snow.

PAUL (sadly with a touch of roguishness). Dearest, when the sun is down, there is nothing left to give light.

ANTOINETTE. Indeed, my beloved, indeed! Then come the stars. They are finer.

PAUL. Do you believe in the stars?

ANTOINETTE. You heretic, I believe!...

PAUL. Still believe in heaven and hell?

ANTOINETTE. No longer for us. For us, the stars.

PAUL. Do you think so? For us?

ANTOINETTE. For us and lovers such as we are!

PAUL. How do you know that?

ANTOINETTE. Since I have you!

PAUL. Then I believe it too!

ANTOINETTE. My friend! My beloved! My life! (She presses him to her.)

PAUL. My beloved! My wife! [Blissful silence.]

ANTOINETTE (straightens up). Don't you hear steps? (She listens.)

PAUL (also listens). Where, pray tell.

ANTOINETTE (has risen). Out in the garden. It seemed so to me.

PAUL. I hear nothing. All is still.

ANTOINETTE (leans upon him). I am afraid, Paul.

PAUL. Afraid? Of what?

ANTOINETTE. That he will come and get me. Our time is short.

PAUL. Then I will protect you.

ANTOINETTE. Paul, I don't want to see him again! I don't want to see another soul!

PAUL (looks at her with glowing eyes). How beautiful you are now, Toinette!

ANTOINETTE. Am I beautiful? Am I beautiful. For you, my Paul, for you!

PAUL. For me. (He puts his arms around her.)

ANTOINETTE (proudly). I am still beautiful and young and yet I shall cast it away. I am not afraid.

PAUL (his arms about her). We are not afraid!

ANTOINETTE. Out into night and death together with you!

PAUL. It is not worth living! We have realized that!

ANTOINETTE (looks up at him, smiling). Haven't we, Paul, we two lost creatures? (In each other's embrace, they are silent for a moment.)

ANTOINETTE (roguishly). Do you remember, dear, what you used to do when you were a little boy?

PAUL. No, sweetheart, tell me!

ANTOINETTE. Try to recall, dear. What did you do when your mother gave us bread and cake.

PAUL. I took the bread first, is that what you mean, and then finished up with the cake.

ANTOINETTE (shakes her finger at him). Kept the cake for the end, you crafty fellow!

PAUL (is forced to laugh). Kept the best part for the end! Yes that's what I did.

ANTOINETTE (on his breast). Just wait, you rogue. Now I'll make you answer. Tell me, what am _I_ now, bread or cake!

PAUL. My last, my best, my all, that's what you are to me!

ANTOINETTE. There can be no joy beyond this. Shall we become old and gray and withered? Come, my dear, come!

PAUL (looks at her for a long time). Do you know of what you remind me now?

ANTOINETTE. Of what, Paul?

PAUL. That is just the way you stood in our park when you were a girl, out there under the alders, and beckoned to me when you wanted me to come and play with you.

ANTOINETTE (beckoning roguishly). Come on, Paul. Come on. Isn't that it?

PAUL. Just so! Just so!

ANTOINETTE. Catch me, Paulie!... Catch me! (She runs to the left, opens the door and remains standing.)

PAUL (runs after her and seizes her). Now I have you, you rogue?

ANTOINETTE (in his arms). Have me and hold me fast!

PAUL. New Year's Eve! New Year's Eve!... Is it here?

ANTOINETTE. It's no longer necessary for us to cast lead to find out how long we are to live. We know!

PAUL. Soon we shall know nothing!

ANTOINETTE. Soon we shall know all!

PAUL. On your stars, do you mean?

ANTOINETTE (nods). On our star, my lover, you and I shall meet again.

PAUL. There we shall meet again!

ANTOINETTE (starts, and listens). Do you hear?

[INSPECTOR ZINDEL opens the door in the background and stands in
the door. PAUL and ANTOINETTE let go of each other, keeping their
places.]

INSPECTOR ZINDEL. The bay is bridled, sir, and stands out here.

ANTOINETTE (has an inspiration). The bay bridled? Is my gray there, too?

INSPECTOR ZINDEL. It is, madam!

ANTOINETTE. Very well. Stay with the horses. We shall be there immediately!

[INSPECTOR ZINDEL withdraws.]

PAUL (astonished). What is it, dear? What do you intend to do?

ANTOINETTE (with frantic passion). To our horses, dearest! To our horses!

PAUL (incredulously). Out into the world, after all?

ANTOINETTE (with a wild fervor). Out with you into the night ... the night of Saint Sylvester!

PAUL (sadly). Stay here, Toinette! Why begin the farce anew! Let it end upon this soil, that nurtured our childhood!

ANTOINETTE (imploring). Come, dearest, to our horses! Let us ride to my home.

PAUL. To your home?

ANTOINETTE. To Rukkoschin, the house of my fathers.

PAUL. Do you wish to go there?

ANTOINETTE. I wish to see it once more!

PAUL. And then we shall be ready?

ANTOINETTE. The house lies secluded and empty and dead.

PAUL. Only the spirits of your fathers are stirring.

ANTOINETTE. But I know of one room where I played as a child, that has suffered no change.

PAUL (overcome). To our horses! To our horses!

ANTOINETTE. The night is clear. Many thousands of stars will light the way. We shall ride through the forest. Right across the lake. The ice is firm.

[She draws him out.]

PAUL (with a gesture toward the outside). Farewell, Hella! Your reign is over!... We are returning to Mother Earth! (They depart through the door in the background.)

HUGO VON HOFMANNSTHAL

* * * * * *

THE MARRIAGE OF SOBEIDE

A DRAMATIC POEM

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

A WEALTHY MERCHANT

SOBEIDE, his young wife

BACHTJAR, the Jeweler, SOBEIDE'S father

SOBEIDE'S MOTHER

SHALNASSAR, the Carpet-dealer

GANEM, his son

GUeLISTANE, a ship-captain's widow

An Armenian Slave

An old Camel-driver

A Gardener

His wife

BAHRAM, Servant of the MERCHANT

A Debtor of SHALNASSAR

An old city in the Kingdom of Persia

The time is the evening and the night after the wedding-feast of the wealthy merchant.

THE MARRIAGE OF SOBEIDE (1899)

TRANSLATED BY BAYARD QUINCY MORGAN, PH.D.

Assistant Professor of German, University of Wisconsin

Scene I

Sleeping chamber in the house of the wealthy MERCHANT. To the rear an alcove with dark curtains. To the left a door, to the right a small door leading into the garden, and a window. Candles.

Enter the MERCHANT and his old Servant, BAHRAM.

MERCHANT.
Speak, Bahram, gav'st thou heed unto my bride?

SERVANT.
Heed, in what sense!

MERCHANT.
She is not cheerful, Bahram.

SERVANT.
She is a serious girl. And 'tis a moment
That sobers e'en the flightiest, remember.

MERCHANT.
Not she alone: the more I bade them kindle
Lights upon lights, the heavier hung a cloud
About this wedding-feast. They smiled like masks,
And I could catch the dark or pitying glances
They flung to one another; and her father
Would oft subside into a dark reflection,
From which he roused himself with laughter forced,
Unnatural.

SERVANT.
My Lord, our common clay
Endureth none too well the quiet splendor
Of hours like these. We are but little used
To aught but dragging through our daily round
Of littleness. And on such high occasions
We feel the quiet opening of a portal
From which an unfamiliar, icy breath
Our spirit chills, and warns us of the grave.
As in a glass we then behold our own
Forgotten likeness come into our vision,
And easier 'twere to weep than to be merry.

MERCHANT.
She tasted not a morsel that thou placed
Before her.

SERVANT.
Lord, her modest maidenhood
Was like a noose about her throat; but yet
She ate some of the fruit.

MERCHANT.
Yes, one small seed,
I noticed that, 'twas a pomegranate seed.

SERVANT.
Then too she suddenly bethought herself
That wine, a blood-red flame in sparkling crystal,
Before her stood, and raised the splendid goblet
And drank as with a sudden firm resolve
The half of it, so that the color flooded
Her cheeks, and deep she sighed as with relief.

MERCHANT.
Methinks that was no happy resolution.
So acts the man who would deceive himself,
And veils his glance, because the road affrights him.

SERVAMT.
Vain torments these: this is but women's way.

MERCHANT.(looks about the room, smiles).
A mirror, too, I see thou hast provided.

SERVAMT.
Thine own command, the mirror is thy mother's,
Brought hither from her chamber with the rest.
And thou thyself didst bid me, just this one ...

MERCHANT.
What, did I so? It was a moment, then,
When I was shrewder than I am just now.
Yes, yes, a youthful bride must have a mirror.

SERVANT.
Now I will go to fetch your mother's goblet
And bring the cooling evening drink.

MERCHANT.
Ah yes.
Go, my good Bahram, fetch the evening drink.
[Exit BAHRAM.]
Thou mirror of my mother, dwells no glimmer
In thee of her sweet pallid smile, to rise
As from the dewy mirror of a well-spring?
Her smile, the faintest, loveliest I have known,
Was like the flutter of a tiny birdling,
That sleeps its last upon the hollowed hand.
[Stands before the mirror.]
No, naught but glass. Too long it empty stood.
Only a face that does not smile--my own.
My Self, beheld with my own eyes, so vacant
As if one glass but mirrored forth another,
Unconscious.--Oh for higher vision yet,
For but one moment infinitely brief,
To see how stands upon _her_ spirit's mirror
My image! Is't an old man she beholds?
Am I as young as oft I deem myself,
When in the silent night I lie and listen
To hear my blood surge through its winding course?
Is it not being young, to have so little
Of rigidness or hardness in my nature?
I feel as if my spirit, nursed and reared
On nourishment so dreamlike, bloodless, thin,
Were youthful still. How else should visit me
This faltering feeling, just as in my boyhood,
This strange uneasiness of happiness,
As if 'twould slip each moment from my hands
And fade like shadows? Can the old feel this?
No, old men take the world for something hard
And dreamless; what their fingers grasp and hold,
They hold. While _I_ am even now a-quiver
With all this moment brings; no youthful monarch
Were more intoxicated, when the breezes
Should waft to him that cryptic word "possession."
[He nears the window.]
Ah, lovely stars, are ye out there as ever?
From out of this unstable mortal body
To look upon your courses in your whirling
Eternal orbits--that has been the food
That bore with ease my years, until I thought
I scarcely felt my feet upon the earth.
And have I really withered, while my eyes
Clung to yon golden suns, that do not wither?
And have I learned of all the quiet plants,
And marked their parts and understood their lives,
And how they differ when upon the mountains,
Or when by running streams we find them growing,--
Almost a new creation, yet at bottom
A single species; and with confidence
Could say, this one does well, its food is pure,
And lightly bears the burden of its leaves,
But this through worthless soil and sultry vapors
Has thickened stems, and bloated, swollen leaves ...
And more ... and of myself I can know nothing,
And heavy scales are crusted on my eyes,
Impeding judgment ...
[He hastily steps before the mirror again.]
Soulless tool!
Not like some books and men caught unawares:
Thou never canst reveal the hidden truth
As in a lightning flash.

SERVANT (returning).
My master.

MERCHANT.
Well?

SERVANT.
The guests depart. The father of thy bride
And others have been asking after thee.

MERCHANT.
And what of her?

SERVANT.
She takes leave of her parents.

[MERCHANT stands a moment with staring
eyes, then goes out at the door to the left
with long strides. SERVANT follows him.
The stage remains empty for a short time.
Then the MERCHANT reenters, hearing a
candelabrum which he places on the table
beside the evening drink. SOBEIDE enters
behind him, led by her father and mother.
All stop in the centre of the room, somewhat
to the left, the MERCHANT slightly removed
from the rest. SOBEIDE gently releases
herself. Her veil hangs down behind her.
She wears a string of pearls in her hair,
a larger one about her neck.]

FATHER.
From much in life I have been forced to part.
This is the hardest. My beloved daughter,
This is the day which I began to dread
When still I saw thee smiling in thy cradle,
And which has been my nightmare o'er and o'er.
(To the MERCHANT.)
Forgive me. She is more to me than child.
I give thee that for which I have no name,
For every name comprises but a part--
But she was everything to me!

SOBEIDE.
Dear father,
My mother will be with thee.

MOTHER (gently).
Cross him not:
He is quite right to overlook his wife.
I have become a part of his own being,
What strikes me, strikes him too; but what I do
Affects him only as when right and left
Of his own body meet. Meanwhile, however,
The soul remains through all its days a nursling,
And reaches out for breasts more full of life,
Farewell. Be no worse helpmeet than I was,
And mayst thou be as happy too. This word
Embraces all.

SOBEIDE.
Embrace--that is the word;
Till now my fate was in your own embraced,
But now the life of this man standing here
Swings wide its gates, and in this single moment
I breathe for once the blessed air of freedom:
No longer yours, and still not his as yet.
I beg you, go; for this unwonted thing,
As new to me as wine, has greater power,
And makes me view my life and his and yours
With other eyes than were perhaps befitting.
(With a forced smile.)
I beg you, look not in such wonderment:
Such notions oft go flitting through my head,
Nor dream nor yet reality. Ye know,
As child I was much worse. And then the dance
Which I invented, is't not such a thing:
Wherein from torchlight and the black of night
I made myself a shifting, drifting palace,
From which I then emerged, as do the queens
Of fire and ocean in the fairy-tales.
[The MOTHER has meanwhile thrown the
FATHER a glance and has noiselessly gone
to the door. Noiselessly the FATHER has
followed her. Now they stand with clasped
hands in the doorway, to vanish the next
moment.]
Ye go so softly? What? And are ye gone?
[She turns and stands silent, her eyes cast
down.]

MERCHANT (caresses her with a long look, then goes to the
rear, but stops again irresolute).
Wilt thou not lay aside thy veil?
[SOBEIDE starts, looks about her absent-mindedly.]

MERCHANT (points to the glass).
'Tis yonder.
[SOBEIDE takes no step, loosens mechanically
the veil from her hair.]

MERCHANT.
Here--in thy house--and just at first perhaps
Thou mayst lack much. This house, since mother's death,
Has grown disused to serve a woman's needs.
And our utensils here do not display
The splendor and magnificence in which
I fain had seen thee framed, but yet for me
Scant beauty dwells in what all men may have:
So from the stuffy air of chests and caskets
That, like the sandal-wood in sanctuary,
Half took my breath, I had all these removed
And placed there in thy chamber for thy service,
Where something of my mother's presence still--
Forgive me--seems to cling. I thought in this
To show and teach thee something ... On some things
There are mute symbols deeply stamped, with which
The air grows laden in our quiet hours,
And fuses something with our consciousness
That could not well be said, nor was to be.
[Pause.]
It hurts me when I see thee thus, benumbed
By all these overladen moments, that
Scarce walk upright beneath their heavy burden.
But let me say, all good things enter in
Our souls in quiet unpretentious ways,
And not with show and noise. One keeps expecting
To see Life suddenly appear somewhere
On the horizon, like a new domain,
A country yet untrodden. Yet the distance
Remains unpeopled; slowly then our eyes
Perceive its traces ling'ring here and yonder,
And that it compasses, embraces us,
And bears us, is in us, and nowhere fails us.
The words I say can give thee little pleasure,
Too much renunciation rings in them.
But not to me, by Heaven! My sweet child,
Not like a beggar do I feel before thee,
(With a long look at her.)
However fair thy youth's consummate glory
Envelop thee from top to toe ... thou knowest
Not much about my life, thou hast but seen
A fragment of its shell, as dimly gleaming
In shadows through the op'nings of a hedge.
I wish thine eye might pierce the heart of it:
As fully as the earth beneath my feet
Have I put from me all things low and common.
Callst thou that easy, since I now am old?
'Tis true, I've lost some friends by death ere this--
And thou at most thy grandam--many friends,
And those that live, where are they scattered now?
To them was linked the long forgotten quiver
Of nights of youth, those evening hours in which
Vague fear with monstrous, sultry happiness
Was mingled, and the perfume of young locks
With darkling breezes wafted from the stars.

* * * * * *

The glamor of the motley towns and cities,
The distant purple haze--that now is gone,
Nor could be found, though I should go to seek it;
But here within me, when I call, there rises
A something, rules my spirit, and I feel
As if it might in thee as well--
[He changes his tone.]
Knowst thou the day, on which thou needst must dance
Before thy father's guests? A smile unfading
Dwelt on thy lips, than any string of pearls
More fair, and sadder than my mother's smile,
Which thou hast ne'er beheld. This is to blame:
That smile and dance were interlaced, like wondrous
Fingers of dreamlike possibilities.
Wouldst thou they ne'er had been, since they're to blame,
My wife, that thou art standing here with me?

SOBEIDE (in such a tone that her voice is heard
to strike her teeth).
Commandest thou that I should dance? If not,
Commandest thou some other thing?

MERCHANT.
My wife,
How wild thou speakest with me, and how strangely!

SOBEIDE.
Wild? Hard, perhaps: my fate is none too soft.
Thou speakest as a good man speaks, then be
So good as not to speak with me today.
I am thy chattel, take me as thy chattel,
And let me, like a chattel, keep my thoughts
Unspoken, only uttered to myself!
[She weeps silently with compressed lips, her
face turned toward the darkness.]

MERCHANT.
So many tears and in such silence. This
Is not the shudder that relieves the anguish
Of youth. Here there is deeper pain to quiet
Than inborn rigidness of timid spirits.

SOBEIDE.
Lord, shouldst thou waken in the night and find
Me weeping thus whenas I seem to sleep,
Then wake me, lest I do what thy good right
Forbids me. For in dreams upon thy bed
I shall be seeing then another man
And longing for him; this were not becoming,
And makes me shudder at myself to think it.
Oh promise me that thou wilt then awake me!
[Pause. The MERCHANT is silent; deep feeling
darkens his face.]
No question who it is? Does that not matter?
No? But thy face is gloomy and thou breathest
With effort? Then I will myself confess it:
Thou hast beheld him at our house ere now,
His name is Ganem--son of old Shalnassar,
The carpet-dealer--and 'tis three years now
Since first I knew him. But since yesteryear
I have not seen him more.
This I have said, this last thing I reveal,
Because I will permit no sediment
Of secrecy and lies to lurk within me.
I care not thou shouldst know: I am no vessel
Sold off as pure, but lined with verdigris
To eat its bottom out--and then because
I wanted to be spared his frequent visits
In this abode--for that were hard to bear.

MERCHANT (threateningly, but soon choked by wrath and pain).
Thou! Thou hast ... thou hast ...
[He claps his hands to his face.]

SOBEIDE.
Thou weepest too, then, on thy wedding-day?
And have I spoiled some dream for thee? Look hither:
Thou sayst, I am so young, and this, and this--
[Points to hair and cheeks.]
Are young indeed, but weary is my spirit,
So weary, that there is no word to tell
How weary and how aged before my time.
We are one age, perhaps thou art the younger.
In conversation once thou saidst to me,
That almost all the years since I was born
Had passed for thee in sitting in thy gardens
And in the quiet tower thou hast builded,
To watch the stars from it. 'Twas on that day
It first seemed possible to me, that thy
And, more than that, my father's fond desire
Might be ... fulfilled. For I supposed the air
In this thy house must have some lightness in it,
So light, so burdenless!--And in our house
It was so overladen with remembrance,
The airy corpse of sleepless nights went floating
All through it, and on all the walls there hung
The burden of those fondly cherished hopes,
Once vivid, then rejected, long since faded.
The glances of my parents rested ever
Upon me, and their whole existence.--Well,
Too well I knew each quiver of an eyelash,
And over all there was the constant pressure
Of thy commanding will, that on my soul
Lay like a coverlet of heavy sleep.
'Twas common, that I yielded at the last:
I seek no other word. And yet the common
Is strong, and all our life is full of it.
How could I thrust it down and trample on it,
While I was floundering in it up to the neck?

MERCHANT.
So my desire lay like a cruel nightmare
Upon thy breast! Then thou must surely hate me ...

SOBEIDE.
I hate thee not, I have not learned to hate,
And only just began to learn to love.
The lessons stopped, but I am fairly able
To do such things as, with that smile thou knowest,
To dance, with heart as heavy as the stones,
To face each heavy day, each coming evil
With smiles: the utmost power of my youth
That smile consumed, but to the bitter end
I wore it, and so here I stand with thee.

MERCHANT.
In this I see but shadowy connection.

SOBEIDE.
How I connect my being forced to smile
And finally becoming wife to thee?
Wilt thou know this? And must I tell thee all?
Then knowst thou, since thou art rich, so little
Of life, and hast no eyes for aught but stars,
And flowers in thy heated greenhouse? Listen:
This is the cause: a poor man is my father,
Not always poor, much worse: once rich, now poor,
And many people's debtor, most of all
Thy debtor. And his starving spirit lived
Upon my smile, as other people's hearts
On other lies. These last years, since thou camest,
I knew my task; till then had been my schooling.

MERCHANT.
And so became my wife!
As quick she would have grasped her pointed shears
And opened up a vein and with her blood
Have let her life run out into a bath,
If that had been the price with which to purchase
Her father's freedom from his creditor!
... Thus is a wish fulfilled!

SOBEIDE.
Be not distressed. This is the way of life.
I am myself as in a waking dream.
As one who, taken sick, no more aright
Compares his thoughts, nor any more remembers
How on the day before he viewed a matter,
Nor what he then had feared or had expected:
He cannot look with eyes of yesterday ...
So also when we reach the worser stages
Of that great illness: Life. I scarcely know
Myself how great my fear of many things,
How much I longed for others, and I feel,
When some things cross my mind, as if it were
Another woman's fate, and not my own,
Just some one that I know about, not I.
I tell thee, I am bitter, but not evil:
And if at first I was too wild for thee,
There will be no deception in me later,
When I shall sit at ease and watch thy gardeners.
My head is tired out. I grow so dizzy,
When I must keep two things within myself
That fight against each other. Much too long
Have I been forced to do this. Give me peace!
Thou giv'st me this, and for that I am grateful.
Call not this little: terrible in weakness
Is everything that grows on shifting sands
Of doubt. But here is perfect certainty.

MERCHANT.
And how of him?

SOBEIDE.
That too must not distress thee.
'Twere hard to judge, had I concealed it from thee;
I have revealed it now, so let it rest.

MERCHANT.
Thou art not free of him!

SOBEIDE.
So thinkest thou?
When is one "free?" Things have no hold on us,
Except we have in us the will to hold them.
All that is past. [Gesture.]

MERCHANT (after a pause).
His love was like to thine?
[SOBEIDE nods.]
But then, why then, how has it come to pass
That he was not the one--

SOBEIDE
Why, we were poor!
No, more than poor, thou knowst. His father, too.
Poor too. Besides, a gloomy man, as hard
As mine was all too soft, and on him weighing
As mine on me. The whole much easier
To live through than to put in words. For years
It lasted. We were children when it started,
Ere long as tired as foals, too early harnessed
For drawing heavy wagons in the harvest.

MERCHANT.
But let me tell thee, this cannot be true
About his father. I know old Shalnassar,
The carpet-dealer. Well, he is a graybeard,
And he who will may speak good of his name,
But I will not. A wicked, bad old man!

SOBEIDE.
May be, all one. To him it is his father.
I ne'er have seen him. Ganem sees him so.
He calls him sick, is saddened when he speaks
Of him. And therefore I have never seen him,
That is, not since my childhood, when I saw
Him now and then upon the window leaning.

MERCHANT.
But he's not poor, no, anything but poor!

SOBEIDE (sure of her facts, sadly smiling).
Thinkst thou I should be here?

MERCHANT.
And he?

SOBEIDE.
What, he?

MERCHANT.
He clearly made thee feel
He thought impossible, what he and thou
Had wished for years and long held possible?

SOBEIDE. Why, for it was impossible? ... and then
"Had wished for years"--thou seest, all these matters
Are different, and the words we use
Are different. At one time this has ripened,
But to decay again. For there are moments
With cheeks that burn like the eternal suns--
When somewhere hovers mute an unconfessed
Confession, somewhere vanishes in air
The echo of a call that never reached
Its utterance; here in me something whispers,
"I yielded to him;" mark: in thought! "I yielded"--
The following moment swallows everything,
As night the lightning flash ... How all began
And ended? Well, in this wise: first I sealed
My lips, soon then set seal upon my eye-lids,
And he--

MERCHANT.
Well, how was he?

SOBEIDE.
Why, very noble.
As one who seeks to sully his own image
In other eyes, to spare that other pain--
Quite different, no longer kind as once
--It was the greatest kindness, so to act--
His spirit rent and full of mockery, that
Perhaps was bitterer to himself than me,
Just like an actor oftentimes, so strangely
With set intent. At other times again
Discoursing of the future, of the time
When I should give my hand--

MERCHANT (vehemently).
To me?

SOBEIDE (coldly).
When I should give my hand to any other;--
Describing what he knew that I should never
Endure, if life should ever take that form.
As little as himself would e'er have borne it
A single hour, for he but made a show,
Acquaint with me, and knowing it would cost
The less of pain to wrench my heart from him,
So soon as I had come to doubt his faith.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

'Twas too well acted, but what wealth of goodness
Was there.

MERCHANT. The greatest goodness, _if_ 'twas really
Naught but a pose assumed.

SOBEIDE (passionately).
I beg thee, husband,
This one thing: ruin not our life together.
As yet 'tis young and blind as tiny fledglings,
A single speech like this might swiftly slay it!
I shall not be an evil wife to thee:
I mean that slowly I shall find, perhaps,
In other things a little of that bliss
For which I held out eager fingers, thinking
There was a land quite full of it, both air
And earth, and one might enter into it.
I know by now that _I_ was not to enter ...
I shall be almost happy in that day,
All longing, painless, shared 'twixt past and present,
Like shining sunlight on the fresh green trees,
And like an unburdened sky behind the garden
The future: empty, yet quite full of light ...
But we must give it time to grow:
As yet confusion everywhere prevails.
Thou must assist me, it must never happen
That with ill-chosen words thou link this present
Too strongly to the life which now is over.
They must be parted by a wall of glass,
As airtight and as rigid as in dreams.
(At the window.)
That evening must not come, that should discover
Me sitting at this window without thee:
--Just not to be at home, not from the window
Of my long girlhood's chamber to look out
Into the darkness, has a dangerous,
Peculiar and confusing power, as if
I lay upon the open road, no man's possession,
As fully mine as never in my dreams!
A maiden's life is much more strictly ruled
By pressure of the air, than thou conceivest,
To whom it seems most natural to be free.
The evening ne'er must come, when I should thus
Stand here, with all the weight of heavy shadows,
My parents' eyes, all, all behind me thrust,
Involved in yon dark hangings at my back,
And this brave landscape with the golden stars,
The gentle breeze, the bushes, thus before me.
(With growing agitation.)
The evening ne'er must come, when I should see
All this with eyes like these, to say to me:
Here lies a road that shimmers in the moonlight:
Before the gentle breeze the next light cloudlet
Impels to meet the moon, a man could run
That road unto its end, between the hedges,
Then comes a cross-road, now a planted field,
And then the shadow of the standing corn,
At last a garden! There his hand would touch
At once a curtain, back of which is all:
All kissing, laughing, all the happiness
This world can give promiscuously flung
About like balls of golden wool, such bliss
That but a drop of it on parched lips
Suffices to be lighter than a flame,
To see no more of difficulty, nor
To understand what men call ugliness!
(Almost shrieking.)
The evening ne'er must come, that with a thousand
Unfettered tongues should cry to me: why not?
Why hast thou never run in dark of night
That road? Thy feet were young, thy breath sufficient:
Why hast thou saved it, that thou mightst have plenty
To weep a thousand nights upon thy pillow?
[She turns her back to the window, clutches
the table, collapses and falls to her knees,
and remains thus, her face pressed to the
table, her body shaken with weeping. A
long pause.]

MERCHANT. And if the first door I should open wide,
The only locked one on this road of love?
[He opens the small doorway leading into
the garden on the right; the moonlight
enters.]

SOBEIDE (still kneeling by the table).
Art thou so cruel as, in this first hour,
To make a silly pastime of my weeping!
Art thou so fain to put thy scorn upon me?
Art thou so proud of holding me securely?

MERCHANT (with the utmost self-control).
How much I could have wished that thou hadst learned
To know me otherwise, but now there is
No time for that.
Thy father, if 'tis this which so constrains thee,
Thy father owes me nothing now, indeed
Within some days agreements have been made
Between us twain, from which some little profit
And so, I hope, a much belated gleam
Of joyousness may come.

[She has crept closer to him on her knees, listening.]

So then thou mightest--
Thou mayst, I mean to say, if it was this
That lamed thee most, if in this--_alien_ dwelling
Again thou feel the will to live, which thou
Hadst lost, if, as from heavy sleep aroused,
Yet not awake, thou feel it is this portal
That leads thee out to pulsing, waking life--
Then in the name of God and of the stars
I give thee leave to go where'er thou wilt.

SOBEIDE (still on her knees).
What?

MERCHANT.
I do no more regard thee as my wife
Than any other maid who, for protection
From tempest or from robbers by the wayside,
Had entered for a space into my house,
And I renounce herewith my claim upon thee,
Just as I have no valid right to any,
Whom such a chance might cast beneath my roof.

SOBEIDE.
What sayest thou?

MERCHANT.
I say that thou art free
To pass out through this door, and where thou wilt.
Free as the wind, the butterfly, the water.

SOBEIDE (half standing).
To go?

MERCHANT.
To go.

SOBEIDE.
Where'er I will?

MERCHANT.
Where 'er

Thou wilt, and at what time thou wilt.

SOBEIDE (still half dazed, now at the door).
Now? Here?

MERCHANT.
Or now, or later. Here, or otherwhere.

SOBEIDE (doubtfully).
But to my parents only?

MERCHANT (in a more decided tone).
Where thou wilt.

SOBEIDE (laughing and Weeping at once).
This dost thou then? O never in a dream
I ventured such a thought, in maddest dreams
I ne'er had crept to thee upon my knees

[She falls on her knees before him.]

With this request, lest I should see thy laughter
Upon such madness ... yet thou doest it,
Thou doest it! O thou! Thou good, good man!

[He raises her gently, she stands bewildered.]

MERCHANT (turns away).
When wilt thou go?

SOBEIDE.
This very instant, now!
O be not angry, think not ill of me!
Consider: can I tarry in thy house,
A stranger's house this night? Must I not go
At once to him, since I belong to him?
How may his property this night inhabit
An alien house, as it were masterless?

MERCHANT (bitterly).
Already his?

SOBEIDE.
Why sir, a proper woman
Is never masterless: for from her father
Her husband takes her, she belongs to him,
Be he alive or resting in the earth.
Her next and latest master--that is Death.

MERCHANT.
Then wilt thou not, at least till break of day,
Return to rest at home?

SOBEIDE.
No, no, my friend.
All that is past. My road, once and for all,
Is not the common one, this hour divides
Me altogether from all maiden ways.
So let me walk it to its very end
In this one night, that in a later day
All this be like a dream, nor I have need
To feel ashamed.

MERCHANT.
Then go!

SOBEIDE.
I give thee pain?

[MERCHANT turns away.]

Permit a single draught from yonder goblet.

MERCHANT.
It was my mother's, take it to thyself.

SOBEIDE.
I cannot. Lord. But let me drink from it.

[Drinks.]

MERCHANT.
Drain this, and never mayst thou need in life
To quench thy thirst with wine from any goblet
Less pure than that.

SOBEIDE.
Farewell.

MERCHANT.
Farewell.

[She is already on the threshold.]

Hast thou no fear? Thou never yet hast walked
Alone. We dwell without the city wall.

SOBEIDE.
Dear friend, I feel above all weakling fear,
And light my foot, as never in the daytime.

[Exit.]

MERCHANT (after following her long with his eyes, with a
gesture of pain).
As if some plant were drawing quiet rootlets
From out my heart, to take wing after her,
And air were entering all the empty sockets!

[He steps away from the window.]

Does she not really seem to me less fair,
So hasty, so desirous to run thither,
Where scarce she knows if any wait her coming!
No: 'tis her youth that I must see aright;
This is a part of all things beautiful,
And all this haste becomes this creature just
As mute aspects become the fairest flowers.

[Pause.]