Chapter VI: Act II

(_Another room of the villa, adjoining the throne room. Its
furniture is antique and severe. Principal exit at rear in
the background. To the left, two windows looking on the
garden. To the right, a door opening into the throne room._

_Late afternoon of the same day._

_Donna Matilda, the doctor and Belcredi are on the stage
engaged in conversation; but Donna Matilda stands to one
side, evidently annoyed at what the other two are saying;
although she cannot help listening, because, in her agitated
state, everything interests her in spite of herself. The
talk of the other two attracts her attention, because she
instinctively feels the need for calm at the moment_).

BELCREDI. It may be as you say, doctor, but that was my
impression.

DOCTOR. I won't contradict you; but, believe me, it is only
... an impression.

BELCREDI. Pardon me, but he even said so, and quite clearly
(_turning to the Marchioness_). Didn't he, Marchioness?

DONNA MATILDA (_turning round_). What did he say?... (_Then
not agreeing_). Oh yes ... but not for the reason you think!

DOCTOR. He was alluding to the costumes we had slipped
on.... Your cloak (_indicating the Marchioness_), our
Benedictine habits.... But all this is childish!

DONNA MATILDA (_turning quickly, indignant_). Childish? What
do you mean, doctor?

DOCTOR. From one point of view, it is--I beg you to let me
say so, Marchioness! Yet, on the other hand, it is much more
complicated than you can imagine.

DONNA MATILDA. To me, on the contrary, it is perfectly
clear!

DOCTOR (_with a smile of pity of the competent person
towards those who do not understand_). We must take into
account the peculiar psychology of madmen; which, you must
know, enables us to be certain that they observe things and
can, for instance, easily detect people who are disguised;
can in fact recognize the disguise and yet believe in it;
just as children do, for whom disguise is both play and
reality. That is why I used the word childish. But the thing
is extremely complicated, inasmuch as he must be perfectly
aware of being an image to himself and for himself--that
image there, in fact (_alluding to the portrait in the
throne room, and pointing to the left_)!

BELCREDI. That's what he said!

DOCTOR. Very well then--An image before which other images,
ours, have appeared: understand? Now he, in his acute and
perfectly lucid delirium, was able to detect at once a
difference between his image and ours: that is, he saw that
ours were make-believes. So he suspected us; because all
madmen are armed with a special diffidence. But that's all
there is to it! Our make-believe, built up all round his,
did not seem pitiful to him. While his seemed all the more
tragic to us, in that he, as if in
defiance--understand?--and induced by his suspicion, wanted
to show us up merely as a joke. That was also partly the
case with him, in coming before us with painted cheeks and
hair, and saying he had done it on purpose for a jest.

DONNA MATILDA (_impatiently_). No, it's not that, doctor.
It's not like that! It's not like that!

DOCTOR. Why isn't it, may I ask?

DONNA MATILDA (_with decision but trembling_). I am
perfectly certain he recognized me!

DOCTOR. It's not possible ... it's not possible!

BELCREDI (_at the same time_). Of course not!

DONNA MATILDA (_more than ever determined, almost
convulsively_). I tell you, he recognized me! When he came
close up to speak to me--looking in my eyes, right into my
eyes--he recognized me!

BELCREDI. But he was talking of your daughter!

DONNA MATILDA. That's not true! He was talking of me! Of me!

BELCREDI. Yes, perhaps, when he said....

DONNA MATILDA (_letting herself go_). About my dyed hair!
But didn't you notice that he added at once: "or the memory
of your dark hair, if you were dark"? He remembered
perfectly well that I was dark--then!

BELCREDI. Nonsense! nonsense!

DONNA MATILDA (_not listening to him, turning to the
doctor_). My hair, doctor, is really dark--like my
daughter's! That's why he spoke of her.

BELCREDI. But he doesn't even know your daughter! He's never
seen her!

DONNA MATILDA. Exactly! Oh, you never understand anything!
By my daughter, stupid, he meant me--as I was then!

BELCREDI. Oh, this is catching! This is catching, this
madness!

DONNA MATILDA (_softly, with contempt_). Fool!

BELCREDI. Excuse me, were you ever his wife? Your daughter
is his wife--in his delirium: Bertha of Susa.

DONNA MATILDA. Exactly! Because I, no longer dark--as he
remembered me--but _fair_, introduced myself as "Adelaide,"
the mother. My daughter doesn't exist for him: he's never
seen her--you said so yourself! So how can he know whether
she's fair or dark?

BELCREDI. But he said dark, speaking generally, just as
anyone who wants to recall, whether fair or dark, a memory
of youth in the color of the hair! And you, as usual, begin
to imagine things! Doctor, you said I ought not to have
come! It's she who ought not to have come!

DONNA MATILDA (_upset for a moment by Belcredi's remark,
recovers herself. Then with a touch of anger, because
doubtful_). No, no ... he spoke of me... He spoke all the
time to me, with me, of me....

BELCREDI. That's not bad! He didn't leave me a moment's
breathing space; and you say he was talking all the time to
you? Unless you think he was alluding to you too, when he
was talking to Peter Damiani!

DONNA MATILDA (_defiantly, almost exceeding the limits of
courteous discussion_). Who knows? Can you tell me why, from
the outset, he showed a strong dislike for you, for you
alone? (_From the tone of the question, the expected answer
must almost explicitly be: "because he understands you are
my lover." Belcredi feels this so well that he remains
silent and can say nothing_).

DOCTOR. The reason may also be found in the fact that only
the visit of the Duchess Adelaide and the abbot of Cluny was
announced to him. Finding a third person present, who had
not been announced, at once his suspicions....

BELCREDI. Yes, exactly! His suspicion made him see an enemy
in me: Peter Damiani! But she's got it into her head, that
he recognized her....

DONNA MATILDA. There's no doubt about it! I could see it
from his eyes, doctor. You know, there's a way of looking
that leaves no doubt whatever.... Perhaps it was only for an
instant, but I am sure!

DOCTOR. It is not impossible: a lucid moment....

DONNA MATILDA. Yes, perhaps ... And then his speech seemed
to me full of regret for his and my youth--for the horrible
thing that happened to him, that has held him in that
disguise from which he has never been able to free himself,
and from which he longs to be free--he said so himself!

BELCREDI. Yes, so as to be able to make love to your
daughter, or you, as you believe--having been touched by
your pity.

DONNA MATILDA. Which is very great, I would ask you to
believe.

BELCREDI. As one can see, Marchioness; so much so that a
miracle-worker might expect a miracle from it!

DOCTOR. Will you let me speak? I don't work miracles,
because I am a doctor and not a miracle-worker. I listened
very intently to all he said; and I repeat that that certain
analogical elasticity, common to all symptomatised delirium,
is evidently with him much ... what shall I say?--much
relaxed! The elements, that is, of his delirium no longer
hold together. It seems to me he has lost the equilibrium of
his second personality and sudden recollections drag
him--and this is very comforting--not from a state of
incipient apathy, but rather from a morbid inclination to
reflective melancholy, which shows a ... a very considerable
cerebral activity. Very comforting, I repeat! Now if, by
this violent trick we've planned....

DONNA MATILDA (_turning to the window, in the tone of a sick
person complaining_). But how is it that the motor has not
returned? It's three hours and a half since....

DOCTOR. What do you say?

DONNA MATILDA. The motor, doctor! It's more than three hours
and a half....

DOCTOR (_taking out his watch and looking at it_). Yes, more
than four hours, by this!

DONNA MATILDA. It could have reached here an hour ago at
least! But, as usual....

BELCREDI. Perhaps they can't find the dress....

DONNA MATILDA. But I explained exactly where it was!
(_impatiently_). And Frida ... where is Frida?

BELCREDI (_looking out of the window_). Perhaps she is in
the garden with Charles....

DOCTOR. He'll talk her out of her fright.

BELCREDI. She's not afraid, doctor; don't you believe it:
the thing bores her rather....

DONNA MATILDA. Just don't ask anything of her! I know what
she's like.

DOCTOR. Let's wait patiently. Anyhow, it will soon be over,
and it has to be in the evening.... It will only be the
matter of a moment! If we can succeed in rousing him, as I
was saying, and in breaking at one go the threads--already
slack--which still bind him to this fiction of his, giving
him back what he himself asks for--you remember, he said:
"one cannot always be twenty-six years old, madam!" if we
can give him freedom from this torment, which even _he_
feels is a torment, then if he is able to recover at one
bound the sensation of the distance of time....

BELCREDI (_quickly_). He'll be cured! (_then emphatically
with irony_). We'll pull him out of it all!

DOCTOR. Yes, we may hope to set him going again, like a
watch which has stopped at a certain hour ... just as if we
had our watches in our hands and were waiting for that other
watch to go again.--A shake--so--and let's hope it'll tell
the time again after its long stop. (_At this point the
Marquis Charles Di Nolli enters from the principal
entrance_).

DONNA MATILDA. Oh, Charles!... And Frida? Where is she?

DI NOLLI. She'll be here in a moment.

DOCTOR. Has the motor arrived?

DI NOLLI. Yes.

DONNA MATILDA. Yes? Has the dress come?

DI NOLLI. It's been here some time.

DOCTOR. Good! Good!

DONNA MATILDA (_trembling_). Where is she? Where's Frida?

DI NOLLI (_shrugging his shoulders and smiling sadly, like
one lending himself unwillingly to an untimely joke_).
You'll see, you'll see!... (_pointing towards the hall_).
Here she is!... (_Berthold appears at the threshold of the
hall, and announces with solemnity_).

BERTHOLD. Her Highness the Countess Matilda of Canossa!
(_Frida enters, magnificent and beautiful, arrayed in the
robes of her mother as "Countess Matilda of Tuscany," so
that she is a living copy of the portrait in the throne
room_).

FRIDA (_passing Berthold, who is bowing, says to him with
disdain_). Of Tuscany, of Tuscany! Canossa is just one of my
castles!

BELCREDI (_in admiration_). Look! Look! She seems another
person....

DONNA MATILDA. One would say it were I! Look!--Why, Frida,
look! She's exactly my portrait, alive!

DOCTOR. Yes, yes.... Perfect! Perfect! The portrait, to the
life.

BELCREDI. Yes, there's no question about it. She _is_ the
portrait! Magnificent!

FRIDA. Don't make me laugh, or I shall burst! I say, mother,
what a tiny waist you had? I had to squeeze so to get into
this!

DONNA MATILDA (_arranging her dress a little_). Wait!...
Keep still!... These pleats ... is it really so tight?

FRIDA. I'm suffocating! I implore you, to be quick!...

DOCTOR. But we must wait till it's evening!

FRIDA. No, no, I can't hold out till evening!

DONNA MATILDA. Why did you put it on so soon?

FRIDA. The moment I saw it, the temptation was
irresistible....

DONNA MATILDA. At least you could have called me, or have
had someone help you! It's still all crumpled.

FRIDA. So I saw, mother; but they are old creases; they
won't come out.

DOCTOR. It doesn't matter, Marchioness! The illusion is
perfect. (_Then coming nearer and asking her to come in
front of her daughter, without hiding her_). If you please,
stay there, there ... at a certain distance ... now a little
more forward....

BELCREDI. For the feeling of the distance of time....

DONNA MATILDA (_slightly turning to him_). Twenty years
after! A disaster! A tragedy!

BELCREDI. Now don't let's exaggerate!

DOCTOR (_embarrassed, trying to save the situation_). No,
no! I meant the dress ... so as to see ... You know....

BELCREDI (_laughing_). Oh, as for the dress, doctor, it
isn't a matter of twenty years! It's eight hundred! An
abyss! Do you really want to shove him across it (_pointing
first to Frida and then to Marchioness_) from there to here?
But you'll have to pick him up in pieces with a basket! Just
think now: for us it is a matter of twenty years, a couple
of dresses, and a masquerade. But, if, as you say, doctor,
time has stopped for and around him: if he lives there
(_pointing to Frida_) with her, eight hundred years ago....
I repeat: the giddiness of the jump will be such, that
finding himself suddenly among us.... (_The doctor shakes
his head in dissent_). You don't think so?

DOCTOR. No, because life, my dear baron, can take up its
rhythms. This--our life--will at once become real also to
him; and will pull him up directly, wresting from him
suddenly the illusion, and showing him that the eight
hundred years, as you say, are only twenty! It will be like
one of those tricks, such as the leap into space, for
instance, of the Masonic rite, which appears to be heaven
knows how far, and is only a step down the stairs.

BELCREDI. Ah! An idea! Yes! Look at Frida and the
Marchioness, doctor! Which is more advanced in time? We old
people, doctor! The young ones think they are more ahead;
but it isn't true: we are more ahead, because time belongs
to us more than to them.

DOCTOR. If the past didn't alienate us....

BELCREDI. It doesn't matter at all! How does it alienate us?
They (_pointing to Frida and Di Nolli_) have still to do
what we have accomplished, doctor: to grow old, doing the
same foolish things, more or less, as we did.... This is the
illusion: that one comes forward through a door to life. It
isn't so! As soon as one is born, one starts dying;
therefore, he who started first is the most advanced of all.
The youngest of us is father Adam! Look there: (_pointing to
Frida_) eight hundred years younger than all of us--the
Countess Matilda of Tuscany. (_He makes her a deep bow_).

DI NOLLI. I say, Tito, don't start joking.

BELCREDI. Oh, you think I am joking?...

DI NOLLI. Of course, of course ... all the time.

BELCREDI. Impossible! I've even dressed up as a
Benedictine....

DI NOLLI. Yes, but for a serious purpose.

BELCREDI. Well, exactly. If it has been serious for the
others ... for Frida, now, for instance. (_Then turning to
the doctor_): I swear, doctor, I don't yet understand what
you want to do.

DOCTOR (_annoyed_). You'll see! Let me do as I wish.... At
present you see the Marchioness still dressed as....

BELCREDI. Oh, she also ... has to masquerade?

DOCTOR. Of course! of course! In another dress that's in
there ready to be used when it comes into his head he sees
the Countess Matilda of Canossa before him.

FRIDA (_while talking quietly to Di Nolli notices the
doctor's mistake_). Of Tuscany, of Tuscany!

DOCTOR. It's all the same!

BELCREDI. Oh, I see! He'll be faced by two of them....

DOCTOR. Two, precisely! And then....

FRIDA (_calling him aside_). Come here, doctor! Listen!

DOCTOR. Here I am! (_Goes near the two young people and
pretends to give some explanations to them_).

BELCREDI (_softly to Donna Matilda_). I say, this is getting
rather strong, you know!

DONNA MATILDA (_looking him firmly in the face_). What?

BELCREDI. Does it really interest you as much as all
that--to make you willing to take part in...? For a woman
this is simply enormous!...

DONNA MATILDA. Yes, for an ordinary woman.

BELCREDI. Oh, no, my dear, for all women,--in a question
like this! It's an abnegation.

DONNA MATILDA. I owe it to him.

BELCREDI. Don't lie! You know well enough it's not hurting
you!

DONNA MATILDA. Well then, where does the abnegation come in?

BELCREDI. Just enough to prevent you losing caste in other
people's eyes--and just enough to offend me!...

DONNA MATILDA. But who is worrying about you now?

DI NOLLI (_coming forward_). It's all right. It's all right.
That's what we'll do! (_Turning towards Berthold_): Here
you, go and call one of those fellows!

BERTHOLD. At once! (_Exit_).

DONNA MATILDA. But first of all we've got to pretend that we
are going away.

DI NOLLI. Exactly! I'll see to that ... (_to Belcredi_) you
don't mind staying here?

BELCREDI (_ironically_). Oh, no, I don't mind, I don't
mind!...

DI NOLLI. We must look out not to make him suspicious again,
you know.

BELCREDI. Oh, Lord! _He_ doesn't amount to anything!

DOCTOR. He must believe absolutely that we've gone away.
(_Landolph followed by Berthold enters from the right_).

LANDOLPH. May I come in?

DI NOLLI. Come in! Come in! I say--your name's Lolo, isn't
it?

LANDOLPH. Lolo, or Landolph, just as you like!

DI NOLLI. Well, look here: the doctor and the Marchioness
are leaving, at once.

LANDOLPH. Very well. All we've got to say is that they have
been able to obtain the permission for the reception from
His Holiness. He's in there in his own apartments repenting
of all he said--and in an awful state to have the pardon!
Would you mind coming a minute?... If you would, just for a
minute ... put on the dress again....

DOCTOR. Why, of course, with pleasure....

LANDOLPH. Might I be allowed to make a suggestion? Why not
add that the Marchioness of Tuscany has interceded with the
Pope that he should be received?

DONNA MATILDA. You see, he has recognized me!

LANDOLPH. Forgive me ... I don't know my history very well.
I am sure you gentlemen know it much better! But I thought
it was believed that Henry IV. had a secret passion for the
Marchioness of Tuscany.

DONNA MATILDA (_at once_). Nothing of the kind! Nothing of
the kind!

LANDOLPH. That's what I thought! But he says he's loved her
... he's always saying it.... And now he fears that her
indignation for this secret love of his will work him harm
with the Pope.

BELCREDI. We must let him understand that this aversion no
longer exists.

LANDOLPH. Exactly! Of course!

DONNA MATILDA (_to Belcredi_). History says--I don't know
whether you know it or not--that the Pope gave way to the
supplications of the Marchioness Matilda and the Abbot of
Cluny. And I may say, my dear Belcredi, that I intended to
take advantage of this fact--at the time of the pageant--to
show him my feelings were not so hostile to him as he
supposed.

BELCREDI. You are most faithful to history, Marchioness....

LANDOLPH. Well then, the Marchioness could spare herself a
double disguise and present herself with Monsignor
(_indicating the doctor_) as the Marchioness of Tuscany.

DOCTOR (_quickly, energetically_). No, no! That won't do at
all. It would ruin everything. The impression from the
confrontation must be a sudden one, give a shock! No, no,
Marchioness, you will appear again as the Duchess Adelaide,
the mother of the Empress. And then we'll go away. This is
most necessary: that he should know we've gone away. Come
on! Don't let's waste any more time! There's a lot to
prepare.

(_Exeunt the doctor. Donna Matilda, and Landolph, Right_).

FRIDA. I am beginning to feel afraid again.

DI NOLLI. Again, Frida?

FRIDA. It would have been better if I had seen him before.

DI NOLLI. There's nothing to be frightened of, really.

FRIDA. He isn't furious, is he?

DI NOLLI. Of course not! he's quite calm.

BELCREDI (_with ironic sentimental affectation_).
Melancholy! Didn't you hear that he loves you?

FRIDA. Thanks! That's just why I am afraid.

BELCREDI. He won't do you any harm.

DI NOLLI. It'll only last a minute....

FRIDA. Yes, but there in the dark with him....

DI NOLLI. Only for a moment; and I will be near you, and all
the others behind the door ready to run in. As soon as you
see your mother, your part will be finished....

BELCREDI. I'm afraid of a different thing: that we're
wasting our time....

DI NOLLI. Don't begin again! The remedy seems a sound one to
me.

FRIDA. I think so too! I feel it! I'm all trembling!

BELCREDI. But, mad people, my dear friends--though they
don't know it, alas--have this felicity which we don't take
into account....

DI NOLLI (_interrupting, annoyed_). What felicity? Nonsense!

BELCREDI (_forcefully_). They don't reason!

DI NOLLI. What's reasoning got to do with it, anyway?

BELCREDI. Don't you call it reasoning that he will have to
do--according to us--when he sees her (_indicates Frida_)
and her mother? We've reasoned it all out, surely!

DI NOLLI. Nothing of the kind: no reasoning at all. We put
before him a double image of his own fantasy, or fiction, as
the doctor says.

BELCREDI (_suddenly_). I say, I've never understood why they
take degrees in medicine.

DI NOLLI (_amazed_). Who?

BELCREDI. The alienists!

DI NOLLI. What ought they to take degrees in, then?

FRIDA. If they are alienists, in what else should they take
degrees?

BELCREDI. In law, of course! All a matter of talk! The more
they talk, the more highly they are considered. "Analogous
elasticity," "the sensation of distance in time!" And the
first thing they tell you is that they don't work
miracles--when a miracle's just what is wanted! But they
know that the more they say they are not miracle-workers,
the more folk believe in their seriousness!

BERTHOLD (_who has been looking through the keyhole of the
door on right_). There they are! There they are! They're
coming in here.

DI NOLLI. Are they?

BERTHOLD. He wants to come with them.... Yes!... He's coming
too!

DI NOLLI. Let's get away, then! Let's get away, at once!
(_To Berthold_): You stop here!

BERTHOLD. Must I?

(_Without answering him, Di Nolli, Frida, and Belcredi go
out by the main exit, leaving Berthold surprised. The door
on the right opens, and Landolph enters first, bowing. Then
Donna Matilda comes in, with mantle and ducal crown as in
the first act; also the doctor as the abbot of Cluny. Henry
IV. is among them in royal dress. Ordulph and Harold enter
last of all_).

HENRY IV. (_following up what he has been saying in the
other room_). And now I will ask you a question: how can I
be astute, if you think me obstinate?

DOCTOR. No, no, not obstinate!

HENRY IV. (_smiling, pleased_). Then you think me really
astute?

DOCTOR. No, no, neither obstinate, nor astute.

HENRY IV. (_with benevolent irony_). Monsignor, if obstinacy
is not a vice which can go with astuteness, I hoped that in
denying me the former, you would at least allow me a little
of the latter. I can assure you I have great need of it. But
if you want to keep it all for yourself....

DOCTOR. I? I? Do I seem astute to you?

HENRY IV. No. Monsignor! What do you say? Not in the least!
Perhaps in this case, I may seem a little obstinate to you
(_cutting short to speak to Donna Matilda_). With your
permission: a word in confidence to the Duchess. (_Leads her
aside and asks her very earnestly_): Is your daughter really
dear to you?

DONNA MATILDA (_dismayed_). Why, yes, certainly....

HENRY IV. Do you wish me to compensate her with all my love,
with all my devotion, for the grave wrongs I have done
her--though you must not believe all the stories my enemies
tell about my dissoluteness!

DONNA MATILDA. No, no, I don't believe them. I never have
believed such stories.

HENRY IV. Well, then are you willing?

DONNA MATILDA (_confused_). What?

HENRY IV. That I return to love your daughter again? (_Looks
at her and adds, in a mysterious tone of warning_). You
mustn't be a friend of the Marchioness of Tuscany!

DONNA MATILDA. I tell you again that she has begged and
tried not less than ourselves to obtain your pardon....

HENRY IV. (_softly, but excitedly_). Don't tell me that!
Don't say that to me! Don't you see the effect it has on me,
my Lady?

DONNA MATILDA (_looks at him; then very softly as if in
confidence_). You love her still?

HENRY IV. (_puzzled_). Still? Still, you say? You know,
then? But nobody knows! Nobody must know!

DONNA MATILDA. But perhaps she knows, if she has begged so
hard for you!

HENRY IV. (_looks at her and says_): And you love your
daughter? (_Brief pause. He turns to the doctor with
laughing accents_). Ah, Monsignor, it's strange how little I
think of my wife! It may be a sin, but I swear to you that I
hardly feel her at all in my heart. What is stranger is that
her own mother scarcely feels her in her heart. Confess, my
Lady, that she amounts to very little for you. (_Turning to
Doctor_): She talks to me of that other woman, insistently,
insistently, I don't know why!...

LANDOLPH (_humbly_). Maybe, Majesty, it is to disabuse you
of some ideas you have had about the Marchioness of Tuscany.
(_Then, dismayed at having allowed himself this observation,
adds_): I mean just now, of course....

HENRY IV. You too maintain that she has been friendly to me?

LANDOLPH. Yes, at the moment, Majesty.

DONNA MATILDA. Exactly! Exactly!...

HENRY IV. I understand. That is to say, you don't believe I
love her. I see! I see! Nobody's ever believed it, nobody's
ever thought it. Better so, then! But enough, enough!
(_Turns to the doctor with changed expression_): Monsignor,
you see? The reasons the Pope has had for revoking the
excommunication have got nothing at all to do with the
reasons for which he excommunicated me originally. Tell Pope
Gregory we shall meet again at Brixen. And you, Madame,
should you chance to meet your daughter in the courtyard of
the castle of your friend the Marchioness, ask her to visit
me. We shall see if I succeed in keeping her close beside me
as wife and Empress. Many women have presented themselves
here already assuring me that they were she. But they all,
even while they told me they came from Susa--I don't know
why--began to laugh! And then in the bedroom.... Well a man
is a man, and a woman is a woman. Undressed, we don't bother
much about who we are. And one's dress is like a phantom
that hovers, always near one. Oh, Monsignor, phantoms in
general are nothing more than trifling disorders of the
spirit: images we cannot contain within the bounds of sleep.
They reveal themselves even when we are awake, and they
frighten us. I ... ah ... I am always afraid when, at night
time, I see disordered images before me. Sometimes I am even
afraid of my own blood pulsing loudly in my arteries in the
silence of night, like the sound of a distant step in a
lonely corridor!... But, forgive me! I have kept you
standing too long already. I thank you, my Lady, I thank
you, Monsignor. (_Donna Matilda and the Doctor go off
bowing. As soon as they have gone, Henry IV. suddenly
changes his tone_). Buffoons, buffoons! One can play any
tune on them! And that other fellow ... Pietro Damiani!...
Caught him out perfectly! He's afraid to appear before me
again. (_Moves up and down excitedly while saying this; then
sees Berthold, and points him out to the other three
valets_). Oh, look at this imbecile watching me with his
mouth wide open! (_Shakes him_). Don't you understand? Don't
you see, idiot, how I treat them, how I play the fool with
them, make them appear before me just as I wish? Miserable,
frightened clowns that they are! And you (_addressing the
valets_) are amazed that I tear off their ridiculous masks
now, just as if it wasn't I who had made them mask
themselves to satisfy this taste of mine for playing the
madman!

LANDOLPH--HAROLD--ORDULPH (_bewildered, looking at one
another_). What? What does he say? What?

HENRY IV. (_answers them imperiously_). Enough! enough!
Let's stop it. I'm tired of it. (_Then as if the thought
left him no peace_): By God! The impudence! To come here
along with her lover!... And pretending to do it out of
pity! So as not to infuriate a poor devil already out of the
world, out of time, out of life! If it hadn't been supposed
to be done out of pity, one can well imagine that fellow
wouldn't have allowed it. Those people expect others to
behave as they wish all the time. And of course, there's
nothing arrogant in that! Oh, no! Oh, no! It's merely their
way of thinking, of feeling, of seeing. Everybody has his
own way of thinking; you fellows, too. Yours is that of a
flock of sheep--miserable, feeble, uncertain.... But those
others take advantage of this and make you accept their way
of thinking; or, at least, they suppose they do; Because,
after all, what do they succeed in imposing on you? Words,
words which anyone can interpret in his own manner! That's
the way public opinion is formed! And it's a bad look out
for a man who finds himself labelled one day with one of
these words which everyone repeats; for example "madman," or
"imbecile." Don't you think is rather hard for a man to keep
quiet, when he knows that there is a fellow going about
trying to persuade everybody that he is as he sees him, than
to fix him in other people's opinion as a
"madman"--according to him? Now I am talking seriously!
Before I hurt my head, falling from my horse.... (_stops
suddenly, noticing the dismay of the four young men_).
What's the matter with you? (_Imitates their amazed looks_).
What? Am I, or am I not, mad? Oh, yes! I'm mad all right!
(_He becomes terrible_). Well, then, by God, down on your
knees, down on your knees! (_Makes them go down on their
knees one by one_). I order you to go down on your knees
before me! And touch the ground three times with your
foreheads! Down, down! That's the way you've got to be
before madmen! (_Then annoyed with their facile
humiliation_): Get up, sheep! You obeyed me, didn't you? You
might have put the straight jacket on me!... Crush a man
with the weight of a word--it's nothing--a fly! all our life
is crushed by the weigh of words: the weight of the dead.
Look at me here: can you really suppose that Henry IV. is
still alive? All the same, I speak, and order you live men
about! Do you think it's a joke that the dead continue to
live?--Yes, _here_ it's a joke! But get out into the live
world!--Ah, you say: what a beautiful sunrise--for us! All
time is before us!--Dawn! We will do what we like with this
day--. Ah, yes! To tell with tradition, the old conventions!
Well, go on! You will do nothing but repeat the old, old
words, while you imagine you are living! (_Goes up to
Berthold who has now become quite stupid_.) You don't
understand a word of this, do you? What's your name?

BERTHOLD. I?... What?... Berthold....

HENRY IV. Poor Berthold! What's your name here?

BERTHOLD. I ... I ... my name in Fino.

HENRY IV. (_feeling the warning and critical glances of the
others, turns to them to reduce them to silence_). Fino?

BERTHOLD. Fino Pagliuca, sire.

HENRY IV. (_turning to Landolph_). I've heard you call each
other by your nick-names often enough! Your name is Lolo,
isn't it?

LANDOLPH. Yes, sire.... (_then with a sense of immense
joy_). Oh, Lord! Oh Lord! Then he is not mad....

HENRY IV. (_brusquely_). What?

LANDOLPH (_hesitating_). No ... I said....

HENRY IV. Not mad, eh? We're having a joke on those that
think I am mad! (_To Harold_)--I say, boy, your name's
Franco.... (_to Ordulph_) And yours....

ORDULPH. Momo.

HENRY IV. Momo, Momo.... A nice name that!

LANDOLPH. So he isn't....

HENRY IV. What are you talking about? Of course not! Let's
have a jolly, good laugh!... (_Laughs_): Ah!... Ah!...
Ah!...

LANDOLPH--HAROLD--ORDULPH (_looking at each other half happy
and half dismayed_). Then he's cured!... he's all right!...

HENRY IV. Silence! Silence!... (_To Berthold_): Why don't
you laugh? Are you offended? I didn't mean it especially for
you. It's convenient for everybody to insist that certain
people are mad, so they can be shut up. Do you know why?
Because it's impossible to hear them speak! What shall I say
of these people who've just gone away? That one is a whore,
another a libertine, another a swindler ... don't you think
so? You can't believe a word he says ... don't you think
so?--By the way, they all listen to me terrified. And why
are they terrified, if what I say isn't true? Of course, you
can't believe what madmen say--yet, at the same time, they
stand there with their eyes wide open with terror!--Why?
Tell me, tell me, why?--You see I'm quite calm now!

BERTHOLD. But, perhaps, they think that....

HENRY IV. No, no, my dear fellow! Look me well in the
eyes!... I don't say that it's true--nothing is true,
Berthold! But ... look me in the eyes!

BERTHOLD. Well....

HENRY IV. You see? You see?... You have terror in your own
eyes now because I seem mad to you! There's the proof of it
(_laughs_)!

LANDOLPH (_coming forward in the name of the others,
exasperated_). What proof?

HENRY IV. Your being so dismayed because now I seem again
mad to you. You have thought me mad up to now, haven't you?
You feel that this dismay of yours can become terror
too--something to dash away the ground from under your feet
and deprive you of the air you breathe! Do you know what it
means to find yourselves face to face with a madman--with
one who shakes the foundations of all you have built up in
yourselves, your logic, the logic of all your constructions?
Madmen, lucky folk! construct without logic, or rather with
a logic that flies like a feather. Voluble! Voluble! Today
like this and tomorrow--who knows? You say: "This cannot
be"; but for them everything can be. You say: "This isn't
true!" And why? Because it doesn't seem true to you, or you,
or you ... (_indicates the three of them in succession_) ...
and to a hundred thousand others! One must see what seems
true to these hundred thousand others who are not supposed
to be mad! What a magnificent spectacle they afford, when
they reason! What flowers of logic they scatter! I know that
when I was a child, I thought the moon in the pond was real.
How many things I thought real! I believed everything I was
told--and I was happy! Because it's a terrible thing if you
don't hold on to that which seems true to you today--to that
which will seem true to you tomorrow, even if it is the
opposite of that which seemed true to you yesterday. I would
never wish you to think, as I have done, on this horrible
thing which really drives one mad: that if you were beside
another and looking into his eyes--as I one day looked into
somebody's eyes--you might as well be a beggar before a door
never to be opened to you; for he who does enter there will
never be you, but someone unknown to you with his own
indifferent and impenetrable world.... (_Long pause.
Darkness gathers in the room, increasing the sense of
strangeness and consternation in which the four young men
are involved. Henry IV. remains aloof, pondering on the
misery which is not only his, but everybody's. Then he pulls
himself up, and says in an ordinary tone_): It's getting
dark here....

ORDULPH. Shall I go for a lamp?

HENRY IV. (_Ironically_). The lamp, yes the lamp!... Do you
suppose I don't know that as soon as I turn my back with my
oil lamp to go to bed, you turn on the electric light for
yourselves, here, and even there, in the throne room? I
pretend not to see it!

ORDULPH. Well, then, shall I turn it on now?

HENRY IV. No, it would blind me! I want my lamp!

ORDULPH. It's ready here behind the door. (_Goes to the main
exit, opens the door, goes out for a moment, and returns
with an ancient lamp which is held by a ring at the top_).

HENRY IV. Ah, a little light! Sit there around the table,
no, not like that; in an elegant, easy, manner!... (_To
Harold_): Yes, you, like that (poses him)! (_Then to
Berthold_): You, so!... and I, here (_sits opposite them_)!
We could do with a little decorative moonlight. It's very
useful for us, the moonlight. I feel a real necessity for
it, and pass a lot of time looking up at the moon from my
window. Who would think, to look at her that she knows that
eight hundred years have passed, and that I, seated at the
window, cannot really be Henry IV. gazing at the moon like
any poor devil? But, look, look! See what a magnificent
night scene we have here: the emperor surrounded by his
faithful counsellors!... How do you like it?

LANDOLPH (_softly to Harold, so as not to break the
enchantment_). And to think it wasn't true!...

HENRY IV. True? What wasn't true?

LANDOLPH (_timidly as if to excuse himself_). No ... I mean
... I was saying this morning to him (_indicates
Berthold_)--he has just entered on service here--I was
saying: what a pity that dressed like this and with so many
beautiful costumes in the wardrobe ... and with a room like
that (_indicates the throne room_)....

HENRY IV. Well? what's the pity?

LANDOLPH. Well ... that we didn't know....

HENRY IV. That it was all done in jest, this comedy?

LANDOLPH. Because we thought that....

HAROLD (_coming to his assistance_). Yes ... that it was
done seriously!

HENRY IV. What do you say? Doesn't it seem serious to you?

LANDOLPH. But if you say that....

HENRY IV. I say that--you are fools! You ought to have known
how to create a fantasy for yourselves, not to act it for
me, or anyone coming to see me; but naturally, simply, day
by day, before nobody, feeling yourselves alive in the
history of the eleventh century, here at the court of your
emperor, Henry IV.! You Ordulph (_taking him by the arm_),
alive in the castle of Goslar, waking up in the morning,
getting out of bed, and entering straightway into the dream,
clothing yourself in the dream that would be no more a
dream, because you would have lived it, felt it all alive in
you. You would have drunk it in with the air you breathed;
yet knowing all the time that it was a dream, so you could
better enjoy the privilege afforded you of having to do
nothing else but live this dream, this far off and yet
actual dream! And to think that at a distance of eight
centuries from this remote age of ours, so coloured and so
sepulchral, the men of the twentieth century are torturing
themselves in ceaseless anxiety to know how their fates and
fortunes will work out! Whereas you are already in history
with me....

LANDOLPH. Yes, yes, very good!

HENRY IV. ... Everything determined, everything settled!

ORDULPH. Yes, yes!

HENRY IV. And sad as is my lot, hideous as some of the
events are, bitter the struggles and troublous the
time--still all history! All history that cannot change,
understand? All fixed forever! And you could have admired at
your ease how every effect followed obediently its cause
with perfect logic, how every event took place precisely and
coherently in each minute particular! The pleasure, the
pleasure of history, in fact, which is so great, was yours.

LANDOLPH. Beautiful, beautiful!

HENRY IV. Beautiful, but it's finished! Now that you know, I
could not do it any more! (_Takes his lamp to go to bed_).
Neither could you, if up to now you haven't understood the
reason of it! I am sick of it now. (_Almost to himself with
violent contained rage_): By God, I'll make her sorry she
came here! Dressed herself up as a mother-in-law for me...!
And he as an abbot...! And they bring a doctor with them to
study me...! Who knows if they don't hope to cure me?...
Clowns...! I'd like to smack one of them at least in the
face: yes, that one--a famous swordsman, they say!... He'll
kill me.... Well, we'll see, we'll see!... (_A knock at the
door_). Who is it?

THE VOICE OF JOHN. Deo Gratias!

HAROLD (_very pleased at the chance for another joke_). Oh,
it's John, it's old John, who comes every night to play the
monk.

ORDULPH (_rubbing his hands_). Yes, yes! Let's make him do
it!

HENRY IV. (_at once, severely_). Fool, why? Just to play a
joke on a poor old man who does it for love of me?

LANDOLPH (_to Ordulph_). It has to be as if it were true.

HENRY IV. Exactly, as if true! Because, only so, truth is
not a jest (_opens the door and admits John dressed as a
humble friar with a roll of parchment under his arm_). Come
in, come in, father! (_Then assuming a tone of tragic
gravity and deep resentment_): All the documents of my life
and reign favorable to me were destroyed deliberately by my
enemies. One only has escaped destruction, this, my life,
written by a humble monk who is devoted to me. And you would
laugh at him! (_Turns affectionately to John, and invites
him to sit down at the table_). Sit down, father, sit down!
Have the lamp near you (_puts the lamp near him_)! Write!
Write!

JOHN (_opens the parchment and prepares to write from
dictation_). I am ready, your Majesty!

HENRY IV. (_dictating_). "The decree of peace proclaimed at
Mayence helped the poor and humble, while it damaged the
weak and the powerful (_curtain begins to fall_): It brought
wealth to the former, hunger and misery to the latter...."

_Curtain._