Scene VI
[The scenes are mis-numbered in the book and skip from the number IV to the number VI in Act V. (note of etext transcriber)]
The same. Marion, The Jailer
THE JAILER (to Marion.)
Be sure to come at the appointed hour.
[Goes up stage; during the rest of this scene he continues to walk up and down at the back.
MARION (advances with tottering steps as if absorbed in some desperate thought. Every now and then she draws her hand across her face as if to rub off something).
His lips, like red-hot iron, have branded me!
[Suddenly she discovers Didier, gives a cry, runs and throws herself breathless at his feet.
Didier—Didier!
DIDIER (roused with a start).
Here, Marion! My God!
[Coldly.] ’Tis you?
MARION.
Who should it be? Oh, leave me here—
Here at your feet! It is the place I love!
Your hands, your dear loved hands, give them—your hands!
Oh, they are wounded! Those harsh chains did that.
The wretched creatures! But I’m here—you know—
Oh, it is terrible! [She weeps; her sobs are audible.
DIDIER.
Why do you weep?
MARION.
Why? Didier, I’m not weeping! No, I laugh!
[She laughs.
We’ll soon escape from here! I laugh. I’m happy.
You will live; the danger’s passed.
[She falls again at Didier’s feet and sobs.
My God!
All this is killing me! I’m broken—crushed.
DIDIER.
Madame—
MARION (rises, without hearing him, and gets the bundle and brings it to him).
Now hurry! We have not much time!
Take this disguise. I’ve bribed the sentinels.
We’ll leave Beaugency without being seen.
Go down that street, at the wall’s end, out there!
The Cardinal will come to see them execute
His orders; we can’t lose an instant now.
The cannon will be fired when he arrives,
And we’ll be lost if we should still be here.
DIDIER.
’Tis well!
MARION.
Quick! hurry! Didier, you are saved!
To be free! Didier, how I love you—God!
DIDIER.
You say a street where the wall ends?
MARION.
I do.
I saw it. I’ve been there. It is quite safe.
I saw them close up the last window, too.
It may be we shall meet some women, but
They’ll think you’re just a passer-by. Come, love;
When you are far off—please put on these things—
We’ll laugh to see you thus disguised. Come, dear!
DIDIER (pushing the clothes aside with his foot).
There is no hurry.
MARION.
Death waits at the door.
Fly! Didier! Since I’ve come!
DIDIER.
Why did you come?
MARION.
To save you! What a question to ask me!
Why such a freezing tone?
DIDIER (with a sad smile).
Ah, well! We men
Are often senseless.
MARION.
We are losing time.
The horses wait. What you have in your mind,
You’ll tell me afterward. We must fly now.
DIDIER.
Who is that man there watching us?
MARION.
The jailer.
He’s safe; I bribed him, as I did the guard.
Do you suspect them? You have such an air.
DIDIER.
It’s nothing. We’re so easily deceived.
MARION.
Come! Each lost moment chills me to the heart.
I seem to hear the tread of that great crowd.
Hasten, my Didier—on my knees—oh, fly!
DIDIER (indicating Saverny, asleep).
Tell me which one of us you want to save.
MARION (overcome for a moment).
[Aside.] Gaspard is generous: he would not tell.
[Aloud.] Does Didier speak to his beloved thus?
My Didier, what have you against me?
DIDIER.
Naught.
Lift up your face and look me in the eyes.
[Marion, trembling, fixes her eyes on him.
It is a perfect likeness! Yes.
MARION.
My love,
I worship you, but come!
DIDIER.
Don’t turn away!
[He looks at her fixedly.
MARION (terrified at his look).
[Aside.] The kisses of that man, he sees them! God!
[Aloud.] You have a secret, something against me!
It hurts you! Tell me all about it, dear.
You know we often make things worse by thinking,
And too late find it out; then we regret.
I had my share in all your thoughts, love, once!
Speak, are those days for evermore gone by?
Do you not love me now? Have you forgot
My little room at Blois? Forgotten how
We loved each other, till the world was lost?
Sometimes you grew uneasy; then I said,
“If any one should see him!” Oh, ’twas fine!
But one day has destroyed it all. You’ve said
A thousand times, in words that burned my soul,
I was your love, I knew your secrets, I
Could make you anything I chose. What have
I ever asked? I’ve always thought with you!
This time, oh, yield to me! It is your life
I’m pleading for. My Didier, hark to me.
Alive or dead, I swear to follow you.
All things with you, love, will be sweet to me—
To fly, or die upon the scaffold. What!
You push me back? You shall not! Leave your hand,
I want it. My poor brow, it does no harm
To rest it on your knees. I am so tired;
I ran so fast to come! What would they say,
The people I knew once, to see me now?
I was so gay, so merry; now I weep!
What is it that you have against me? Speak!
Oh, shame! You must let me lie at your feet.
It’s very cruel of you not to say
One single word. When we have thoughts, we speak!
’Twould be more merciful to stab me, love!
See, I have dried my tears, and I am smiling.
You smile too. Oh, if you don’t smile at me,
I will not love you! I have always done
Just what you wanted; now it is your turn.
These chains are what have chilled your soul. Love, smile
And speak to me, and say “Marie.”
DIDIER.
“Marie”
Or “Marion”?
MARION (falls annihilated at his feet).
Didier, be merciful!
DIDIER (with terrible tone).
Here, no one finds an entrance easily.
Prisons of state are guarded night and day,
The doors are iron, walls twenty cubits high;
To open these remorseless doors, madame,
To whom here did you prostitute yourself?
MARION.
Who told you?
DIDIER.
No one; but I understand.
MARION.
Didier, I swear by every hope divine
It was to save you, tear you from this place;
To melt the executioner—to save you—
Don’t you hear?
DIDIER (folding his arms).
I thank you! To descend
As low as that! To have no shame, no soul!
Oh, madame! can one be so infamous?
[Crossing the court with a great cry of rage.
Who is this trader in disgrace and vice,
Who puts a price like that upon my head?
Where is the jailer, where the judge, the man?—
That I may crush him as I crush this thing.
[He is about to break the portrait in his hands, but he stops, and beside himself, continues.
The judge? Yes, gentlemen, make laws and judge!
What matters it to me if the false weight
Which swings your vile scales to this side or that
Be made of woman’s honor or man’s life?
[To Marion.] Go to your lover!
MARION.
Do not treat me thus!
Another word of scorn and I fall dead
Here at your feet. If ever love was true
And strong and pure, mine was. If any man
Was ever worshiped by a woman, you
Have been by me.
DIDIER.
Hush! Do not speak! I might,
For sorrow, have been born a woman too.
I might have been as infamous as you.
I might have sold myself, have given my breast
To any passer-by, as place for rest.
But if there came to me, in his frank way,
An honest man, filled with the love of truth,
If I had met a heart insane enough
To keep its vain illusions all these years,
Oh, sooner than not tell that honest man
“I’m this,” sooner than charm and dazzle him,
Sooner than fail to warn him that my eyes
So candid and my lips so pure were lies,
Sooner than be perfidious and base like that,
I’d want to dig my grave with my own hands.
MARION.
O God!
DIDIER.
How you would laugh if you could see
The picture that my heart painted of you!
How wise you were to shatter it, madame!
There you were chaste and beautiful and pure!
What injury has this poor man done you,
Who loved you on his bended knees?
[Presenting portrait to her.
Perhaps
This is a fitting time to give you back
This pledge of love ardent and true.
MARION (turning away with a cry).
Oh, shame!
DIDIER.
Did you not have it painted just for me?
[He laughs, and dashes the locket to the ground.
MARION.
Will some one, out of pity, kill me now?
THE JAILER.
Time’s passing.
MARION.
Yes, it flies; and we are lost.
Didier, I’ve not the right to say a single word.
I am a woman to whom naught is due.
You have rebuked and cursed me: you did well!
I merit still more hate and shame. You’ve been
Too kind; my broken, bruised heart is grateful.
But the remorseless hour draws near. Away!
The headsman you forget, remembers you.
I’ve planned it all. You can escape. Now, listen—
My God! do not refuse. You know how much
It costs me. Hate me, strike me, curse me, leave
Me to my shame, disown me, walk upon
My bleeding heart—but fly!
DIDIER.
Fly where? From whom?
There’s naught but you to fly from in this world;
And I escape you, for the grave is deep.
THE JAILER.
The hour is passing.
MARION.
O my Didier, fly!
DIDIER.
I will not!
MARION.
Just for pity!
DIDIER.
Pity! why?
MARION.
To see you taken, bound! To see you—there!
Only to think it makes me die of horror!
Come! I will be a servant unto you.
Come! Take me, when I have redeemed myself,
Just to have something underneath your feet.
The one you called “a wife” in times of trial—
DIDIER.
A wife! [Cannon sounds in the distance.
This makes of you a widow, then!
MARION.
Didier!
THE JAILER.
The hour is past.
[Rolling of drums. Enter Councilor of the Great Chamber, accompanied by penitents bearing torches, and by Executioner. A crowd of soldiers and people follow.
MARION.
Ah, Christ!