The Mortal Gods and Other Plays Part 65

Doubt-blown city, rest.

Sleep on my heart. You shall not bleed for me.

[_Enter Ardia from chamber midway right_]

_Ard._ Alone, my father?

_Char._ Never alone, and yet My wish was calling thee. [_Sits, and draws her beside him_]

_Ard._ Ah, not one guard About thee?

_Char._ The only guard is always near,-- A fearless heart.

_Ard._ Then I have none. My heart Is made of fears.

_Char._ No charm but love will lift Our gates of rock.

_Ard._ But who knows love from hate In days like these? Some foe with friends.h.i.+p's eyes, Some secret knife of Oswald's----

_Char._ None may tread The guarded pa.s.s save our knight Vairdelan And your two brothers.

_Ard._ Vairdelan is late.

Why went he down?

_Char._ Knights true as he, my girl, Are never questioned.

_Ard._ [_Starting_] Who are at the gates?

_Char._ Your brothers come.

_Ard._ So soon? That means good news From Banissat. He'll be your strength against This mighty Oswald.

_Char._ Fair his word may be, But I go down the pa.s.s.

_Ard._ Go down? To meet That fiend?

_Char._ The man who calls himself my foe, But named of G.o.d my brother.

_Ard._ O, too much Thou lovest love! A fiend, I say!

_Char._ That name Give unto me when I consent to piece This spun-out life with breath of babes and gasp Of dying mothers. Would you feed these veins, Gelid and old, all golden venture done, With the warm waste of youth whose saved stream Might bear mankind unto the port of G.o.ds?

_Ard._ But you--you are my father!

_Char._ It is such cries Unsettle justice till her shaken scales Weigh nations 'gainst a heart.

_Ard._ Must I not love you?

_Char._ My Ardia, fair as though thou wert not mine, Or wert all hers who made gray Corinth young, The love that feeds behind a sheltered door Must be unroofed and take its bread of stars Ere it may answer to its holy name.

The heart must build no walls----

_Ard._ I build them not, But find them risen about me. You are here, Guardful and best, fending my eyes,--there stands My Biondel,--there Vigard brave,--and there....

_Char._ And there, my daughter?

_Ard._ Hark! 'Tis Vairdelan's voice!

[_Singing heard below_]

O fires that build upon the sea Till wave and foam of ye are part, And burn in mated ecstasy, Ye build again within my heart.

O clouds that breathe in flame and run In linked dreams along the sky In me the fire is never done, Though Eve's gray hand soon puts ye by.

Christ be my Hand of Eve upon The flame that tireless, fadeless leaps!

Haste holily, O Mary's moon, With dew for fire that never sleeps!

[_Ardia keeps a listening att.i.tude, not heeding the entrance of her brothers who come on left_]

_Char._ Well, sons?

_Bion._ Ay, well! That is the word we bring.

Avesta's prince, the gracious Banissat, Is now your sworn defender.

_Ard._ [_Turning_] And asks no price?

_Bion._ No more than your fair self, my sister.

_Vig._ [_As Ardia stands silent_] You doubt?

'Tis true. He'll make you princess!

_Ard._ He is old....

_Bion._ What call you old? He's in the fairest top Of manhood.

_Vig._ Old!

_Ard._ And cannot sing....

_Vig._ Not sing!

_Ard._ What need have we of him? Can Oswald scale These rock-barred heights?

_Vig._ Starvation can.

_Ard._ We've food Will last three harvest moons.

_Bion._ And Oswald camps Where plain and sea will feed ten thousand men As many years.

_Vig._ While here our skeletons With bleached grin may watch the feast below!