Plays of Gods and Men, Lord Dunsany [e books free to read TXT] 📗

id="id01022">Queen:

Nothing to fear? No, no more little fears to trouble me.

King Karnos:

They have told you there is nothing at all to fear. Indeed there is nothing.

Queen:

No more little fears. There is one great fear.

King Karnos:

A great fear! Why, what is it?

Queen:

I must not say. For you have often soothed me when I was frightened, and it were not well for me to trouble you at the last.

King Karnos:

What is your fear? Shall I send again for your maidens?

Queen:

No, it is not my fear. It is all men's fear if they knew.

King Karnos: [glancing round]

Ah, you have seen my man in red. I will send him away. I will——

Queen:

No, no. My fear is not earthly. I am not afraid of little things any more.

King Karnos:

Why, what is it then?

Queen:

I do not quite know. But you know how I have ever feared the gods. The gods are going to do some dreadful thing.

King Karnos:

Believe me; the gods do nothing nowadays.

Queen:

You have indeed been very good to me. It seems a little while since the camels came to Argun-Zeerith by the iris marshes, the camels with the gold-hung palanquin, and the bells above their heads, high up in the air, the silver bridal bells. It seems a very little while ago. I did not know how swift the end would come.

King Karnos:

What end? To whom is the end coming?

Queen:

Do not be troubled. We should not let Fate trouble us. The World and its daily cares, ah, they are frightful: but Fate—I smile at Fate. Fate cannot hurt us if we smile at it.

King Karnos:

What end do you say is coming?

Queen:

I do not know. Something that has been shall soon be no more.

King Karnos:

No, no. Look upon Thek. It is built of rock and our palace is all of marble. Time has not scratched it with six centuries. Six tearing centuries with all their claws. We are throned on gold and founded upon marble. Death will some day find me, indeed, but I am young. Sire after sire of mine has died in Barbul-el-Sharnak or in Thek, but has left our dynasty laughing sheer in the face of Time from over these age-old walls.

Queen:

Say farewell to me now, lest something happen.

King Karnos:

No, no, we will not say unhappy things.

Executioner:

The sun has set.

King Karnos:

Not yet. The jungle hides it. It is not yet set. Look at the beautiful light upon the orchids. For how long they have flashed their purple on the gleaming walls of Thek. For how long they will flash there on our immortal palace, immortal in marble and immortal in song. Ah, how the colour changes.

[To the Executioner]

The sun is set. Take him away.

[To the Queen]

It is he whose end you foresaw.

[The Executioner grips the Prophet by the arm.]

Voice-of-the-Gods:

The gods have lied!

King Karnos:

The jungle is sinking! It has fallen into the earth!

[The Queen smiles a little, holding his hand.]

The city is falling in! The houses are rolling towards us!

[Thunder off.]

Ichtharion:

They are coming up like a wave and darkness is coming with them.

[Loud and prolonged thunder. Flashes of red light and then total darkness. A little light comes back, showing recumbent figures, shattered pillars and rocks of white marble.]

[The Prophet's back is broken, but he raises the fore-part of his body for a moment.]

Voice-of-the-Gods: [triumphantly]

They have not lied!

Ichtharion:

O, I am killed.

[Laughter heard off.]

Someone is laughing. Laughing even in Thek! Why, the whole city is shattered.

[The laughter grows demoniac.]

What is that dreadful sound?

Voice-of-the-Gods:

It is the laughter of the gods that cannot lie, going back to their hills.

[He dies.]

[Curtain]

The Queen's Enemies

Dramatis Personæ

The Queen
Ackazárpses (her handmaid)
Prince Rhádamandáspes
Prince Zophérnes
The Priest of Horus
The King of the Four Countries
The Twin Dukes of Ethiopia
Tharni, Tharrabas, Harlee (Slaves)
Slaves.

Scene: An underground temple in Egypt.

Time: The Sixth Dynasty.

[The Curtain rises on darkness in both parts of the stage. Two Slaves appear with tapers on the steps. As they go down the steps, they light the torches that are clamped against the wall, with their tapers. Afterwards when they come to the temple they light the torches there till they are all lit. The two Slaves are Tharni and Tharrabas.]

Tharrabas:

Is it much further, Tharni?

Tharni:

I think not, Tharrabas.

Tharrabas:

A dank and terrible place.

Tharni:

It is not much further.

Tharrabas:

Why does the Queen banquet in so fearful a place?

Tharni:

I know not. She banquets with her enemies.

Tharrabas:

In the land from which I was taken we do not banquet with our enemies.

Tharni:

No? The Queen will banquet with her enemies.

Tharrabas:

Why? Know you why?

Tharni:

It is the way of the Queen.

[Silence.]

Tharrabas:

The door, Tharni, we have come to the door!

Tharni:

Yes, that's the Temple.

Tharrabas:

Surely a grim place.

Tharni:

The banquet is prepared. We light these torches, that is all.

Tharrabas:

Unto whom is it holy?

Tharni:

They say to the Nile once. I know not to whom it is holy now.

Tharrabas:

So Nile has left it?

Tharni:

They say they worship him in this place no longer.

Tharrabas:

And if I were holy Nile I also would stay up there [pointing] in the sunlight.

[He suddenly sees the huge misshapen bulk of Harlee.]

Oh-h-h!

Harlee:

Urh

Tharni:

Why, it's Harlee.

Tharrabas:

I thought you were some fearful, evil god.

[Harlee laughs. He remains leaning on his great iron bar.]

Tharni:

He waits here for the Queen.

Tharrabas:

What sinister need could she have of Harlee?

Tharni:

I know not. You wait for the Queen, Harlee?

[Harlee nods.]

Tharrabas:

I would not banquet here. Not with a Queen.

[Harlee laughs long.]

Tharrabas:

Our work is done. Come. Let us leave this place.

[Exeunt Tharrabas and Tharni up the steps.]

[The Queen appears with her handmaid, Ackazárpses, coming down the steps. Her handmaid holds her train. They enter the temple.]

Queen:

Ah. All is ready.

Ackazárpses:

No, no, Illustrious Lady. Nothing is ready. Your raiment—we must fasten it here [shoulder], and then the bow in your hair.

[She begins to titivate the Queen.]

Queen:

Ackazárpses, Ackazárpses, I cannot bear to have enemies.

Ackazárpses:

Indeed, Illustrious Lady, it is wrong that you should have enemies. One so delicate, so slender and withal so beautiful should never have a foe.

Queen:

If the gods could understand they would never permit it.

Ackazárpses:

I have poured out dark wine to them, I have offered them fat, indeed, I have often offered them savoury things. I have said: The Queen should not have enemies; she is too delicate, too fair. But they will not understand.

Queen:

If they could see my tears they would never permit such woes to be borne by one small woman. But they only look at men and their horrible wars. Why must men slay one another and make horrible war?

Ackazárpses:

I blame your enemies, Illustrious Lady, more than the gods. Why should they trouble you who are so fair and so easily hurt by their anger? It was but a little territory you took from them. How much better to lose a little territory than to be unmannerly and unkind.

Queen:

O speak not of the territory. I know naught of these things. They say my Captains took it. How should I know? O why will they be my enemies?

Ackazárpses:

You are most fair to-night, Illustrious Lady.

Queen:

I must needs be fair to-night.

Ackazárpses:

Indeed you are most fair.

Queen:

A little more perfume, Ackazárpses.

Ackazárpses:

I will tie the coloured bow more evenly.

Queen:

O they will never look at it. They will not know if it is orange or blue. I shall weep if they do not look at it. It is a pretty bow.

Ackazárpses:

Calm yourself, lady! They will be here soon.

Queen:

Indeed I think they are very close to me now, for I feel myself trembling.

Ackazárpses:

You must not tremble, Illustrious Lady; you must not tremble.

Queen:

They are such terrible men, Ackazárpses.

Ackazárpses:

But you must not tremble, for your raiment is now perfect; yet if you tremble, alas! who may say how it will hang?

Queen:

They are such huge, terrible men.

Ackazárpses:

O the raiment, the raiment; you must not, you must not!

Queen:

O I cannot bear it. I cannot bear it. There is Rhádamandáspes, that huge, fierce soldier, and the terrible Priest of Horus, and… and… O I cannot see them, I cannot see them.

Ackazárpses:

Lady, you have invited them.

Queen:

O say I am ill, say I am sick of a fever.

Quick, quick, say I have some swift fever and cannot see them.

Ackazárpses:

Illustrious Lady——

Queen:

Quick, for I cannot bear it.

[Exit Ackazárpses.]

Queen:

O, I cannot bear to have enemies.

Ackazárpses:

Lady, they are here.

Queen:

O what shall we do?… Set this bow higher upon my head so that it must be seen. [Ackazárpses does so.] The pretty bow.

    [She continues to look in a hand mirror. A Slave descends the
    stairs. Then Rhádamandáspes and Zophérnes. Rhádamandáspes and
    Zophérnes stop; the Slave stops lower down.]

Zophérnes:

For the last time, Rhádamandáspes, consider. Even yet we may turn back.

Rhádamandáspes:

She had no guards outside nor was there any hiding place for them.
There was the empty plain and the Nile only.

Zophérnes:

Who knows what she may have in this dark temple?

Rhádamandáspes:

It is small and the stairway narrow; our friends are close behind us.
We could hold these steps with our swords against all her men.

Zophérnes:

True. They are narrow steps. Yet… Rhádamandáspes, I do not fear man or god or even woman, yet when I saw the letter this woman sent bidding us banquet with her I felt that it was not well that we should come.

Rhádamandáspes:

She said that she would love us though we were her enemies.

Zophérnes:

It is not natural to love one's enemies.

Rhádamandáspes:

She is much swayed by whims. They sway her as the winds in spring sway flowers—this way and that. This is one of her whims.

Zophérnes:

I do not trust her whims.

Rhádamandáspes:

They name you Zophérnes, giver of good counsel, therefore I will turn back because you counsel it, though I would fain go down and banquet with this little playful lady.

[They turn and mount.]

Zophérnes:

Believe me, Rhádamandáspes, it is better. I think that if you had gone down these steps we scarcely should have seen the sky again.

Rhádamandáspes:

Well, well, we turn back, though I would fain have humoured the Queen's whim. But look. The others come. We cannot turn back. There comes the Priest of Horus; we must go to the banquet now.

Zophérnes:

So be it.

[They descend.]

Rhádamandáspes:

We will be circumspect. If she has men in there we return at once.

Zophérnes:

So be it.

[The Slave opens the door.]

Slave:

The Princes Rhádamandáspes and Zophérnes.

Queen:

Welcome, Illustrious Princes.

Rhádamandáspes:

Greeting.

Queen:

O you have brought your sword!

Rhádamandáspes:

I have brought my sword.

Queen:

O but it is so terrible, your great sword.

Zophérnes:

We always carry our