Complete Works of Thomas Hardy (Illustrated) (1093 page)

(She breaks down.)

Tristram

I spoke too rawly, maybe; mouthed what I Ought only to have mused. But do you dream

I for a leastness longer could abide Such dire disastrous lying? — Back to your ship;

Get into it; return by the aptest wind And mate with another man when thou canst find him,

Never uncovering how you cozened me: His temper might be tried thereby, as mine!

Iseult the White H.

No, no! I won’t be any other’s wife! How can a thing so monstrous ever be?

Tristram

If I had battened in Brittany with thee —

Iseult the White H.

But you don’t mean you’ll live away from me,

Leave me, and henceforth be unknown to me,

O you don’t surely? I could not help

coming;

Don’t send me away — do not, do not, do so!

(Q. Iseult above moves restlessly.) Forgive your Iseult for appearing here, Untoward seem it! For I love you so Your sudden setting out was death to me When I discerned the cause. Your sail smalled down:

0   I should have died had I not followed you. Only, my Tristram, let me be with thee, And see thy face. I do not sue for more!

Q. Iseult
{above)

She has no claim to importune like that, And gloss her hardihood in tracking him!

Tristram

Thou canst not haunt another woman’s house!

Iseult the White H.

O yes I can, if there’s no other way!

I have heard she does not mind. I’d

rather be

Her bondwench, if I am not good enough To be your wife, than not stay here at all-

Aye, I, the child of kings and governors, As luminous in ancestral line as she, Say this, so utter my abasement now! — Something will happen if I go away Of import dark to you (no matter what To me); and we two should not greet again!

— Could you but be the woman, I the man, I would not fly from you or banish you For fault so small as mine. O do not think It was so vile a thing. I wish — how much! —

You could have told me twenty such untruths,

That I might then have shown you / would not

Rate them as faults, but be much joyed to have you

In spite of all. If you but through and through

Could spell me, know how staunch I have stood, and am,

You’d love me just the same. Come, say you do,

And let us not be severed so again.

Q. Iseult
{above)

I can’t bear this!

Iseult the White H.

All the long hours and days

And heavy gnawing nights, and you not there,

But gone because you hate me! ‘Tis past what

A woman can endure!

Tristram (more gently)

Not hate you, Iseult.

But, hate or love, lodge here you cannot now:

It’s out of thinking.

(Drunken revellers heard.)

Know you, that in that room Just joining this, King Mark is holding feast, And may burst in with all his wassailers, And that the Queen —

Q. Iseult
{above)

He’s softening to her. Come! Let us go down, and face this agony!

Queen Iseult and Brangwain descend from the Gallery.

Iseult the White H.

O, I suppose I must not! And I am tired, Tired, tired! And now my once-dear Brittany home Is but a desert to me. (Q. Iseult and Brangwain come forward.)

— Oh, the Queen! Can I — so weak — encounter —

Q. Iseult

Ah — as I thought, Quite as I thought. It is my namesake, sure!

(Iseult the White h.faints. Indecision. Brangwain goes to her.) Take her away. The blow that bruises her

Is her own dealing. Better she had known The self-sown pangs of prying ere she sailed!

Brangwain carries her out, Tristram suddenly assisting at the last moment as far as the door.

Chanters : Men (as she is carried)

Fluttering with fear, Out-tasked her strength has she! Loss of her Dear Threatening too clear, Gone to this length has she! Strain too severe!

SCENE XV

Queen Iseult, Tristram, and Chanters.

Q. Iseult (after restlessly watching Tristram render aid and return)

So, after all, am I to share you, then, With another, Tristram? who, as I count,

comes here To take the Castle as it were her own!

Tristram

Sweet Queen, you said you’d let her come one day!

However, back she’s going to Brittany, Which she should not have left. Think

kindly of her, A weaker one than you!

Q. Iseult

What, Tristram; what! O this from you to me, who have sacrificed

Honour and name for you so long, so long! Why, she and I are oil and water here: Other than disunite we cannot be. She weaker? Nay, I stand in jeopardy This very hour —

(‘Noise of Mark and revellers.) Listen to him within! His peer will pierce your cloak ere long — or would

Were he but sober — and then where am I? Better for us that I do yield you to her, And you depart! Hardly can I do else: In the eyes of men she has all claim to thee

And I have none, yes, she possesses you! — (Turning and speaking in a murmur.) — Th’other Iseult possesses him, indeed; And it was I who set it in his soul To seek her out! — my namesake, whom I felt

A kindness for — alas, I know not why!

(Sobs silently.)

Chanters: Women

White-Hands did this, Desperate to win again Back to her kiss One she would miss! — Yea, from the Queen again Win, for her bliss!

Chanters: M. and W.

Dreams of the Queen Always possessing him Racked her yestreen Cruelly and keen — Him, once professing him

Hers through Life’s scene!

Re-enter
Brangwain.

SCENE XVI

Tristram, Queen Iseult, Brangwain, and Chanters.

Brangwain stands silent a few moments, till Q. Iseult turns and looks demandingly at her.

Brangwain The lady from the other coast now mends.

Q. Iseult (
haughtily)

Give her good rest. (Bitterly) Yes, yes, in

sooth I said That she might come. Put her in mine own bed:

I’ll sleep upon the floor!

Exit
Brangwain.

Tristram

‘Tis in your bitterness, My own sweet Queen, that you speak thus and thus!

Enter King Mark with Sir Andret to the Gallery, unperceived.

SCENE XVII

King Mark and Sir Andret
(above):
Queen Iseult, Tristram, and Chanters.

Sir Andret
(to
K. Mark)

See, here they are. God’s ‘ounds, sure, then was he

That harper I misdoubted once or twice; Or must have come while we were clinking cups,

No mischief dreaming!

Tristram

But, my best-beloved, Forgo these frets, and think of Joyous Gard!

(Approaches her.)

Q. Iseult (drawing back)

Nay, no more claspings! And if it should be That these new meetings operate on me

(You well know what I am touching on in this)

Mayhap by year’s-end I’ll not be alive, The which I almost pray for —

K. Mark (above)

Then ‘tis so! Their dalliances are in full gush again, Though I had deemed them hindered by his stay,

And vastly talked of ties, in Brittany.

Sir Andret

Such is betokened, certes, by their words, If we but wit them straight.

Tristram

O Queen my Love, Pray sun away this cloud, and shine again; Throw into your ripe voice and burning soul The music that they held in our aforetime: We shall outweather this!

(Enter Damsel with a letter.)

Who jars us now?

SCENE XVIII

Queen Iseult, Tristram, Damsel, King Mark., Sir Andret. and Chanters.

Damsel (‘humbly)

This letter, brought at peril, noble Knight,

King Mark has writ to our great Over- King —

Aye, Arthur — I the bearer. And I said,

“All that I can do for the brave Sir Tristram

That do will I! “ So I unscreen this scroll

(A power that chances through a friendly clerk).

In it he pens that as his baneful foe

He holds Sir Tristram, and will wreak revenge

Thrice through his loins as soon as hap may serve.

King Mark descends from Gallery and stands in the background, Sir Andret remaining above.

Q. Iseult {aside to Tristram with misgivings)

These threats of Mark against you quail my heart,

And daunt my sore resentment at your wounds

And slights of late! O Tristram, save thyself,

And think no more of me!

Tristram

Forget you — never!

(Softly) Rather the sunflower may forget the sun!

(To Damsel) Wimple your face anew, wench: go unseen;

Re-seal the sheet, which I care not to con,

And send it on as bid.

Exit
Damsel.

SCENE XIX

Queen Iseult, Tristram, King Mark, Sir Andret, and Chanters.

Tristram

Sure, Mark was drunk When writing such! Late he fed heavily And has, I judge, roved out with his boon knightage

Till evenfall shall bring him in to roost. Q. Iseult

I wonder! . . . [nestling closer) I’ve forebodings, Tristram dear; But, your death’s mine, Love!

Tristram

And yours mine, Sweet Heart!... — Now that the hall is lulled, and none seems near,

I’ll keep up my old minstrel character And sing to you, ere I by stealth depart To wait an hour more opportune for love. —

I could, an if I would, sing jeeringly Of the King; I mean the song Sir Dinadan Made up about him. He was mighty

wroth To hear it.

Q. Iseult

Nay, Love; sadness suits you best . . . Sad, sad are we: we will not jeer at him:

Such darkness overdraws us, it may whelm Us even with him my master! Sing of love.

(Tristram harps a prelude.) I hope he may not heel back home and hear!

Tristram (singing and playing)

Yea, Love, true is it sadness suits me best!

Sad, sad we are; sad, sad shall ever be. What shall deliver us from Love’s unrest, And bonds we did not forecast, did not see!

Q. Iseult

Yea, who will dole us, in these chains that chafe,

Bare pity! — O were ye my King — not he!

(She weeps, and he embraces her awhile.)

Tristram (thoughtfully)

Where is King Mark? I must be soon away!

King Mark, having drawn his dagger, creeps up behind Tristram.

K. Mark (in a thick voice)

He’s in his own house, where he ought to be,

Aye, here! where thou’lt be not much longer, man!

He runs Tristram through the back with his dagger. Queen Iseult shrieks. Tristram falls, Queen Iseult sinking down by him with clasped hands. Sir Andret descends quickly from the gallery.

Tristram (
weakly)

From you! — against whom never have I sinned