502
Vittoria
Father.lead us here. Few minutes have I leftTo linger, dear one. My command is stern
Vittoria. We will not trouble you along the wayNor ask you why you go, nor beg to comeUnto the city, since you tell us nay.Let us go with you to the great white cliff—Only so far!
Father (smiling). Then you will wish to seeThe next cliff and the next!
Vittoria.next cliff and the next! I promise, no!For all my wandering shall I find an endAt the white cliff. [She puts her arms around her father's neck and whispers:Such utter happinessIs mine I cannot bear it! Let me share,If but an hour, my great joy with you.It is for this, this only I would go.A single shadow dims the sun for me—This undreamed gladness is not wholly yoursAs it is mine. Dear, did you ever knowContent like this?
Father (putting his finger on her lip).Hush! hush! If you must goMake ready in all haste.(To himself.) She springs awayLoosening her golden girdle as she moves.Oh, may the radiance upon her faceShine throughout life undimmed! My little one!Alone, from you to the great mysteryI go, not to return. Never againShall I behold your face, above all elseBeloved, save only hers, the unforgotten,Unforgettable!
Scene III.—The road toward the city. Vittoria rides between her father and her lover. The servants are behind.
Vittoria (gayly). The yellow butterflies show us the way!So with you two I could ride endlessly,The fresh wind in our faces, and aheadThis road between the green hills and the sea.
Father. When you are old, bambina, you will wishSometimes to stop and rest.
Vittoriatimes to stop and rest. When we are old!We shall be old together, old and glad—Three white heads nodding early off to sleep!When will the wrinkles come? “Too soon,” you say,“And youth is short?” Then age is very long,But love is longest, surely. You must rest:The sun is growing warm. At the last bendI saw the great white cliff, straight as a lineDropped from a blue sky to a bluer sea,There we shall stop, and you shall go to sleepIn some deep shadow, while we sit near byMaking our plans for all the days to come.Soon you return to us, and I shall hearSome day a knocking at the convent gate.How I shall listen for it! Then we goBack to our villa. Till I see againThe old familiar things, I shall not knowMy blessedness. The dial in the grass,The cypress shade must measure it for me,And all the waves must tell it. Dear, my lord,[She touches her lover's arm.I want old places round me once again.Life is too sacred for the new.
Luigi (looking at the father with eyes of pity).Life is too sacred for the new. We goBeloved, to your villa. May our lifeBeat on like music, pealing strong betweenThe murmur of the fountain and the sea.
Vittoria (laughing). We shall be blessèd. Now the footstep comesFor which I watched, not knowing, and shall fallUpon our floor. Soon shall the wine be pouredIn three slim glasses, not again in two;For three the bread be broken; three carved chairsStand by the table. Wishing no least thing,We shall go on forever. Now I waitTo ask Teresa of the tapestryThat shall be hung in your apartment, sir.[She turns back.
Father. Your eyes still beg for sacrifice, my son.It may not be! The bitterness of deathAlready you have taken. When I seeUnshadowed in my daughter’s eyes the loveThat you have lighted, I go on content.May I but stand at my cathedral gate,And have, from out the numbered minutes leftOf this my life, but time enough to speak!
Luigi. “My heart is full of sadness for you, sir,And full of fear for her. We journey onToward a plague-stricken city. Death may passAt any minute. Walking carelesslyAlong the green grass here she may look upTo see some face borne past. How can I thenFulfil my trust ?
Father (thinking). It may come first to her:Not knowing, she may meet the enemyAnd greet him gladly, as one greets a friend.Oh, they are happy who thus touch his handEre it is laid on the belovèd!
Luigi.it is laid on the belovèd!YetThe risk?
Father. My son, I know not what to say.In the great shadow of approaching changeThis old world startles me as one new-made. I doubt where I was sure, and what was doubtSeems trembling into hope. Blindly, perhaps,Have I done wrong? Had she a right to knowThe secret?
Luigi.secret? It may be.
Father.secret? It may be. Your smile is sad.If I should tell her now, before I go—?Should make her understand, if one may knowWho has not seen
Luigi (hastily). Tell her, but not to-day!Her wedding-day must keep her as she was.I could not have her change, not by one shadeOf color in her cheek or differenceOf thought in her dear eyes.
Father.thought in her dear eyes. No, not to-day!It is enough, if, in the danger hereWe meet the unknown thing, to tell her then.At the first sight she has of death we speak—All that we know.
