BEFORE THE CASTLE OF PETRELLA.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
ENTER BEATRICE AND LUCRETIA ABOVE ON THE RAMPARTS.
BEATRICE:
They come not yet.
LUCRETIA:
’Tis scarce midnight.
BEATRICE:
How slow
Behind the course of thought, even sick with speed,
Lags leaden-footed time!
LUCRETIA:
The minutes pass...
If he should wake before the deed is done?
BEATRICE:
O, mother! He must never wake again. _5
What thou hast said persuades me that our act
Will but dislodge a spirit of deep hell
Out of a human form.
LUCRETIA:
’Tis true he spoke
Of death and judgement with strange confidence
For one so wicked; as a man believing _10
In God, yet recking not of good or ill.
And yet to die without confession!...
BEATRICE:
Oh!
Believe that Heaven is merciful and just,
And will not add our dread necessity
To the amount of his offences.
[ENTER OLIMPIO AND MARZIO BELOW.]
LUCRETIA:
See, _15
They come.
BEATRICE:
All mortal things must hasten thus
To their dark end. Let us go down.
[EXEUNT LUCRETIA AND BEATRICE FROM ABOVE.]
OLIMPIO:
How feel you to this work?
MARZIO:
As one who thinks
A thousand crowns excellent market price
For an old murderer’s life. Your cheeks are pale. _20
OLIMPIO:
It is the white reflection of your own,
Which you call pale.
MARZIO:
Is that their natural hue?
OLIMPIO:
Or ’tis my hate and the deferred desire
To wreak it, which extinguishes their blood.
MARZIO:
You are inclined then to this business?
OLIMPIO:
Ay, _25
If one should bribe me with a thousand crowns
To kill a serpent which had stung my child,
I could not be more willing.
[ENTER BEATRICE AND LUCRETIA BELOW.]
Noble ladies!
BEATRICE:
Are ye resolved?
OLIMPIO:
Is he asleep?
MARZIO:
Is all
Quiet?
LUCRETIA:
I mixed an opiate with his drink: _30
He sleeps so soundly...
BEATRICE:
That his death will be
But as a change of sin-chastising dreams,
A dark continuance of the Hell within him,
Which God extinguish! But ye are resolved?
Ye know it is a high and holy deed? _35
OLIMPIO:
We are resolved.
MARZIO:
As to the how this act
Be warranted, it rests with you.
BEATRICE:
Well, follow!
OLIMPIO:
Hush! Hark! What noise is that?
MARZIO:
Ha! some one comes!
BEATRICE:
Ye conscience-stricken cravens, rock to rest
Your baby hearts. It is the iron gate, _40
Which ye left open, swinging to the wind,
That enters whistling as in scorn. Come, follow!
And be your steps like mine, light, quick and bold.
[EXEUNT.]
SCENE 4.3: