Metternich.
Grazalcowitch!
That's terrible!
[To a Lackey.]
Pray let me have a sandwich.
Sedlinzky.
You laugh?—Hush!—Here they come. They've fled the light
And seek a nook to whisper in.
[Enter several Dominos.]
One of the Dominos.
My dear,
How sweet it is to run a risk for his sake.
Second Domino.
Let us conspire!
Third Domino.
His hair's such lovely auburn.
Fourth Domino.
It's like a pretty little halo, dear,
Through which a regal crown is dimly seen.
Fifth Domino.
He has a doubly-fascinating charm:—
A fair Napoleon! Hamlet dressed in white!
First Domino.
Let us conspire!
Second Domino.
First, I suggest we order
A golden bee from Stieger in Vienna.
Another Domino.
Vienna! Why? That would be idiotic!
We'll have it made by Odiot in Paris.
Fourth Domino.
I move we always wear with every dress
A very striking bunch of violets.
First Domino.
That's it, Princess!
Another Domino.
And let us risk returning
To Empire fashions.
Second Domino.
For evening: not for day.
Third Domino.
Dear, don't forget the horrible short waists.
All.
And all the puffs!—and ruches!—Dearest!
Metternich.
Ladies—
All.
Good heavens!
Metternich.
Go on with your delicious plotting.
Conspire! conspire! Ha-ha!
[He goes out, laughing heartily.]
First Domino.
And now
That thanks to idle chatter we've removed
Whatever doubts Sedlinzky had aroused,
We'll prove that after female Machiavellis
The Metternichest Metternich's a baby.
All.
Yes!
First Domino.
Each remembers what she has to do?
All.
Yes!
First Domino.
Mingle with the dances.
Several Masks.
[Pursuing another.]
He's so funny!
A Mask.
It must be Sandor!
Another.
No! it's Fürstenberg!
Another.
And who's the bear, dancing to Schubert's waltz?
A Mask.
What's sad Elvira's dress? A star?
Gentz.
A night-light.
A Mask.
Thecla, the hypocrite—?
Gentz.
Disguised as Truth.
Tiburtius.
[Entering with Theresa.]
Not gone to Parma, sister?
Theresa.
No. To-morrow.
The Duchess put it off to see this ball.
[Pointing to a Domino who passes at the back
accompanied by a Mask.]
She's yonder with Bombelles: the greenish cape.
Tiburtius.
I'm glad you're going, for Noblesse oblige;
I couldn't stand much more of those asides
Between the little Bonaparte and you.
Theresa.
What?
Tiburtius.
'Tis our glory that our ancestors
Have not been over-prudish with our kings;
It is no fall to pick up handkerchiefs
When on the handkerchief a lily's broidered.
But honor never will accept a rag
Which bears the Bonapartist weed and hornet,
Woe to the Ogre's brat—!
Theresa.
What!
Tiburtius.
If he touched you!
Theresa.
You use expressions, brother—
Tiburtius.
They are warnings.
A Bear.
[Passing with a Chinese woman.]
How do you know I am a diplomat?
The Chinese Woman.
Why, by the skilful way you hide your claws.
The Attaché.
[Pursuing Fanny.]
Is there no way of knowing who you are?
Now, are you English?
Fanny.
Ja.
The Attaché.
Or German?
Fanny.
Oui.
Prokesch.
[Entering with the Duke.]
My Lord, is not the ball beyond compare?
The Punchinello.
[To a Domino.]
Your ear—!
The Domino.
What for?
The Punchinello.
My secret! Hush!
[To another Domino.]
Your ear!
Prokesch.
This corner's charming, given up to shadows—
The Chinese Woman.
[To the Bear.]
What are you carrying on your arm?
The Bear.
My nose-ring.
Prokesch.
Charming, those scattered blocks, the broken god,
The ivied urn, and, in its frame of stone,
Yonder the water. It is like—
The Duke.
A mirror!
Prokesch.
What had Prince Metternich to say last night?
[Seeing the Duke unmask.]
You take your mask off?
The Duke.
And, alas, that's all
A stone.
Prokesch.
What for?
The Duke.
To cast into the pond—
All's vanished. Only circles on the water.
Prokesch.
You are depressed, and yet to-night the plot
Must come to a head if I may trust the symptoms.
These lines were slipped into my hand this morning:
[He takes a note out of his pocket.]
"Ask him to be there early, and to wear
His uniform beneath a violet cloak."
The Duke.
Oh, 'twere too criminal—
Prokesch.
The note—
The Duke.
The note
Is from a woman anxious not to miss me.
I've taken her advice, for I am here
Only for love's adventure.
Prokesch.
No!
The Duke.
That's all.
Prokesch.
But then—the plot?
The Duke.
Oh, 'twere too criminal,
Dear country, made of sunshine and of laughter,
To raise upon the high seat of thy glory
A child of night, misfortune, and the Escurial!
What if, when I were seated there, the past,
Plunging its yellow hands into my soul,
With hideous claws unearthed some ancestor:
Some Rudolph or some Philip? Ah! I dread
Lest at the humming of Imperial bees
The monster sleeping in me should awake.
Prokesch.
[Laughing.]
Prince, this is madness!
The Duke.
[With a shudder and a look which makes Prokesch
start back with horror.]
Madness! Do you think so?
Prokesch.
Good heavens!
The Duke.
Buried in their fastnesses,
Cowering in Bohemia or Castile,
Each had his madness. What is mine to be?
Come! We'll decide! You see I am resigned.
'Tis ti
me to choose—and I have choice enough:
My thoughtful forebears left a catalogue!
Shall I be melomaniac or astrologer?
Catch birds, bend o'er alembics, mumble prayers?
Prokesch.
Too well I see what Metternich has done!
The Duke.
Grandfather, shall I carry on your great
Herbarium, where the hellebore is missing?
Or shall I, living, play at being dead?
Which ancestor will godfather my madness?
The living-dead, the alchemist, or bigot?
You see, they took their madness rather sadly,
But mingled perfumes make a novel scent;
My brain, mixed of these gloomy brains, may start
Some pretty little madness of its own.
Come! What shall my peculiar madness be?
By heavens! My instincts, conquered till to-day,
Make it quite simple: I'll be mad with love!
I'll love and love, and crush, with bitter hate,
This Austrian lip under a passionate kiss!
Prokesch.
Prince!
The Duke.
As Don Juan I am all my race!
Snarer of hearts, astrologer of eyes;
I'll have herbaria full of blighted names,
And the philosopher's stone I seek is love!
Prokesch.
My Lord!
The Duke.
Why, if you think of it, dear friend,
Napoleon's son, Don Juan, is strict logic.
The soul's the same: ever dissatisfied;
The same unceasing lust of victory.
Oh splendid blood another has corrupted,
Who, striving to be Cæsar, was not able;
Thy energy is not all dead within me.
A misbegotten Cæsar is Don Juan!
Yes, 'tis another way of conquering;
Thus I shall know that fever of the heart
Which Byron tells us kills whom it devours;
And 'tis a way of being still my father.
Napoleon or Don Juan!—They're decision,
The magic will, and the seductive grace.
When to retake a great unfaithful land,
Calm and alone, sure of himself and her,
The adventurer landed in the Gulf of Juan,
He felt Don Juan's thrill; and when Don Juan
Pricked a new conquest in his list of loves,
Did he not feel the pride of Bonaparte?
And, after all, who knows whether 'tis greater
To conquer worlds, or be a moment loved?
So be it? 'Tis well the legend closes thus,
And that this conqueror is the other's son.
I'm the fair shadow of the dusky hero,
And, as he conquered nations, one by one,
So will I conquer women, one by one.
Moonbeams shall be my sun of Austerlitz!
Prokesch.
Ah, silence! for your irony's too bitter.
The Duke.
Oh, yes; I know. I hear the spectres crying—
Blue-coated spectres torn along the whirlwind—
"Well? What about the Imperial tale of triumph?
Our toil? our wounds? our glory?—What about
The snow, the blood, the history, the dead
We left on all the fields of victory?
What will you do with these?"—I'll charm the ladies!
It's fine, among the people in the Prater,
To ride a horse that cost three thousand florins,
Which one can christen Jena. Austerlitz
Is a sure bait to catch a fair coquette.
Prokesch.
You'll never have the heart to use it thus.
The Duke.
Why, yes; why, yes, my friend. And in my scarf—
For 'tis a thing looks well upon a lover—
I'll wear a dainty eaglet for a pin.
There's music!—Now, O Cæsar's son, you're but
Mozart's Don Juan! Nay, not even Mozart's!
Strauss's! I'll waltz; for now I must become
Charming and useless: Austrian fancy-goods!
My aunt?—Why—!
Prokesch.
Oh, not that!
The Duke.
I want to see—
[Prokesch goes out.]
The Duke.
How deep the linden's perfume is to-night.
The Archduchess.
Notice my salver. I'm so proud of it.
The Duke.
You represent?
The Archduchess.
The "Chocolate-girl," the famous
Picture in Dresden.
The Duke.
[Affectedly.] Cha'ming. But your chocolate
Must be a nuisance.
The Archduchess.
No.
The Duke.
Do put it down.
The Archduchess.
Well, Franz? A little bit in love with life?
The Duke.
Glad to be nephew of a pretty aunt.
The Archduchess.
And I am glad to have so big a nephew.
The Duke.
Too pretty.
The Archduchess.
And too big.
The Duke.
For such a game.
The Archduchess.
What game?
The Duke.
The game of tender intimacy.
The Archduchess.
I fear your eyes to-night—!
The Duke.
But I love yours!
The Archduchess.
Ah, now I see! As all the court is masked,
Even friendship wears the domino of love.
The Duke.
Oh friendship—auntie with a cousin's eyes—
Friendship and love are always much too near
'Twixt aunts and nephews, god-sons and god-mothers—
Oh! do but smell the fragrance of the lindens!—
'Twixt pretty chocolate-girls and officers,
And frontier incidents are bound to happen.
The Archduchess.
Our friendship's lost its bloom.
The Duke.
I dearly love
This sentiment one cannot understand,
Where all's confused and mingled—
The Archduchess.
No, let be.
[She moves away.]
The Duke.
Oh, if you put on airs of an Archduchess—!
The Archduchess.
Farewell; you've pained me deeply, Franz.
[She goes.]
The Duke.
Ah, bah!
Into our friendship I let fall a drop,
And friendship turns to troubled love. I'll wait.
[He sees Theresa.]
Why! What is this? How comes it you are here?
So you're not hastening toward the skies of Parma?
And all this grass? What are you?
Theresa.
"Little Brooklet."
The Duke.
Ah, yes, I know. An exile on his rock,
My father had a brooklet for his friend
To drown the gaoler's voice, and that is why
At Schönbrunn, which is my Saint Helena,
My soul must not be left deprived of comfort.
Having the gaoler I've the brooklet too.
Theresa.
But you will never stoop to look at me.
The Duke.
Because I dreamed of flying from my rock;
L'Aiglon Page 14
