have heard he loved you,
As some old miser loves the dragon-stone
He hides among the cobwebs near the roof.
DEIDRE.
You mean that when a man who has loved like that
Is after crossed, love drowns in its own flood,
And that love drowned and floating is but hate.
And that a king who hates, sleeps ill at night,
Till he has killed, and that, though the day laughs,
We shall be dead at cockcrow.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
You have not my thought.
When I lost one I loved distractedly,
I blamed my crafty rival and not him,
And fancied, till my passion had run out,
That could I carry him away with me,
And tell him all my love, I’d keep him yet.
DEIDRE.
Ah! now I catch your meaning, that this king
Will murder Naisi, and keep me alive.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
’Tis you that put that meaning upon words
Spoken at random.
DEIDRE.
Wanderers like you,
Who have their wit alone to keep their lives,
Speak nothing that is bitter to the ear
At random; if they hint at it at all
Their eyes and ears have gathered it so lately
That it is crying out in them for speech.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
We have little that is certain.
DEIRDRE.
Certain or not,
Speak it out quickly, I beseech you to it;
I never have met any of your kind,
But that I gave them money, food, and fire.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
There are strange, miracle-working, wicked stones,
Men tear out of the heart and the hot brain
Of Libyan dragons.
DEIDRE.
The hot Istain stone,
And the cold stone of Fanes, that have power
To stir even those at enmity to love.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
They have so great an influence, if but sewn
In the embroideries that curtain in
The bridal bed.
DEIDRE.
O Mover of the stars
That made this delicate house of ivory,
And made my soul its mistress, keep it safe.
FIRST MUSICIAN.
I have seen a bridal bed, so curtained in,
So decked for miracle in Conchubar’s house,
And learned that a bride’s coming.
DEIDRE.
And I the bride?
Here is worse treachery than the seamew suffered,
For she but died and mixed into the dust
Of her dear comrade, but I am to live
And lie in the one bed with him I hate.
Where is Naisi? I was not alone like this
When Conchubar first chose me for his wife;
I cried in sleeping or waking and he came,
But now there is worse need.
NAISI [entering with FERGUS].
Why have you called?
I was but standing there, without the door.
DEIRDRE [going to the other door].
The horses are still saddled, follow me,
And hurry to our ships, and get us gone.
NAISI.
[Stopping her and partly speaking to her, partly to FERGUS.]
There’s naught to fear; the king’s forgiven all.
She has the heart of a wild bird that fears
The net of the fowler or the wicker cage,
And has been ever so. Although it’s hard,
It is but needful that I stand against you,
And if I did not you’d despise me for it,
As women do the husbands that they lead
Whether for good or evil.
DEIDRE.
I have heard
Monstrous, terrible, mysterious things,
Magical horrors and the spells of wizards.
FERGUS.
Why, that’s no wonder, you’ve been listening
To singers of the roads that gather up
The tales of the whole world, and when they weary
Imagine new, or lies about the living,
Because their brains are ever upon fire.
DEIDRE.
