[_A movement of horror._] AHINOAM All Gibeah! A WOMAN My little ones? No, no! [_She rushes frantically out._] SAMUEL Then, Saul of Gibeah, one thing and one Alone is to be done. A champion, To break this beetling giant down to death! SAUL There is none. SAMUEL Is none! Call! I order it. SAUL Then who will dare against him! [_A silence._] See you now. SAMUEL You, Abner, will not? ABNER It were death and vain. SAMUEL Doeg, chief servant of the king? DOEG Why me? Had I a mother out of Israel? I am an alien, an Edomite. DAVID My lord, this is no more endurable! Futile and death? Alien? Edomite? Has not this Philistine before the gates With insult and illimitable breath Vaunting of vanity and smiting laughter Boasted and braved and threatened up to Baal? And now unless one slay him, Israel From babe to age must bleed and be no more! I am a shepherd, have but seized the lion And throttled the bleating kid out of his throat; Little it then beseems that I thrust in Where battle captains pale and falter off; But this is past all carp of rank or station. One must go out--Goliath must have end. DOEG Ah, ah! and _you_ will! ISHUI _You?_ JONATHAN No, David! SAUL _You?_ DAVID Sudden you hound about me ravenous? Have I thrown doom not daring to your feet, Ruler of Israel, that you rise wild, Livid above me as an avalanche? DOEG A plot! it is a plot! He will be slain-- From you, my lord, dominion then will fall! Or should it not … SAMUEL Liar; it is no plot. But courage sprung seraphic out of night, Beautiful and a bravery from God! MICHAL [_Behind the throng._] Open, and let me enter! Open! [_She enters._] Father, It is not false? but now, the uttermost? To-morrow, if Goliath still exult, There’s peril of desolation, bloody ruin? SAMUEL I answer for him. MICHAL Then to your will, Father, unto will of yesterday I bend me now with sacrificial joy. Unto Goliath’s slayer is the hand Of Michal, the king’s daughter! DAVID [_Joyously_] Michal! Michal! DOEG See, see, my lord! Do you not understand? ISHUI It is another coiling of their plot! MICHAL Coiling of plot? What mean you? MERAB Ah? You know Not it is David offers against Goliath? MICHAL David? [_Shrinking_] David?