Pélléas and Mélisande; Alladine and Palomides; HomeMaeterlinck, Maurice
General
Pélléas and Mélisande; Alladine and Palomides; Home
Maeterlinck, Maurice
French drama
Yes, yes; there is something underneath....
SECOND SERVANT.
Yes; but she was delivered of her babe three days ago....
THE OLD SERVANT.
Exactly!... She was delivered on her death-bed; is that a little
sign?--And what a child! Have you seen it?--A wee little girl a beggar
would not bring into the world.... A little wax figure that came much
too soon;... a little wax figure that must live in lambs' wool....
Yes, yes; it is not happiness that has come into the house....
FIRST SERVANT.
Yes, yes; it Is the hand of God that has been stirring....
SECOND SERVANT.
Yes, yes; all that did not happen without reason....
THIRD SERVANT.
It is as good lord Pélléas ... where is he?--No one knows....
THE OLD SERVANT.
Yes, yes; everybody knows.... But nobody dare speak of it.... One does
not speak of this;... one does not speak of that;... one speaks no
more of anything;... one no longer speaks truth.... But _I_ know he
was found at the bottom of Blind Man's Spring;... but no one, no one
could see him.... Well, well, we shall only know all that at the last
day....
FIRST SERVANT.
I dare not sleep here any longer....
THE OLD SERVANT.
Yes, yes; once ill-fortune is in the house, one keeps silence in
vain....
THIRD SERVANT.
Yes; it finds you all the same....
THE OLD SERVANT.
Yes, yes; but we do not go where we would....
FOURTH SERVANT.
Yes, yes; we do not do what we would....
FIRST SERVANT.
They are afraid of us now....
SECOND SERVANT.
They all keep silence....
THIRD SERVANT.
They cast down their eyes in the corridors.
FOURTH SERVANT.
They do not speak any more except in a low voice.
FIFTH SERVANT.
You would think they had all done it together.
SIXTH SERVANT.
One doesn't know what they have done....
SEVENTH SERVANT.
What is to be done when the masters are afraid?... [_A silence_.
FIRST SERVANT.
I no longer hear the children screaming.
SECOND SERVANT.
They are sitting down before the ventilator.
THIRD SERVANT.
They are huddled against each other.
THE OLD SERVANT.
I no longer hear anything in the house....
FIRST SERVANT.
You no longer even hear the children breathe....
THE OLD SERVANT.
Come, come; it is time to go up....
[_Exeunt in silence._
SCENE II.--_An apartment in the castle._
ARKËL, GOLAUD, _and the_ PHYSICIAN _discovered in one corner of the
room._ MÉLISANDE _is stretched upon her bed._
THE PHYSICIAN.
It cannot be of that little wound she is dying; a bird would not have
died of it.... It is not you, then, who have killed her, good my lord;
do not be so disconsolate.... She could not have lived.... She was
born without reason ... to die; and she dies without reason.... And
then, it is not sure we shall not save her....
ARKËL.
No, no; it seems to me we keep too silent, in spite of ourselves, in
her room.... It is not a good sign.... Look how she sleeps ... slowly,
slowly;... it is as if her soul was cold forever....
GOLAUD.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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