Lady S. Not yet. Here on your stage we two must die together-- An ever famous tragedy of art In this uncouth commercial age of ours. I hear it still: "If Warwick Groom plays Troilus." He cannot play it now--poor Warwick Groom! Ambiguous poison in that "if"; but death Will end all ambiguity. Tristram, drink. Sir T. Your eyes are wandering, pale and beggarly; Your voice is phantom-like, far off and chill: Martha, you have gone mad. Lady S. We both were mad; But I am sane at last: I cannot live. Be sane, and drink. Sir T. Not here, not now, not ever. Lady S. Not? But defeat is here, is everywhere; Behind the scenes, in front, and in our hearts. You promised me a hundred thousand times You never would survive defeat. Sir T. We loved Each other then; and were you now to say, "If failure rings the curtain down to-night, "Let us two, having loved each other well, "Having discharged ourselves of all our love, "Die in each other's arms", I should assent; Forget these years of dull estrangement; snatch You off to Venice or Palermo; end Defeat and triumph, and the world and time In one superb and golden aftermath, A full-eared harvest-moon of winnowed love. Lady S. Your words are like a smoky gust of heat Across a wilderness of snow! Shame! shame! Sir T. I cannot love where I am not beloved, And will not die to please an unloved wife. Lady S. But I do love you, Tristram! Love you? Oh, Did I not give you all the love I had? I love you now with something more than love; And never shall I rest until my dust, Cold, senseless, passionless, inanimate, Divinely rotted into virgin mould, Is mixed with yours to all eternity. Sir T. A deadly love--that has the ring of hate! Lady S. It is a kind of hate. I cannot live! I cannot live! I cannot let you live! Remember, Tristram, how like frantic beasts We toiled at love. Oh! ... Oh! ... How long I fought This grinding passion of remorse, how strove To deem the noxious beautiful! A fan Against a storm! The wind is up; my boat Beats on the breakers; all is swamped and lost. Sir T. But beauty sanctioned all our frantic love. Sometimes a moment's nausea--yes, sometimes I shudder when I think; but hurl it off Because I know the meaning: I am tired, Depressed, too solitary; or forget To eat, absorbed in study: food and wine Replenish all my powers, and straightway sex Becomes the purest wonder in the world. Lady S. My sex is dead: it dies in women, sex. I sinned; my life was sin; and since the power To sin is dead, the sinner must die too. Sir T. But I have still the power, the will to sin. Lady S. How hateful! Oh, how hateful! Tristram, think! Failure, defeat, disgrace--certain, to-night: I see it, feel it, know it; and never yet Has my delivered mood brought back to me A lying message. Better instant death! Sir T. But fortune came with Gervase--so you said.