You have done this,
My noble Julian! I will go with you
To sunset, if you will. My father gone!
Julian, there’s none to love me now but you.
You will love me, Julian?—always?
I but fear
That your heart, Lilia, is not big enough
To hold the love wherewith my heart would fill it.
I know why you think that; and I deserve it.
But try me, Julian. I was very silly.
I could not help it. I was ill, you know;
Or weak at least. May I ask you, Julian,
How your arm is to-day?
Almost well, child.
Twill leave an ugly scar, though, I’m afraid.
Never mind that, if it be well again.
I do not mind it; but when I remember
That I am all yours, then I grudge that scratch
Or stain should be upon me—soul, body, yours.
And there are more scars on me now than I
Should like to make you own, without confession.
My poor, poor Julian! never think of it; Putting her arms round him.
I will but love you more. I thought you had
Already told me suffering enough;
But not the half, it seems, of your adventures.
You have been a soldier!
I have fought, my Lilia.
I have been down among the horses’ feet;
But strange to tell, and harder to believe,
Arose all sound, unmarked with bruise, or blood
Save what I lifted from the gory ground. Sighing.
My wounds are not of such. Lilia, loosening her arms, and drawing back a little with a kind of shrinking, looks a frightened interrogation.
No. Penance, Lilia;
Such penance as the saints of old inflicted
Upon their quivering flesh. Folly, I know;
As a lord would exalt himself, by making
His willing servants into trembling slaves!
Yet I have borne it.
Laying her hand on his arm.
Ah, alas, my Julian,
You have been guilty!
Not what men call guilty,
Save it be now; now you will think I sin.
Alas, I have sinned! but not in this I sin.—
Lilia, I have been a monk.
A monk? Turningpale.
I thought—Faltering.
Julian—I thought you said … did you not say … ? Very pale, brokenly.
I thought you said … With an effort.
I was to be your wife! Covering her face with her hands, and bursting into tears.
Speaking low and in pain.
And so I did.
Hopefully, and looking up.
Then you’ve had dispensation?
God has absolved me, though the Church will not.
He knows it was in ignorance I did it.
Rather would he have men to do his will,
Than keep a weight of words upon their souls,
Which they laid there, not graven by his finger.
The vow was made to him—to him I break it.
Weeping bitterly.
I would … your words were true … but I do know …
It never can … be right to break a vow;
If so, men might be liars every day;
You’d do the same by me, if we were married.
In anguish.
’Tis ever so. Words are the living things!
There is no spirit—save what’s born of words!
Words are the bonds that of two souls make one!
Words the security of heart to heart!
God, make me patient! God, I pray thee, God!
Not heeding him.
Besides, we dare not; you would find the dungeon
Gave late repentance; I should weep away
My life within a convent.
Come to England,
To England, Lilia.
Men would point, and say:
“There go the monk and his wife”; if they, in truth,
Called me not by a harder name than that.
There are no monks in England.
But will that
Make right what’s wrong?
Did I say so, my Lilia?
I answered but your last objections thus;
I had a different answer for the first.
No, no; I cannot, cannot, dare not do it.
Lilia, you will not doubt my love; you cannot.
—I would have told you all before, but thought,
Foolishly, you would feel the same as I;—
I have lived longer, thought more, seen much more;
I would not hurt your body, less your soul,
For all the blessedness your love can give:
For love’s sake weigh the weight of what I say.
Think not that must be right which you have heard
From infancy—it may—
My lord, there’s such an uproar in the town!
They call you murderer and heretic.
The officers of justice, with a monk,
And the new Count Nembroni, accompanied
By a fierce mob with torches, howling out
For justice on you, madly cursing you!
They caught a glimpse of me as I returned,
And stones and sticks flew round me like a storm;
But I escaped them, old man as I am,
And was in time to bar the castle-gates.—
Would heaven we had not cast those mounds, and shut
The river from the moat! Distant yells and cries.
Escape, my lord!
Calmly.
Will the gates hold them out awhile, my Joseph?
A little while, my lord; but those damned torches!
Oh, for twelve feet of water round the walls!
Leave us, good Joseph; watch them from a window,
And tell us of their progress. Joseph goes. Sounds approach.
Farewell, Lilia! Putting his arm round her. She stands like stone.
Fear of a coward’s name shall not detain me.
My presence would but bring down evil on you,
My heart’s beloved; yes, all the ill you fear,
The terrible things that you have imaged out
If you fled with me. They will not hurt you,
If you be not polluted by my presence. Light from without flares on the wall.
They’ve fired the gate. An outburst of mingled cries.
Entering.
They’ve fired the gate, my lord!
Well, put yourself in safety, my dear Joseph.
You and old Agata tell all the truth,
And they’ll forgive you. It will not hurt me;
I shall be safe—you know me—never fear.
God grant it may be so. Farewell, dear lord! Is going.
But add, it was in vain; the signorina
Would not consent; therefore I fled alone. Lilia stands as before.
Can it be so? Goodbye, goodbye, my master! Goes.
Put your arms round me once,
