Plays of Near & Far by Lord Dunsany (top novels to read TXT) 📗

not of leaving the golden palace!

Queen: If it came again.

Oozizi: It will not come again.

[The heels of the Princes drum louder, off.

Queen: Again, Oozizi:

[Oozizi pants. The Queen waits, listening, in fear. Again the heels are heard.

[The Queen runs to the small door. She looks out.

Oozizi: Lady! Lady!

Queen: Oozizi.

Oozizi: Lady! Lady! You must never leave the palace. You must never leave it. You must not.

Queen: Hark, it is quiet now.

Oozizi: Lady, it would be terrible to leave the golden palace. Who would reign? What would happen?

Queen: It is quiet now. What would happen, Oozizi?

Oozizi: The world would end.

Queen: It is quiet now; perhaps I need not fly.

Oozizi: Lady, you must not.

Queen: And yet I would fain go over those green fields all gleaming with summer, and see the golden hoards that no man guards, glittering with such a light as glows this June.

Oozizi: O, speak not, great lady, of the green fields and June. It is these that have intoxicated the Princes so that they do this unrecorded thing, letting sound of them be heard in your sacred room.

Queen: Has June intoxicated them, Oozizi?

Oozizi: Oh, lady, speak not of June.

Queen: Is June so terrible?

[She returns towards Oozizi.

Oozizi: It does strange things.

[The noise breaks out again.

Hark!

[The Queen runs to the door again. Oozizi stretches out her arms to the Queen.

O, lady, never leave the golden palace.

[The Queen listens; all is silent; she looks outside.

Queen: I see the green fields gleaming. Strange flowers are standing among them, like princes I have not known.

Oozizi: Oh, lady, speak not of the bewildering fields. They are all enchanted with Summer, and they have maddened the Princes. It is dangerous to look at them, lady.

[The Queen gazes on over the fields.

And yet you look.

Queen: I would fain go far over the strange soft fields; far and far to the high heathery lands——

Oozizi: Lady, all is quiet; there is no danger; you must not leave the palace.

Queen: Yes, all is quiet.

[The Queen returns.

Oozizi: It was a passing madness seized the Princes.

Queen: Oozizi, when I hear the sound of all their feet it is dreadful, and I must fly. And when I see the wonderful fields in the sunlight sloping away to lands I have never known, then I long to fly away and away for ever, passing from field to field and land to land.

Oozizi: Lady, no, no!

Queen: Oozizi.

Oozizi: Yes, great lady.

Queen: There is a mountain there that towers above the earth. It goes up into a calm of which our world knows nothing. Heaven, like a cloak, is draped about its shoulders. Why have none told me of this mountain, Oozizi?

Oozizi (awed): Aether Mountain.

Queen: Why has none told me?

Oozizi: When your glorious mother, lady, loved for a day ...

Queen: Yes, Oozizi ...

Oozizi: She went, as all songs tell, to Aether Mountain.

Queen (entranced): To Aether Mountain?

Oozizi: So they sing at evening, when they throw down their loads of gold and rest.

Queen: To Aether Mountain.

Oozizi: Lady, Destiny sent her; but you must not go. You must not leave your throne to go to Aether Mountain.

Queen: There is a calm upon it not of earth.

Oozizi: You must not go, lady, you must not go.

Queen: I will not go.

[The Princes drum again, still louder with their heels.

Hark!

[Oozizi is frightened, The Queen runs to the door.

It is louder! They are nearer! They are coming here!

Oozizi: No, lady. They would not dare!

Queen: I must go, Oozizi; I must go.

Oozizi: No, lady. They will never dare. You must not. Hark! They come no nearer. June has maddened them, but they come no nearer. They are quiet now. Come back, lady. Leave the door, they come no nearer. See, it is all quiet now. They come no nearer, lady. (Oozizi catches her by the sleeve.) Lady, you must not.

Queen (much calmer, gazing away): Oozizi, I must go.

Oozizi: No, no, lady! All is quiet; you must not go.

Queen (calmly): It is calling for me, Oozizi.

Oozizi: What is calling, lady? Nothing calls.

Queen: It is calling, Oozizi.

Oozizi: Oh, lady, all is silent. No one calls.

Queen: It is calling for me now, Oozizi.

Oozizi: No, no, lady. What calls?

Queen: Aether Mountain is calling. I know now who called my mother. It was Aether Mountain, Oozizi; he is calling.

Oozizi: I—I scarce dare look out of the golden palace, lady, to where we must not go. Yet, yet I will look. (She peers.) Yes, yes, indeed; there stands old Aether Mountain. But he does not call. Indeed he does not call. He is all silent in Heaven.

Queen: It is his voice, Oozizi.

Oozizi: What, lady? I hear no voice.

Queen: That great, great silence is his voice, Oozizi. He is calling me out of that blue waste of Heaven.

Oozizi: Lady, I cannot understand.

Queen: He calls, Oozizi.

Oozizi: Come away, lady. It is bad to look so long. Oh, if the Princes had not made their clamour heard! Oh, if they had not you had not gone to the door and seen Aether Mountain, and this trouble had not come. Oh! Oh! Oh!

Queen: There is no trouble upon Aether Mountain.

Oozizi: Oh, lady, it is terrible that you should leave the palace.

Queen: There is no trouble there. Aether Mountain goes all calm into Heaven. His grey-blue slopes are calm as the sky about him. There he stands calling. He is calling to me, Oozizi.

Oozizi (reflecting): Can it be?

Queen: What would you ask, Oozizi?

Oozizi: Can it be that it is with you, great lady, as it was with the Queen, your mother, when Destiny sent her hence to Aether Mountain?

Queen: Aether Mountain calls.

Oozizi: Lady, for a moment hear me. Come with me but a little while.

[She leads the Queen slowly by the arm back to the throne.

Lady, be seated here once more and take up the orb and sceptre in your small hands as of old.

[The Queen patiently does as she is told.

Now, if Destiny calls you, let him call to you as to a Queen. Now, if it be for no whim of those that pass, that you would go so far from here to that great mountain, say, seated upon your throne in the golden palace with sceptre and orb in hand, say would you go forth, lady?

Queen (almost dreaming): Aether Mountain calls.

[Oozizi bursts into tears. She helps the Queen by the arm from her throne and leads her part of the way to the door. There she stops. The Queen goes on to the door alone.

Oozizi: Farewell, lady.

[The Queen gazes out rapturously towards Aether Mountain. Then she walks back and embraces Oozizi.

Queen: Farewell, Oozizi.

Oozizi: Farewell, great lady.

[The Queen turns, then suddenly she runs swiftly and nimbly through the door and disappears.

[At once there is a murmur of voices from the Hall of the Hundred Princes.

Voices (off): Ah, ah, ah.

[Oozizi stands still weeping.

[Enter the Princes, exquisite and frivolous. They crowd past each other.

Meliflor: And where is our little Queen?

[Oozizi answers with a defiant look through her tears, which has its effect on them.

Moomoomon (foppishly): There, there.

Ximenung: Gone!

Meliflor: Come! Let us follow.

Moomoomon: Shall we?

Several: Yes.

Moomoomon: Come.

[They stream across from the side door R to the door in back, Oozizi regarding them haughtily.

Oozizi (menacingly): It is Aether Mountain.

[Entranced, silent, last of all Zoon follows. Exeunt all the Princes. Sounds as of rough protest heard from the workers off. The grim brown heads of two or three peer round the door by which the Princes entered. Many come on, dumb, puzzled, turning their brown heads, searching. At last they cluster round Oozizi. "Er"? they say.

Oozizi: Aether Mountain has called her.

[They nod dumb heads gravely.

CURTAIN. Scene III

On the base of Aether Mountain.

Right, heather sloping up to left, which is rugged with tumbled grey rocks.

Further left all the scene is filled with the rising bulk of Aether Mountain.

Low down, far off and small in the background to the right appears a little palace of pure gold.

Enter right the Queen running untired and nimble, unchecked by those grey rocks.

Following her the tired Princes come.

Zoon is no longer last, but about fourth, and gaining.

Meliflor leads.

Meliflor: Permit me, great lady. My hand over the rocks. Permit ...

[He falls and cannot rise.

Moomoomon: Permit me. (He falls too.) These rocks; it is these rocks.

Ximenung (going wearily): Great lady. A moment. One moment, great lady. Allow me.

[But Zoon does not speak. Exeunt L. the Queen and those Princes that have not fallen. The curtain falls on stragglers crossing the stage.

CURTAIN. Scene IV

The Summit.

On the snow on the pinnacle of Aether Mountain, with only bright blue sky all round and everywhere, recline Queen Zoomzoomarma and the Prince of Zoon.

The Queen: You had known no love before, First of a Hundred?

Prince of Zoon: There is no love on earth, O Queen of all.

Queen: Only here.

Zoon: Pure love is only here on this peak lonely in heaven.

Queen: Would you love me elsewhere if we went from here?

Zoon: But we will never go from here.

Queen: No, we will never leave it.

Zoon: Lady, look down. (She looks.) The earth is sorrowful. (She sighs.) Cares. Cares. All over the wide surface we can see are troubles; troubles far off and grey, that harm not Aether Mountain.

Queen: It looks a long way off and long ago.

Zoon (wonderingly): Only to-day we came to Aether Mountain.

Queen: Only to-day?

Zoon: We crossed a gulf of time.

Queen: It lies below us, all drowsy with years.

Zoon: Lady, here is your home, this peak that has entered heaven. Let us never leave your home.

Queen: I knew not until to-day of Aether Mountain. None had told me.

Zoon: Knew you never, lady, of love?

Queen: None had told me.

Zoon: This is your home; not Earth; no golden palace. Reign here alone, not knowing the cares of men, without yesterday or to-morrow, untroubled by history or council.

Queen: Yes, yes, we will return no more.

Zoon: See, lady, see the Earth. Is it not as a dream just faded?

Queen: It is dim indeed, grey and dream-like.

Zoon: It is the Earth we knew.

Queen: It is all dream-like.

Zoon: It is gone; we can dimly see it.

Queen: Was it a dream?

Zoon: Perhaps. It is gone now and does not matter.

Queen: Poor Earth. I hope it was real.

Zoon (seizing her hand): Oh, Zoomzoomarma, say not you hope that Earth was real. It is gone now. See; it is so far away. Sigh not for Earth, oh lady, sigh not for Earth.

Queen: Why not, King of Aether Mountain?

Zoon: Because when you sigh for tiny things I tremble for your love. See how faint and small it is and how far away.

Queen: I do not sigh for Earth, King of the Mountain. I only wish it well.

Zoon: Oh, wish it not well, lady.

Queen: Let us