The Four Corners of the World

by A. E. W. Mason

UNDER BIGNOR HILL

[UNDER BIGNOR HILL][^[1]]

The action of the play takes place on a night in summer at the foot of Bignor Hill on the north side of the Sussex Downs. The time is that of the Roman occupation of England. In the foreground is an open space of turf surrounded with gorse-bushes. The turf rises in a steep bank at the back and melts into the side of the hill. The left of the stage is closed in by a wooded spur of the hill. The scene is wild and revealed by a strong moonlight. A fallen tree-trunk lies on the right, and a raised bank is at the left of the stage.

On the summit of the hill the glow of a camp-fire is seen, and from time to time a flame leaps up as though fuel had been added. Towards the end of the play the fire dies down and goes out.

When the curtain rises the stage is empty, but a sound of men marching is faintly heard. The sound is heard in pauses throughout the first part of the play.

[Gleva enters from the R. She is a British princess, clothed in skins. But she has added to her dress some of the refinements of the conquerors--a shirt of fine linen, the high sandals of the Roman lady, the Roman comb in her hair, some jewellery, a necklace of stones, and bracelets. She is followed by three men of her tribe, wild men in skins, armed with knives, and flint axes carried at the waist. Gleva comes forward silently into the open space of turf.]

Gleva: No one!

Bran: The trumpet has not sounded the last call on the hill.

Gleva: No. Yet the hour for it is past. By now the camp should be asleep. (She looks up the hill and then turns to her men.) Be ready to light the torch.

Caransius: Everything is strange to-day.

[He sits R. under the shelter of a bush, and with a flint and steel kindles a tiny flame during the following scene. He has a torch in his hand which he lays by his side. When the fire is lighted he blows on it from time to time to keep it alight.]

Bran: Yes. And yesterday. For many months we have been left in quiet. Now once more the soldiers march through Anderida.

Gleva (holds up her hand): Listen!

[A pause. The sound of marching is heard quite clearly, but at a distance.]

Bran: It does not stop, Princess.

Gleva: All yesterday, all through last night, all through this long day! Listen to it, steady as a heart beating, steady and terrible. (She speaks with great discouragement, moving apart, L., and sitting on tree bole.)

Caransius (lighting fire): I crept to the edge of the forest to-day. I lay very quiet behind the bushes and looked out across the clearing to the road.

Gleva: You!

[A general exclamation of astonishment.]

Caransius: Oh, it's not easy to frighten me, I can tell you. I fought at Verulanium with the Iceni. I know. I carried a sling. (He nods majestically at his companions.) And there you have it.

Gleva: Yes, yes, good friend. But which way did the soldiers march? What of the road?

[She goes over to him.]

Caransius: Mistress, there wasn't any road. There were only soldiers. As far as my eyes could see, bright helmets and brown faces and flashing shoulder plates bobbing up and down between the trees and a smother of dust until my head whirled.

Bran and Both Attendants: Oh!

Gleva: But which way did they go?

Caransius: I lost my dog, too--the brute. He ran from me and joined the marching men. I dared not call to him.

Bran: Yes, that is the way of dogs.

Gleva: Did they go north towards the Wall? (She shakes him.)

Caransius (who has been blowing on the fire, now sits up comfortably and smiles upon Gleva, who is tortured with impatience): God bless you, mistress, there isn't any Wall. I know about the Romans; I know! I fought at Verulanium. Now!

[Gleva turns away in despair of getting any sense out of him. A trumpet sounds on the top of Bignor Hill, faintly. All turn swiftly towards it.]

Gleva: Ready!

[A sound of armed men moving, a clash of shields is heard from the top of Bignor Hill.]

Now fire the torch. Give it me! (She springs on to the bank and waves it three times from side to side, steps down, and gives it back to an attendant, who puts it out.)

Caransius (continuing placidly): No, there's no Wall. There are a great many mistakes made about the Romans. They are no longer the men they were. I carried a sling at Verulanium, and there you have it. I'll tell you something. The soldiers were marching to Regnum.

Gleva: To Regnum? Are you sure?

Caransius: Yes. Up over the great Down they went. I saw their armour amongst the trees on the side of the hill, and the smoke of their marching on the round bare top.

Gleva: They were going to Regnum and the sea. (She speaks in despair.)

Third Attendant: I am afraid.

Gleva (turns on him scornfully): You! Why should you fear if they are marching to the sea?

Third Attendant: I have been afraid ever since yesterday. The noise of the marching scattered my wits.

[Gleva and the others laugh contemptuously.]

And because I was afraid--I killed. (A low cry of consternation bursts from Bran and Caransius.)

Bran: Madman! Madman!

Gleva: You killed one of the Romans!

Third Attendant (stands before her): I was afraid. It was by the old forge in the forest. There's a brook by the forge.

Bran: Yes.

Third Attendant: He had fallen out of the ranks. He was stooping over the brook. I saw the sun sparkle upon his helmet as he dipped it into the water, and his strong, brown neck as he raised it. I crept close to him and struck at his neck as he drank.

Caransius: That was a good stroke.

Bran: A mad stroke.

Third Attendant: He fell over without a cry, and all his armour rattled once.

Bran: It will be the fire for our barns, and death for every tenth man of the tribe.

Third Attendant: No one saw.

Gleva: Stand here!

[The third attendant stands before her.]

I gave an order.

Caransius: Yet, mistress, it is better to strike against orders than to leave one's friends and, like my dog, follow the marching men.

[A cry bursts from Bran. He seizes Caransius. Gleva stands with her hand upon her knife. Then she turns away, and buries her face in her hands. A whistle is heard from the hillside above her on the left. She looks up, and her face changes. She turns to third attendant.]

Gleva: Go up the hill--close to the camp, as close as you can creep, and watch. So may you earn your pardon. (He goes off.) You two stand aside--but not so far but that a cry may bring you instantly.

Bran: We will be ready. (Exeunt R.)

[Gleva faces the spur of the hill on her left as if all her world was there. There is a movement among the trees on the spur, a flash of armour in the moonlight, and at the edge of the trees appears Quintus Calpurnius Aulus, a Captain about thirty-five years old, handsome, but in repose his face is stern and inscrutable. He is active, lithe, self-confident. He comes out into the open just below the trees, and stands quite still. His very attitude should suggest strength.]

Quintus: I am here. (He speaks with the voice of a man accustomed to command, and to have his orders obeyed without question. Gleva stands erect questioning his authority. Then she crosses her hands upon her bosom and bows her head.)

Gleva: My Lord Calpurnius.

[Calpurnius laughs. He runs down the slope.]

Calpurnius: That's well. (He takes her in his arms.) You have a trick of saying "Calpurnius." I shall remember it till I die.

[Gleva draws away from him.]

Say it again.

Gleva: With all my soul in the word. It is a prayer. Calpurnius!

[Calpurnius is moved by the passion of her voice. He takes her hands in his.]

Calpurnius: Yes. I shall remember till I die. (They move towards the bank.)

Gleva: My lord is late to-night.

Calpurnius: Late! A Roman soldier of fifteen years' service late. My dear, let us talk sense. Come!

[The trumpet sounds again from the hill. Calpurnius stops.]

Gleva: Why does the trumpet sound?

Calpurnius: To call some straggler back to Rome.

Gleva: Rome! (With a cry.)

Calpurnius: Yes. For every one of us, the camp on the empty hill-top there is Rome, and all Rome's in the trumpet call.

Gleva: Is the sound so strange and moving?

Calpurnius: Yes. Most strange, most moving. For I know that at this actual minute every Roman soldier on guard throughout the world has the sound of it in his ears, here in the forest of Anderida, far away on some fortress wall in Syria. (Throws off his seriousness.) But I am talking of sacred things, and that one should be shy to do. Come, Gleva. We have little time. When the moon touches those trees I climb again.

Gleva: Yet, my lord, for one more moment think of me not as the foolish, conquered slave. Listen! Turn your head this way and listen.

Calpurnius: What shall I hear? Some nightingale pouring out love upon a moonlit night? He'll not say "Calpurnius" with so sweet a note as you.

Gleva: You'll hear no nightingale, nor any sound that has one memory of me in it. Listen, you'll hear--all Rome.

[He looks at her quickly. In the pause is heard the sound of men marching.]

That speaks louder than the trumpets.

[He is very still.]

Calpurnius! (She sits by him, and puts an arm about his shoulder. She speaks his name as if she were afraid.) The Romans flee from Britain.

Calpurnius (with a start of contempt): Madness! It's one legion going home. Another, with its rest still to earn, will take its place.

Gleva: Which legion goes?

Calpurnius: How should I know? (A pause.) The Valeria Victrix.

Gleva: Yours! (She starts away from him.) Calpurnius, yours!

Calpurnius: Yes, mine. My legion goes to Rome. (His voice thrills with eagerness. He has been troubled through the scene how he shall break the news. Now it is out, he cannot conceal his joy.)

Gleva: But you--you stay behind.

Calpurnius (gently): This is our last night together. Let us not waste it. Never was there a night so made for love. (He draws her towards him.)

Gleva: You go with your legion?

Calpurnius: Before the dawn.

Gleva: It's impossible. No. You'll stay behind.

Calpurnius: No.

Gleva: Listen to me. You shall be King with me.

Calpurnius (in a burst of contempt): King here! In the forests of Britain! I!

Gleva: Yes. You'll lie quiet here. I by your side. Your hand in mine. See! We'll forget the hours. The dawn will come.

Calpurnius: And find me a traitor!

Gleva: I am already one. There was a servant with me. He told me I was like a dog that leaves its own people to follow the marching men.

Calpurnius (sits up): And you let him live, with this knife ready in your girdle?

Gleva: He spoke the truth.

Calpurnius: The truth! (Contemptuously.) There's a word for you! Child! There's a greater thing in the world than truth. Truth wins no battles.

Gleva: What's this greater thing?

Calpurnius: Discipline! You should have struck.

Gleva: I wish I had. For he might have struck back.

Calpurnius: Discipline! So I go with my legion.

Gleva (with a cry accusingly): You want to go.

Calpurnius (springs up): By all the gods I do. For ten years I have toiled in Britain building roads--roads--roads--till I'm sick of them. First the pounded earth, then the small stones, next the rubble, then the concrete, and last of all the pavement; here in Anderida, there across the swamps to Londinium, northwards through the fens to Eboracum--ten years of it. And now--Rome--the mother of me!

Gleva: Rome? (She speaks despairingly. Calpurnius has forgotten her: he answers her voice, not her.)

Calpurnius: Just for a little while. Oh, I shall go out again, but just for a little while--to rise when I want to, not at the trumpet's call, the house all quiet till I clap my hands--to have one's mornings free--to saunter through the streets, picking up the last new thing of Juvenal in the Argiletum, or some fine piece of Corinthian bronze in the Campus Martius, and stopping on the steps of the Appian Way to send a basket of flowers or a bottle of new scent to some girl that has caught one's fancy. To go to the theatre, and see the new play, though, to be sure, people write to me that there are no plays nowadays.

Gleva: Plays?

Calpurnius: And in the evening with a party of girls in their bravest, all without a care, to gallop in the cool along the Appian Way to Baiae and crowned with roses and violets have supper by the sea. Oh, to see one's women again--Lydia'll be getting on, by the way!--women dressed, jewelled, smelling of violets. Oh, just for a little while! By Castor and Pollux, I have deserved it.

Gleva (who has been listening in grief): Yes, you must go. (She goes to him and sits at his side.) I have a plan.

Calpurnius: Yes. (Absently.)

Gleva: Listen to me!--Calpurnius.

[He laughs affectionately at her pronunciation of his name.]

Calpurnius: Let me hear this wise plan!

Gleva: I will go with you.

Calpurnius (rising): What?

[Gleva pulls him down.]

Gleva: Yes, I'll give up my kingdom here, sacrifice it all, and go to Rome with you. Calpurnius (in a whisper), I'll be your Lydia. Oh, to drive with you on such a night as this, all crowned with roses, from Rome to Baiae on the sea.

Calpurnius: These are dreams.

Gleva (passionately): Why? Why? Are these women in Rome more beautiful than I? Look! (She rises.) I can dress, too, as the Roman women do. I wear the combs you gave me. I don't think they are pretty, but I wear them. See, I wear, too, the sandals, the bracelets.

Calpurnius: No. There are no women in Rome more beautiful than you--but--but----

Gleva (all her passion dying away): You would be ashamed of me.

[Calpurnius is uncomfortable.]

Calpurnius: You would be--unusual. People would turn and stare. Other women would laugh. Some scribbler would write a lampoon. Oh, you are beautiful, but this is your place, not Rome. Each to his own in the end, Gleva. I to Rome--you to your people.

Gleva: My people! Oh, you did right to laugh at the thought of reigning here. What are my people? Slaves for your pleasure. It can't be! You to Rome, the lights, the women--oh, how I hate them! You would not reproach me because my knife hangs idle, had I your Roman women here! Calpurnius, be kind. From the first morning when I saw you in the forest, shining in brass, a god, there has been no kingdom, no people for me but you. I have watched you, learnt from you. Oh! I am of the Romans--I'll----

Calpurnius: Each to his own in the end. That's the law.

Gleva: A bitter, cruel one.

Calpurnius: Very likely. But it can't be changed. So long as the world lasts, centuries hence, wherever soldiers are, still it will be the law.

Gleva: Soldiers! Say soldiers, and all must be forgiven!

Calpurnius: Much, at all events, by those with understanding. Hear what a soldier is. You see him strong, browned by the sun, flashing in armour, tramping the earth, a conqueror--a god, yes, a god! Ask his centurion who drills him in the barrack square.

Gleva: But the centurion----

Calpurnius: The centurion's the god, then? Ask me, his Captain, who tells him off. Am I the god, then? Ask my Colonel, who tells me off. Is it my Colonel, my General? Ask the Emperor in Rome who, for a fault, strips them of their command and brings them home. Soldiers are men trained to endurance by a hard discipline, cursed, ridiculed, punished like children but with a man's punishments, so that when the great ordeal comes they may move, fight, die, like a machine. The soldier! He suffers discomfort, burns in the desert, freezes in the snow at another's orders. He has no liberty, he must not argue, he must not answer; and he gets an obol a day, and in the end--in the end, a man, he gives his life without complaint, without faltering, gladly as a mere trifle in the business of the day, so that his country may endure. And what's his reward? What does he get? A woman's smile in his hour of furlough. That's his reward. He takes it. Blame him who will. The woman thinks him a god, and he does not tell her of the barrack square. Good luck to him and her, I say. But at the last, there's the long parting, just as you and I part in the forest of Anderida to-night. Other soldiers will say good-bye here on this spot to other women in centuries from now. Their trouble will be heavy, my dear, but they'll obey the soldier's law.

Gleva: Very well, then! Each to his own! I, too, will obey that law. (She confronts him, erect and, strong.)

Calpurnius: You will? (Doubtfully.)

Gleva: To the letter. To the very last letter. I'll gather my men. There shall be no more Romans in Anderida. There shall be only stubble in the fields where the scythes of my chariots have run.

Calpurnius: Silence! (Sternly.)

Gleva: I learn my lesson from my Lord Calpurnius. Why should my teacher blame me if I learn it thoroughly?

Calpurnius: Gleva, you cannot conquer Rome. (He speaks gently. She stands stubbornly.) How shall I prove it to you--you who know only one wild corner of Britain! (Thinks.) There is that road where the soldiers march. You know--how much of it?--a few miles where it passes through the forest. That's all. But it runs to the Wall in the north.

Gleva (scornfully): Is there a Wall?

Calpurnius: Is there a Wall? Ye gods! I kept my watch upon it through a winter under the coldest stars that ever made a night unfriendly. I freeze now when I think of it. Yes, there's a Wall in the north, and that road runs to it; and in the south, it does not end at Regnum.

Gleva: Doesn't it? Wonderful road!

Calpurnius: Yes, wonderful road. For on the other side at the very edge of the sea in Gaul it lives again--yes, that's the word--the great road lives and runs straight as a ruled line to Rome. For forty days you drive, inns by the road-side, post horses ready and a cloud of traffic, merchants on business, governors on leave, pedlars, musicians and actors for the fairs, students for the universities, Jews, explorers, soldiers, pack-horses and waggons, gigs and litters. Oh, if I could make you see it--always on each side the shade of trees, until on its seven hills springs Rome. Nor does the road end there.

Gleva: This same road? (Her scorn has gone. She speaks doubtfully.)

Calpurnius: This same road which runs by the brook down here in the forest. (Pointing L.) It crosses Rome and goes straight to the sea again--again beyond the sea it turns and strikes to Jerusalem four thousand miles from where we stand to-night, Rome made it. Rome guards it, and where it runs Rome rules. You cannot conquer Rome--until the road's destroyed.

Gleva: I will destroy it.

Calpurnius: Only Rome can destroy it. (A pause.) Gleva, let what I say sink deep into your heart. A minute ago I sneered at the road. I blasphemed. The roads are my people's work. While it builds roads, it's Rome, it's the Unconquerable. But when there are no new roads in the making and the weeds sprout between the pavements of the old ones, then your moment's coming. When the slabs are broken and no company marches down from the hill to mend them, it has come. Launch your chariots then, Gleva! Rome's day is over, her hand tired. She has grown easy and forgotten. But while Rome does Rome's appointed work, beware of her! Not while the road runs straight from Regnum to the Wall, shall you or any of you prevail.

Gleva (looking inscrutably.) No, I cannot conquer Rome.

[A moment's pause.]

Calpurnius: Listen!

Gleva: The sound upon the road has ceased.

Calpurnius: There are no longer men marching.

Gleva: All have gone over the hill to the sea.

Calpurnius: Yes. There's a freshness in the air, a breath of wind. The morning comes----

Gleva: I cannot conquer Rome.

[A trumpet rings out clear from the top of the hill. The morning is beginning to break. There is the strange light which comes when moonlight and the dawn meet.]

Calpurnius: The reveillé! (He turns to her.)

Gleva: And----

Calpurnius (nods): My summons. Gleva!

Gleva: My Lord will bid farewell to his slaves. (She calls aloud): Bran, Caransius.

Calpurnius: Oh, before they come! (He holds out his arms to her.) Gleva! (She comes slowly into his embrace.) I shall remember this night. Some of our poets say that we are born again in another age. So may it be with us! We shall grow old and die, you here, I where my Emperor shall send me. May we be born again, love again, under a happier star.

[He kisses her, she clings to him. Behind enter Bran, Caransius. They approach carefully.]

But now there's Rome in front of me.

[He tries to draw away from her. She clings about his neck.]

And I must go.

Gleva: Not yet, my Lord--Calpurnius.

Calpurnius: Farewell! and the Gods prosper you. (He is seized from behind on a gesture from Gleva. She utters a cry.)

Gleva: Do him no hurt! Yet hold him safe. (They bind him. Calpurnius struggles.)

Calpurnius: Help! Romans, help!

[The two men gag him.]

Gleva: Do him no hurt!

[They lay him on the bank. Gleva goes to him.]

No, I cannot conquer Rome, but one Roman--yes. You taught me, Calpurnius, the lesson of the road. I thank you. I learn another lesson. (She is speaking very gently.) On that long, crowded way from the edge of Gaul to Rome many a soldier of your legion will be lost--lost and remain unheard of. Calpurnius, you shall stay with me, reign with me, over me. You shall forget Rome.

[Once more the trumpet sounds only more faintly. Calpurnius utters a stifled groan. The morning broadens. A cracking of bushes is heard. From the right enters third attendant excitedly.]

Attendant: Mistress! Mistress!

Gleva: Well?

[She turns, stands between Calpurnius and attendants, e. g.:

Bran.

Third Attendant. Gleva. Calpurnius. Caransius.]

[Footlights.]

Attendant: They have gone! The hill is empty; the camp is scattered.

Gleva: They march to the coast. The Valeria Victrix.

[A movement from Calpurnius, who is working his hands free.]

Third Attendant: They are putting out to sea. The harbour's black with ships. Some have reached the open water.

Gleva: All have gone.

Third Attendant: All. Already there's a wolf in the camp on the hill.

Calpurnius (freeing his hands and mouth, plucks out his sword. He buries it in his heart.) Rome! Rome! (In a whisper.)

[Gleva turns and sees Calpurnius dead. She stands motionless. Then she waves her attendants away. They go silently. Gleva seats herself by Calpurnius's side. She runs her hand over his hair.]

Gleva (with a sob): My Lord Calpurnius!

[The Curtain Falls Slowly.]