Charles: Of that!—of that?—

Cecco: Pardon, I but——

Charles: Smirker!—Yet, was it so?
That night indeed?

Cecco: Sir, surely.

Charles: And the moon's
'Scutcheon hung stainless up the purple east?

Cecco: Half, sir; even as now.

Charles (as to himself): Since that hour's close
To this I have not stood in so much calm.
Still was he not in every vein of him,
And breath, a traitor? A Greek who—I'll not say it,
Since she is Greek I must forget the word
Sounds the diapason of perfidy.

Cecco: My lord thinks of the gentle Helena?

Charles: And if I do?

Cecco: Why, sir——