Paula: Mercy!
Charles (looking about): Yet
Perchance he too walks in his sleep. Were it
Quite well if they have met—these two that walk?
Paula: My lady, my sweet lady!
Charles (releasing her): Go, for she
Still wonderful may lie upon her couch,
One arm dropt whitely. If you prayed for her—
If you should pray for her—Something may chance:
There is so much may chance—we cannot know!
(Paula goes.
(Disturbed.) This child who hath but dwelt about her, touched
And coiled the mystery of her hair, has might
Almost too much!
Hæmon: You cloud me with these words.
Were they Antonio's——
Charles: If I but think
"Helena" must you link "Antonio" to it!
Can they not be, yet be apart? Will winds
Not bear them, and not sound them separate!
If angels cry one at the stars will they
But echo back the other?—This is froth—
The froth and fume of folly. You are thick
In falsity, and in disquietude.
Another rapture rules Antonio's eye,
Not Helena.
Hæmon: You know it—yet have led
Her to his arms?
Charles: His arms! Ah, mole to burrow
Thus under blind and muddy misbelief!
To mine is she come here. (Terribly.) Were he a seraph,
And did from Paradise desire to fold her—
No mercy!—But, I will speak as a child,
As he who woke with Ruth fair at his feet;
Long have I gleaned amid the years and lone.
She shall glean softly now beside me—softly,
Till sunset fail in me and I am night.
Hæmon: This is a gin, a net, and I am fast!
Charles: A net to snare what never has been free?