PAOLO. I have.
LANCIOTTO. You juggle, you turn deadly pale,
Fumble your dagger, stand with head half round,
Tapping your feet.—You dare not look at me!
By Satan! Count Paolo, let me say,
You look much like a full-convicted thief!
PAOLO. Brother!—
LANCIOTTO. Pshaw! brother! You deceive me, sir:
You and that lady have a devil's league,
To keep a devil's secret. Is it thus
You deal with me? Now, by the light above
I'd give a dukedom for some fair pretext
To fly you all! She does not love me? Well,
I could bear that, and live away from her.
Love would be sweet, but want of it becomes
An early habit to such men as I.
But you—ah! there's the sorrow—whom I loved
An infant in your cradle; you who grew
Up in my heart, with every inch you gained;
You whom I loved for every quality,
Good, bad, and common, in your natural stock;
Ay, for your very beauty! It is strange, you'll say,
For such a crippled horror to do that,
Against the custom of his kind! O! yes,
I love, and you betray me!
PAOLO. Lanciotto,
This is sheer frenzy. Join your bride.
LANCIOTTO. I'll not!
What, go to her, to feel her very flesh
Crawl from my touch?—to hear her sigh and moan,
As if God plagued her? Must I come to that?
Must I endure your hellish mystery
With my own wife, and roll my eyes away
In sentimental bliss? No, no! until
I go to her, with confident belief
In her integrity and candid love,
I'll shun her as a leper. [Alarm-bells toll.
MALATESTA. What is that?
Enter, hastily, a MESSENGER in disorder.
MESSENGER. My lord, the Ghibelins are up—
LANCIOTTO. And I
Will put them down again! I thank thee, Heaven,
For this unlooked-for aid! [Aside.