The succeeding scene shows them on a terrace at the exit of the vaults. Golaud warns Pelléas. "About Mélisande: I overheard what passed and what was said last night. I realize that it was but child's play; but it must not be repeated.... She is very delicate, and it is necessary to be more than usually careful, as she is perhaps with child, and the least emotion might cause serious results. It is not the first time I have noticed that there might be something between you.... You are older than she; it will suffice to have said this to you. Avoid her as much as possible, though not too pointedly."
The next scene passes before the castle. Golaud and his little son Yniold, the innocent playfellow of Mélisande and Pelléas, are together. Golaud questions him. "You are always with mama.... See, we are just under mama's window now. She may be saying her prayers at this moment.... Tell me, Yniold, she is often with your uncle Pelléas, is she not?" The child's naïve answers inflame his jealousy, confirm his suspicions, though they baffle him. "Do they never tell you to go and play somewhere else?" he asks. "No, papa, they are afraid when I am not with them.... They always weep in the dark.... That makes one weep, too.... She is pale, papa." "Ah! ah!... patience, my God, patience!" cries the anguished Golaud.... "They kiss each other sometimes?" he queries. "Yes ... yes; ... once ... when it rained." "They kissed each other?—But how, how did they kiss?" "So, papa, so!" laughs the boy, and then cries out as he is pricked by his father's beard. "Oh, your beard!... It pricks! It is getting all gray, papa; and your hair, too—all gray, all gray!" Suddenly the window under which they are sitting is illuminated, and the light falls upon them. "Oh, mama has lit her lamp!" exclaims Yniold. "Yes," observes Golaud; "it begins to grow light." Yniold wishes to go, but Golaud restrains him. "Let us stay here in the shadow a little longer.... One cannot tell, yet.... I think Pelléas is mad!" he exclaims violently. He lifts Yniold up to the window, cautioning him to make no noise, and asks him what he sees. The child reports that Mélisande is there, and that his uncle Pelléas is there, too. "What are they doing? Are they near each other?" "They are looking at the light." "They do not say anything?" "No, papa, they do not close their eyes.... Oh! oh!... I am terribly afraid!" "Why, what are you afraid of?—look! look!" demands Golaud. "Oh, oh! I am going to cry, papa!—let me down! let me down!" insists Yniold, in nameless terror.
ACT IV
Mélisande and Pelléas meet in an apartment in the castle. Pelléas is about to leave, to travel, he tells her, now that his father is recovering; but before he goes he must see her alone—he must speak to her that night. He asks that she meet him in the park, at the "Fountain of the Blind." It will be the last night, he says, and she will see him no more. Mélisande consents to meet him, but she will not hear of his going away. "I shall see you always; I shall look upon you always," she tells him. "You will look in vain," says Pelléas; "I shall try to go very far away." They separate. Arkël enters. He tells Mélisande that he has pitied her since she came to the castle: "I observed you. You were listless—but with the strange, astray look of one who, in the sunlight, in a beautiful garden, awaits ever a great misfortune.—I cannot explain.—But I was sad to see you thus. Come here; why do you stay there mute and with downcast eyes?—I have kissed you but once hitherto, the day of your coming; and yet the old need sometimes to touch with their lips a woman's forehead or the cheek of a child, that they may still keep their faith in the freshness of life and avert for a moment the menaces of death. Are you afraid of my old lips? How I have pitied you these months!" She tells him that she has not been unhappy. But perhaps, he says, she is of those who are unhappy without knowing it. Golaud enters, ferocious and distraught. He has blood on his forehead. It is nothing, he says—he has passed through a thicket of thorns. Mélisande would wipe his brow. He repulses her fiercely. "I will not have you touch me, do you understand?" he cries. "I came to get my sword." "It is here, on the prie-Dieu," says Mélisande, and she brings it to him. "Why do you tremble so?" he says to her. "I am not going to kill you.—You hope to see something in my eyes without my seeing anything in yours? Do you suppose I may know something?" He turns to Arkël. "Do you see those great eyes?—it is as if they gloried in their power." "I see," responds Arkël, "only a great innocence." "A great innocence!" cries Golaud wildly. "They are more than innocent!... They are purer than the eyes of a lamb.—They might teach God lessons in innocence! A great innocence! Listen! I am so near them that I can feel the freshness of their lashes when they close—and yet I am less far from the great secrets of the other world than from the smallest secret of those eyes!—A great innocence?—More than innocence! One would say that the angels of heaven celebrated there an unceasing baptism. I know those eyes! I have seen them at their work! Close them! close them! or I shall close them forever!—You need not put your right hand to your throat so; I am saying a very simple thing—I have no concealed meaning. If I had, why should I not speak it? Ah!—do not attempt to flee!—Here!—Give me that hand!—Ah! your hands are too hot!—Away! the touch of your flesh disgusts me!—Here!—You shall not escape me now!" He seizes her by the hair. "Down on your knees! On your knees before me!—Ah! your long hair is of some use at last!" He throws her from side to side, holding her by her hair. "Right, left!—Left, right!—Absalom! Absalom!—Forward! now back! To the ground! to the ground! Ha! ha! you see, I laugh already like an imbecile!" Arkël, running up, seeks to restrain him. Golaud affects a sudden and disdainful calmness. "You are free to act as you please," he says.—"It is of no consequence to me.—I am too old to care; and, besides, I am not a spy. I shall await my chance; and then.... Oh! then!... I shall simply act as custom demands." "What is the matter?—Is he drunk?" asks Arkël. "No, no!" cries Mélisande, weeping. "He hates me—and I am so wretched! so wretched!"
"If I were God," ruminates the aged king, "how infinitely I should pity the hearts of men!"
The scene changes once more to the fountain in the park. Yniold is discovered seeking to move a great rock behind which his golden ball has rolled. Night is coming on. The distant bleating of sheep is heard. Yniold looks over the edge of the terrace and sees the flock crowding along the road. Suddenly they cease their crying. Yniold calls to the shepherd. "Why do they not speak any more?" "Because," answers the shepherd, who is concealed from sight, "it is no longer the road to the fold." "Where are they going to sleep to-night?" cries the child. There is no answer, and he departs, exclaiming that he must find somebody to speak to.[5] Pelléas enters, to keep his tryst with Mélisande. "It is the last time," he meditates. "It must all be ended. I have been playing like a child with what I did not understand. I have played, dreaming about the snares of fate. By what have I been suddenly awakened? Who has aroused me all at once? I shall depart, crying out for joy and woe like a blind man fleeing from his burning house. I shall tell her I am going. My father is out of danger; and I can no longer lie to myself.—It is late; she is not coming.
—It would be better to go away without seeing her again.—But I must look well at her this time.—There are some things that I no longer recall.—It seems at times as though I had not seen her for a hundred years.—And I have not yet looked deep into her gaze. There remains nothing to me if I go away thus. And all those memories!—it is as if I were to carry away a little water in a muslin bag.—I must see her one last time, see to the bottom of her heart.—I must tell her all that I have never told her." Mélisande enters. Their greeting is simple. Pelléas bids her come under the shade of the linden. She wishes to remain where it is lighter; she wishes to stay where she may be seen. Golaud, she says, is sleeping. It is late. In an hour the great gates of the castle will be closed. Pelléas tells her that it is perhaps the last time he shall see her, that he must go away forever. She asks him why it is that he is always saying that. "Must I tell you what you know already?" rejoins Pelléas. "You know not what I am going to tell you?" "Why, no; I know nothing," says Mélisande. "You know not why I must go? You know not that it is because [he kisses her abruptly] I love you?" "I love you too," says Mélisande simply, in a low voice. "You love me? you love me too?" cries Pelléas. "Since when have you loved me?" "Since I saw you first," she answers. "Oh, how you say that!" cries Pelléas. "Your voice seems to have blown across the sea in spring!... You say it so frankly—like an angel questioned.—Your voice! your voice! It is cooler and more frank than the water is!—It is like pure water on my lips!—Give me, give me your hands!—Oh, how small your hands are!—I did not know you were so beautiful! I have never before seen anything so beautiful!—I was filled with unrest; I sought everywhere; yet I found not beauty.—And now I have found you!—I do not believe there can be upon the earth a woman more beautiful!" Their love-scene is harshly interrupted. "What is that noise?" asks Pelléas. "They are closing the gates!—We cannot return now. Do you hear the bolts?—Listen!—the great chains!—It is too late!" "So much the better!" cries Mélisande, in passionate abandonment. "Do you say that?" exclaims her lover. "See, it is no longer we who will it so! Come, come!" They embrace. "Listen! my heart is almost strangling me! Ah! how beautiful it is in the shadows!" "There is some one behind us!" whispers Mélisande. Pelléas has heard nothing. "I hear only your heart in the darkness." "I heard the crackling of dead leaves," insists Mélisande. "A-a-h! he is behind a tree!" she whispers. "Who?" "Golaud!—he has his sword!" "And I have none!" cries Pelléas. "He does not know we have seen him," he cautions. "Do not stir; do not turn your head.—He will remain there so long as he thinks we do not know he is watching us.—He is still motionless.—Go, go at once this way. I will wait for him—I will hold him back." "No, no, no!" cries Mélisande.
"Go! go! he has seen everything!—He will kill us!"
"All the better! all the better!"
"He is coming!—Your mouth! your mouth!"