Osw. Your pardon. I forget you count it much
To give a crust and cell for this broad kingdom.
I who have paid my heart out for a crown
Must thank you now to wear it.
Ber. Good-night.
Osw. O, son,
Have you no patience with a man grown old
In many battles? Now feel I my age,
Knowing the dearest blows of my long life
Have bought me but this shadow. In you is drained
Ambition's heart,—my every burning aim
Fails here in you, and cools unforged, unshapen.
Yet do you turn from me as though 'twere I
Not you who gave the wound that parts us.
Ber. I?
Osw. Of all my sons I loved you best. You think
I gave you to the friars with no twinge
Here at my heart? Your mother said "One son
We must return to God," and I said "Yea,
So it be not my Bertrand." But her will
Ran 'gainst me. When she had her way, I longed
Through many a day to have you at my side,
While you were happy with your songs and saints,
Your father quite forgot.
Ber. [Stirred] Nay, not forgot.
And I am with you now.
Osw. O, let me feel
My son is mine! I'll yield you anything.
Ay, even Ardia! She shall be my daughter——
Ber. By heaven that keeps me true, I will not hear
That name again! There's maddest music in it.
I see her when I hear it. [Covering his eyes]
Osw. [Aside] I see the lime
Will catch you.
Ber. Again, good-night.