MADAME METTERNICH
The Emperor has just left me. We have tapped
This theme and that; his empress and—his next.
Ay, so! Now, guess you anything?
SCHWARZENBERG
Of her?
No more than that the stock of Romanoff
Will not supply the spruce commodity.
MADAME METTERNICH
And that the would-be customer turns toe
To our shop in Vienna.
SCHWARZENBERG
Marvellous;
And comprehensible but as the dream
Of Delaborde, of which I have lately heard.
It will not work!—What think you, madame, on’t?
MADAME METTERNICH
That it will work, and is as good as wrought!—
I break it to you thus, at his request.
In brief time Prince Eugène will wait on you,
And make the formal offer in his name.
SCHWARZENBERG
Which I can but receive ad referendum,
And shall initially make clear as much,
Disclosing not a glimpse of my own mind!
Meanwhile you make good Metternich aware?
MADAME METTERNICH
I write this midnight, that amaze may pitch
To coolness ere your messenger arrives.
SCHWARZENBERG
This radiant revelation flicks a gleam
On many circling things!—the courtesies
Which graced his bearing toward our officer
Amid the tumults of the late campaign,
His wish for peace with England, his affront
At Alexander’s tedious-timed reply...
Well, it will thrust a thorn in Russia’s side,
If I err not, whatever else betide!
[Exeunt. The maskers surge into the foreground of the scene, and
their motions become more and more fantastic. A strange gloom
begins and intensifies, until only the high lights of their
grinning figures are visible. These also, with the whole ball-
room, gradually darken, and the music softens to silence.]
SCENE II
PARIS. THE TUILERIES
[The evening of the next day. A saloon of the Palace, with
folding-doors communicating with a dining-room. The doors are
flung open, revealing on the dining-table an untouched dinner,
NAPOLÉON and JOSÉPHINE rising from it, and DE BAUSSET, chamberlain-
in-waiting, pacing up and down. The EMPEROR and EMPRESS come
forward into the saloon, the latter pale and distressed, and
patting her eyes with her handkerchief.
The doors are closed behind them; a page brings in coffee; NAPOLÉON
signals to him to leave. JOSÉPHINE goes to pour out the coffee,
but NAPOLÉON pushes her aside and pours it out himself, looking at
her in a way which causes her to sink cowering into a chair like a
frightened animal.]