I will have you tell him
How changeable all women are.
How changeable all women are.
Yeats
Not yet.
I cannot be your queen
Till the past's finished, and its debts are paid.
When a man dies and there are debts unpaid,
He wanders by the debtor's bed and cries,
There's so much owing.
CONCHUBAR.
You are deceiving me.
You long to look upon his face again.
Why should I give you now to a dead man
That took you from a living?
[_He makes a step towards her. _
DEIRDRE.
In good time.
You'll stir me to more passion than he could,
And yet, if you are wise, you'll grant me this:
That I go look upon him that was once
So strong and comely and held his head so high
That women envied me. For I will see him
All blood-bedabbled and his beauty gone.
It's better, when you're beside me in your strength,
That the mind's eye should call up the soiled body,
And not the shape I loved. Look at him, women.
He heard me pleading to be given up,
Although my lover was still living, and yet
He doubts my purpose.
I will have you tell him
How changeable all women are. How soon
Even the best of lovers is forgot,
When his day's finished.
CONCHUBAR.
No; but I will trust
The strength you have spoken of, and not your purpose.
DEIRDRE [_almost with a caress_].
I'll have this gift--the first that I have asked.
He has refused. There is no sap in him,
Nothing but empty veins. I thought as much.
He has refused me the first thing I have asked--
Me, me, his wife. I understand him now;
I know the sort of life I'll have with him;
But he must drag me to his house by force.
If he refuse [_she laughs_], he shall be mocked of all.
They'll say to one another, 'Look at him
That is so jealous that he lured a man
From over sea, and murdered him, and yet
He trembled at the thought of a dead face! '
[_She has her hand upon curtain. _
CONCHUBAR.
How do I know that you have not some knife,
And go to die upon his body?
Till the past's finished, and its debts are paid.
When a man dies and there are debts unpaid,
He wanders by the debtor's bed and cries,
There's so much owing.
CONCHUBAR.
You are deceiving me.
You long to look upon his face again.
Why should I give you now to a dead man
That took you from a living?
[_He makes a step towards her. _
DEIRDRE.
In good time.
You'll stir me to more passion than he could,
And yet, if you are wise, you'll grant me this:
That I go look upon him that was once
So strong and comely and held his head so high
That women envied me. For I will see him
All blood-bedabbled and his beauty gone.
It's better, when you're beside me in your strength,
That the mind's eye should call up the soiled body,
And not the shape I loved. Look at him, women.
He heard me pleading to be given up,
Although my lover was still living, and yet
He doubts my purpose.
I will have you tell him
How changeable all women are. How soon
Even the best of lovers is forgot,
When his day's finished.
CONCHUBAR.
No; but I will trust
The strength you have spoken of, and not your purpose.
DEIRDRE [_almost with a caress_].
I'll have this gift--the first that I have asked.
He has refused. There is no sap in him,
Nothing but empty veins. I thought as much.
He has refused me the first thing I have asked--
Me, me, his wife. I understand him now;
I know the sort of life I'll have with him;
But he must drag me to his house by force.
If he refuse [_she laughs_], he shall be mocked of all.
They'll say to one another, 'Look at him
That is so jealous that he lured a man
From over sea, and murdered him, and yet
He trembled at the thought of a dead face! '
[_She has her hand upon curtain. _
CONCHUBAR.
How do I know that you have not some knife,
And go to die upon his body?
