No More Learning

[_NAISI enters. _]

NAISI.

The Libyan, knowing that a servant's life
Is safe from hands like mine, but turned and mocked.

FERGUS.

I'll call my friends, and call the reaping-hooks,
And carry you in safety to the ships.
My name has still some power. I will protect,
Or, if that is impossible, revenge.

[_Goes out by other door. _

NAISI.

[_Who is calm, like a man who has passed beyond life. _]

The crib has fallen and the birds are in it;
There is not one of the great oaks about us
But shades a hundred men.

DEIRDRE.

Let's out and die,
Or break away, if the chance favour us.

NAISI.

They would but drag you from me, stained with blood.
Their barbarous weapons would but mar that beauty,
And I would have you die as a queen should--
In a death chamber. You are in my charge.
We will wait here, and when they come upon us,
I'll hold them from the doors, and when that's over,
Give you a cleanly death with this grey edge.

DEIRDRE.

I will stay here; but you go out and fight.
Our way of life has brought no friends to us,
And if we do not buy them leaving it,
We shall be ever friendless.

NAISI.

What do they say?
That Lugaidh Redstripe and that wife of his
Sat at this chessboard, waiting for their end.
They knew that there was nothing that could save them,
And so played chess as they had any night
For years, and waited for the stroke of sword.
I never heard a death so out of reach
Of common hearts, a high and comely end:
What need have I, that gave up all for love,
To die like an old king out of a fable,
Fighting and passionate? What need is there
For all that ostentation at my setting?
I have loved truly and betrayed no man.
I need no lightning at the end, no beating
In a vain fury at the cage's door.

[_To MUSICIANS. _]

Had you been here when that man and his queen
Played at so high a game, could you have found
An ancient poem for the praise of it?