Hoia! Swerve down upon them, little hawk.
_A shout follows._
Now they run all together round one man:
Now they murmur....
A VOICE. Close in, lift bows again:
He has no shafts, for this is one of ours.
_Arrows fly in at the casement._
GUNNAR.
Wife, here is something in my arm at last:
The head is twisted--I must cut it clear.
_STEINVOR throws open the dais door and rushes through with a high
shriek._
STEINVOR.
Woman, let us out--help us out--
The burning comes--they are calling out for fire.
_She shrieks again. ODDNY and ASTRID, who have come behind her, muffle
her head in a kirtle and lift her._
ASTRID, _turning as they bear her out._
Fire suffuses only her cloudy brain:
The flare she walks in is on the other side
Of her shot eyes. We heard a passionate voice,
A shrill unwomanish voice that must be Mord,
With "Let us burn him--burn him house and all."
And then a grave and trembling voice replied
"Although my life hung on it, it shall not be."
Again the cunning fanatic voice went on
"I say the house must burn above his head."
And the unlifted voice "Why wilt thou speak
Of what none wishes: it shall never be."
_ASTRID and ODDNY disappear with STEINVOR._
GUNNAR.
To fight with honest men is worth much friendship:
I'll strive with them again.
_He lifts his bow and loosens arrows at intervals while HALLGERD and
RANNVEIG speak._
_HALLGERD, in an undertone to RANNVEIG, looking out meanwhile to the
left._
Mother, come here--
Come here and hearken. Is there not a foot,
A stealthy step, a fumbling on the latch
Of the great door? They come, they come, old mother:
Are you not blithe and thirsty, knowing they come
And cannot be held back? Watch and be secret,
To feel things pass that cannot be undone.
RANNVEIG.
It is the latch. Cry out, cry out for Gunnar,
And bring him from the loft.
HALLGERD. O, never:
For then they'd swarm upon him from the roof.
Leave him up there and he can bay both armies,
While the whole dance goes merrily before us
And we can warm our hearts at such a flare.
_RANNVEIG, turning both ways, while HALLGERD watches her gleefully._
Gunnar, my son, my son! What shall I do....
_ORMILD enters from the left, white and with her hand to her side, and
walking as if she is sick._
HALLGERD.
Bah--here's a bleached assault....
RANNVEIG. O, lonesome thing,
To be forgot and left in such a night.
What is there now--are terrors surging still?
ORMILD.
I know not what has gone: when the men came
I hid in the far cowhouse. I think I swooned....
And then I followed the shadow. Who is dead?
RANNVEIG.
Go to the bower: the women will care for you.
_ORMILD totters up the hall from pillar to pillar._
ASTRID, _entering by the dais door._
Now they have found the weather-ropes and lashed them
Over the carven ends of the beams outside:
They bear on them, they tighten them with levers,
And soon they'll tear the high roof off the hall.
GUNNAR.
Get back and bolt the women into the bower.
_ASTRID takes ORMILD, who has just reached her, and goes out with her by
the dais door, which closes after them._
Hallgerd, go in: I shall be here thereafter.
HALLGERD.
I will not stir. Your mother had best go in.
RANNVEIG.
How shall I stir?
VOICES, _outside and gathering volume._
Ai ... Ai ... Reach harder ... Ai ...
GUNNAR.
Stand clear, stand clear--it moves.
THE VOICES. It moves ... Ai, ai ...
_The whole roof slides down rumblingly, disappearing with a crash behind
the wall of the house. All is dark above. Fine snow sifts down now and
then to the end of the play._
GUNNAR, _handling his bow._
The wind has changed: 'tis coming on to snow.
The harvesters will hurry in to-morrow.
THORBRAND THORLEIKSSON _appears above the wall-top a little past_
GUNNAR, _and, reaching noiselessly with a sword, cuts_ GUNNAR'S
_bowstring._
GUNNAR, _dropping the bow and seizing his bill._
Ay, Thorbrand, is it thou? That's a rare blade,
To shear through hemp and gut.... Let your wife have it
For snipping needle-yarn; or try it again.
THORBRAND, _raising his sword._
I must be getting back ere the snow thickens:
So here's my message to the end--or farther.
Gunnar, this night it is time to start your journey
And get you out of Iceland....
GUNNAR, _thrusting at_ THORBRAND _with the bill._
I think it is:
So you shall go before me in the dark.
Wait for me when you find a quiet shelter.
THORBRAND _sinks backward from the wall and is heard to fall farther.
Immediately_ ASBRAND THORLEIKSSON _starts up in his place._
ASBRAND, _striking repeatedly with a sword._
O, down, down, down!
GUNNAR, _parrying the blows with the bill._
Ay, Asbrand, thou as well?
Thy brother Thorbrand was up here but now:
He has gone back the other way, maybe--
Be hasty, or you'll not come up with him.
_He thrusts with the bill: ASBRAND lifts a shield before the blow._
Here's the first shield that I have seen to-night.
_The bill pierces the shield: ASBRAND disappears and is heard to fall.
GUNNAR turns from the casement._
Hallgerd, my harp that had but one long string,
But one low song, but one brief wingy flight,
Is voiceless, for my bowstring is cut off.
Sever two locks of hair for my sake now,
Spoil those bright coils of power, give me your hair,
And with my mother twist those locks together
Into a bowstring for me. Fierce small head,
Thy stinging tresses shall scourge men forth by me.
HALLGERD.
Does ought lie on it?
GUNNAR. Nought but my life lies on it;
For they will never dare to close on me
If I can keep my bow bended and singing.
HALLGERD, _tossing back her hair._
Then now I call to your mind that bygone blow
You gave my face; and never a whit do I care
If you hold out a long time or a short.
GUNNAR.
Every man who has trod a war-ship's deck,
And borne a weapon of pride, has a proud heart
And asks not twice for any little thing.
Hallgerd, I'll ask no more from you, no more.
RANNVEIG, _tearing off her wimple._
She will not mar her honour of widowhood.
O, widows' manes are priceless.... Off, mean wimple--
I am a finished widow, why do you hide me?
Son, son who knew my bosom before hers,
Look down and curse for an unreverend thing
An old bald woman who is no use at last.
These bleachy threads, these tufts of death's first combing,
And loosening heart-strings twisted up together
Would not make half a bowstring. Son, forgive me....
GUNNAR.
A grasping woman's gold upon her head
Is made for hoarding, like all other gold:
A spendthrift woman's gold upon her head
Is made for spending on herself. Let be--
She goes her heart's way, and I go to earth.
AUNUND'S _head rises above the wall near_ GUNNAR.
What, are you there?
AUNUND. Yes, Gunnar, we are here.
GUNNAR, _thrusting with the bill._
Then bide you there.
AUNUND'S _head sinks:_ THORGEIR'S _rises in the same place._
How many heads have you?
THORGEIR.
But half as many as the feet we grow on.
GUNNAR.
And I've not yet used up (_thrusting again_) all my hands.
_As he thrusts another man rises a little farther back, and leaps past
him into the loft. Others follow, and GUNNAR is soon surrounded by many
armed men, so that only the rising and falling of his bill is seen._
The threshing-floor is full.... Up, up, brain-biter!
We work too late to-night--up, open the husks.
O, smite and pulse
On their anvil heads:
The smithy is full,
There are shoes to be made
For the hoofs of the steeds
Of the Valkyr girls....
FIRST MAN.
Hack through the shaft....
SECOND MAN.
Receive the blade
In the breast of a shield,
And wrench it round....
GUNNAR.
For the hoofs of the steeds
Of the Valkyr girls
Who race up the night
To be first at our feast,
First in the play
With immortal spears
In deadly holes....
THIRD MAN.
Try at his back....
MANY VOICES, _shouting in confusion._
Have him down.... Heels on the bill.... Ahui, ahui....
_The bill does not rise._
HROALD, _with the breaking voice of a young man,
high over all._
Father.... It is my blow.... It is I who kill him....
_The crowd parts, suddenly silent, showing GUNNAR fallen._
_RANNVEIG covers her face with her hands._
HALLGERD, _laughing as she leans forward and
holds her breasts in her hands._
O, clear sweet laughter of my heart, flow out!
It is so mighty and beautiful and blithe
To watch a man dying--to hover and watch.
RANNVEIG.
Cease: are you not immortal in shame already?
HALLGERD.
Heroes, what deeds ye compass, what great deeds--
One man has held ye from an open door:
Heroes, heroes, are ye undefeated?
GIZUR, _an old white-bearded man, to the other riders._
We have laid low to earth a mighty chief:
We have laboured harder than on greater deeds,
And maybe won remembrance by the deeds
Of Gunnar when no deed of ours should live;
For this defence of his shall outlast kingdoms
And gather him fame till there are no more men.
MORD.
Come down and splinter those old birds his gods
That perch upon the carven high-seat pillars;
Wreck every place his shadow fell upon,
Rive out his gear, drive off his forfeit beasts.
SECOND MAN.
It shall not be.
MANY MEN. Never.
GIZUR. We'll never do it:
Let no man lift a blade or finger a clout--
Is not this Gunnar, Gunnar, whom we have slain?
Home, home, before the dawn shows all our deed.
_The riders go down quickly over the wall-top, and disappear._
HALLGERD.
Now I shall close his nostrils and his eyes,
And thereby take his blood-feud into my hands.
RANNVEIG.
If you do stir I'll choke you with your hair.
I will not let your murderous mind be near him
When he no more can choose and does not know.
HALLGERD.
His wife I was, and yet he never judged me:
He did not set your motherhood between us.
Let me alone--I stand here for my sons.
RANNVEIG.
The wolf, the carrion bird, and the fair woman
Hurry upon a corpse, as if they think
That all is left for them the grey gods need not.
_She twines her hands in HALLGERD'S hair and draws her down to the
floor._
O, I will comb your hair with bones and thumbs,
Array these locks in my right widow's way,
And deck you like the bed-mate of the dead.
Lie down upon the earth as Gunnar lies,
Or I can never match him in your looks
And whiten you and make your heart as cold.
HALLGERD.
Mother, what will you do? Unloose me now--
Your eyes would not look so at me alone.
RANNVEIG.
Be still, my daughter....
HALLGERD. And then?
RANNVEIG. Ah, do not fear--
I see a peril nigh and all its blitheness.
Order your limbs--stretch out your length of beauty,
Let down your hands and close those deepening eyes,
Or you can never stiffen as you should.
A murdered man should have a murdered wife
When all his fate is treasured in her mouth.
This wifely hair-pin will be sharp enough.
HALLGERD, _starting up as_ RANNVEIG _half loosens her to take a hair-pin
from her own head._
She is mad, mad.... O, the bower is barred--
Hallgerd, come out, let mountains cover you....
_She rushes out to the left._
RANNVEIG, _following her._
The night take you indeed....
_GIZUR enters from the left._
GIZUR. Ay, drive her out;
For no man's house was ever better by her.
RANNVEIG.
Is an old woman's life desired as well?
GIZUR.
We ask that you will grant us earth hereby
Of Gunnar's earth, for two men dead to-night
To lie beneath a cairn that we shall raise.
RANNVEIG.
Only for two? Take it: ask more of me.
I wish the measure were for all of you.
GIZUR.
Your words must be forgiven you, old mother,
For none has had a greater loss than yours.
Why would he set himself against us all....
_He goes out._
RANNVEIG.
Gunnar, my son, we are alone again.
_She goes up the hall, mounts to the loft and stoops beside him._
O, they have hurt you ... but that is forgot.
Boy, it is bedtime; though I am too changed,
And cannot lift you up and lay you in,
You shall go warm to bed--I'll put you there.
There is no comfort in my breast to-night:
But close your eyes beneath my fingers' touch,
Slip your feet down, and let me smooth your hands;
Then sleep and sleep. Ay, all the world's asleep;
But some will waken. _She rises._
You had a rare toy when you were awake--
I'll wipe it with my hair ... Nay, keep it so,
The colour on it now has gladdened you.
It shall lie near you.
_She raises the bill: the deep hum follows._
No; it remembers him,
And other men shall fall by it through Gunnar:
The bill, the bill is singing.... The bill sings!
_She kisses the weapon, then shakes it on high._
CURTAIN.
MIDSUMMER EVE
_TO CLINTON BALMER
AND THE DEAR MEMORY OF
JAMES HAMILTON HAY
FOR THE SUMMER OF 1900
AT CARTMEL_
_IN the lost Valley all is still
To-day: upon the stony hill
The heat of the late afternoon
Settles in coppery haze: and soon
A voice not known to me will call
Silent obedient cows to stall,
In the same immemorial cry
From century to century
Changing but by the uttering voice.
And in a while a little noise
(Hou! Hou!) far off near Newton Head
Will tell that at another stead
The browsing cattle pause and turn
Unwilling heads to seem to learn
That which they know, and move in train
Now milking-time has come again.
In Well Knowe garden now, I know,
Where the pale larkspur used to grow
In the far nook, a sound is heard
(If any is there to hear save bird
And field-mouse in the strawberries
Stirring like a local breeze--
Here, there--the low leaves soundlessly);
A glistening slender wasp-like fly
Is using will and wing to stand
Upon the air as though it spanned
A chasm with trembling outstretched arms,
And in the silence of heat-stilled farms
And heat-veiled wood that seems to shake
Dim clotted leaves yet does not break
By sigh or rustle the hush so dear
Its tiny sting of sound sings clear._
_Oft have I heard that elfin horn
Sound suddenly, as cobweb torn
Must sound in startled elfin ears
Pricked and on edge with elfin fears;
And as I upward watched those spare
Twin shreds of silver like slit air,
Beating and shining, straight and tense,
Simulating impotence
Of motion, enviously I thought
"Had my half useless flesh been caught,
Upborn, and for all limit bound
Between such gossamers of sound,
Not thus, not thus would I deny
My spirit's reach and endlessly
Use all conception and all force
To limit my short vital course.
Had I such wings of urgent light
Insistent not alone on height
But stretched for sweep and latitude
I would not evade flight, I would
Employ my heat and power and sense
In realising difference,
And see my world's variety,
Restricted but by energy."_
_But Well Knowe garden only shines
In memory now, and its dear signs
Only persist and gleam again
In a shut chamber of my brain:
While in a distant place I brood
Upon lost things, and in a mood
Of longing and remembrance feel
The wisdom of that immobile
And senseless mote, and think "Were I
Carnate in a slim glistening fly,
I would flash back upon that fair
Laurel-walled rood, then drop in air
Till no translucent nerve should stir
From strained precision, nor wing should whir
But to maintain one changeless height,
Nor move nor waver from that sight;
And think the years have not gone by
When James and Clinton harboured nigh
And, working in another art
Than mine, yet peopled for my heart
The Valley with the very core
Of vital beauty for evermore--
So that when the air is still
I hear below the meadow-rill
Clinton singing softlier still
Entranced by his own moving brush
Among the stream-side bracken and rush--
Or James repeats with his long hand
The distant line of hills that stand
Between the Valley and the lake
And yet seem lovelier for his sake."_
_How many generations past
Should I be dead had I been cast
In that small rapid shape of light?
Though wings may stand, years move in flight;
And, while I dream, I know, I know
That it is useless I should go
To Well Knowe garden again to see
Things that cannot return to me--
James dead and Clinton gone away,
And one whose name I cannot say
Who built in Cyclopean sound
Other magic heights around
That little place, then turned apart,
Untrue to friendship and to art,
A man of nothing--vanished things,
Dead friends, dead hopes, that must remain
In a shut chamber of my brain;
While only Clinton far away
Will in these verses and this play
See that country of our youth
And our dead friend and our old troth
Of friendship fixed in amber light,
A timeless hour that holds no night._
Summer 1921--Spring 1922.
PERSONS:
NAN }
BET }
URSEL } Kitchen and Dairy Girls.
MAUDLIN }
LIB }
ROGER, a Carter.
MEASE, a Cowherd.
MIDSUMMER EVE
_The scene is the interior of an old barn on a knoll, a long time ago.
At the back the barn's doors are opened widely; outside, a road rises
slightly from left to right in front of the barn; beyond this the knoll
sinks softly yet swiftly to a great meadow, and thence to a wide rich
valley of more meadows and ever more meadows with ancient large cherry
and crab and sloe and bullace and damson trees in their hedges whence
the white and pink thorn-blossom clots are not quite gone, and of
pastures shaded by tall clustering trees. Afar the valley ceases in low,
densely wooded hills._
_A late June twilight is deepening; a faint moist heat-haze hides
nothing, only distinguishing the planes of the distant trees with a
cloudy delicacy. There is no wind, nor any movement; one blackbird sings
somewhere for a little while, then it ceases and there is no sound in
the fields._
_The whole prospect is of a solitary, fruitfully overgrown valley shut
in from everywhere._
_Within the barn, to the left, is a high hay-mow with a ladder leaning
against it; much hay has been tumbled at its foot in forking from the
carts. To the right is a space of floor where the corn is to be heaped
in the ending of summer: as yet, however, it is empty, save for a
wooden plough, a homely rough wooden roller, wooden harrows, an
uptilted, pleasantly shaped cart whence the hay-shelvings have not yet
been removed. In the far corner of the bare walls of undressed stone at
this side is an open door leading into a mistal. Presently a cow is
heard moaning sickly beyond this door._
_The barn is still more dim than the land, so that a stretch of soft
brown darkness is all that is known of the far-off roof. Nearing
footfalls are heard in the road, and a woman's singing grows clearer._
"HOU, Hou," went the neatherd moaning
Down along by the pasture's side;
He turned the cows at the midden-yard loaning,
The loitering cows in the brown owl-tide:
Pale rose the last one, munching, droning,
With wet grass stains on her udder and hide.
My lantern's rings to the low balks floated
As Whitey's tail shook the mistal-sneck;
When I laid my cheek to her belly spotted
I felt her honey-strong breath i' my neck,
For she turns her head does the curd-dark throated
To watch my mouth start her teats with a peck.
_NAN, BET and URSEL ascend the road to the left and enter the barn as
NAN ceases singing._
_They are white-hooded, clumsily shod, gownless; in the right hand NAN
carries a willow frail, the others stoneware greybeards; each holds
several hay-rakes on her left shoulder._
URSEL.
September, O, September's in the song--
I will not have September in my heart,
The ending of so much deliciousness,
The year's sad luscious over-ripening.
Yet here's the haysel done with: how it hurt
To rake behind the last dim cart; and now
My soul creeps in me like the low pale night-mist
To know that in a moment past this moment
We shall not hear it slowly any more
Down in the lane where, wisping the close trees,
It follows us like a mournful sound of change.
Although the Summer is but newly kindled,
Tiptoe I over-reach the joy of it
(Ah, little perfect weeks of fruitfulness)
Because I tremble lest it be slipping past me
Before my eagerness will let me feel it.
Must joy for me be ever in things gone?...
NAN, _as they set down their burdens to lean
the rakes against the wall, where four flails are
hung, on the left of the door._
Nay, there is comfort in the rainy nights,
The long moist twilights of the cider time
When girls hold fitful talk sat in the press-spot
Among the hid sweet apple heaps that gleam
In firelight to a humming out of doors
Of soddening water oozing down the soil;
And there is comfort too at Candlemas
From looking through the casement in the dark,
The last thing ere you chafe your toes in bed,
On the crisp quiet of the woods and fields,
Wondering if 'tis snow or all the moonlight,
Peering so anxiously along the wall
That shades still ewes and whiter first-dropped lambs....
Ay, but I'm tired, lasses, tired now
Because the haysel's over and 'twas fair
And the land's savour wears me with delight.
I'm for indoors and resting--and, beside,
I'm fainest of my supper o' baking days.
BET.
Let all times slip to haste the barley week,
For then our nearest dancing-time will ripen ...
But I'm for bed to get me doffed and stripped
To pick much grass seed from my smock and coats.
URSEL.
Listen, Bet; no cool sheets are yours to-night.
The milk-eyed goodies with grey loose-skinned throats,
Who maunder of rarer girlhoods none can prove,
Tell that at midnight on Midsummer-Eves
They waked in some lone shade far from all sleepers
To feel which should be wedded within the year;
For the year's unknown husbands' images
Come then like swoons from some where ... ay, from some where....
Thoughts shaping for their women's heedless souls,
And if a maid will watch she sees her own
And knows her own, seeing her own alone,
Peering unseen as breath is in June nights.
Surely such dainties rilled no cow-slow eyes;
But Nan and I mean watching and have bid
Maudlin at Grassgarth, Lib at Appletoft
Under our breath, and hither they steal this eve.
We knew we must not tell you ere the hour,
Or ... or ... too many hinds might creep to be
Their own drowsed leering loutish prophecies.
BET.
Am I so old or wistful to be ringed
That I must feign to be content with one?
Where is this moon-swayed peeping, then, to be,
This blest eavesdropping on a mood of fate?
NAN.
Here in the barn, where we may crouch un-thought-of
By moon-estranged eyes in gradual darkness.
And lest we startle at o'er-expected footfalls
Or with night-carried voices rouse the farm,
Maudlin and Lib will warn us by dove-cooings--
Sometimes I hear a cooing up warm nights
From dove pairs far too wise to be asleep,
But mistress bides awake for no such music.
BET.
Dove-cooing Lib will be a thing to brood on--
I'll miss nought here, although you count me least.
NAN.
All works with us; for at the forenoon drinking
I heard dame Stir-Wench mutter "These kesh-pithed lasses
Shall sleep no longer three-a-bed beneath
The dark damp closeness of the garret thatch,
That nigh their heads leans low upon the floor,
Until this heat is past; or they will grow
Yet more slob-cheeked and sodden and dough-limbed
I never saw maids look more like green sickness."
And then she bade Giles carry our gear and bedding
Into the empty meal-webbed granary.
Nought could have fallen better; now we have
No moaning ladder's and open doors' groped passing,
No stocking feet need pad the dairy flags;
Only a silverly weathered latchless board
Keeps out the bats that flap toward pale shapes,
And waits to let us into the large night
Throughout the holiest of the mothering year.
BET.
She said green sickness but she meant green apples.
The codlin tree that o'er each moonset stretches
A creeping spider-shadow on the gable
Fills out its fruit weeks earlier this year,
And the one bough with apples onion-roped
Is one the mended ladder will not reach;
It is weight-arched against our garret window,
So that the curled leaves finger on the panes
When midnight winds are sturdy enough to lift it;
Mam Pantry knows and fears bare orchard-shelves
And herds us to an outhouse. Girls, those apples
Will all be basketed before their time,
Ere threshing heaps the granary once more
And sharp nights make her yield our loft again
Because she finds us cuddled on its threshold.
URSEL.
Mam Patch-Waist counts more eggs than four--she knows
Spring wenches' whifts let loose to sniff the night;
So straightway to the granary Mease she sped
To oil the lock and drive a staple in.
Small is our chance of watching now....
NAN. Quick-Pattens
Even ere she rounded must have been a likely,
A very likely maid for her to know
Our scapemell moods howe'er we prim our mouths.
BET.
Mease for two kisses left the staple loose.
URSEL, _laughing with_ NAN.
Ay, Bet's the market woman, to be sure.
BET.
Mouths, even as eyes, were made to earn our wills.
NAN.
But how came Bet near Mease up in the corn-spot?
And if she knows the need o' the staple loose
Why will she care to watch with us to-night?
BET.
To learn which one it is, Nanikin sly.