ABBOT--Get ready and go down. A word from him,
And down the abbey falls.
LOUIS--Never to rise.
ABBOT--And yet--
I do not think he'll tell it. Rumor, you know,
Has stamped an image on the heated mind.
They never could efface it by a thought
So monsterous as that devils had turned saints
And tripped the air with angels, hand in hand,
Moving as musically as summer stars.
Having no coin that bears the face of truth
They never will suspect a counterfeit,
And so no one will put the question to him.
Unquestioned, certainly Oswald will not speak.
LOUIS--But if he should? (_A pause._)
Awhile ago you prayed
Some god to free us from our policy. (_A pause._)
What time did he go down?
ABBOT--Before day-break.
The town at that time would have been asleep.
LOUIS--And Benedict, who never sleeps?
ABBOT--Go down.
LOUIS--Whose dragon eyes are ever open?
(_He starts toward the dormitory._)
ABBOT--Stay.
LOUIS--Supposing Oswald has already told?
If he has, Benedict will come up here
Raging as upon a den of wolves. Then.
If he should say: "Ha! So it was the dwarf
And not an angel saved your monk. And here
You pass the deed off as a miracle
To swell your abbey's revenues and rob
Me of the alms of my parishioners?"
He sees me coming down the mountain side
And shouts this at me, and I say to him--?
ABBOT--Surprised, amazed, you lift your hands: "Mon Dieu!
A son of Satan save St. Giles' child!
Do devils, then, wait upon men of God
Working salvation? Do they? If they do,
What means this storm of banners in the dawn,
This, 'Dieu le volt!' and these bright harnassed knights
Trampling the Orient into battle smoke?
Why this vast tumult in the dead sunrise?
If devils will take up arms and fight for God,
Why roll these human surges down the East
To smoke and break about the Sepulcher
In hard white foam from which the ravens fly?
Let Hell lead forth her legions from the pit
Impervious to drought and pain alike,
To take and guard the Tomb. No, Father, no.
'Tis blasphemy, the unforgiven sin,
To ascribe to Hell a deed that God hath done."
LOUIS--Says Father Benedict: "But brother Oswald
Told me himself it was the witch's son."
ABBOT--"Mon Dieu again! Could Father keep his wits
After a fall like that, and, rising, say:
'This is the hand that struck me, this that saved'?
It was the dwarf that threw the brother down."
With words like these, chisels of policy,
Upon the shield of each returning knight
That hath spilt blood about the Sepulcher,
We carve an angel that shall plead our cause
Through all the fields and villages of France
And far on into the North and--Ah, this train!
This train shall be the trumpet that shall blow
Our miracle abroad through Italy,
And Italy is the trumpet of the world.
Talk to the strangers then of shooting stars,
Of sounds of heavenly music in the night,
But only when a question calls it forth.
Climbing the tree gives flavor to the fruit.
Be reticent; that will add majesty.
Appear subdued and point to yonder peaks
Where, in the gray dawn, gleams of vanishing wings
Shone on the mountain snows like molten gold.
You understand? About the witch's son,
_Adeste cum silentio._
(_After passing out through the gate, the Abbot
turns and calls after Louis, who is crossing
the court._)
Louis,
No word as yet to Oswald of the dream.
He would not see the glory of it now,
Only the horror. I should fear the result.
BASIL-- (_Coming from behind the chapel._)
Macias is coming with another sorel. (_Louis enters the dormitory._)
Bah, then! Go on. St. Christopher. Plum-head.
(_Drawing himself up as Rene and Simon come from
behind the chapel._)