ERMYNTRUDE. What is your business?
THE INCA. I come on behalf of the Inca of Perusalem.
ERMYNTRUDE. The Allerhochst?
THE INCA. Precisely.
ERMYNTRUDE. I wonder does he feel ridiculous when people call him the
Allerhochst.
THE INCA [surprised]. Why should he? He IS the Allerhochst.
ERMYNTRUDE. Is he nice looking?
THE INCA. I--er. Er--I. I--er. I am not a good judge.
ERMYNTRUDE. They say he takes himself very seriously.
THE INCA. Why should he not, madam? Providence has entrusted to his
family the care of a mighty empire. He is in a position of half divine,
half paternal, responsibility towards sixty millions of people, whose
duty it is to die for him at the word of command. To take himself
otherwise than seriously would be blasphemous. It is a punishable
offence--severely punishable--in Perusalem. It is called
Incadisparagement.
ERMYNTRUDE. How cheerful! Can he laugh?
THE INCA. Certainly, madam. [He laughs, harshly and mirthlessly.] Ha ha!
Ha ha ha!
ERMYNTRUDE [frigidly]. I asked could the Inca laugh. I did not ask could
you laugh.
THE INCA. That is true, madam. [Chuckling.] Devilish amusing, that!
[He laughs, genially and sincerely, and becomes a much more agreeable
person.] Pardon me: I am now laughing because I cannot help it. I am
amused. The other was merely an imitation: a failure, I admit.
ERMYNTRUDE. You intimated that you had some business?
THE INCA [producing a very large jewel case, and relapsing into
solemnity.] I am instructed by the Allerhochst to take a careful note
of your features and figure, and, if I consider them satisfactory, to
present you with this trifling token of His Imperial Majesty's regard.
I do consider them satisfactory. Allow me [he opens the jewel case and
presents it.]
ERMYNTRUDE [staring at the contents]. What awful taste he must have! I
can't wear that.
THE INCA [reddening]. Take care, madam! This brooch was designed by the
Inca himself. Allow me to explain the design. In the centre, the shield
of Arminius. The ten surrounding medallions represent the ten castles
of His Majesty. The rim is a piece of the telephone cable laid by His
Majesty across the Shipskeel canal. The pin is a model in miniature of
the sword of Henry the Birdcatcher.
ERMYNTRUDE. Miniature! It must be bigger than the original. My good man,
you don't expect me to wear this round my neck: it's as big as a turtle.
[He shuts the case with an angry snap.] How much did it cost?
THE INCA. For materials and manufacture alone, half a million Perusalem
dollars, madam. The Inca's design constitutes it a work of art. As such,
it is now worth probably ten million dollars.
ERMYNTRUDE. Give it to me [she snatches it]. I'll pawn it and buy
something nice with the money.
THE INCA. Impossible, madam. A design by the Inca must not be exhibited
for sale in the shop window of a pawnbroker. [He flings himself into his
chair, fuming.]
ERMYNTRUDE. So much the better. The Inca will have to redeem it to save
himself from that disgrace; and the poor pawnbroker will get his money
back. Nobody would buy it, you know.
THE INCA. May I ask why?
ERMYNTRUDL. Well, look at it! Just look at it! I ask you!
THE INCA [his moustache drooping ominously]. I am sorry to have to
report to the Inca that you have no soul for fine art. [He rises
sulkily.] The position of daughter-in-law to the Inca is not compatible
with the tastes of a pig. [He attempts to take back the brooch.]
ERMYNTRUDE [rising and retreating behind her chair with the brooch].
Here! you let that brooch alone. You presented it to me on behalf of the
Inca. It is mine. You said my appearance was satisfactory.
THE INCA. Your appearance is not satisfactory. The Inca would not allow
his son to marry you if the boy were on a desert island and you were the
only other human being on it [he strides up the room.]
ERMYNTRUDE [calmly sitting down and replacing the case on the table].
How could he? There would be no clergyman to marry us. It would have to
be quite morganatic.
THE INCA [returning]. Such an expression is out of place in the mouth of
a princess aspiring to the highest destiny on earth. You have the morals
of a dragoon. [She receives this with a shriek of laughter. He struggles
with his sense of humor.] At the same time [he sits down] there is a
certain coarse fun in the idea which compels me to smile [he turns up
his moustache and smiles.]
ERMYNTRUDE. When I marry the Inca's son, Captain, I shall make the Inca
order you to cut off that moustache. It is too irresistible. Doesn't it
fascinate everyone in Perusalem?
THE INCA [leaning forward to her energetically]. By all the thunders of
Thor, madam, it fascinates the whole world.
ERMYNTRUDE. What I like about you, Captain Duval, is your modesty.
THE INCA [straightening up suddenly]. Woman, do not be a fool.
ERMYNTRUDE [indignant]. Well!
THE INCA. You must look facts in the face. This moustache is an exact
copy of the Inca's moustache. Well, does the world occupy itself with
the Inca's moustache or does it not? Does it ever occupy itself with
anything else? If that is the truth, does its recognition constitute
the Inca a coxcomb? Other potentates have moustaches: even beards
and moustaches. Does the world occupy itself with those beards and
moustaches? Do the hawkers in the streets of every capital on the
civilized globe sell ingenious cardboard representations of their faces
on which, at the pulling of a simple string, the moustaches turn up and
down, so--[he makes his moustache turn, up and down several times]? No!
I say No. The Inca's moustache is so watched and studied that it has
made his face the political barometer of the whole continent. When that
moustache goes up, culture rises with it. Not what you call culture;
but Kultur, a word so much more significant that I hardly understand
it myself except when I am in specially good form. When it goes down,
millions of men perish.
ERMYNTRUDE. You know, if I had a moustache like that, it would turn my
head. I should go mad. Are you quite sure the Inca isn't mad?
THE INCA. How can he be mad, madam? What is sanity? The condition of the
Inca's mind. What is madness? The condition of the people who disagree
with the Inca.
ERMYNTRUDE. Then I am a lunatic because I don't like that ridiculous
brooch.
THE INCA. No, madam: you are only an idiot.
ERMYNTRUDE. Thank you.
THE INCA. Mark you: It is not to be expected that you should see eye to
eye with the Inca. That would be presumption. It is for you to accept
without question or demur the assurance of your Inca that the brooch is
a masterpiece.
ERMYNTRUDE. MY Inca! Oh, come! I like that. He is not my Inca yet.
THE INCA. He is everybody's Inca, madam. His realm will yet extend to
the confines of the habitable earth. It is his divine right; and let
those who dispute it look to themselves. Properly speaking, all those
who are now trying to shake his world predominance are not at war with
him, but in rebellion against him.
ERMYNTRUDE. Well, he started it, you know.
THE INCA. Madam, be just. When the hunters surround the lion, the lion
will spring. The Inca had kept the peace of years. Those who attacked
him were steeped in blood, black blood, white blood, brown blood, yellow
blood, blue blood. The Inca had never shed a drop.
ERMYNTRUDE. He had only talked.
THE INCA. Only TALKED! ONLY talked! What is more glorious than talk? Can
anyone in the world talk like him? Madam, when he signed the declaration
of war, he said to his foolish generals and admirals, 'Gentlemen, you
will all be sorry for this.' And they are. They know now that they had
better have relied on the sword of the spirit: in other words, on their
Inca's talk, than on their murderous cannons. The world will one day do
justice to the Inca as the man who kept the peace with nothing but his
tongue and his moustache. While he talked: talked just as I am talking
now to you, simply, quietly, sensibly, but GREATLY, there was peace;
there was prosperity; Perusalem went from success to success. He has
been silenced for a year by the roar of trinitrotoluene and the bluster
of fools; and the world is in ruins. What a tragedy! [He is convulsed
with grief.]
ERMYNTRUDE. Captain Duval, I don't want to be unsympathetic; but suppose
we get back to business.
THE INCA. Business! What business?
ERMYNTRUDE. Well, MY business. You want me to marry one of the Inca's
sons: I forget which.
THE INCA. As far as I can recollect the name, it is His Imperial
Highness Prince Eitel William Frederick George Franz Josef Alexander
Nicholas Victor Emmanuel Albert Theodore Wilson--
ERMYNTRUDE [interrupting]. Oh, please, please, mayn't I have one with a
shorter name? What is he called at home?
THE INCA. He is usually called Sonny, madam. [With great charm of
manner.] But you will please understand that the Inca has no desire to
pin you to any particular son. There is Chips and Spots and Lulu and
Pongo and the Corsair and the Piffler and Jack Johnson the Second,
all unmarried. At least not seriously married: nothing, in short, that
cannot be arranged. They are all at your service.
ERMYNTRUDE. Are they all as clever and charming as their father?
THE INCA [lifts his eyebrows pityingly; shrugs his shoulders; then,
with indulgent paternal contempt]. Excellent lads, madam. Very honest
affectionate creatures. I have nothing against them. Pongo imitates
farmyard sounds--cock crowing and that sort of thing--extremely well.
Lulu plays Strauss's Sinfonia Domestica on the mouth organ really
screamingly. Chips keeps owls and rabbits. Spots motor bicycles. The
Corsair commands canal barges and steers them himself. The Piffler
writes plays, and paints most abominably. Jack Johnson trims ladies'
hats, and boxes with professionals hired for that purpose. He is
invariably victorious. Yes: they all have their different little
talents. And also, of course, their family resemblances. For example,
they all smoke; they all quarrel with one another; and they none of them
appreciate their father, who, by the way, is no mean painter, though the
Piffler pretends to ridicule his efforts.
ERMYNTRUDE. Quite a large choice, eh?
THE INCA. But very little to choose, believe me. I should not recommend
Pongo, because he snores so frightfully that it has been necessary to
build him a sound-proof bedroom: otherwise the royal family would get no
sleep. But any of the others would suit equally well--if you are really
bent on marrying one of them.
ERMYNTRUDE. If! What is this? I never wanted to marry one of them. I
thought you wanted me to.
THE INCA. I did, madam; but [confidentially, flattering her] you are not
quite the sort of person I expected you to be; and I doubt whether
any of these young degenerates would make you happy. I trust I am not
showing any want of natural feeling when I say that from the point of
view of a lively, accomplished, and beautiful woman [Ermyntrude bows]
they might pall after a time. I suggest that you might prefer the Inca
himself.
ERMYNTRUDE. Oh, Captain, how could a humble person like myself be of
any interest to a prince who is surrounded with the ablest and most
far-reaching intellects in the world?
TAE INCA [explosively]. What on earth are you talking about, madam? Can
you name a single man in the entourage of the Inca who is not a born
fool?