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Title: The Resources of Quinola
Author: Balzac, Honoré de, 1799-1850
Language: English
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THE RESOURCES OF QUINOLA
A COMEDY IN A PROLOGUE AND FIVE ACTS
BY
HONORE DE BALZAC
First Presented at the Theatre de l'Odeon, Paris March 19, 1842.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
Had the author of the following play written it merely for the purpose
of winning for it the universal praise which the journals have
lavished upon his romances, and which perhaps transcended their
merits, _The Resources of Quinola_ would still have been an excellent
literary speculation; but, when he sees himself the object of so much
praise and so much condemnation, he has come to the conclusion that it
is much more difficult to make successfully a first venture on the
stage than in the field of mere literature, and he has armed himself,
accordingly, with courage, both for the present and for the future.
The day will come when the piece will be employed by critics as a
battering ram to demolish some piece at its first representation, just
as they have employed all his novels and even his play entitled
_Vautrin_, to demolish _The Resources of Quinola_.
However tranquil may be his mood of resignation, the author cannot
refrain from making here two suggestive observations.
Not one among fifty feuilleton writers has failed to treat as a fable,
invented by the author, the historic fact upon which is founded the
present play.
Long before M. Arago mentioned this incident in his history of steam,
published in the _Annuaire du Bureau des Longitudes_, the author, to
whom the incident was known, had guessed in imagination the great
drama that must have led up to that final act of despair, the
catastrophe which necessarily ended the career of the unknown
inventor, who, in the middle of the sixteenth century, built a ship
that moved by steam in the harbor of Barcelona, and then scuttled it
with his own hands in the presence of two hundred thousand spectators.
This observation is sufficient answer to the derision which has been
flung upon what was supposed to be the author's hypothesis as to the
invention of steam locomotion before the time of the Marquis of
Worcester, Salomon de Caus and Papin.
The second observation relates to the strange manner in which almost
all the critics have mistaken the character of Lavradi, one of the
personages in this comedy, which they have stigmatized as a hideous
creation. Any one who reads the piece, of which no critic has given an
exact analysis, will see that Lavradi, sentenced to be transported for
ten years to the _presides_, comes to ask pardon of the king. Every
one knows how freely the severest penalties were in the sixteenth
century measured out for the lightest offences, and how warmly valets
in a predicament such as Quinola's, were welcomed by the spectators in
the antique theatres.
Many volumes might be filled with the laments of feuilletonists, who
for nearly twenty years have called for comedies in the Italian,
Spanish or English style. An attempt has been made to produce one, and
the critics would rather eat their own words than miss the opportunity
of choking off the man who has been bold enough to venture upon a
pathway of such fertile promise, whose very antiquity lends to it in
these days the charm of novelty.
Nor must we forget to mention, to the disgrace of our age, the howl of
disapprobation which greeted the title "Duke of Neptunado," selected
by Philip II. for the inventor, a howl in which educated readers will
refuse to join, but which was so overwhelming at the presentation of
the piece that after its first utterance the actors omitted the term
during the remainder of the evening. This howl was raised by an
audience of spectators who read in the newspapers every morning the
title of the Duke of Vittoria, given to Espartero, and who must have
heard of the title Prince of Paz, given to the last favorite of the
last but one of the kings of Spain. How could such ignorance as this
have been anticipated? Who does not know that the majority of Spanish
titles, especially in the time of Charles V. and Philip II. refer to
circumstances under which they were originally granted?
An admiral took that of _Transport-Real_, from the fact that the
dauphin sailed with him to Italy.
Navarro was given the title _La Vittoria_ after the sea-fight of
Toulon, though the issue of the conflict was indecisive.
These examples, and as many others, are outdone by that of the famous
finance minister, a parvenu broker, who chose to be entitled the
Marquis Insignificant (l'Ensenada).
In producing a work, constructed with all the dramatic irregularity of
the early French and Spanish stage, the author has made an experiment
which had been called for by the suffrages of more than one "organ of
public opinion," as well as of all the "first-nighters" of Paris. He
wished to meet the genuine public and to have his piece represented in
a house filled with a paying audience. The unsatisfactory result of
this ordeal was so plainly pointed out by the whole press, that the
indispensability of _claqueurs_ has been now forever established.
The author had been confronted by the following dilemma, as stated by
those experienced in such matters. If he introduced into the theatre
twelve hundred "dead heads," the success secured by their applause
would undoubtedly be questioned. If twelve hundred paying spectators
were present, the success of the piece was almost out of the question.
The author chose to run the risk of the latter alternative. Such is
the history of this first representation, where so many people
appeared to be made so uncomfortable by their elevation to the dignity
of independent judges.
The author intends therefore to return to the beaten track, base and
ignoble though it be, which prejudice has laid out as the only avenue
to dramatic success; but it may not be unprofitable to state here,
that the first representation of _The Resources of Quinola_ actually
redounded to the advantage of the _claqueurs_, the only persons who
enjoyed any triumph in an evening entertainment from which their
presence was debarred!
Some idea of the criticism uttered on this comedy may be gained from
the fact that out of the fifty newspapers, all of which for the last
twenty years have uttered over the unsuccessful playwright the
hackneyed phrase, "the play is the work of a clever man who will some
day take his revenge," not one employed it in speaking of _The
Resources of Quinola_, which they were unanimous in consigning to
oblivion. This result has settled the ambition of the author.
Certain persons, whose good auguries the author had done nothing to
call forth, encouraged from the outset this dramatic venture, and thus
showed themselves less critical than unkind; but the author counts
such miscalculations as blessings in disguise, for the loss of false
friends is the best school of experience. Nor is it less a pleasure
than a duty thus publicly to thank the friends, like M. Leon Gozlan,
who have remained faithful, towards whom the author has contracted a
debt of gratitude; like M. Victor Hugo, who protested, so to speak,
against the public verdict at the first representation, by returning
to witness the second; like M. de Lamartine and Madame de Girardin,
who stuck to their first opinion, in spite of the general public
reprobation of the piece. The approval of such persons as these would
be consoling in any disaster.
LAGNY, 2 April, 1842.
PERSONS OF THE PROLOGUE
Philip II., King of Spain
Cardinal Cienfuegos, Grand Inquisitor
The Captain of the Guards
The Duke of Olmedo
The Duke of Lerma
Alfonso Fontanares
Lavradi, known as Quinola
A halberdier
An alcalde of the palace
A familiar of the Inquisition
The Queen of Spain
The Marchioness of Mondejar
PERSONS OF THE PLAY
Don Fregose, Viceroy of Catalonia
Grand Inquisitor
Count Sarpi, secretary to the Viceroy
Don Ramon, a savant
Avaloros, a banker
Mathieu Magis, a Lombard
Lothundiaz, a burgess
Alfonso Fontanares, an inventor
Lavradi, known as Quinola, servant to Fontanares
Monipodio, a retired bandit
Coppolus, a metal merchant
Carpano, a locksmith
Esteban, workman
Girone, workman
The host of the "Golden Sun"
A bailiff
An alcalde
Faustine Brancadori
Marie Lothundiaz, daughter to Lothundiaz
Dona Lopez, duenna to Marie Lothundiaz
Paquita, maid to Faustine
SCENE: Spain--Valladolid and Barcelona
TIME: 1588-89
THE RESOURCES OF QUINOLA
PROLOGUE
SCENE FIRST
(The scene is laid at Valladolid, in the palace of the King of Spain.
The stage represents the gallery which leads to the chapel. The
entrance to the chapel is on the spectators' left, that to the royal
apartment on the right. The principal entrance is in the centre. On
each side of the principal door stand two halberdiers. At the rise of
the curtain the Captain of the Guards and two lords are on the stage.
An alcalde of the palace stands in the centre of the gallery. Several
courtiers are walking up and down in the hall that leads to the
gallery.)
The Captain of the Guards, Quinola (wrapped in his mantle) and a
halberdier.
The halberdier (barring the way to Quinola)
No one passes this way, unless he has the right to do so. Who are you?
Quinola (lifting up the halberd)
An ambassador.
(All look at him.)
Halberdier
From what state?
Quinola (passing in)
From what state? From a state of misery.
The Captain of the Guards
Go and bring the major-domo of the palace, that he may render to this
ambassador the honors that are due him. (To the halberdier) Three
days' imprisonment.
Quinola (to the Captain)
You are a very droll rascal.
Quinola (taking him aside)
Are not you the cousin of the Marchioness of Mondejar?
The Captain
What if I am?
Quinola
Although she is high in favor, she is on the brink of an abyss, into
which she may fall and lose her head in falling.
The Captain
All people of your class trump up these stories!--Listen, you are the
twenty-second person, and we have only reached the tenth of the month,
who has made an attempt to be introduced to the favorite, for the
purpose of squeezing a few pistoles from her. Take yourself off or
else--
Quinola
My lord, it is better to be misled by twenty-two poor devils,
twenty-two times, than once to miss the opportunity of heeding him who
is sent by your good angel; and you see, I may also say (he opens his
mantle) I am wearing her wings.
The Captain
Let us end this, and tell me what proof of your errand you can give?
Quinola (handing him a letter)
This little message you must return to me so that the secret remains
in our possession, and hang me if you do not see the marchioness swoon
when she reads it. Believe moreover that I profess, in common with an
immense majority of Spaniards, a deep-seated aversion for--the
gallows.
The Captain
And suppose that some ambitious woman has paid for your life, that she
give it in exchange for another's?
Quinola
Should I be in rags? My life is as good as Caesar's. Look here, my
lord. (He unseals the letter, smells it, folds it up again, and gives
it to him) Are you satisfied?
The Captain (aside)
I have yet time. (To Quinola) Remain where you are, I am going to her.
SCENE SECOND
Quinola (alone, in the front of the stage, looking at the departing
captain)
That is all right! O my dear master, if the torture chamber has not
broken your bones, you are likely to get out of the cells of the holy
--the thrice holy Inquisition--saved by your poor cur Quinola! Poor?
--why should I say poor? My master once free, we will end by cashing
our hopes. To live at Valladolid for six months without money, and
without being nabbed by the alguazils, argues the possession of
certain small talents, which, if applied to--other ends, might bring a
man to--something different in fact! If we knew where we were going no
one would stir a step--I purpose speaking to the king, I, Quinola. God
of the rapscallions, give me the eloquence--of--a pretty woman, of the
Marchioness of Mondejar--
SCENE THIRD
Quinola and the Captain.
The Captain (to Quinola)
Here are fifty doubloons which the marchioness sends you, that you may
be enabled to make your appearance here in decent guise.
Quinola (pouring the gold from one hand into the other)
Ah, this burst of sunshine has been long expected! I will return, my
lord, radiant as that amorous valet, whose name I have assumed;
Quinola at your service, Quinola soon to be lord of wide domains,
where I shall administer justice, from the time--(aside) I cease to
fear its ministers.
SCENE FOURTH
The Courtiers and the Captain.
The Captain (alone at the front of the stage)
What secret has this miserable creature discovered? My cousin almost
fainted away. She told me that it concerned all my friends. The king
must have something to do in the matter. (To a lord) Duke of Lerma, is
there anything new in Valladolid?
The Duke of Lerma (whispering)
It is said that the Duke of Olmedo was murdered this morning, at three
o'clock, just before dawn. It happened a few paces from the Mondejar
palace.
The Captain
It is quite likely he should be assassinated for prejudicing the
king's mind against my cousin; the king, like all great statesmen,
esteems as true everything that appears to be probable.
The Duke
It is said that enmity between the duke and the marchioness was only a
pretence, and that the assassin is not to be prosecuted.
The Captain
Duke, this ought not to be repeated unless it can be proved, and even
then could not be written excepting with a sword dipped in my blood.
The Duke
You asked me the news.
(The duke retires.)
SCENE FIFTH
The same persons, and the Marchioness of Mondejar.
The Captain
Ah! here is my cousin! (To the marchioness) Dear marchioness, you are
still very much agitated. In the name of our common salvation, control
yourself; you will attract attention.
The Marchioness
Has that man come back?
The Captain
Now, how can a man of such base condition as he is throw you into such
terror?
The Marchioness
He holds my life in his hands; more than my life, indeed; for he holds
in his power the life also of another, who, in spite of the most
scrupulous precautions, cannot avoid exciting the jealousy--
The Captain
Of the king!--Did he cause the assassination of the Duke of Olmedo, as
is rumored?
The Marchioness
Alas! I do not know what to think.--Here I am alone, helpless--and
perhaps soon to be abandoned.
The Captain
You may rely upon me--I shall constantly be in the midst of all our
enemies like a hunter on the watch.
SCENE SIXTH
The same persons and Quinola.
Quinola
I have only thirty doubloons left, but I have had the worth of sixty.
--Ah! what a lovely scent! The marchioness can now talk to me without
fear.
The Marchioness (pointing out Quinola)
Is this our man?
The Captain
Yes.
The Marchioness
Keep watch, my cousin, so that I may be able to talk without being
overheard. (To Quinola) Who are you, my friend?
Quinola (aside)
Her friend! As soon as you have a woman's secret, you are her friend.
(Aloud) Madame, I am a man superior to all considerations and all
circumstances.
The Marchioness
You have reached a pretty good height, at any rate.
Quinola
Is that a threat or a warning?
The Marchioness
Sir, you are very impertinent.
Quinola
Do not mistake farsightedness for impertinence. You must study me,
before coming to a decision. I am going to describe my character to
you; my real name is Lavradi. At the moment Lavradi ought to be
serving a ten years' sentence in Africa, at the presides, owing to an
error of the alcaldes of Barcelona. Quinola is the conscience, white
as your fair hands, of Lavradi. Quinola does to know Lavradi. Does the
soul know the body? You may unite the soul, Quinola, to the body,
Lavradi, all the more easily because this morning Quinola was at the
postern of your garden, with the friends of the dawn who stopped the
Duke of Olmedo--
The Marchioness
What has happened to him?
Quinola
Lavradi would take advantage of this moment, which is full of promise,
to ask a pardon; but Quinola is a gentleman.
The Marchioness
You are taken up too much with yourself--
Quinola
And not sufficiently with him--that is just. The duke took us for foul
assassins; we were simply asking him, at a rather too advantageous
hour, to make us a loan, pledged by our rapiers as collateral. The
famous Majoral, who was in command of us, being close pressed by the
duke, was forced to disable him by a little thrust, of which he knows
the secret.
The Marchioness
O! My God!--
Quinola
Happiness is cheap at such a cost, madame.
The Marchioness (aside)
Hush! He knows my secret.
Quinola
When we saw that the duke had not a maravedi about him, we left him
where he was. As I was the least culpable of all the gang, I was
charged to take him home; in adjusting his pockets, which had been
turned inside out, I found the letter which he had written to you,
and, learning your position at the court, I understood--
The Marchioness
That your fortune was made?
Quinola
Not at all--that my life was in danger.
The Marchioness
Indeed?
Quinola
To whom are you speaking? Quinola or Lavradi?
The Marchioness
Lavradi shall have his pardon. What does Quinola desire? To enter my
service?
Quinola
Foundling children are of gentle birth; Quinola will deliver your
letter to you with asking a maravedi, without obliging you to do
anything unworthy of you, and he expects that you will refrain from
desiring the services of a poor devil who carries under his wallet the
heart of the Cid.
The Marchioness
How dear you are going to cost me, fellow!
Quinola
You said to me just now, "my friend."
The Marchioness
Were you not my enemy?
Quinola
On account of that word I trust you, madame, and intend to tell you
everything. But here--do not laugh--you must promise--I wish--
The Marchioness
You wish?
Quinola
I wish--to speak to the king--at the moment when he passes on his way
to the chapel; I desire you to lend favor to my request.
The Marchioness
But what are you going to ask him?
Quinola
The most simple thing in the world--an audience for my master.
The Marchioness
Explain yourself, for time presses.
Quinola
Madame, I am the servant of a philosopher; and if the mark of genius
is poverty, we have a great deal too much genius, madame.
The Marchioness
To the point.
Quinola
Senor Alfonso Fontanares has come here from Catalonia to offer the
king our master the sceptre of the sea. At Barcelona he was taken for
a madman; here he is considered a sorcerer. When it becomes known what
he proposes, he is scoffed at in the antechambers. One wishes to
protest for the sake of ruining him; another, a philosopher, throws a
doubt on the existence of our secret, with the view of filching it;
others again make him a business proposition--capitalists who wish to
entangle him in their meshes. As things go at present we do not know
how they will turn out. No one certainly can deny the forces of
mechanics and geometry, but the finest theorems have very little
bodily nourishment in them, and the smallest of ragouts is better for
the stomach; but, really, science is not to blame for that. During the
past winter my master and myself warmed ourselves over our projects,
and chewed the end of our illusions. . . . Well, madame, he is now in
prison, for he has been accused of being on too friendly terms with
the devil; and, unfortunately, the Holy Office is right, this time,
for we have constantly seen him at the bottom of our purse. And now,
madame, I implore you, inspire the king with curiosity to see a man
who will give him a dominion as extended as that which Columbus gave
to Spain.
The Marchioness
But since Columbus gave a new world to Spain, new worlds are being
offered to us once in every fortnight!
Quinola
Ah! madame, every man of genius has one of his own to offer. By
heavens, it is so rare that a man can make honestly a fortune both for
himself and the state that the phenomenon deserves to be favored.
The Marchioness
But what is the project about?
Quinola
I must once more beg you not to laugh, madame. His plan is to make
ships travel without sail or oar, against the wind, by means of a pot
filled with water, which is kept boiling.
The Marchioness
What an idea! Where do you come from? What do you mean? Are you
dreaming?
Quinola
That is just what they all say! Ah, common herd, ye are so constituted
that the man of genius, who is right ten years before everybody else,
passes for a madman for twenty-five years. I am the only one who
believes in this man, and it is on this account I love him; to
understand another is to be his equal.
The Marchioness
And you want me to repeat this nonsense to the king?
Quinola
Madame, you are the only person in the whole of Spain to whom the king
will not say, "Be silent."
The Marchioness
You do not know the king, and I do. (Aside) I must get back my letter.
(Aloud) There is one recent circumstance whose occurrence seems
favorable to your master; news comes to the king that the Armada has
been lost; wait for him on his way through to chapel and address him.
(Exit.)
SCENE SEVENTH
The Captain of the Guards, the Courtiers and Quinola.
Quinola (in the front of the stage)
It is not sufficient to possess genius and to employ it, for there are
plenty of people who make a false show to have it and meet excellent
success. There is need also of opportunity and favoring circumstances;
a picked up letter which puts a favorite in danger, in order to obtain
an interceding tongue, and the loss of the mightiest of flotillas, in
order to open the ears of a prince. Chance is an infamous wretch! And
now, in the duel of Fontanares with his century, the hour has come for
his poor second to appear. (Bells are heard; guard is mounted.) Is yon
sound an omen of success? (To the Captain of the Guards) How ought the
king to be spoken to?
The Captain
Step forward, bow your knee, and say: "Sire"--and pray God to guide
your tongue aright.
(The royal procession appears.)
Quinola
I shall have no trouble falling upon my knees; they are giving way
already; for it is not only the fate of a man, but of a world, that is
at stake.
A page
The queen!
A page
The king!
(Tableau.)
SCENE EIGHTH
The same persons, the King, the Queen, the Marchioness of Mondejar,
the Grand Inquisitor and the whole Court.
Philip II.
Gentlemen, we are about to pray God and honor Him who had dealt a
deadly blow to Spain. England has escaped us, the Armada is lost, and
we desire no more to talk of that flotilla. Admiral (he turns to the
admiral), you were not sent to give battle to the storms.
Quinola
Sire! (He falls on one knee.)
Philip II.
Who are you?
Quinola
The most insignificant and the most devoted of your subjects; the
servant of a man who pines in the prisons of the Holy Office, accused
of magic, because he desires to give to your Majesty the power of
escaping from similar disasters--
Philip II.
If you are really a servant, rise to your feet. Only grandees are wont
to kneel here, in presence of the king.
Quinola
My master, then, shall kneel at your feet.
Philip II.
Explain yourself in brief; the moments of the king's whole life are
not so numerous as are his subjects.
Quinola
You must have, then, but one hour for each of your empires. My master,
Senor Alfonso Fontanares, is in the prison of the Holy Office--
Philip II. (to the Grand Inquisitor)
Father (the Grand Inquisitor approaches), what can you tell us of a
certain Alfonso Fontanares?
The Grand Inquisitor
He is a pupil of Galileo. He professes the heretical doctrine of his
master and boasts the power to do wonders while he refuses to explain
the means. He is accused of being rather a Moor than a Spaniard.
Quinola (aside)
That sallow face is going to spoil all! (To the King) Sire, my master
knows no sorcery, excepting so far as he is madly in love, first with
the glory of your Majesty, next with a maid of Barcelona, heiress of
Lothundiaz, the richest burgess of the town. As he picked up more
science than wealth in studying natural science in Italy, the poor
youth has failed in his attempt to marry this maid.--And notice, sire,
how great men are calumniated; in his despair he made a pilgrimage to
the Virgen del Pilar, to beg her assistance, because Marie was the
name of the lady he loved. On leaving the church, he sat down wearied
under a tree and fell asleep. In his dreams the Virgin appeared to him
and communicated to him an invention by which he could navigate ships
without sails, without oars, against wind and tide. He approached you,
sire; but between the sun and him a cloud intervened, and after a
deadly conflict with the cloud, he is now suffering for his confidence
in the Virgen del Pilar and in his king. No one but his servant has
sufficient courage to come and throw at your feet the news that there
exists a means of realizing universal dominion.
Philip II.
I will see your master when I leave the chapel.
The Grand Inquisitor
Surely, the king will not expose himself to such peril?
Philip II.
My duty is to inquire.
The Grand Inquisitor
And mine is to make men respect the privileges of the Sacred Office.
Philip II.
I know them. Obey me and keep silence. I know that I owe you a
hostage. I know it. (He looks round) Tell me, where is the Duke of
Olmedo?
Quinola (aside)
Aha!
The Marchioness (aside)
We are lost.
The Captain of the Guards
Sire, the duke is not yet--arrived--
Philip II.
Who has given him leave thus boldly to forsake the duties of his
office? (Aside) Some one is deceiving me. (To the Captain of the
Guards) Tell him, if he comes, that the king has committed him as a
prisoner of the Holy Office. (To the Grand Inquisitor) Issue the
order.
The Grand Inquisitor
Sire, I will go myself.
The Queen
And what if the duke fails to come?
Philip II.
In that case he must be dead. (To the captain) You will take his place
in the execution of my orders. (He enters the chapel.)
The Marchioness (to Quinola)
Run to the duke's house, tell him to come and comport himself as if he
were not wounded to the death. The report will then be considered mere
calumny.
Quinola
You may reckon upon me, but grant us your protection. (Alone) Great
heavens! The king seemed charmed by my little fable of the Virgen del
Pilar; I must make a vow to her--but what shall it be?--we will see
after we have succeeded.
(Scene curtain.)
SCENE NINTH
(A cell of the Inquisition.)
Fontanares (alone)
I understand now why Columbus desired that his fetters should be
placed beside him in his coffin. What a lesson for discoverers! A
great discovery is a revelation of truth. And truth destroys so many
abuses and errors that all those who live by falsehood rise up to slay
the truth; they begin by assailing the man. Let inventors then have
patience! I myself desire to have it. Unfortunately, my patience
proceeds from my love. In the hope of obtaining Marie, I dream of
glory and I pursue it. I saw a piece of straw fly up above a boiler.
All men have had the same experience since boilers and straw existed.
But I saw there a force; in order to estimate its violence, I put a
lid on the boiler; the lid flew off but did not kill me. Archimedes
and I are of the same mind! He wished for a lever and a fulcrum to
move the world; I possess this lever and have been fool enough to say
so; since then--misfortunes have overwhelmed me. If I should die, you,
man of genius who shall discover the secret, act on it, but keep
silence. The light which we discover, men take from us, only to set on
fire our funeral pile. Galileo, my master, is in prison for having
said that the earth moves, and I am here for attempting to apply the
forces of the earth. No! I am here because I rebel against the
cupidity of those who desire to steal my secret; were it not for my
love for Marie, I would claim my liberty to-night, leaving to them the
profit, keeping to myself the fame--Ah! What rage is in my heart! But
rage is only fit for children; let me be calm and then I shall be
strong. Would that I might have news of the only man who has faith in
me! He is at liberty, he, who begged to win me bread. But faith is
only found among the poor, who have need of it.
SCENE TENTH
The Grand Inquisitor, a familiar and Fontanares.
The Grand Inquisitor
Well, my son, how are you? You were speaking of faith, doubtless you
have made some sage reflections recently. Come now, spare the Holy
Office a resort to severity.
Fontanares
Father, what do you wish me to say?
The Grand Inquisitor
Before setting you at liberty, the Holy Office must be sure that the
means you employ are natural--
Fontanares
Father, if I had made a compact with the Evil One, would he have let
me languish here?
The Grand Inquisitor
Your words are impious; the devil has a master whose existence is
proved by our burning of heretics.
Fontanares
Have you ever seen a ship on the sea? (The Grand Inquisitor assents.)
By what means is it propelled?
The Grand Inquisitor
The wind fills the sails.
Fontanares
Did the devil reveal this method of navigation to the first sailor?
The Grand Inquisitor
Do you know who he was?
Fontanares
He was, perhaps, the founder of some long forgotten power that ruled
the sea--at any rate, the means that I employ are not less natural
than his. I have seen a certain force in nature, a force controllable
by man. For the wind is God's creature, and man is not its master, but
the wind propels the ships of man, while my force is in the ship
itself.
The Grand Inquisitor (aside)
This man may prove a dangerous fellow. (Aloud) And you refuse to tell
us what it is?
Fontanares
I will tell the king, in presence of the court; for, after that, no
one will be able to rob me of my glory and the fortune that it brings.
The Grand Inquisitor
You call yourself an inventor, and yet you think of nothing but
fortune! You are too ambitious to be a man of genius.
Fontanares
Father, I am so profoundly disgusted by the jealousy of the vulgar, by
the avarice of the great, by the behavior of sham philosophers, that--
but for my love for Marie--I would give back that which chance has
bestowed upon me.
The Grand Inquisitor
Chance?
Fontanares
I am wrong. I would give back to God the thought which God has sent to
me.
The Grand Inquisitor
God did not send it to you that it might be hidden, and we have the
right to force you to divulge it. (To his familiar) Bid them prepare
the rack.
Fontanares
I was expecting it.
SCENE ELEVENTH
The Grand Inquisitor, Fontanares, Quinola and the Duke of Olmedo.
Quinola
It isn't a very healthy thing, this torture.
Fontanares
Quinola! And in what a livery!
Quinola
The livery of success, for you are to be freed.
Fontanares
Free? And to pass from hell to heaven in an instant?
The Duke of Olmedo
As martyrs do.
The Grand Inquisitor
Sir, do you dare to say such words in this place!
The Duke of Olmedo
I am charged by the king to take out of your custody this man, and
will answer for him to the Holy Inquisition.
The Grand Inquisitor
What a mistake!
Quinola
Ah! you would like to boil him in your cauldrons of oil! Many thanks!
His cauldrons are going to carry us 'round the world--like this. (He
twirls his hat.)
Fontanares
Embrace me, my friend, and tell me how--
The Duke of Olmedo
Say not a word here--
Quinola
Yes (he points to the Inquisitor), for here the walls have ears. Come.
And you (speaking to the duke) take courage. You are pale, and I must
give to you a tinge of color; but I know how to do it.
(Scene curtain.)
SCENE TWELFTH
(Palace gallery as in first scene.)
The Duke of Olmedo, the Duke of Lerma, Fontanares and Quinola.
The Duke of Olmedo
We have come just in time!
The Duke of Lerma
You were not wounded then?
The Duke of Olmedo
Who said I was? Would the favorite of the king ruin me? And should I
be here, as you see me, if I were dead? (To Quinola) Stand close and
hold me up.
Quinola (to Fontanares)
This is a man worthy of your love.
Fontanares
Who would not envy such a one? Yet how seldom is occasion given to
show one's love.
Quinola
Spare us, good sir, all this rigmarole about love, in the presence of
the king; for the king, hark you--
A page
The King!
Fontanares
Come on, and let all our thoughts be for Marie!
Quinola (noticing that the Duke of Olmedo is fainting)
How are you? (He puts a flask to his nostrils.)
SCENE THIRTEENTH
The same persons, the King, the Queen, the Captain of the Guards, the
Grand Inquisitor, the Marchioness of Mondejar, the President of the
Council of Castile and the whole court.
Philip II. (to the Captain of the Guards)
Has our man arrived?
The Captain
The Duke of Olmedo, whom I met on the palace steps, has at once obeyed
the commands of the king.
The Duke of Olmedo (falling on one knee)
Will the king deign to pardon a delay--unpardonable?
Philip II. (raising him by his wounded arm)
I was told you were dying--(he glances at the marchioness)--of a wound
received in a nocturnal attack.
The Duke of Olmedo
Well, you see me here, sire, a sufficient answer.
The Marchioness (aside)
He is rouged!
Philip II. (to the duke)
Where is your prisoner?
The Duke of Olmedo (pointing to Fontanares)
Yonder he stands.
Fontanares (kneeling)
And ready, to the great glory of God, to do wonders which shall add
splendor to the reign of the king, my master.
Philip II.
Rise up and speak to me; what is this force miraculous which shall
give to Spain the empire of the world?
Fontanares
It is a force invincible, sire. It is steam; for, when water has
become expanded in steam, it demands a much more extensive area than
that which it occupies in its natural form; and in order to take that
space it would blow up mountains. By my invention this force is
confined; the machine is provided with wheels, which beat the sea and
propel a vessel as swiftly as the wind, so that tempests cannot resist
its course. Voyages can be made in safety and so swiftly that there is
no limit to speed excepting in the revolution of the wheels. Human
life is lengthened every time a moment is economized. Sire,
Christopher Columbus gave to you a world three thousand leagues across
the ocean; I will bring one to you at the port of Cadiz, and you shall
claim, with the assistance of God, the dominion of the sea.
The Queen
You do not seem to be astonished, sire?
Philip II.
Astonishment is involuntary flattery, and kings may never flatter. (To
Fontanares) What do you ask of me?
Fontanares
That which Columbus asked, a ship and the presence of my king to
witness the experiment.
Philip II.
You shall have all--the king, the realm of Spain--the whole world.
They tell me that you love a maid of Barcelona. I am about to cross
the Pyrenees, to visit my possessions, Roussillon and Perpignan; you
shall receive your vessel at Barcelona.
Fontanares
In granting me this vessel, sire, you have done me justice; in giving
it to me at Barcelona, you have bestowed a favor which, from a
subject, makes me your slave.
Philip II.
Yet be cautious; to lose a vessel of the state will be to risk your
life, for so the law provides.
Fontanares
I know it, and accept the risk.
Philip II.
Well said, brave man! If you succeed in constructing this sailless,
oarless vessel that shall face the wind as swiftly as if the wind were
in its favor, I will create you--what is your name?
Fontanares
Alfonso Fontanares.
Philip II.
You shall be Don Alfonso Fontanares, Duke of--Neptunado, Grandee of
Spain.
The Duke of Lerma
Sire, the statutes concerning nobility--
Philip II.
Silence! Duke of Lerma. It is the duty of the king to exalt the man of
genius above all other men and thus to honor the ray of light which
God has given to him.
The Grand Inquisitor
Sire--
Philip II.
What would you?
The Grand Inquisitor
We did not imprison the man on the charge that he had commerce with
the devil, nor because of his impiety, nor because he springs from a
family suspected of heresy; but for the safety of monarchies. Printing
has permitted clever men to communicate their thoughts to others and
the result has been--Luther, whose word has flown abroad in every
direction. But this man is endeavoring to make out of all the nations
of the earth a single people, and, before a multitude like this, the
Holy Office trembles for the fate of monarchy.
Philip II.
All progress moves heavenward.
The Grand Inquisitor
Heaven does not command many things which yet it does not hinder men
from doing.
Philip II.
Our duty consists in bringing good out of evil things and in this work
of amelioration gathering all within one circle, whose centre is the
throne. Do you not see what is here at stake, even the realization of
that universal dominion long-sought for by my glorious father? (To
Fontanares) When you have won the rank of duke and Spanish grandee of
the first class, I will put upon your breast the Golden Fleece; you
shall then be appointed Grand Master of Naval Construction in Spain
and the Indies. (To a minister) President, you will issue, this very
day, under pain of my displeasure, the order to put at the disposal of
this man, in our port of Barcelona, such a vessel as he desires, and
--see that no obstacle interferes with his enterprise.
Quinola
Sire--
Philip II.
What do you desire?
Quinola
While you are here, grant, sire, full pardon to a wretch named
Lavradi, who was sentenced by a deaf magistrate.
Philip II.
Because the judge was deaf, must the king be blind?
Quinola
No, but indulgent, sire, which is almost the same thing.
Fontanares
Pardon! Grant pardon to the only man who has sustained me in my
struggle!
Philip II. (to a minister)
This man has talked with me, and I gave him my hand to kiss; issue to
him letters of my full pardon.
The Queen (to the king)
If this man (she points to Fontanares) is one of those great
discoverers, raised up by God, Don Philip you have done a good day's
work this morning.
Philip II. (to the queen)
It is very difficult to distinguish between a man of genius and a
madman; but if he is a madman, my promises are only worth the value of
his.
Quinola (to the marchioness)
Here is your letter, but let me beg you, between ourselves, to write
no more.
The Marchioness
We are saved!
(The court follows the king into the royal apartment.)
SCENE FOURTEENTH
Fontanares and Quinola.
Fontanares
Surely I am dreaming--Duke! Grandee of Spain! The Golden Fleece!
Quinola
And Master of Naval Construction! We shall have plenty of contractors
to patronize. The court is an odd place, I should like to succeed
there; how is it to be done? By impudence? I have enough of that to
sell! By trickery? Why, the king believes my tale of the Virgen del
Pilar. (He laughs) But what is my master thinking about?
Fontanares
Let us start at once.
Quinola
For what place?
Fontanares
For Barcelona.
Quinola
No--for a tavern. If the air of the court gives the citizens a good
appetite, it makes me devilish thirsty. After a drink, my glorious
master, you will see your Quinola a very busy man; for we must not
delude ourselves. Between the word of the king and the attainment of
success, we shall meet with as many jealous philosophers, scheming
tricksters, malicious cavillers, crooked, rapacious, greedy beasts of
prey, thievish parasites as have ever beset you in your attempts to
see the king.
Fontanares
Yet to obtain my Marie I must succeed.
Quinola
Yes, and for our own sakes also.
Curtain to the Prologue.
ACT I
SCENE FIRST
(The scene is Barcelona. The stage represents a public place. On the
left of the spectator appear houses, among which that of Lothundiaz
stands at the corner of the street. To the right is the palace of
Senora Brancadori. The time is night, but the day begins to dawn.)
Monipodio (wrapped in a mantle, seated under the balcony of the
Brancadori palace), Quinola (who glides forth cautiously like a thief,
and brushes against Monipodio).
Monipodio
Who is it dares to tread on my shoes?
Quinola (in ragged array)
A gentleman, who does not wear any.
Monipodio
That sounds like Lavradi.
Quinola
Monipodio!--I thought that you had been--hanged!
Monipodio
I thought that you had been beaten to death in Africa.
Quinola
Alas, we have been beaten enough without going to Africa!
Monipodio
And do you dare to show yourself here?
Quinola
You seem comfortable enough here. As for me, I have the king's pardon
in my pocket, and while I am waiting for my patent of nobility I call
myself Quinola.
Monipodio
I suppose you stole your pardon?
Quinola
Yes, from the king.
Monipodio
And have you seen the king? (He sniffs at him.) You smell of poverty--
Quinola
Like a poet's garret. And what are you doing?
Monipodio
Nothing.
Quinola
That is soon done; if it gives you any income, I would like to embrace
your profession.
Monipodio
I have been misunderstood, my friend! Hunted by our political enemies.
Quinola
The judges, magistrates and police.
Monipodio
It is necessary for a man to have a political party.
Quinola
I understand you; from being the game you have become the hunter.
Monipodio
What nonsense! I am always myself. I have merely come to an
understanding with the viceroy. When one of my fellows has reached the
end of his tether, I say to him: "Get off," and if he doesn't go, ah!
I hale him to justice--you understand!--That is not treachery is it?
Quinola
It is prevision--
Monipodio
And, by the bye, you have just come from court.
Quinola
Listen. (Aside) Here is a man, the very one I want, knows everything
in Barcelona. (Aloud) After what you have told me we ought to be
friends.
Monipodio
He who has my secret must be my friend--
Quinola
You are as watchful here as if you were jealous. What is it? Come let
us moisten our clay and wet our whistle with a bottle in some tavern;
it is daybreak--
Monipodio
Do you see how this palace is lit up for a feast? Don Fregose is
dining and gaming at the house of Senora Faustine Brancadori.
Quinola
Quite Venetian, Brancadori. 'Tis a rare name! She must be the widow of
some patrician.
Monipodio
She is twenty-two, subtle as musk, and governs the governor, and, let
me tell you between ourselves, has already wheedled out of him all
that he picked up under Charles V. in the wars of Italy. What comes
from the flute--
Quinola
The air takes. What is the age of the viceroy?
Monipodio
He owns up to sixty years.
Quinola
And yet they speak of first love! I know of nothing so terrible as
last love; it strangles a man. I am happy that I have been brought up
so far with unsinged wings! I might be a statesman--
Monipodio
The old general is still young enough to employ me as a spy upon the
Brancadori, while she pays me for her liberty; and--you can understand
the joyous life I lead by making no mischief!
Quinola
Now you want to know all, Old Curiosity, in order to place your thumb
upon the throat of opportunity! (Monipodio nods assent.) Is Lothundiaz
still alive?
Monipodio
Yonder is his house, and this palace belongs to him; always grasping
more and more property.
Quinola
I had hoped to find the heiress her own mistress. My master is ruined!
Monipodio
You bring back a master with you?
Quinola
One who will bring me mines of gold.
Monipodio
Could not I enter his service?
Quinola
I am counting very much upon your co-operation here. Listen,
Monipodio; we are going to change the face of the earth. My master has
promised the king to make one of his finest vessels move through the
water, without sails or oars, in the wind's eyes, more swiftly than
the wind itself.
Monipodio (examining Quinola as he walks round him)
Something has changed my friend.
Quinola
Monipodio, please to remember that men like us must not be astonished
at anything. Leave that to smaller people. The king has given us the
ship, but without a doubloon to go and get her. We arrived here,
therefore, with those two faithful companions of genius, hunger and
thirst. A poor man who discovers a valuable idea has always seemed to
me like a crumb of bread in a fish-pond; every fish takes a bite at
him. We are likely to reach the goal of glory naked and dying.
Monipodio
You are probably right.
Quinola
One morning at Valladolid, my master was within an ace of divulging
his secret to a philosopher who knew nothing of it. I warrant you, I
showed that gentleman the door, with a dose of cudgel given with a
good will.
Monipodio
But how is it possible for us to gain a fortune honestly?
Quinola
My master is in love. Now love forces a man to do as many foolish
things as wise things. We two have first of all to protect our
protector. My master is a philosopher who cannot keep accounts--
Monipodio
Oh! my dear fellow, in choosing a master, you ought to have selected
one--
Quinola
Devotion and address count more with him than money; for money and
favor to him are mere snares. I know him well; he will either give us
or permit us to take enough to end our days in respectability.
Monipodio
Ah! that is what I have dreamed of.
Quinola
We must then use all our talents, which have been so far wasted, in
carrying out this grand enterprise. We should have had a great deal of
misfortune if the devil had not favored us.
Monipodio
It will be almost worth while to make a journey to Compostello. I have
the smuggler's faith, and I love wine.
Quinola
Are you not still in touch with the coiners of false money, and the
skeleton key-makers?
Monipodio
Yes--but for the good of the country--
Quinola
Well, that's the trick! As my master constructs his machine, I shall
take possession of the models of each part and we will make a
duplicate--
Monipodio
Quinola!
Quinola
What now?
(Paquita shows herself on the balcony.)
Monipodio
You are the greatest of men!
Quinola
I know it. Make a discovery, and you will die persecuted as a
criminal; make a copy, and you will live happy as a fool! And on the
other hand, if Fontanares should die, why should not I save his
invention for the good of humanity?
Monipodio
Especially, since we ourselves are humanity, as an old author says.
Let me embrace you.
SCENE SECOND
The same persons and Paquita.
Quinola (aside)
Next to an honest dupe, I know nothing better than the self-deluding
rascal.
Paquita (to herself)
Two friends embrace each other! They cannot therefore be spies.
Quinola
You are already in the secrets of the viceroy, you have the confidence
of the Brancadori lady. That is a good beginning! Work a miracle and
give us some clothes first of all, and if we two, taking counsel with
a flask of liquor, do not discover some way by which my master and
Marie Lothundiaz may meet, I will not answer for the consequences. For
the last two days his constant talk has been of her, and I am afraid
he may some day entirely lose his head.
Monipodio
The maiden is guarded like a condemned convict. This is the reason:
Lothundiaz has had two wives; the first was poor and gave him a son,
the second had a fortune, and when she died left all to her daughter,
and left it in such a way that she could never be deprived of it. The
old man is a miser whose only object is his son's success. Sarpi, the
secretary of the viceroy, in order to win the rich heiress, has
promised to obtain a title for Lothundiaz, and takes vast interest in
the son--
Quinola
There you are--an enemy at the very outset.
Monipodio
We must use great prudence. Listen. I am going to give a hint to
Mathieu Magis, the most prominent Lombard in the city, and a man
entirely under my influence. You will find everything you need at his
palace, from diamonds down to low shoes. When you return here you
shall see our young lady. (Exeunt.)
SCENE THIRD
Paquita and Faustine.
Paquita
Madame is right; two men are on sentry under her balcony and are going
away on seeing the day dawn.
Faustine
The old viceroy will end by disgracing me! He suspects me, even at my
own house, while I am within sight and hearing of him.
(Exit Paquita.)
SCENE FOURTH
Faustine and Don Fregose.
Don Fregose
Madame, you run the risk of catching cold; it is too chilly here.
Faustine
Come here, my lord. You tell me, that you have faith in me; but you
put Monipodio to watch under my windows. Your behavior is not to be
excused like the excessive prudence of a young man, and necessarily
exasperates an honest woman. There are two kinds of jealousy: the
first makes a man distrust his mistress; the second leads him to lose
faith in himself. Confine yourself, if you please, to the second.
Don Fregose
Do not end so charming a celebration, senora, by a burst of anger
which I do not deserve.
Faustine
Was Monipodio, through whom you learn everything that goes on in
Barcelona, under my windows last night, or was he not? Answer me on
your honor as a gentleman.
Don Fregose
He might have been in the neighborhood to prevent our gamesters from
being attacked on their way home.
Faustine
This is the evasive stratagem of an old general! I must know the
truth. If you have deceived me I will never see you again so long as I
live!
(She leaves him.)
SCENE FIFTH.
Don Fregose (alone)
Oh, why cannot I give up the sight, the voice of this woman! She
delights me even in her very anger, and I love to call forth her
reproaches, that I may listen to her words.
SCENE SIXTH
Paquita and Monipodio (disguised as a begging friar at the door of the
Brancadori Palace).
Paquita
Madame told me to learn why Monipodio stationed himself below, but I
saw no one there.
Monipodio
Alms, my dear child, is a treasure which is laid up in heaven.
Paquita
I have nothing to give.
Monipodio
Never mind, promise me something.
Paquita
This is rather a jovial friar.
Monipodio
She does not recognize me and I believe I can run the risk.
(Monipodio knocks at the door of Lothundiaz.)
Paquita
Ah! If you count upon the alms of our friend the land-owner, you would
be richer with my promise. (To Faustine Brancadori, who appears on the
balcony) Madame, the men are gone.
SCENE SEVENTH
Monipodio and Dona Lopez (at the door of the Lothundiaz Mansion.)
Dona Lopez
What is it you desire?
Monipodio
The brothers of our order have received tidings of your dear Lopez--
Dona Lopez
That he was living?
Monipodio
As you conduct the Senorita Marie to the convent of the Dominicans,
take a turn round the square; you will meet there an escaped Algerian
captive, who will tell you about Lopez.
Dona Lopez
Merciful heavens! Would that I could ransom him!
Monipodio
Be careful, first of all, when you approach on that subject; suppose
that he were a Mussulman?
Dona Lopez
Dear Lopez! I must go and prepare the senorita for her journey.
(Dona Lopez re-enters the house.)
SCENE EIGHTH
Monipodio, Quinola and Fontanares.
Fontanares
At last, Quinola, we stand beneath her windows.
Quinola
Yes, but where is Monipodio? Has he allowed himself to be beaten off?
(He turns to the friar) Sir Beggar?
Monipodio
All goes well.
Quinola
Sangodemy! What perfection of mendicancy! Titian ought to paint you.
(To Fontanares) She will come. (To Monipodio) How do you find things?
Monipodio
Most favorable.
Quinola
He shall be a grandee of Spain.
Monipodio
Oh! That is nothing. There is something still better than that!
Quinola (to Fontanares)
Now, sir, you must above all things be prudent. Let us have no
sighing, which might open the eyes of the duenna.
SCENE NINTH
The same persons, Dona Lopez and Marie.
Monipodio (to the duenna, pointing to Quinola)
This is the Christian who escaped from captivity.
Quinola (speaking to the duenna)
Ah! madame, I recognize you from the portrait of your charms which
Senor Lorenzo drew for me.
(He takes her aside.)
SCENE TENTH
Monipodio, Marie and Fontanares.
Marie
Is it really you?
Fontanares
Yes, Marie, I have so far succeeded; our happiness is assured.
Marie
Ah! If you only knew how I have prayed for your success!
Fontanares
I have millions of things to say to you; but there is one thing which
I ought to say a million times, to make up for all the weary time of
my absence.
Marie
If you speak thus to me, I shall believe you do not know the depth of
my attachment; for it is fed less upon flattering words than upon the
interest I feel in all that interests you.
Fontanares
What I am most interested in now, Marie, is to learn before engaging
in so important an undertaking, whether you have the courage to resist
your father, who is said to contemplate a marriage for you.
Marie
Do you think then that I could change?
Fontanares
With us men, to love is to be forever jealous! You are so rich, I am
so poor. When you thought I was ruined, you had no perturbation for
the future, but now that success has come we shall have the whole
world between us. And you shall be my star! And shall shine upon me
though from so great a distance. If I thought that at the end of my
long struggle I should not find you at my side, oh! in the midst of
all the triumph I should die for grief!
Marie
Do you not know me yet? Though I was lonely, almost a recluse while
you were absent, the pure feeling which from our childhood united me
with you has grown greater with your destiny! When these eyes, which
with such rapture look on you again, shall be closed forever; when
this heart which only beats for God, for my father and for you shall
be reduced to dust, I believe that on earth will survive a soul of
mine to love you still! Do you doubt now my constancy?
Fontanares
After listening to such words as these, what martyr would not receive
new courage at the stake?
SCENE ELEVENTH
The same persons and Lothundiaz.
Lothundiaz
That cursed duenna has left my door open.
Monipodio (aside)
Alas, those poor children are ruined! (To Lothundiaz) Alms is a
treasure which is laid up in heaven.
Lothundiaz
Go to work, and you can lay up treasures here on earth. (He looks
round) I do not see my daughter and her duenna in their usual place.
Monipodio (to Lothundiaz)
The Spaniard is by nature generous.
Lothundiaz
Oh! get away! I am a Catalonian and suspicious by nature. (He catches
sight of his daughter and Fontanares.) What do I see? My daughter with
a young senor! (He runs up to them) It is hard enough to pay duennas
for guarding children with the heart and eyes of a mother without
finding them deceivers. (To his daughter) How is it that you, Marie,
heiress of ten thousand sequins a year, should speak to--do my eyes
deceive me? It is that blasted machinist who hasn't a maravedi.
(Monipodio makes signs to Quinola.)
Marie
Alfonso Fontanares is without fortune; he has seen the king.
Lothundiaz
So much the worst for the king.
Fontanares
Senor Lothundiaz, I am quite in a position to aspire to the hand of
your daughter.
Lothundiaz
Ah!
Fontanares
Will you accept for your son-in-law the Duke of Neptunado, grandee of
Spain, and favorite of the king?
(Lothundiaz pretends to look for the Duke of Neptunado.)
Marie
But it is he himself, dear father.
Lothundiaz
You, whom I have known since you were two foot high, whose father used
to sell cloth--do you take me for a fool?
SCENE TWELFTH
The same persons, Quinola and Dona Lopez.
Quinola
Who said fool?
Fontanares
As a present upon our wedding, I will procure for you and for my wife
a patent of nobility; we will permit you to settle her fortune by
entail upon your son--
Marie
How is that, father?
Quinola
How is that, sir?
Lothundiaz
Why! This is that brigand of a Lavradi!
Quinola
My master has won from the king an acknowledgment of my innocence.
Lothundiaz
To obtain for me a patent of nobility cannot then be a difficult
matter.
Quinola
And do you really think that a townsman can be changed into a nobleman
by letters-patent of the king! Let us make the experiment. Imagine for
a moment that I am the Marquis of Lavradi. My dear duke, lend me a
hundred ducats?
Lothundiaz
A hundred cuts of the rod! A hundred ducats! It is the rent of a piece
of property worth two thousand gold doubloons.
Quinola
There! I told you so--and that fellow wishes to be ennobled! Let us
try again. Count Lothundiaz, will you advance two thousand doubloons
in gold to your son-in-law that he may fulfill his promises to the
King of Spain?
Lothundiaz (to Fontanares)
But you must tell me what you have promised.
Fontanares
The King of Spain, learning of my love for your daughter, is coming to
Barcelona to see a ship propelled without oars or sails, by a machine
of my invention, and will himself honor our marriage by his presence.
Lothundiaz (aside)
He is laughing at me. (Aloud) You are very likely to propel a ship
without sails or oars! I hope you will do it; I'll go to see it. It
would amuse me, but I don't wish to have for a son-in-law any man of
such lofty dreams. Girls brought up in our families need no prodigies
for husbands, but men who are content to mind their business at their
own homes, and leave the affairs of the sun and moon alone. All that I
want is that my son-in-law should be the good father of his family.
Fontanares
Your daughter, senor, when she was but twelve years old, smiled on me
as Beatrice smiled on Dante. Child as she was, she saw in me at first
naught but a brother; since then, as we felt ourselves separated by
fortune, she has watched me as I formed that bold enterprise which
should bridge with glory the gulf that stood between us. It was for
her sake I went to Italy and studied with Galileo. She was the first
to applaud my work, the first to understand it. She had wedded herself
to my thought before it had occurred to her that one day she might wed
herself to me. It is thus she has become the whole world to me. Do you
now understand how I adore her?
Lothundiaz
It is just for that reason that I refuse to give her to you. In ten
years' time she would be deserted, that you might run after some other
discovery.
Marie
Is it possible, father, that a lover could prove false to a love which
has spurred him on to work such wonders?
Lothundiaz
Yes, when he can work them no longer.
Marie
If he should become a duke, grandee of Spain, and wealthy?
Lothundiaz
If! If! If! Do you take me for an imbecile? These ifs are the horses
that drag to the hospital all these sham world-discoverers.
Fontanares
But here are the letters in which the king grants to me the use of a
ship.
Quinola
Now open your eyes! My master is at once a man of genius and a
handsome youth; genius dulls a man and makes him of no use in a home,
I grant you; but the handsome youth is there still; what more is
needed by a girl for happiness?
Lothundiaz
Happiness does to consist in these extremes. A handsome youth and a
man of genius,--these, forsooth, are fine reasons for pouring out the
treasures of Mexico. My daughter shall be Madame Sarpi.
SCENE THIRTEENTH
The same persons, and Sarpi (on the balcony).
Sarpi (aside)
Some one uttered my name. What do I see? It is the heiress and her
father! What can they be doing in the square at this hour?
Lothundiaz
Sarpi has not gone to look for a ship in the harbor of Valladolid, but
he gained promotion for my son.
Fontanares
Do not, Lothundiaz, merely for the sake of your son's advancement,
dispose of your daughter's hand without my consent; she loves me and I
love her in return. In a short time I shall be (Sarpi appears) one of
the most influential men in Spain, and powerful enough to reap my
vengeance--
Marie
Oh! not upon my father!
Fontanares
Tell him then Marie, all that I am doing to deserve you.
Sarpi (aside)
What! A rival?
Quinola (to Lothundiaz)
Sir, if you don't consent, you are in a fair way to be damned.
Lothundiaz
Who told you that?
Quinola
And worse than that,--you are going to be robbed; this I'll swear to.
Lothundiaz
To prevent my either being robbed or damned I am keeping my daughter
for a man who may not have genius, but who has common sense--
Fontanares
At least you will give me time--
Sarpi
Why give him time?
Quinola (to Monipodio)
Who can that be?
Monipodio
Sarpi.
Quinola
What a bird of prey he looks!
Monipodio
And he is as difficult to kill. He is the real governor of Barcelona.
Lothundiaz
My respects to you, honorable secretary! (To Fontanares) Farewell, my
friend, your arrival is an excellent reason why I should hurry on the
wedding. (To Marie) Come, my daughter, let us go in. (To the duenna)
And you, old hag, you'll have to pay for this.
Sarpi (to Lothundiaz)
This hidalgo seems to have pretensions--
Fontanares (to Sarpi)
Nay, I have a right!
(Exeunt Marie, the duenna and Lothundiaz.)
SCENE FOURTEENTH
Monipodio, Sarpi, Fontanares and Quinola.
Sarpi
A right? Do you know that the nephew of Fra Paolo Sarpi, kinsman of
the Brancadori, count in the Kingdom of Naples, secretary to the
viceroy of Catalonia, makes pretension to the hand of Marie
Lothundiaz? When another man claims a right in the matter he insults
both her and me.
Fontanares
Do you know that I for five years, I, Alfonso Fontanares, to whom the
king our master has promised the title of Duke of Neptunado and
Grandee, as well as the Golden Fleece, have loved Marie Lothundiaz,
and that your pretensions, made in spite of the oath which she has
sworn to me, will be considered, unless you renounce them, an insult
both by her and by me?
Sarpi
I did not know, my lord, that I had so great a personage for a rival.
In any case, future Duke of Neptunado, future Grandee, future Knight
of the Golden Fleece, we love the same woman; and if you have the
promise of Marie, I have that of her father; you are expecting honors,
while I possess them.
Fontanares
Now, listen; let us remain just where we are; let us not utter another
word; do not insult me even by a look. Had I a hundred quarrels, I
would fight with no one until I had completed my enterprise and
answered successfully the expectation of my king. When that moment
comes, I will fight singled-handed against all. And, when I have ended
the conflict, you will find me--close to the king.
Sarpi
Oh! we are not going to lose sight of each other.
SCENE FIFTEENTH
The same persons, Faustine, Don Fregose and Paquita.
Faustine (on the balcony)
Tell me what is going on, my lord, between that young man and your
secretary? Let us go down.
Quinola (to Monipodio)
Don't you think that my master has pre-eminently the gift of drawing
down the lightning on his own head?
Monipodio
He carries his head so high!
Sarpi (to Don Fregose)
My lord, there has arrived in Catalonia a man upon whom the king our
master has heaped future honors. According to my humble opinion, he
should be welcomed by your excellency in accordance with his merits.
Don Fregose (to Fontanares)
Of what house are you?
Fontanares (aside)
How many sneers, such as this, have I not been forced to endure!
(Aloud) The king, your excellency, never asked me that question. But
here is his letter and that of his ministers. (He hands him a
package.)
Faustine (to Paquita)
That man has the air of a king.
Paquita
Of a king who will prove a conqueror.
Faustine (recognizing Monipodio)
Monipodio! Do you know who that man is?
Monipodio
He is a man who, according to rumor, is going to turn the world upside
down.
Faustine
Ah! I see; it is that famous inventor of whom I have heard so much.
Monipodio
And here is his servant.
Don Fregose
Sarpi, you may file these ministerial documents; I will keep that of
the king. (To Fontanares) Well, my fine fellow, the letter of the king
seems to me to be positive. You are undertaking, I see, to achieve the
impossible! However great you may be, perhaps it would be well for you
to take the advice, in this affair, of Don Ramon, a philosopher of
Catalonia who, on this subject, has written some famous treatises--
Fontanares
In a matter of this kind, your excellency, the finest dissertations in
the world are not worth so much as a practical achievement.
Don Fregose
That sounds presumptuous. (To Sarpi) Sarpi, you must place at the
disposal of this gentleman whatever vessel in the harbor he may
choose.
Sarpi (to the viceroy)
Are you quite sure that such is the king's wish?
Don Fregose
We shall see. In Spain it is best to say a _paternoster_ between every
two steps we take.
Sarpi
Other letters on the same subject have reached us from Valladolid.
Faustine (to the viceroy)
What are you talking about?
Don Fregose
Oh, it is nothing but a chimera.
Faustine
But don't you know that I am rather fond of chimeras?
Don Fregose
This is the chimera of some philosopher which the king has taken
seriously on account of the disaster of the Armada. If this gentleman
succeeds, we shall have the court at Barcelona.
Faustine
We shall be much indebted to him for that.
Don Fregose
He has staked his life on a commission to propel a vessel, swift as
the wind, yet straight in the wind's eye, without the employment of
either oars or sails.
Faustine
Staked his life? He must be a child to do so.
Sarpi
Alfonso Fontanares reckons that the performance of this miracle will
win for him the hand of Marie Lothundiaz.
Faustine
Ah! He loves her then--
Quinola (whispering to Faustine)
No, senora, he adores her.
Faustine
The daughter of Lothundiaz!
Don Fregose
You seem suddenly to feel a great interest in him.
Faustine
I hope the gentleman may succeed, if it were only for the purpose of
bringing the court here.
Don Fregose
Senora, will you not come and take luncheon at the villa of Avaloros?
A vessel is at your service in the harbor.
Faustine
No, my lord, the night of pleasure has wearied me, and a sail would
prove too much. I am not obliged, like you, to be indefatigable; youth
loves sleep, give me leave then to retire and take a little rest.
Don Fregose
You never say anything to me but that your words contain some
innuendo.
Faustine
You ought to be grateful that I do not take you seriously!
(Exeunt Faustine, the Viceroy and Paquita.)
SCENE SIXTEENTH
Avaloros, Quinola, Monipodio, Fontanares and Sarpi.
Sarpi (to Avaloros)
It is too late for a sail.
Avaloros
I do not care; I have won ten crowns in gold.
(Sarpi and Avaloros talk together.)
Fontanares (to Monipodio)
Who is this person?
Monipodio
It is Avaloros, the richest banker of Catalonia; he has bought the
whole Mediterranean to be his tributary.
Quinola
I feel my heart filled with tenderness towards him.
Monipodio
Every one of us owns him as our master.
Avaloros (to Fontanares)
Young man, I am a banker; if your business is a good one, next to the
protection of God and that of the king, nothing is as good as that of
a millionaire.
Sarpi (to the banker)
Make no engagements at present. You and I together will easily be able
to make ourselves masters of this enterprise.
Avaloros (to Fontanares)
Very well, my friend, you must come to see me.
(Monipodio secretly robs him of his purse.)
SCENE SEVENTEENTH
Monipodio, Fontanares and Quinola.
Quinola (to Fontanares)
Are you making a good beginning here?
Monipodio
Don Fregose is jealous of you.
Quinola
Sarpi is bent on defeating your enterprise.
Monipodio
You are posing as a giant before dwarfs who are in power! Before you
put on these airs of pride, succeed! People who succeed make
themselves small, slip into small openings and glide inward to the
treasure.
Quinola
Glory? But my dear sir, it can only be obtained by theft.
Fontanares
Do you wish me to abase myself?
Monipodio
Yes, in order that you may gain your point.
Fontanares
Pretty good for a Sarpi! I shall make an open struggle for it. But
what obstacle do you see between success and me? Am I not on my way to
the harbor to choose a fine galleon?
Quinola
Ah! I am superstitious on that point. Sir, do not choose the galley!
Fontanares
I see no reason why I shouldn't.
Quinola
You have had no experience! You have had something else to make
discoveries about. Ah, sir, we are moneyless, without credit at any
inn, and if I had not met this old friend who loves me, for there are
friends who hate you, we should have been without clothes--
Fontanares
But she loves me! (Marie waves her handkerchief at the window.) See,
see, my star is shining!
Quinola
Why, sir, it is a handkerchief! Are you sufficiently in your right
mind to take a bit of advice? This is not the sort of madonna for you;
you need a Marchioness of Mondejar--one of those slim creatures, clad
in steel, who through love are capable of all the expedients which
distress makes necessary. Now the Brancadori--
Fontanares
If you want me to throw the whole thing up you will go on talking like
that! Bear that in mind; love gives the only strength I have. It is
the celestial light that leads me on.
Quinola
There, there, do not excite yourself.
Monipodio
This man makes me anxious! He seems to me rather to be possessed by
the machinery of love than by the love of machinery.
SCENE EIGHTEENTH
The same persons and Paquita.
Paquita (to Fontanares)
My mistress bids me tell you, senor, that you must be on your guard.
You are the object of implacable hatred to certain persons.
Monipodio
That is my business. You may go without fear through all the streets
of Barcelona; if any one seeks your life, I shall be the first to know
it.
Fontanares
Danger! Already?
Paquita
You have given me no answer for her.
Quinola
No, my pet, people don't think about two machines at the same time;
tell your divine mistress that my master kisses her feet. I am a
bachelor, sweet angel, and wish to make a happy end.
(He kisses her.)
Paquita (slapping him in the face)
You fool!
Quinola
Oh, charming!
(Exit Paquita.)
SCENE NINETEENTH
Fontanares, Quinola and Monipodio.
Monipodio
Come to the Golden Sun. I know the host; you will get credit there.
Quinola
The battle is beginning even earlier than I had expected.
Fontanares
Where shall I obtain money?
Quinola
We can't borrow it, but we can buy it. How much do you need?
Fontanares
Two thousand doubloons in gold.
Quinola
I have been trying to make an estimate of the treasury I intended to
draw upon; it is not plump enough for that.
Monipodio
Well, now, I have found a purse.
Quinola
Forget nothing in your estimate; you will require, sir, iron, copper,
steel, wood, all of which the merchants can supply. I have an idea! I
will found the house of Quinola and Company; if they don't prosper you
shall.
Fontanares
Ah! what would have become of me without you?
Monipodio
You would have been the prey of Avaloros.
Fontanares
To work, then! The inventor must prove the salvation of the lover.
(Exeunt.)
Curtain to the First Act.
ACT II
SCENE FIRST
(A room in the palace of Senora Brancadori.)
Avaloros, Sarpi and Paquita.
Avaloros
Is the queen of our lives really ill?
Paquita
She is melancholy.
Avaloros
Is thought, then, a malady?
Paquita
Yes, and you therefore can be sure of good health.
Sarpi
Say to my dear cousin that Senor Avaloros and I are awaiting her good
pleasure.
Avaloros
Stay; here are two ducats if you will say that I am sometimes
pensive--
Paquita
I will say that your tastes are expensive. But I must go and induce
the senora to dress herself. (Exit.)
SCENE SECOND
Avaloros and Sarpi.
Sarpi
Poor viceroy! He is the youngster.
Avaloros
While your little cousin is making a fool of him, you are displaying
all the activity of a statesman and clearing the way for the king's
conquest of French Navarre. If I had a daughter I would give her to
you. Old Lothundiaz is no fool.
Sarpi
How fine it would be to be founder of a mighty house; to win a name in
the history of the country; to be a second Cardinal Granville or Duke
of Alva!
Avaloros
Yes! It would be a very fine thing. I also think of making a name. The
emperor made the Fuggers princes of Babenhausen; the title cost them a
million ducats in gold. For my part, I would like to be a nobleman at
a cheaper rate.
Sarpi
You! How could you accomplish it?
Avaloros
This fellow Fontanares holds the future of commerce in his own hands.
Sarpi
And is it possible that you who cling so persistently to the actual
have any faith in him?
Avaloros
Since the invention of gunpowder, of printing and the discovery of the
new world I have become credulous. If any one were to tell me that a
man had discovered the means to receive the news from Paris in ten
minutes, or that water contained fire, or that there are still new
Indies to discover, or that it is possible to travel through the air,
I would not contradict it, and I would give--
Sarpi
Your money?
Avaloros
No; my attention to the enterprise.
Sarpi
If the vessel is made to move in the manner proposed, you would like
then to be to Fontanares what Amerigo Vespucci was to Christopher
Columbus.
Avaloros
Have I not here in my pocket enough to pay for six men of genius?
Sarpi
But how would you manage the matter?
Avaloros
By means of money; money is the great secret. With money to lose, time
is gained; and with time to spend, everything is possible; by this
means a good business may be made a bad one, and while those who
control it are in despair the whole profit may be carried off by you.
Money,--that is the true method. Money furnishes the satisfaction of
desire, as well as of need. In a man of genius, there is always a
child full of unpractical fancies; you deal with the man and you come
sooner or later on the child; the child will become your debtor, and
the man of genius will go to prison.
Sarpi
And how do you stand with him now?
Avaloros
He does not trust my offers; that is, his servant does not. I shall
negotiate with the servant.
Sarpi
I understand you; I am ordered to send all the ships of Barcelona to
the coasts of France; and, through the prudence of the enemies which
Fontanares made at Valladolid, this order is absolute and subsequent
to the king's letter.
Avaloros
What do you want to get out of the deal?
Sarpi
The functions of the Grand Master of Naval Construction--these I wish
to be mine.
Avaloros
But what is your ultimate object?
Sarpi
Glory.
Avaloros
You rascally trickster!
Sarpi
Your greedy extortioner!
Avaloros
Let us hunt together; it will be time enough to quarrel when we come
to the division of the prey. Give me your hand. (Aside) I am the
stronger, and I control the viceroy through the Brancadori.
Sarpi (aside)
We have fattened him sufficiently, let us kill him; I know how to
destroy him.
Avaloros
We must gain over this Quinola to our interests, and I have sent for
him to hold a conference with the Brancadori.
SCENE THIRD
The same persons and Quinola.
Quinola
I hang between two thieves. But these thieves are powdered over with
virtue and tricked out with fine manners. And they would like to hang
the rest of us!
Sarpi
You rogue, while you are waiting for your master to propel the galleys
by new methods, you ought to be rowing in them yourself.
Quinola
The king, who justly appreciates my merits, well understands that he
would lose too much by such an arrangement.
Sarpi
You shall be watched!
Quinola
That I can well believe, for I keep watch on myself.
Avaloros (to Sarpi)
You are rousing his suspicions, for he is an honest lad. (To Quinola)
Come my good fellow, have you any idea of what is meant by wealth?
Quinola
No, for I have seen it from too great a distance.
Avaloros
Say, such a sum as two thousand golden doubloons?
Quinola
What? I do not know what you mean! You dazzle me. Is there such a sum?
Two thousand doubloons! That means to be a land-holder, to own a
house, a servant, a horse, a wife, an income; to be protected instead
of being chased by the Holy Brotherhood!--What must I do to gain it?
Avaloros
You must assist me in obtaining a contract for the mutual advantage of
your master and myself.
Quinola
I understand! To tangle him up. O my conscience, that is very fine!
But, dear conscience, be silent for a while; let me forget you for a
few days, and we will live comfortably together for the rest of my
life.
Avaloros (to Sarpi)
We have him.
Sarpi (to Avaloros)
He is fooling us! If he were in earnest he would not talk thus.
Quinola
I suppose you won't give me the two thousand doubloons in gold until
after the treaty has been signed.
Sarpi (with eagerness)
You can have it before.
Quinola
You don't mean it! (Holding out his hand) Give it me then.
Avaloros
As soon as you sign notes of hand for the amounts which have already
matured.
Quinola
The Grand Turk himself never offered the bowstring with greater
delicacy.
Sarpi
Has your master got his ship?
Quinola
Valladolid is at some distance from this, I admit; but we control in
that city a pen which has the power of decreeing your disgrace.
Sarpi
I will grind you to powder.
Quinola
I will make myself so small that you can't do it.
Avaloros
Ah! you scoundrel, what do you propose to do?
Quinola
To talk to you about the gold.
SCENE FOURTH
The same persons, Faustine and Paquita.
Paquita
Gentlemen, here is the senora. (Exit.)
SCENE FIFTH
The same persons, with the exception of Paquita.
Quinola (approaching the Brancadori)
Senora, my master talks of killing himself unless he can obtain the
ship which Count Sarpi has refused for thirty days to give him; Senor
Avaloros asks for his life while offering him his purse; do you
understand? (Aside) A woman was our salvation at Valladolid; the women
shall be our salvation at Barcelona. (Aloud) He is very despondent.
Avaloros
The wretched man seems daring enough.
Quinola
Daring without money is naturally amazing to you.
Sarpi (to Quinola)
Will you enter my service?
Quinola
I am too set in my ways to take a master.
Faustine (aside)
He is despondent! (Aloud) Why is it that men like you, Sarpi and
Avaloros, for whom I have done so much, should persecute, instead of
protecting, the poor man of genius who has so lately arrived among us?
(Avaloros and Sarpi are confused.) I cry shame upon you! (To Quinola)
You must explain to me exactly their schemes against your master.
Sarpi (to Faustine)
My dear cousin, it does to need much penetration to divine what malady
it is under which you have labored since the arrival of this
Fontanares.
Avaloros (to Faustine)
You owe me, senora, two thousand doubloons, and you will need to draw
still further on my purse.
Faustine
I? What have I ever asked of you?
Avaloros
Nothing, but you never refuse anything which I am generous enough to
offer you.
Faustine
Your monopoly of the wheat trade is a monstrous abuse.
Avaloros
Senora, I owe you a thousand doubloons.
Faustine
Write me at once a receipt for the two thousand doubloons, and a check
for the like sum which I do not intend to pay you. (To Sarpi) After
having put you in the position in which you now flourish, I warn you
that your best policy is to keep my secret.
Sarpi
My obligations to you are too great to admit of my being ungrateful.
Faustine (aside)
He means just the contrary, and he will make the viceroy furious with
me.
(Exit Sarpi.)
SCENE SIXTH
The same persons, with the exception of Sarpi.
Avaloros
Here they are, senora. (Handing her the receipt and the check.)
Faustine
Very good.
Avaloros
We shall be friends?
Faustine
Your monopoly of the wheat trade is perfectly legal.
Avaloros
Ah! senora.
Quinola (aside)
That is what is called doing business.
Avaloros
Senora, you are a noble creature, and I am--
Quinola (aside)
A regular swindler.
Faustine (offering the check to Quinola)
Here, Quinola, this is for the expenses of your master's machine.
Avaloros (to Faustine)
Don't give it to him, senora, he may keep it for himself, and for
other reasons you should be prudent; you should wait--
Quinola (aside)
I pass from the torrid to the arctic zone; what a gamble is life!
Faustine
You are right. (Aside) Better that I should hold in a balance the
fortune of Fontanares. (To Avaloros) If you wish to keep your monopoly
hold your tongue.
Avaloros
There is nothing keeps a secret better than capital. (Aside) These
women are disinterested until the day they fall in love. I must try to
defeat her; she is beginning to cost me too much. (Exit.)
SCENE SEVENTH
Faustine and Quinola.
Faustine
Did you not tell me he was despondent?
Quinola
Everything is against him.
Faustine
But he knows how to wrestle with difficulties.
Quinola
We have been for two years half drowned in difficulties; sometimes we
have gone to the bottom and the gravel was pretty hard.
Faustine
But what force of character, what genius he has!
Quinola
You see, there, senora, the effects of love.
Faustine
And with whom is he in love now?
Quinola
Still the same--Marie Lothundiaz.
Faustine
A doll!
Quinola
Yes, nothing but a doll.
Faustine
Men of talent are all like that.
Quinola
Colossal creatures with feet of clay!
Faustine
They clothe with their own illusions the creature that entangles them;
they love their own creation; they are egotists!
Quinola (aside)
Just like the women! (Aloud) Listen, senora, I wish that by some
honest means we could bury this doll in the depths of the--that is--of
a convent.
Faustine
You seem to me to be a fine fellow.
Quinola
I love my master.
Faustine
Do you think that he has noticed me?
Quinola
Not yet.
Faustine
Speak to him of me.
Quinola
But then, he would speak to me by breaking a stick across my back. You
see, senora, that girl--
Faustine
That girl ought to be forever lost to him.
Quinola
But he would die, senora.
Faustine
He must be very much in love with her.
Quinola
Ah! that is not my fault! All the way here from Valladolid I have a
thousand times argued the point, that a man like he ought to adore
women, but never to love an individual woman! Never--
Faustine
You are a pretty worthless rascal! Go and tell Lothundiaz to come and
speak with me and to bring his daughter with him. (Aside) She shall be
put in a convent.
Quinola (aside)
She is the enemy. She loves me so much that she can't help doing us a
great deal of harm. (Exit.)
SCENE EIGHTH
Faustine and Fregose.
Fregose
While you expect the master, you spend your time in corrupting the
servant.
Faustine
Can a woman ever lose her habit of seduction?
Fregose
Senora, you are ungenerous; I should think that a patrician lady of
Venice would know how to spare the feelings of an old soldier.
Faustine
Come, my lord, you presume more upon your white hair than a young man
would presume upon his fairest locks, and you find in them a stronger
argument than in--(She laughs). Let me have no more of this petulance.
Fregose
How can I be otherwise than vexed when you compromise yourself thus,
you, whom I wish to be my wife? Is it nothing to have a chance of
bearing one of the noblest of names?
Faustine
Do you think it is too noble for a Brancadori?
Fregose
Yet, you would prefer stooping to a Fontanares!
Faustine
But what if he could raise himself as high as to a Brancadori? That
would be a proof of love indeed! Besides, as you know from your own
experience, love never reasons.
Fregose
Ah! You acknowledge that!
Faustine
Your friendship to me is so great that you have been the first to
learn my secret.
Fregose
Senora! Yes, love is madness! I have surrendered to you more than
myself! Alas, I wish I had the world to offer you. You evidently are
not aware that your picture gallery alone cost me almost all my
fortune.
Faustine
Paquita!
Fregose
And that I would surrender to you even my honor.
SCENE NINTH
The same persons and Paquita.
Faustine (to Paquita)
Tell my steward that the pictures of my gallery must immediately be
carried to the house of Don Fregose.
Fregose
Paquita, do not deliver that order.
Faustine
The other day, they tell me, the Queen Catherine de Medici sent an
order to Diana of Poitiers to deliver up what jewels she had received
from Henry II.; Diana sent them back melted into an ingot. Paquita,
fetch the jeweler.
Fregose
You will do nothing of the kind, but leave the room.
(Exit Paquita.)
SCENE TENTH
The same persons, with the exception of Paquita.
Faustine
As I am not yet the Marchioness of Fregose, how dare you give your
orders in my house?
Fregose
I am quite aware of the fact that here it is my duty to receive them.
But is my whole fortune worth one word from you? Forgive an impulse of
despair.
Faustine
One ought to be a gentleman, even in despair; and in your despair you
treat Faustine as a courtesan. Ah! you wish to be adored, but the
vilest Venetian woman would tell you that this costs dear.
Fregose
I have deserved this terrible outburst.
Faustine
You say you love me. Love me? Love is self-devotion without the hope
of recompense. Love is the wish to live in the light of a sun which
the lover trembles to approach. Do not deck out your egotism in the
lustre of genuine love. A married woman, Laura de Nova, said to
Petrarch, "You are mine, without hope--live on without love." But when
Italy crowned the poet she crowned also his sublime love, and
centuries to come shall echo with admiration to the names of Laura and
Petrarch.
Fregose
There are very many poets whom I dislike, but the man you mention is
the object of my abomination. To the end of the world women will throw
him in the face of those lovers whom they wish to keep without taking.
Faustine
You are called general, but you are nothing but a soldier.
Fregose
Indeed, and how then shall I imitate this cursed Petrarch?
Faustine
If you say you love me, you will ward off from a man of genius--(Don
Fregose starts)--yes, there are such--the martyrdom which his
inferiors are preparing for him. Show yourself great, assist him! I
know it will give you pain, but assist him; then I shall believe you
love me, and you will become more illustrious, in my sight at least,
by this act of generosity than by your capture of Mantua.
Fregose
Here, in your presence, I feel capable of anything, but you cannot
dream of the tempest which will fall upon my head, if I obey your
word.
Faustine
Ah! you shrink from obeying me!
Fregose
Protect him, admire him, if you like; but do not love him!
Faustine
The ship given him by the king has been held back; you can restore it
to him, in a moment.
Fregose
And I will send him to give you the thanks.
Faustine
Do it! And learn how much I love you.
(Exit Don Fregose.)
SCENE ELEVENTH
Faustine (alone)
And yet so many women wish that they were men.
SCENE TWELFTH
Faustine, Paquita, Lothundiaz and Marie.
Paquita
Senora, here are Senor Lothundiaz and his daughter. (Exit.)
SCENE THIRTEENTH
The same persons, excepting Paquita.
Lothundiaz
Ah! senora, you have turned my palace into a kingdom!
Faustine (to Marie)
My child, seat yourself by me. (To Lothundiaz) Be seated.
Lothundiaz
You are very kind, senora; but permit me to go and see that famous
gallery, which is spoken of throughout Catalonia.
(Faustine bows assent and Lothundiaz leaves the room.)
SCENE FOURTEENTH
Faustine and Marie.
Faustine
My child, I love you and have learned of the position in which you
stand. Your father wishes you to marry my cousin Sarpi, while you are
in love with Fontanares.
Marie
And have been for five years, senora.
Faustine
At sixteen one knows not what it is to love.
Marie
What does that matter, if I love him?
Faustine
With us, sweet girl, love is but self-devotion.
Marie
I will devote myself to him, senora.
Faustine
What! Would you give him up if that were for his interest?
Marie
That would be to die, but yet my life is wholly his.
Faustine (aside as she rises from her seat)
What strength in weakness and innocence! (Aloud) You have never left
your father's house, you know nothing of the world nor of its
hardships, which are terrible! A man often dies from having met with a
woman who loves him too much, or one who loves him not at all;
Fontanares may find himself in this situation. He has powerful
enemies; his glory, which is all he lives for, is in their hands; you
may disarm them.
Marie
What must I do?
Faustine
By marrying Sarpi, you will assure the triumph of your dear
Fontanares; but no woman would counsel such a sacrifice; it must come,
it will come from you. At first you must dissemble. Leave Barcelona
for a time. Retire to a convent.
Marie
And never see him again? Ah! If you knew--he passes every day at a
certain hour under my windows, and that hour is all the day to me.
Faustine (aside)
She stabs me to the heart! Oh! She shall be Countess Sarpi.
SCENE FIFTEENTH
The same persons and Fontanares.
Fontanares (to Faustine)
Senora. (He kisses her hand.)
Marie (aside)
What a pang I feel!
Fontanares
Shall I live long enough to testify my gratitude to you? If I achieve
anything, if I make a name, if I attain to happiness, it will be
through you.
Faustine
Why that is nothing! I merely tried to smooth the way for you. I feel
such pity for men of talent in misfortune that you may ever count upon
my help. Yes, I would go so far as to be the mere stepping-stone over
which you might climb to your crown.
Marie (drawing Fontanares by his mantle)
But I am here, I (he turns around), and you never saw me.
Fontanares
Marie! I have not spoken to you for ten days! (To Faustine) Oh!
senora, what an angel you are!
Marie (to Fontanares)
Rather say a demon. (Aloud) The senora was advising me to retire to a
convent.
Fontanares
She!
Marie
Yes.
Faustine
Children that you are, that course were best.
Fontanares
I trip up, it seems, on one snare after another, and kindness ever
conceals a pitfall. (To Marie) But tell me who brought you here?
Marie
My father!
Fontanares
He! Is he blind? You, Marie, in this house!
Faustine
Sir!
Fontanares
To a convent indeed, that she might dominate her spirit, and torture
her soul!
SCENE SIXTEENTH
The same persons and Lothundiaz.
Fontanares
And it was you who brought this angel of purity to the house of a
woman for whom Don Fregose is wasting his fortune and who accepts from
him the most extravagant gifts without marrying him?
Faustine
Sir!
Fontanares
You came here, senora, widow of a cadet of the house of Brancadori, to
whom you sacrificed the small fortune your father gave you; but here
you have utterly changed--
Faustine
What right have you to judge my actions?
Lothundiaz
Keep silence, sir; the senora is a high born lady, who has doubled the
value of my palace.
Fontanares
She! Why she is a--
Faustine
Silence!
Lothundiaz
My daughter, this is your man of genius! Extreme in everything, but
leaning rather to madness than good sense. Senor Mechination, the
senora is the cousin and protector of Sarpi.
Fontanares
Well, take your daughter away from the house of the Marchioness of
Mondejar of Catalonia.
(Exeunt Lothundiaz and Marie.)
SCENE SEVENTEENTH
Faustine and Fontanares.
Fontanares
So, senora, your generosity was merely a trick to serve the interests
of Sarpi! We are quits then! And so farewell. (Exit.)
SCENE EIGHTEENTH
Faustine and Paquita.
Faustine
How handsome he looked in his rage, Paquita!
Paquita
Ah! senora, what will become of you if you love him in this way?
Faustine
My child, I feel that I have never loved before, and in an instant I
have been transformed as by a stroke of lightning. In one moment I
have loved for all lost time! Perhaps I have set my foot upon the path
which leads to an abyss. Send one of my servants to the house of
Mathieu Magis, the Lombard.
(Exit Paquita.)
SCENE NINETEENTH
Faustine (alone)
I already love him too much to trust my vengeance to the stiletto of
Monipodio, for he has treated me with such contempt that I must bring
him to believe that the greatest honor he could win would be to have
me for his wife! I wish to see him groveling at my feet, or I will
perish in the attempt to bring him there.
SCENE TWENTIETH
Faustine and Fregose.
Fregose
What is this? I thought to find Fontanares here, happy in the
possession of the ship you gained for him.
Faustine
You have given it to him then, and I suppose hate him no longer. I
thought the sacrifice would be above your strength, and wished to know
if hate were stronger than obedience.
Fregose
Ah! senora--
Faustine
Could you take it back again?
Fregose
Whether obedient or disobedient, I cannot displease you. Good heavens!
Take back the ship! Why, it is crowded with artisans who are its
masters.
Faustine
You never know what I want, and what I do not want.
Fregose
His death?
Faustine
No, but his disgrace.
Fregose
And in that I shall avenge myself for a whole month of anguish.
Faustine
Take care to keep your hands off what is my prey. And first of all,
Don Fregose, take back your pictures from my gallery. (Don Fregose
shows astonishment). It is my will.
Fregose
You refuse then to be marchioness of--
Faustine
They shall be burned upon the public square or sold, and the price
given to the poor.
Fregose
Tell me, what is your reason for this?
Faustine
I thirst for honor and you have ruined mine.
Fregose
Accept my name and all will be well.
Faustine
Leave me, I pray you.
Fregose
The more power you have, the more you abuse it. (Exit.)
SCENE TWENTY-FIRST
Faustine (alone)
So, so! I am nothing then but the viceroy's mistress! He might as well
have said as much! But with the aid of Avaloros and Sarpi I intend to
have a pretty revenge--one worthy of old Venice.
SCENE TWENTY-SECOND
Faustine and Mathieu Magis.
Mathieu Magis
I am told the senora has need of my poor services.
Faustine
Pray tell me, who are you?
Mathieu Magis
Mathieu Magis, a poor Lombard of Milan, at your service.
Faustine
You lend money?
Mathieu Magis
I lend it on good security--diamonds or gold--a very poor business.
Our losses are overwhelming, senora. And at present money seems
actually to be asleep. The raising of maravedis is the hardest of
farm-labor. One unfortunate deal carries off the profits of ten lucky
strokes, for we risk a thousand doubloons in the hands of a prodigal
for three hundred doubloons profit. The world is very unjust to us.
Faustine
Are you a Jew?
Mathieu Magis
In what sense do you mean?
Faustine
In religion.
Mathieu Magis
I am a Lombard and a Catholic, senora.
Faustine
You disappoint me.
Mathieu Magis
Senora would have wished--
Faustine
I would have wished that you were in the clutches of the Inquisition.
Mathieu Magis
Why so?
Faustine
That I might be certain of your fidelity.
Mathieu Magis
I keep many secrets in my strong box, senora.
Faustine
If I had your fortune in my power--
Mathieu Magis
You would have my soul.
Faustine (aside)
The only way to gain this man's adherence is by appealing to his
self-interest, that is plain. (Aloud) You lend--
Mathieu Magis
At twenty per cent.
Faustine
You don't understand what I mean. Listen; you are lending the use of
your name to Senor Avaloros.
Mathieu Magis
I know Senor Avaloros. He is a banker; we do some business together,
but his name in the city stands too high and his credit in the
Mediterranean is too sound for him to need the help of poor Mathieu
Magis--
Faustine
I see, Lombard, you are very cautious. If you wish to lend your name
to promote an important business undertaking--
Mathieu Magis
Is it smuggling?
Faustine
What difference does it make? The question is, what would guarantee
your absolute silence?
Mathieu Magis
High profit.
Faustine (aside)
This is a rare hunting dog. (Aloud) Very well, I am going to entrust
you with a secret of life and death, for I purpose giving up to you a
great man to devour.
Mathieu Magis
My small business feeds on the great passions of life; (aside) where
there is a fine woman, there is a fine profit.
Curtain to the Second Act.
ACT III
SCENE FIRST
(The stage setting is the interior of a stable. Overhead are piles of
hay; along the walls are wheels, tubes, shafts, a long copper chimney,
a huge boiler. To the left of the spectator the Madonna is sculptured
on a pillar. To the right is a table strewn with paper and
mathematical instruments. Above the table hangs on the wall a
blackboard covered with figures; by the side of the table is a shelf
on which are onions, a water crock and a loaf. To the right of the
spectator is a wide door, and to the left, a door opening on the
fields. A straw bed lies by the side of the pillar at the feet of the
Madonna. It is night-time.)
Fontanares and Quinola.
(Fontanares, in a black robe girded by a leathern belt, works at his
table. Quinola is checking the various parts of the machine.)
Quinola
Though you wouldn't think it, senor, I also have been in love! Only
when I have once understood the woman, I have always bade her
good-bye. A full pot and bottle, ah! these never betray, and moreover,
you grow fat on them. (He glances at his master.) Pshaw! He doesn't
even hear me. There are three more pieces ready for the forge. (He
opens the door.) Here is Monipodio!
SCENE SECOND
The same persons and Monipodio.
Quinola
The last three pieces have come in. Bring the models and make
duplicates of them, as a provision against accident.
(Monipodio beckons to Quinola from the passage; two men make their
appearance.)
Monipodio
Carry these away, boys, and not a sound! Vanish like spectres. This is
worse than theft. (To Quinola) He is dead and buried in his work.
Quinola
He suspects nothing as yet.
Monipodio
Neither they nor any one else suspect us. Each piece is wrapped up
like a jewel and hidden in a cellar. But we need thirty ducats.
Quinola
Zounds!
Monipodio
Thirty rascals built like those fellows eat as much as sixty ordinary
men.
Quinola
Quinola and Company have failed, and I am a fugitive!
Monipodio
From protests?
Quinola
Stupid! They want me bodily. Fortunately, I have two or three suits of
old clothes which may serve to deliver Quinola from the clutches of
the keenest sleuths, until I can make payment.
Monipodio
Payment? That is folly.
Quinola
Yes, I have kept a little nest-egg against our thirst. Put on that
ragbag of the begging friar and go to Lothundiaz and have a talk with
the duenna.
Monipodio
Alas! Lopez has returned from Algeria so often that our dear duenna
begins to suspect us.
Quinola
I merely wish her to carry this letter to Senorita Marie Lothundiaz
(handing a letter). It is a masterpiece of eloquence, inspired by that
which inspires all masterpieces. See! We have been living for ten days
on bread and water.
Monipodio
And what could we look for? To eat ortolans? If our men had expected
fine fare they would have struck long ago.
Quinola
If love would only cash my note of hand, we might still get out of
this hole.
(Exit Monipodio.)
SCENE THIRD
Quinola and Fontanares.
Quinola (rubbing an onion into his bread)
This is the way we are told the Egyptian pyramid-builders were fed,
but they must also have had the sauce which gives us an appetite, and
that is faith. (Drinks water.) You don't appear to be hungry, senor?
Take care that the machine in your head doesn't go wrong!
Fontanares
I am nearing the final solution--
Quinola (whose sleeve splits up as he puts back the crock)
And I have found one in the continuity of my sleeve. In this trade my
clothes are becoming as uncertain as an unknown quantity in algebra.
Fontanares
You are a fine fellow! Always merry, even in the depths of misfortune.
Quinola
And why not, gadzooks! Fortune loves the merry almost as much as the
merry love her.
SCENE FOURTH
The same persons and Mathieu Magis.
Quinola
Ah! Here comes our dear Lombard; he looks at all these pieces of
machinery as if they were already his lawful property.
Mathieu Magis
I am your most humble servant, my dear Senor Fontanares.
Quinola
This is he, polished, dry, cold as marble.
Fontanares
Good-day, Senor Magis. (Cuts himself a piece of bread.)
Mathieu Magis
You are a sublime hero, and as far as I am concerned, I wish you all
sorts of good luck.
Fontanares
And is this the reason why you try to bring upon me all sorts of bad
luck?
Mathieu Magis
You snap me up very sharply; you do wrong, you forget that in me there
are two men.
Fontanares
I have never seen the other.
Mathieu Magis
I have a heart, away from my business.
Fontanares
But you are never away from your business.
Mathieu Magis
I am always filled with admiration at the sight of your struggle.
Fontanares
Admiration is the passion which is the most easily exhausted.
Moreover, you never make any loans on sentiment.
Mathieu Magis
There are sentiments which bring profit, while others cause ruin. You
are animated by faith; that is very fine, but it is ruinous. We made
six months ago certain little agreements; you asked of me three
thousand ducats for your experiments--
Quinola
On the condition, that you were to receive five thousand in return.
Fontanares
Well?
Mathieu Magis
The payment was due two months ago.
Fontanares
You demanded it by legal process two months ago, the very next day
after it was due.
Mathieu Magis
I did it without thought of annoying you, merely as a formality.
Fontanares
And what do you want now?
Mathieu Magis
You are to-day my debtor.
Fontanares
Eight months gone already? It has passed like a dream! And I was
proposing to myself this evening the solution of the problem how to
introduce cold water, so as to dissolve the steam! Magis, my dear
friend, assist me in this matter, be my protector, and give me a few
days more?
Mathieu Magis
As many as you desire.
Quinola
Do you mean it? This is the first appearance of the other man. (To
Fontanares) Senor, I shall make the gentleman my friend. (To Magis) I
appeal to the two Magises and ask if they will give us the sight of a
few doubloons!
Fontanares
Ah! I begin to breathe freely.
Mathieu Magis
That can easily be managed. I am to-day not merely your money-lender,
I am money-lender and co-proprietor, and I wish to draw out my share
in the property.
Quinola
Double man, and triple dog!
Mathieu Magis
Capital has nothing to do with faith--
Quinola
Or with hope and charity; crowns are not Catholics.
Mathieu Magis
When a man comes and asks us to discount a bill, we cannot say: "Wait
a bit; we have a man of genius at work trying to find a gold mine in a
garret or a stable!" No, indeed! Why in six months I could have
doubled those ducats over again. Besides, senor, I have a small
family.
Fontanares (to Quinola)
That creature has a wife!
Quinola
Yes, and if she brings forth young they will eat up Catalonia.
Mathieu Magis
I have heavy expenses.
Fontanares
You see how I live.
Mathieu Magis
Ah! If I were rich, I would lend you (Quinola holds out his hands) the
wherewith to live better.
Fontanares
Wait fifteen days longer.
Mathieu Magis (aside)
This cuts me to the heart. If the matter concerned only myself I would
perhaps let it go, but I must earn what has been promised me, which is
to be my daughter's dowry. (Aloud) Now really, I have a great regard
for you, you please me immensely--
Quinola (aside)
To think that it would be a crime to strangle him!
Fontanares
You are of iron; I shall show myself as hard as steel.
Mathieu Magis
What do you mean, senor?
Fontanares
You shall help me, whether you would or not.
Mathieu Magis
I will not! I want my capital! And would think nothing of seizing and
selling all this iron work.
Fontanares
You compel me to meet trick with trick. I was proceeding with my work
honestly! Now, if necessary, following your example, I shall leave the
straight path. I shall be of course accused, as if perfection could be
expected of me. But I do not mind calumny. But to have this cup to
drink is too much. You made a senseless contract with me, you now
shall sign another, or you will see me dash my work to fragments, and
keep my secret buried here. (He strikes his hand on his heart.)
Mathieu Magis
Ah! senor, you will not do that. That would be theft, a piece of
rascality of which a great man is incapable.
Fontanares
You seize upon my integrity as a weapon by which you would insure the
success of monstrous injustice.
Mathieu Magis
Listen, I wish to have nothing to do with this matter, and if you will
come to an understanding with Don Ramon, a most excellent man, I will
yield all my rights to him.
Fontanares
Don Ramon?
Quinola
Yes, the philosopher whom all Barcelona sets up in opposition to you.
Fontanares
After all, I have solved the last problem, and glory and fortune will
attend the future current of my life.
Quinola
Your words seem to indicate that there is still a part to be supplied
in the machinery.
Fontanares
A trifle--a matter of some hundred ducats.
Mathieu Magis
Such a sum could not be raised from all that you have here, if it were
sold by authority of government, counting the costs.
Quinola
Carrion! Will you get out?
Mathieu Magis
If you humor Don Ramon, he doubtless will be willing to give you the
assistance of his credit. (Turns to Quinola) As for you, gallows-bird,
if ever you fall into my hands, I will get even with you. (To
Fontanares) Good-bye, man of genius. (Exit.)
SCENE FIFTH
Fontanares and Quinola.
Fontanares
His words make me shudder.
Quinola
And me also! The good ideas of a genius are always caught in the webs
of such spiders as he.
Fontanares
Well, if only we can get a hundred ducats more, from that time forth
we shall have a golden life filled with the banquets of love. (He
takes a drink of water.)
Quinola
I quite believe you, but confess that blooming hope, that heavenly
jade, has led us on pretty deep into the mire.
Fontanares
Quinola!
Quinola
I do not complain for myself, I was born to trouble. The question is,
how are we to get the hundred ducats. You are in debt to the workmen,
to the master locksmith Carpano, to Coppolus the dealer in iron, steel
and copper, and to our landlord, who after taking us in, more from
fear of Monipodio than from compassion, will end by turning us out of
doors; we owe him for nine months' board and lodging.
Fontanares
But the work is all but finished.
Quinola
But what of the hundred ducats?
Fontanares
How is it that you, usually so brave and merry, begin now to speak to
me in such a dolorous tone?
Quinola
It is because, as a means of remaining at your side, I shall be
obliged to disappear.
Fontanares
And why?
Quinola
Why? Pray what are we to do about the sheriff? I have incurred, for
you and for myself, trade debts to the amount of a hundred doubloons;
and lo! these debts take, to my mind, the figure, face and feet of
tipstaves!
Fontanares
How much unhappiness is comprised in the term _glory_!
Quinola
Come! Do not be downcast. Did you not tell me that your grandfather
went, some fifty years ago, with Cortez, to Mexico; has he ever been
heard of?
Fontanares
Never.
Quinola
Don't forget you have a grandfather! You will be enabled to continue
your work, until you reach the day of your triumph.
Fontanares
Do you wish to ruin me?
Quinola
Do you wish to see me go to prison and your machine to the devil?
Fontanares
I do not.
Quinola
Permit me then to bring about the return of this grandfather? He will
be the first of his company to return from the West Indies.
SCENE SIXTH
The same persons and Monipodio.
Quinola
How goes it?
Monipodio
Your princess has received her letter.
Fontanares
What kind of a man is this Don Ramon?
Monipodio
He is an ass.
Quinola
Is he envious?
Monipodio
As three rejected play-writers. He makes himself out to be a wonderful
man.
Quinola
But does any one believe him?
Monipodio
They look upon him as an oracle. He scribbles off his treatises,
explaining that the snow is white because it falls from heaven, and he
maintains, in contradiction to Galileo, that the earth does not move.
Quinola
Do you not plainly see, senor, that I must rid you of this
philosopher? (To Monipodio) You come with me; you must be my servant.
(Exeunt.)
SCENE SEVENTH
Fontanares (alone)
What brain, even though it be encased in bronze, could stand the
strain of this search after money, while also making an inquiry into
the most jealously guarded secrets of nature? How can the mind,
engaged in such quests, have time for distrusting men, fighting them,
and combining others against them? It is no easy thing to see at once
what course had best be taken, in order to prevent Don Ramon from
stealing my glory, and Don Ramons abound on every side. I at last dare
to avow that my endurance is exhausted.
SCENE EIGHTH
Fontanares, Esteban, Girone and two workmen.
Esteban
Can any of you tell me where a person named Fontanares is hiding
himself?
Fontanares
He is not hiding himself. I am he; he is merely meditating in silence.
(Aside) Where is Quinola? He would know how to send them away
satisfied. (Aloud) What do you want?
Esteban
We want our money! We have been working without wages for three weeks;
the laborer lives from day to day.
Fontanares
Alas, my friends, I do not live at all!
Esteban
You are alone; you can pinch your belly. But we have wives and
children. At the present moment we have pawned everything.
Fontanares
Have confidence in me.
Esteban
Can we pay the baker with this confidence in you?
Fontanares
I am a man of honor.
Girone
Hark you! We also are men of honor.
Esteban
Take the honor of each of us to the Lombard and you will see how much
he will lend you on it.
Girone
I am not a man of talent, not I, and no one will give me trust.
Esteban
I am nothing but a villainous workman, but if my wife needs an iron
pot, I pay for it, by heaven!
Fontanares
I would like to know who it is has set you on me in this way?
Girone
Set us on? Are we dogs?
Esteban
The magistrates of Barcelona have given judgment in favor of Masters
Coppolus and Carpano, and have granted them a lien on your inventions;
pray tell us, where is our lien?
Girone
I shan't go away from this place without my money.
Fontanares
Can you find any money by staying here? However, here you may remain.
Good-day. (He takes up his hat and cloak.)
Esteban
No! You won't go out without paying us.
(The workmen prepare to bar the door.)
Girone
There is a piece which I forged myself; I am going to keep it.
Fontanares
What! You wretch! (He draws his sword.)
The Workmen
You will not make us budge.
Fontanares (rushing upon them)
Here is for you! (He stops short and throws away his sword.) Perhaps
these fellows have been sent by Avaloros and Sarpi to push me to
extremes. If they succeeded I might be accused of murder and thrown
into prison for years. (He kneels down before the Madonna.) Oh, my
God! Are genius and crime the same thing in Thy sight? What have I
done to suffer such defeats, such insults and such outrages? Must I
pay for my triumph in advance? (To the workmen) Every Spaniard is
master in his own house.
Esteban
You have no house. This place is the Golden Sun; the landlord has told
us so.
Girone
You haven't paid for your lodging; you pay for nothing.
Fontanares
Remain where you are, my masters, I was wrong; I am in debt.
SCENE NINTH
The same persons, Coppolus and Carpano.
Coppolus
Senor, I come to tell you that the magistrates of Barcelona have
granted me a lien on your machine, and I shall take measures that no
part of it leaves this place. My confrere, Carpano, your locksmith,
shares my claim.
Fontanares
What devil is blinding you? Without me, this machine is nothing but so
much iron, steel, copper and wood; with me, it represents a fortune.
Coppolus
We are not going to leave you.
(The two merchants make a movement as if to hem in Fontanares.)
Fontanares
What friend embraces you so closely as a creditor? Well, well, I wish
the devil would take back the great thought he gave me.
All
The devil!
Fontanares
Ah! I must keep watch upon my tongue or one word will throw me into
the clutches of the Inquisition! No glory can recompense me for such
sufferings as these!
Coppolus (to Carpano)
Shall we have it sold?
Fontanares
But to be worth anything, the machine must be finished, and one piece
of it is wanting, of which the model is before you. (Coppolus and
Carpano consult together.) Two hundred sequins more would be required
for its completion.
SCENE TENTH
The same persons, Quinola (disguised as a fantastic old man),
Monipodio (fancifully dressed), the landlord of the Golden Sun.
The Landlord of the Golden Sun (pointing to Fontanares)
Senor, that is he.
Quinola
And so you have lodged the grandson of General Fontanares in a stable!
The republic of Venice will set him in a palace! My dear boy, let me
embrace you. (He steps up to Fontanares.) The most noble republic has
learned of your promises to the king of Spain, and I have left the
arsenal at Venice, over which I preside, in order that--(aside to
Fontanares) I am Quinola.
Fontanares
Never was an ancestor restored to life more opportunely--
Quinola
In what a miserable condition I find you!--Is this then the
antechamber of glory!
Fontanares
Misery is the crucible in which God tests our strength.
Quinola
Who are these people?
Fontanares
Creditors and workmen clamoring for their wages.
Quinola (to the landlord)
Rascal of a landlord, is this the dwelling-place of my grandson?
The Landlord
Certainly, your excellency.
Quinola
I have some knowledge of the laws of Catalonia, and I shall send for
the magistrate to put these rogues in prison. You may call down the
bailiffs upon my grandson, but keep to your own houses, you
blackguards! (He fumbles in his pocket.) Stay! Now go and drink my
health. (He throws money among them.) Come to me later on and you
shall be paid.
The Workmen
Long live his excellency! (Exeunt.)
Quinola (to Fontanares)
Our last doubloon! But it was a good bluff.
SCENE ELEVENTH
The same persons, without the host and the workmen.
Quinola (to the two tradesmen)
As for you, my good fellows, you seem to be made of better stuff, and
by the intervention of a little money we can come to a settlement.
Coppolus
Yes, we shall then, your excellency, be at your service.
Quinola
Do I see here, my son, that famous invention about which Venice is so
excited? Where is the plan, the elevation, the section, the working
drawings of the machine?
Coppolus (to Carpano)
He knows all about it, but we must get further information before
advancing anything.
Quinola
You are an amazing man, my son! Like Columbus, you will yet have your
day. (He kneels.) I thank God for the honor He had done our family.
(To the merchants) Two hours from this I will pay you.
(Exeunt Coppolus and Carpano.)
SCENE TWELFTH
Quinola, Fontanares and Monipodio.
Fontanares
What will be the result of this imposture?
Quinola
You were tottering on the brink of an abyss, and I rescued you.
Monipodio
It was well impersonated! But the Venetians have abundance of money,
and in order to obtain three months' credit, we must throw dust into
the eyes of the creditors, and this is the most expensive kind of
dust.
Quinola
Didn't I tell you that there was a treasure coming? Well it's here
now.
Monipodio
Coming of its own accord?
(Quinola assents with a nod.)
Fontanares
His effrontery terrifies me.
SCENE THIRTEENTH
The same persons, Mathieu Magis and Don Ramon.
Mathieu Magis
I have brought Don Ramon to you, for I wish to do nothing without his
sanction.
Don Ramon (to Fontanares)
Senor, I am delighted at this opportunity of sharing the work of so
eminent a man of science. We two will be enabled to bring your
invention to the highest perfection.
Quinola
Senor knows mechanics, ballistics, mathematics, dioptrics, catoptrics,
statistics?
Don Ramon
Indeed I do. I have purchased many valuable treatises.
Quinola
In Latin?
Don Ramon
No, in Spanish.
Quinola
No true philosopher, senor, writes in anything but Latin. There is a
danger that science may be vulgarized. Do you know Latin?
Don Ramon
Yes, senor.
Quinola
So much the better for you.
Fontanares
Senor, I respect the name which you have made; but I cannot accept
your offer, because of the dangers attendant on my enterprise; I am
risking my head in this work and yours is too precious to be exposed.
Don Ramon
Do you think, senor, that you can afford to slight Don Ramon, the
great scientific authority?
Quinola
Don Ramon! The famous Don Ramon, who has expounded the causes of so
many natural phenomena, which hitherto had been thought to happen
without cause?
Don Ramon
The very man.
Quinola
I am Fontanaresi, director of the arsenal of the Venetian Republic,
and grandfather of our inventor. My son, you may have full confidence
in Don Ramon; a man of his position can have no designs upon you; let
us tell him everything.
Don Ramon (aside)
Ah! I am going to learn everything about the machine.
Fontanares (aside to Quinola)
What is all this about?
Quinola (aside to Fontanares)
Let me give him a lesson in mathematics; it will do him no good, and
us no harm. (To Don Ramon) Will you come here? (He points out the
parts of the machine) All this is meaningless; for philosophers, the
great thing--
Don Ramon
The great thing?
Quinola
Is the problem itself! You know the reason why clouds mount upwards?
Don Ramon
I believe it is because they are lighter than the air.
Quinola
Not at all! They are heavy as well as light, for the water that is in
them ends by falling as flat as a fool. I don't like water, do you?
Don Ramon
I have a great respect for it.
Quinola
I see that we are made for each other. The clouds rise to such a
height, because they are vapor, and are also attracted by the force of
the cold upper air.
Don Ramon
That may be true. I will write a treatise on the subject.
Quinola
My grandson states this in the formula R plus O. And as there is much
water in the air, we simply say O plus O, which is a new binomial.
Don Ramon
A new binomial!
Quinola
Yes, an X, if you like it better.
Don Ramon
X, ah yes, I understand!
Fontanares (aside)
What a donkey!
Quinola
The rest is a mere trifle. The tube receives the water which by some
means or other, has been changed to cloud. This cloud is bound to rise
and the resulting force is immense.
Don Ramon
Immense, why immense?
Quinola
Immense--in that it is natural, since man--pay particular attention to
this--does not create force--
Don Ramon
Very good, then how--?
Quinola
He borrows it from nature; to invent, is to borrow. Then--by means of
certain pistons--for in mechanics--you know--
Don Ramon
Yes, senor, I know mechanics.
Quinola
Very good! The method of applying a force is child's play, a trifle, a
matter of detail, as in the turnspit--
Don Ramon
Ah! He employs the turnspit then?
Quinola
There are two here, and the force is such that it raises the
mountains, which skip like rams--as was predicted by King David.
Don Ramon
Senor, you are perfectly right, the clouds, that is, the water--
Quinola
Water, senor? Why! It is the world. Without water, you could not--That
is plain. Well now! This is the point on which my grandson's invention
is based; water will subdue water. X equals O plus O, that is the
complete formula.
Don Ramon (aside)
The terms he employs are incomprehensible.
Quinola
Do you understand me?
Don Ramon
Perfectly.
Quinola (aside)
This man is a driveling dotard. (Aloud) I have spoken to you in the
language of genuine philosophy--
Mathieu Magis (to Monipodio)
Can you tell me who this remarkably learned man is?
Monipodio
He is a very great man, to whom I am indebted for my knowledge of
ballistics; he is the director of the Venetian arsenal, and purposes
this evening to make us a contribution on behalf of the republic.
Mathieu Magis
I must go and tell Senora Brancadori, she comes from Venice. (Exit.)
SCENE FOURTEENTH
The same persons, with the exception of Mathieu Magis. Lothundiaz and
Marie.
Marie
Am I in time?
Quinola (aside)
Hurrah! Here comes our treasure.
(Lothundiaz and Don Ramon exchange greetings and examine the pieces of
machinery in the centre of the stage.)
Fontanares
What! Is Marie here?
Marie
My father brought me. Ah! my dear friend, your servant told me of your
distress--
Fontanares (to Quinola)
You scoundrel!
Quinola
What, grandson!
Marie
And he brought all my agonies to an end.
Fontanares
Tell me, pray, what was it troubled you?
Marie
You cannot imagine the persecutions I have endured since your arrival,
and especially since your quarrel with Madame Brancadori. What could I
do against the authority of my father? It is absolute. While I
remained at home, I doubted my power to help you; my heart was yours
in spite of everything, but my bodily presence--
Fontanares
And so you are another martyr!
Marie
By delaying the day of your triumph, you have made my position
intolerable. Alas! when I see you here, I perceive that you yourself
at the same time have been enduring incredible hardships. In order
that I might be with you for a moment, I have feigned an intention of
vowing myself to God; this evening I enter a convent.
Fontanares
A convent? Is that the way they would separate us? These tortures make
one curse the day of his birth. And you, Marie, you, who are the
mainspring and the glory of my discovery, the star that protected my
destiny, I have forced you to seek refuge in heaven! I cannot stand up
against that. (He weeps.)
Marie
But by promising to enter a convent, I obtained my father's permission
to come here. I wish in bidding you farewell to bring you hope. Here
are the savings of a young girl, of your sister, which I have kept
against the day when all would forsake you.
Fontanares
And what care I for glory, for fortune, for life itself, without you?
Marie
Accept the gift which is all that the woman who intends to be your
wife can and ought to offer. If I feel that you are unhappy and in
distress, hope will forsake me in my retirement, and I shall die,
uttering a last prayer for you!
Quinola (to Marie)
Let him play the proud man, we may save him in spite of himself. Do
you know it is for this purpose that I am passing myself off as his
grandfather?
(Marie gives her purse to Quinola.)
Lothundiaz (to Don Ramon)
So you do not think much of him?
Don Ramon
Oh, no, he is an artisan, who knows nothing and who doubtless stole
his secret in Italy.
Lothundiaz
I have always doubted him, and it seems I was right in refusing him my
daughter in marriage.
Don Ramon
He would bring her to beggary. He has squandered five thousand
sequins, and has gone into debt three thousand in eight months,
without attaining any result! Ah! He is a contrast with his
grandfather. There's a philosopher of the first rank for you!
Fontanares will have to work hard to catch up with him. (He points to
Quinola.)
Lothundiaz
His grandfather?
Quinola
Yes, senor, my name of Fontanares was changed to that of Fontanaresi.
Lothundiaz
And you are Pablo Fontanaresi?
Quinola
Yes, Pablo himself.
Lothundiaz
And you are rich?
Quinola
Opulent.
Lothundiaz
That delights me, senor. I suppose that now you will pay me the two
thousand sequins which you borrowed from my father?
Quinola
Certainly, if you can show me my signature, I am ready to pay the
bond.
Marie (after a conversation with Fontanares)
You will accept this--will you not--as a means of securing your
triumph, for is not our happiness staked on that?
Fontanares
To think that I am dragging down this pearl into the gulf which is
yawning to receive me.
(Quinola and Monipodio depart.)
SCENE FIFTEENTH
The same persons and Sarpi.
Sarpi (to Lothundiaz)
You here, Senor Lothundiaz? And your daughter too?
Lothundiaz
I promised that she should come her to say farewell on condition that
she would not refuse to retire to a convent afterwards.
Sarpi
The assembly here is so numerous that I am not surprised, nor in the
least offended, by your complaisance towards her.
Fontanares
Ah! Here comes the fiercest of my persecutors. How are you, senor; are
you come to put my constancy to a fresh test?
Sarpi
I represent the viceroy of Catalonia, senor, and I have a right to
your respectful treatment. (To Don Ramon) Are you satisfied with him?
Don Ramon
If he takes my advice, we are sure of success.
Sarpi
The viceroy has great hopes from your learned co-operation.
Fontanares
Surely I am dreaming! Is it possible they are raising up a rival to
me?
Sarpi
No! senor; but a guide who is able to save you from failure.
Fontanares
Who told you I needed one?
Marie
O Alfonso! But suppose that Don Ramon could insure your success?
Fontanares
Ah! Even she has lost confidence in me!
Marie
They say he is so learned!
Lothundiaz
Presumptuous man! He thinks that he knows more than all the learned in
the world.
Sarpi
I was induced to come here on account of a question which has been
raised and has filled the viceroy with anxiety; you have had in your
possession for nearly ten months a ship belonging to the state, and
you must now render an account of the loan.
Fontanares
The king fixed no term for the time of my experiments.
Sarpi
The administration of Catalonia has the right to demand an account,
and we have received a decree of the ministers to this effect.
(Fontanares appears thunderstruck.) Oh! you can take your time; we do
not wish to embarrass a man like you. Nor are we inclined to think
that you wish to elude the stipulation with regard to your life by
keeping the ship for an indefinite period.
Marie
His life?
Fontanares
Yes, I am staking my life in these experiments.
Marie
And yet, you refuse my help?
Fontanares
In three months, Count Sarpi, I shall have completed, without the
counsel of another, the work I am engaged upon. You will then see one
of the greatest spectacles that a man can produce for his age to
witness.
Sarpi
Here, then, is a bond to that effect; sign it.
(Fontanares signs it.)
Marie
Farewell, my friend! If you are vanquished in this struggle I believe
that I shall love you more than ever!
Lothundiaz
Come, my daughter; the man is mad.
Don Ramon
Young man! be sure to read my treatises.
Sarpi
Farewell, future grandee of Spain.
(Exeunt all except Fontanares.)
SCENE SIXTEENTH
Fontanares (alone in the front of the stage)
While Marie is in a convent the sunlight cannot warm me. I am bearing
up a world, yet fear I am no Titian. No, I shall never succeed; all is
against me. And this work which cost me three years of thought and ten
months of toil will never cleave the ocean! But now, I am heavy with
sleep. (He lies down on the straw.)
SCENE SEVENTEENTH
Fontanares (asleep), Quinola and Monipodio (entering by the Postern).
Quinola
Diamonds! Pearls and gold! We are saved.
Monipodio
Don't forget. The Brancadori is from Venice.
Quinola
Then I'd better be getting back there. Send me the landlord; I wish to
re-establish our credit.
Monipodio
He is here.
SCENE EIGHTEENTH
The same persons and the Landlord of the Golden Sun.
Quinola
What is this, senor, Landlord of the Golden Sun? You don't seem to
have much confidence in the star of my grandson?
The Landlord
A hostelry, senor, is not a banking house.
Quinola
No, but you should not, for charity's sake, have refused him bread.
The most noble republic of Venice sent me to bring him to that city,
but he is too fond of Spain! I return, as I arrived, secretly. I have
nothing with me that I can dispose of excepting this diamond. A month
from this time I will remit to you through the bank. Will you arrange
with my grandson's servant for the sale of this jewel?
The Landlord
Your people here, senor, shall be treated like princes of wealth.
Quinola
You may go.
(Exit landlord.)
SCENE NINETEENTH
The same persons, excepting the landlord.
Quinola
I must go and change my dress. (He looks at Fontanares) He sleeps;
that noble heart has at last succumbed to its emotions; it is only we
who know how to yield before misfortunes; our carelessness he cannot
share. Have I not done well, in always obtaining a duplicate of that
which he required? (To Monipodio) Here is the plan of the last piece;
do you take charge of it.
(Exeunt.)
SCENE TWENTIETH
Fontanares (sleeping), Faustine and Mathieu Magis.
Mathieu Magis
There he is!
Faustine
To what a plight have I reduced him! From the depth of the wounds
which I have thus inflicted upon myself, I realize the depth of my
love! Oh! how much happiness do I owe him in compensation for so much
suffering!
Curtain to the Third Act.
ACT IV
SCENE FIRST
(The stage setting represents a public square. In the centre stands a
sheriff's officer on an auctioneer's block, around the base of which
are the various pieces for the machine. A crowd is gathered on each
side of the platform. To the left of the spectator are grouped
together Coppolus, Carpano, the landlord of the Golden Sun, Esteban,
Girone, Mathieu Magis, Don Ramon and Lothundiaz. To the right are
Fontanares and Monipodio; Quinola conceals himself in a cloak behind
Monipodio.)
Fontanares, Monipodio, Quinola, Coppolus, the landlord of the Golden
Sun, Esteban, Girone, Mathieu Magis, Don Ramon, Lothundiaz, Sheriff's
Officer, a crowd of people.
Sheriff's Officer
Gentlemen, show a little more warmth. Here we have a boiler, big
enough to cook a dinner for a regiment of the guards.
The Landlord
Four maravedis.
Sheriff's Office
Do I hear more? Come and look at it, examine it!
Mathieu Magis
Six maravedis.
Quinola (to Fontanares)
Senor, they will not fetch a hundred ducats.
Fontanares
We must try to be resigned.
Quinola
Resignation seems to me to be the fourth theological virtue omitted
from the list out of consideration for women!
Monipodio
Hold your tongue! Justice is on your track and you would have been
arrested before this if they had not taken you for one of my people.
Sheriff's Officer
This is the last lot, gentlemen. Going, going--no further bid? Gone!
It is knocked down to Senor Mathieu Magis for ten ducats, six
maravedis.
Lothundiaz (to Don Ramon)
What do you think of that? Thus ends the sublime invention of our
great man! He was right, by heaven, when he promised us a rare
spectacle!
Coppolus
You can laugh; he does not owe you anything.
Esteban
It is we poor devils who have to pay for his folly.
Lothundiaz
Did you get nothing, Master Coppolus? And what of my daughter's
diamonds, which the great man's servant put into the machine?
Mathieu Magis
Why, they were seized in my house.
Lothundiaz
And are not the thieves in the hand of justice? I would like best of
all to see Quinola, that cursed pilferer of jewels, in durance.
Quinola (aside)
Oh, my young life, what lessons are you receiving! My antecedents have
ruined me.
Lothundiaz
But if they catch him, his goose will soon be cooked, and I shall have
the pleasure of seeing him dangling from the gallows, and giving the
benediction with his feet.
Fontanares (to Quinola)
Our calamity stirs this dullard's wit.
Quinola
You mean his brutality.
Don Ramon
I sincerely regret this disaster. This young artisan had at last
listened to my advice, and we were on the point of realizing the
promises made by him to the king; but he blindly forfeited his
opportunity; I mean to ask pardon for him at the court, for I shall
tell the king how useful he will be to me.
Coppolus
Here is an example of generosity extremely rare in the conduct of one
learned man towards another.
Lothundiaz
You are an honor to Catalonia!
Fontanares (coming forward)
I have endured with tranquillity the agony of seeing a piece of
workmanship, which entitles me to eternal glory, sold as so much old
junk--(murmurs among the people). But this passes all endurance. Don
Ramon, if you have, I do not say understood, but even guessed, at the
use of all these fragments of machinery, displaced and scattered as
they are, you ought to have bought them even at the sacrifice of your
whole fortune.
Don Ramon
Young man, I respect your misfortunes; but you know that your
apparatus could not possibly go, and that my experience had become
necessary to you.
Fontanares
The most terrible among all the horrors of destitution is that it
gives ground for calumny and the triumph of fools!
Lothundiaz
Is it not disgraceful for a man in your position thus to undertake to
insult a philosopher whose reputation is established? Where would I be
if I had given you my daughter? You would have led me a fine dance
down to beggary; for you have already wasted, for absolutely no
purpose, ten thousand sequins! Really this grandee of Spain seems
particularly small in his grandeur to-day.
Fontanares
You make me pity you.
Lothundiaz
That is possible, but you do not make me envy you; your life is at the
mercy of the tribunal.
Don Ramon
Let him alone; don't you see that he is crazy?
Fontanares
Not quite crazy enough, senor, to believe that O plus O is a binomial.
SCENE SECOND
The same persons, Don Fregose, Faustine, Avaloros and Sarpi.
Sarpi
We have come too late; the sale is over.
Don Fregose
The king will regret the confidence he placed in a charlatan.
Fontanares
A charlatan, my lord? In a few days, you may be able to cut my head
off; kill me, but don't calumniate me; your position in the state is
too high for you to descend so low.
Don Fregose
Your audacity equals the extent of your downfall. Are you unaware that
the magistrates of Barcelona look upon you as an accomplice of the
thief who robbed Lothundiaz? The flight of your servant proves the
crime, and the freedom you now enjoy is due to the intercessions of
this lady. (Points to Faustine.)
Fontanares
My servant, your excellency, might have been in early life a criminal,
but since he has followed my fortune he has been an innocent man. I
declare, on my honor, that he is guiltless of any such act as theft.
The jewels which were seized at the moment he was engaged in selling
them were the free gift of Marie Lothundiaz, from whom I had refused
to accept them.
Faustine
What pride he shows, even in adversity! Nothing can bend him.
Sarpi
And how do you explain the resurrection of your grandfather, the
pretended director of the Venetian arsenal? Unfortunately for you, the
senora and myself were acquainted with the actual man.
Fontanares
I caused my servant to put on this disguise in order that he might
talk science and mathematics with Don Ramon. Senor Lothundiaz will
tell you that the philosopher of Catalonia and Quinola perfectly
understood each other.
Monipodio (to Quinola)
He has ruined himself!
Don Ramon
On this subject I appeal to my writings.
Faustine
Do not be perturbed, Don Ramon; it is so natural for people of this
kind, when they find themselves falling, to drag down other people
with them!
Lothundiaz
Such a disposition is detestable.
Fontanares
Before I die I ought to speak the truth, senora, to those who have
flung me into the abyss. (To Don Fregose) My lord, the king promised
me the protection of his people at Barcelona, and here I have met with
nothing but hatred! Oh, you grandees of the land, you rich, and all
who have in your hands power and influence, why is it that you thus
throw obstacles in the way of advancing thought? Is it the law of God
that you should persecute and put to shame that which eventually you
will be compelled to adore? Had I been pliant, abject and a flatterer,
I might have succeeded! In me you have persecuted that which
represents all that is noblest in man--His consciousness of his own
power, the majesty of his labor, the heavenly inspiration which urges
him to put his hand to enterprise, and--love, that spirit of human
trust, which rekindles courage when it is on the point of expiring in
the storm of mockery. Ah! If the good that you do is done amiss, you
are always successful in the accomplishment of what is bad! But why
should I proceed?--You are not worthy of my anger.
Faustine (aside)
Oh! Another word and I must cry out that I adore him!
Don Fregose
Sarpi, tell the police officers to advance and carry off the
accomplice of Quinola.
(Applause and cries of "bravo!")
SCENE THIRD
The same persons and Marie Lothundiaz.
(At the moment the police officers seize Fontanares, Marie appears, in
the habit of a novice, accompanied by a monk and two sisters.)
Marie Lothundiaz (to the viceroy)
My lord, I have just learned that in my desire to save Fontanares from
the rage of his enemies I have caused his ruin. But now an opportunity
is given me to vindicate the truth, and I beg to declare that I myself
put into the hands of Quinola the precious stones and the money I had
treasured as my own. (Lothundiaz shows some excitement.) They belonged
to me, father, and God grant that you may not have cause some day to
mourn your own blindness.
Quinola (throwing off his cloak)
Whew! I breathe freely at last!
Fontanares (bending his knee before Marie)
Thanks, radiant and spotless creature, through whose love I still am
kept close to that heaven from which I draw my faith and hope; you
have saved my honor.
Marie
And is not your honor also mine? Your glory is yet to come.
Fontanares
Alas! my work is dismembered and dispersed, held in a hundred
avaricious hands, who will not give it back excepting at the price it
cost to fabricate. To recover it I should double the amount of my
indebtedness and fail to complete the enterprise in time. All is over!
Faustine (to Marie)
Only sacrifice yourself for him and he is saved.
Marie
What say you, father? And you, Count Sarpi? (Aside) It will be my
death! (Aloud) Will you consent, on condition I obey you, to give
Fontanares all that is necessary for the success of his undertaking?
(To Faustine) I shall devote myself to God, senora!
Faustine
You are sublime, sweet angel. (Aside) And thus at last deliverance
comes to me!
Fontanares
Stay, Marie! I would choose the struggle and all its perils, I would
choose death itself, rather than the loss of you from such a cause.
Marie
Rather than glory? (To the viceroy) My lord, you will cause my gems to
be restored to Quinola. I return to my convent with a happy mind;
either I am his, or I must live for God alone.
Lothundiaz
I believe he is a sorcerer.
Quinola
This young maiden restores to me my love for womankind.
Faustine (to Sarpi, the viceroy and Avaloros)
Can we not conquer him, in spite of all?
Avaloros
I shall try it.
Sarpi (to Faustine)
All is not lost. (To Lothundiaz) Take your daughter home; she will
soon be obedient to you.
Lothundiaz
God grant it! Come my daughter. (Exeunt.)
SCENE FOURTH
Faustine, Fregose, Avaloros, Fontanares, Quinola and Monipodio.
Avaloros
I have studied you well, young man, and you have a great heart--a
heart firm as steel. Steel will always be the master of gold. Let us
frankly form a copartnership; I will pay your debts, buy up all that
has been sold, give you and Quinola five thousand ducats, and, at my
instance, the viceroy will be willing to forget your freedom with him.
Fontanares
If, in my distress, I have ever failed in respect towards you, senor,
I beg you will pardon me.
Don Fregose
That is quite sufficient, senor. Don Fregose does not easily take
offence.
Faustine
You have done well, my lord.
Avaloros
Thus you see, young man, that tempest is succeeded by calm, and at
present all things smile upon you. The next thing for us to do is to
unite, you and I, in fulfilling your promises to the king.
Fontanares
I care not for fortune excepting for one reason; shall I be enabled to
wed Marie Lothundiaz?
Don Fregose
Is she the only woman in the world you love?
Fontanares
The only one.
(Faustine and Avaloros talk together.)
Don Fregose
You never told me that before. Henceforth, you may count on me, young
man; I am your steadfast ally. (Exit.)
Monipodio
They are coming to terms; we are ruined. I shall take myself off to
France with the duplicate machine. (Exit.)
SCENE FIFTH
Quinola, Fontanares, Faustine and Avaloros.
Faustine (to Fontanares)
Come, now; I also bear no malice, and you must come to the banquet I
am giving.
Fontanares
Senora, your first kindness concealed treachery.
Faustine
Like all those lofty dreamers, who enrich humanity with their
inventions, you know neither women, nor the world.
Fontanares (aside)
I have scarcely eight days left. (To Quinola) I am going to make use
of her.
Quinola
Do so, as you make use of me.
Fontanares
I will come to your house, senora.
Faustine
I must thank Quinola for that. (She offers a purse to Quinola.) Take
this. (To Fontanares) Till we meet again!
(Exeunt Faustine and Avaloros.)
SCENE SIXTH
Fontanares and Quinola.
Fontanares
That woman is treacherous as the sun in winter. Unhappy am I that I
sought her, for she has taught me to lose faith. Is it possible that
there are virtues which it is for our advantage to discard?
Quinola
How is it possible, senor, to distrust a woman who sets in gold her
slightest words! She loves you; that's the secret. Is your heart so
very small that it cannot harbor two affections?
Fontanares
Nonsense! Marie has given me hope, her words have fired my soul. Yes,
I shall succeed.
Quinola (aside)
Where is Monipodio? (Aloud) A reconciliation, senor, is very easy with
a woman who yields so easily as Senora Brancadori.
Fontanares
Quinola!
Quinola
Senor, you make me desperate! Would you oppose the perfidy of a useful
love with the loyalty of a love that is blind? I need the influence of
Senora Brancadori in order to get rid of Monipodio, whose intentions
cause me anxiety. If only I can obtain this influence I will guarantee
you success, and you shall then marry your Marie.
Fontanares
By what means?
Quinola
My dear senor, by mounting on the shoulders of a man who sees a long
distance, as you do, any one can see farther still. You are an
inventor, very good; but I am inventive. You saved me from--I needn't
say what! I, in turn, will deliver you from the talons of envy and
from the clutches of cupidity. Here is gold for us; come dress
yourself, make yourself fine, take courage; you are on the eve of
triumph. But above all things, behave graciously towards Senora
Brancadori.
Fontanares
You must at least tell me, how are you going to effect this?
Quinola
No, senor, if you knew my secret, all would be ruined; you are a man
of talent, and a man of talent is always simple as a child.
(Exeunt.)
SCENE SEVENTH
(The setting represents the drawing-room in Senora Brancadori's
palace.)
Faustine (alone)
The hour is come, to which all my efforts for the last fourteen months
have been looking for fulfillment. In a few moments Fontanares will
see that Marie is forever lost to him. Avaloros, Sarpi and I have
lulled the genius to forgetfulness, and have brought the man up to the
very day when his experiment was to have taken place, so that he
stands helpless and destitute. Oh! how totally is he in my power, just
as I had wished! But does a person ever change from contempt to love?
No, never. Little does he know that for a twelvemonth I have been his
adversary, and the misfortune is, that when he does know he will hate
me! But hatred is not the opposite of love, it is merely the obverse
of the golden coin. I shall tell him everything; I shall make him hate
me.
SCENE EIGHTH
Faustine and Paquita.
Paquita
Senora, your orders have been most exactly carried out by Monipodio.
Senorita Lothundiaz has just been informed by her duenna, of the peril
which threatens Senor Fontanares this evening.
Faustine
Sarpi must be here by this time. Tell him I wish to speak to him.
(Exit Paquita.)
SCENE NINTH
Faustine (alone)
We must baffle the plans of Monipodio. Quinola fears he has received
the order to get rid of Fontanares; it is too bad that there should be
ground for such a fear.
SCENE TENTH
Faustine and Don Fregose.
Faustine
Your arrival is timely, senor, I wish to ask a favor of you.
Don Fregose
Say, rather, that you wish to confer one on me.
Faustine
Monipodio must disappear from Barcelona--yea, and from Catalonia,
within two hours; send him to Africa.
Don Fregose
What has he done to you?
Faustine
Nothing.
Don Fregose
Well, what is your reason.
Faustine
Simply because--You understand?
Don Fregose
Your wish shall be obeyed. (He writes.)
SCENE ELEVENTH
The same persons and Sarpi.
Faustine
Have you made the necessary preparations, cousin, for your immediate
marriage with Marie Lothundiaz?
Sarpi
I have, and her good father has taken care that the contract should be
ready.
Faustine
That is well! Send word to the convent of the Dominicans. The rich
heiress will freely consent to be wedded to you at midnight; she will
accept any conditions, when she sees (whispering to Sarpi) Fontanares
in the hands of justice.
Sarpi
I quite understand, and the only thing now is to have him arrested. My
good fortune seems invincible! And--I owe it all to you. (Aside) What
instrument is there more powerful than the hatred of a woman!
Don Fregose
Sarpi, see that this order is strictly carried out and with no delay.
(Exit Sarpi.)
SCENE TWELFTH
The same persons excepting Sarpi.
Don Fregose
And what of your own marriage?
Faustine
My lord, I can think of nothing at present except the coming banquet;
you shall have my answer this evening. (Fontanares appears.) (Aside)
Oh, there he comes! (To Fregose) If you love me, leave me a while.
Don Fregose
Alone with him?
Faustine
Yes, so I desire.
Don Fregose
After all he loves no one but his Marie Lothundiaz. (Exit.)
SCENE THIRTEENTH
Faustine and Fontanares.
Fontanares
The palace of the king of Spain is not more splendid than yours,
senora, and you here display all the pomp of royalty.
Faustine
Listen to me, dear Fontanares.
Fontanares
Dear! Ah! senora, you have taught me to distrust such words as that!
Faustine
She, whom you have so cruelly insulted, will now reveal herself to
you. A terrible disaster threatens you. Sarpi has persistently worked
against you and in doing so has carried out the orders of an
irresistible power, and this banquet will be for you, unless I
intervene, the scene of a Judas' kiss. I have been told, in
confidence, that on your departure from this house, perhaps without
these very walls, you will be arrested, flung into prison, and your
trial will begin--never to end. Is it possible that you can put into
proper condition in one night the vessel which otherwise will be
forfeited to you? As regards your work, you know how impossible it is
to begin it over again. I wish to save you, you and your glory, you
and your fortune.
Fontanares
You save me? And how?
Faustine
Avalores has placed at my disposal one of his ships, Monipodio has
given me his best smugglers for a cruise; let us start for Venice. The
republic will make you a patrician and will give you ten times as much
gold as Spain has promised. (Aside) Why is it they do not arrive?
Fontanares
And what of Marie? If we are to take her with us, I will believe in
you.
Faustine
Your thoughts are of her at the very moment when the choice between
life and death is to be made. If you delay, we may be lost.
Fontanares
We? Senora?
SCENE FOURTEENTH
The same persons. Guards rush in at every door. A magistrate appears.
Sarpi.
Sarpi
Do your duty!
The Magistrate (to Fontanares)
In the name of the king, I arrest you.
Fontanares
The hour of death has come at last! Yet happily I carry my secret with
me to God, and love shall be my winding sheet.
SCENE FIFTEENTH
The same persons, Marie and Lothundiaz.
Marie
I was not, then, deceived; you have fallen into the hands of your
enemies! And what is left to me, dearest Alfonso, but to die for you
--and yet, by what a frightful death! O beloved! Heaven is jealous of
a perfect love, and thus would teach us by those cruel disasters,
which we call the chances of life, that there is no true happiness
save in the presence of God. What! You here?
Sarpi
Senorita!
Lothundiaz
My daughter!
Marie
For one moment you have left me free, for the last time in my life! I
shall keep my promise, you must not be unfaithful to yours. O sublime
discoverer, you will have to discharge the obligations that belong to
greatness, and to fight the battle of your lawful ambition! This
struggle will be the great interest of your life; while the Countess
Sarpi will die by inches and in obscurity, imprisoned in the four
walls of her house. And now let me remind you, father, and you, count,
that it was clearly agreed, as the condition of my obedience, that
Senor Fontanares should be granted by the viceroy of Catalonia a
further extension of time, for the completion of his experiment.
Fontanares
Marie, how can I live without you?
Marie
How could you live in the hands of your executioner?
Fontanares
Farewell! I am ready to die.
Marie
Did you not make a solemn promise to the King of Spain, yes, to all
the world? (Speaks low to Fontanares) Oh! seize your triumph; after
that we can die!
Fontanares
I will accept, if only you refuse to be his.
Marie
Father, fulfill your promise.
Faustine
I have triumphed.
Lothundiaz (in a low voice to Fontanares)
You contemptible seducer! (Aloud) Here I give you ten thousand
sequins. (In a low voice) Atrocious wretch! (Aloud) My daughter's
income for one year. (In a low voice) May the plague choke you!
(Aloud) Upon the presentation of this check, Senor Avaloros will count
out to you ten thousand sequins.
Fontanares
But does the viceroy consent to this arrangement?
Sarpi
You have publicly accused the viceroy of Catalonia of belying the
promises of the king; here is his answer: (he draws forth a document)
By this ordinance, he puts a stay on the lawsuits of all your
creditors, and grants you a year to complete your experiment.
Fontanares
I am ready to do so.
Lothundiaz
He has made up his mind! Come, my daughter; they are expecting us at
the Dominican convent, and the viceroy has promised to honor us with
his presence at the ceremony.
Marie
So soon?
(Exeunt the whole party.)
Faustine (to Paquita)
Run, Paquita, and bring me word when the ceremony is ended, and they
are man and wife.
SCENE SIXTEENTH
Faustine and Fontanares.
Faustine (aside)
There he stands, like a man pausing on the brink of a precipice to
which tigers have pursued him. (Aloud) Why are you not as great as
your creative thought? Is there but one woman in the world?
Fontanares
What! Do you think that a man can pluck from his heart a love like
mine, as easily as he draws the sword from his scabbard?
Faustine
I can well conceive that a woman should love you and do you service.
But, according to your idea, love is self-abdication. All that the
greatest men have ever wished for: glory, honor, fortune, and more
than that, a triumphant dominion which genius alone can establish
--this you have gained, conquering a world as Caesar, Lucullus and
Luther conquered before you! And yet, you have put between yourself
and this splendid existence an obstacle, which is none other than a
love worthy of some student of Alcala. By birth you are a giant, and
of your own will you are dwindling into a dwarf. But a man of genius
can always find, among women, one woman especially created for him.
And such a woman, while in the eyes of men she is a queen, for him is
but a servant, adapting herself with marvelous suppleness to the
chances of life, cheerful in suffering and as far-sighted in
misfortune as in prosperity; above all, indulgent to his caprices and
knowing well the world and its perilous changes; in a word, capable of
occupying a seat in his triumphal car after having helped it up the
steepest grades--
Fontanares
You have drawn her portrait.
Faustine
Whose?
Fontanares
Marie's!
Faustine
What! Did that child have skill to protect you? Did she divine the
person and presence of her rival? And was she, who had suffered you to
be overcome, worthy of possessing you for her own--she--the child who
has permitted herself to be drawn, step by step, to the altar where at
this moment she bestows herself upon another? If it had been I, ere
this I should have lain dead at your feet! And on whom has she
bestowed herself? On your deadliest enemy, who had accepted the
command to secure the shipwreck of your hopes.
Fontanares
How could I be false to that inextinguishable love, which has thrice
come to my succor, which has eventually saved me, which, having no
sacrifice but itself to offer on the altar of misfortune, accomplishes
the immolation with one hand, and, with the other, offers to me in
this (he shows the letter) the restoration of my honor, the esteem of
my king, the admiration of the universe.
(Enter Paquita, who makes a sign to Faustine, then goes out.)
Faustine (aside)
Ah! Sarpi has now his countess. (To Fontanares) Your life, your glory,
your fortune, your honor, are at last in my hands alone! Marie no
longer stands between us!
Fontanares
Us! Us!
Faustine
Contradict me not, Alfonso! I have conquered all that is yours; do not
refuse me your heart! You will never gain a love more devoted, more
submissive, more full of sympathy than mine; for at last you shall
become the great man that you deserve to be.
Fontanares
Your audacity astounds me. (He shows the letter.) With a sum of money
guaranteed me here I am once more the sole arbiter of my destiny. When
the king sees the character and the results of my work, he will cancel
that marriage, which has been obtained by violence. And my love for
Marie is such that I can wait till then.
Faustine
Fontanares, if I love you distractedly, it is perhaps because of that
delightful simplicity, which is the badge of genius--
Fontanares (aside)
Her smile freezes me to the heart.
Faustine
That gold you speak of--is it already in your possession?
Fontanares
It is here.
Faustine
And would I have let them give that to you, if I thought you would
ever receive it? To-morrow you will find all your creditors standing
between you and the possession of that sum, which you owe to them.
What can you accomplish without gold? Your struggle will begin over
again! But your work, O great, but simple man, has not been dispersed
in fragments; it is all mine; my instrument, Mathieu Magis, has
acquired possession of it. I hold it at my feet, in my palace. I am
the only one who would not rob you either of your glory, or of your
fortune, for what would this be, but to rob myself?
Fontanares
It is you, then, cursed Venetian woman!
Faustine
Yes--since the moment you insulted me, upon this spot, I have directed
everything; it is at my bidding that Magis, and Sarpi, and your
creditors, and the landlord of the Golden Sun, and the workmen have
acted! But ah! How great a love underlay this simulated hatred. Tell
me, have you never been roused from your slumber by a falling
teardrop, the pearl of my repentance, while I was gazing at you with
admiration--you--the martyr that I worshiped?
Fontanares
No! you are not a woman--
Faustine
Ah! There is more than woman, in a woman who loves as I do.
Fontanares
And, as you are not a woman, I could kill you.
Faustine
What of that, provided it were your hand that did it? (Aside) He hates
me!
Fontanares
I am seeking for--
Faustine
Is it anything I can find for you?
Fontanares
--A punishment great enough for your crime.
Faustine
Can there be any punishment which a woman who loves can feel? Come,
try me.
Fontanares
You love me, Faustine. Am I all of life to you? Do you really make my
grief your own?
Faustine
One pang of yours becomes a thousand pangs to me!
Fontanares
If then I die, you will die also. 'Tis plain, therefore, although your
life is not worthy to be set against the love that I have lost, my
course is taken.
Faustine
Ah!
Fontanares
With crossed arms I will await the day of my arrest. At the same
stroke the soul of Marie and my soul shall rise to heaven.
Faustine (flinging herself at the feet of Fontanares)
O Alfonso! Here, at your feet, I will remain till you have promised
me--
Fontanares
Leave me, shameless courtesan! (He spurns her.)
Faustine
You have spoken this openly and in public; but remember, men
oftentimes insult that which they are destined eventually to adore.
SCENE SEVENTEENTH
The same persons and Don Fregose.
Don Fregose
Silence! Wretched journeyman! I refrain from transfixing your heart
with my sword, only because I intend you to pay more dearly for this
insult.
Faustine
Don Fregose! I love this man; whether he makes of me his slave or his
wife, my love shall be the aegis of his life.
Fontanares
Am I to be the victim of fresh persecutions, my lord? I am overwhelmed
with joy. Deal me a thousand blows; they will be multiplied a thousand
fold, she says, in her heart. I am ready!
SCENE EIGHTEENTH
The same persons and Quinola.
Quinola
Sir!
Fontanares
And you also have betrayed me; you!
Quinola
Off goes Monipodio, wafted towards Africa with recommendations on his
hands and feet.
Fontanares
What of that?
Quinola
Under the pretext of robbing you, I have concealed in a cellar a
second machine, for I took care that two should be made, while we only
paid for one.
Fontanares
Thus it is that a true friend renders despair impossible. (He embraces
Quinola.) (To Fregose) My lord, write to the king and build,
overlooking the harbor, an amphitheatre for two hundred thousand
spectators; in ten days I will fulfill my promise, and Spain shall
behold a ship propelled by steam in the face of wind and waves. I will
wait until there is a storm that I may show how I can prevail against
it.
Faustine (to Quinola)
You have manufactured a machine--
Quinola
No, I have manufactured two, as a provision against ill-luck.
Faustine
What devils have you called in to assist you?
Quinola
The three children of Job: Silence, Patience and Perseverance.
(Exeunt Fontanares and Quinola.)
SCENE NINETEENTH
Faustine and Don Fregose.
Don Fregose (aside)
She is hateful, and yet I do not cease to love her.
Faustine
I must have my revenge. Will you assist me?
Don Fregose
Yes, and we will yet succeed in bringing him to ruin.
Faustine
Ah! you love me in spite of all, don't you?
Curtain to the Fourth Act.
ACT V
SCENE FIRST
(The setting is the terrace of the town-hall of Barcelona, on each
side of which are pavilions. The terrace looks on the sea and ends in
a balcony in the centre of the stage; the open sea and the masts of
vessels form the scenery. At the right of the spectator appear a large
arm-chair and seats set before a table. The murmur of an immense crowd
is heard. Leaning over the balcony Faustine gazes at the steamship.
Lothundiaz stands on the left, in a condition of utter stupefaction;
Don Fregose is seated on the right with his secretary, who is drawing
up a formal account of the experiment. The Grand Inquisitor is
stationed in the middle of the stage.)
Lothundiaz, the Grand Inquisitor and Don Fregose.
Don Fregose
I am undone, ruined, disgraced! Even if I were to fall at the feet of
the king, I should gain no pity from him.
Lothundiaz
At what price have I purchased my patent of nobility! My son has been
killed in an ambuscade in Flanders, and my daughter is dying; her
husband, the governor of Roussillon, refused her permission to be
present at the triumph of this devil of a Fontanares. How well she
spoke when she said that I should repent of my willful blindness!
The Grand Inquisitor (to Don Fregose)
The Holy Office has reminded the king of your past services; you will
be sent as viceroy to Peru, where you will be able to repair your
fortunes; but first finish your work here; let us crush this
discoverer and check the progress of his dangerous innovation.
Don Fregose
But how can we do so? The orders of the king must be obeyed, at least
ostensibly.
The Grand Inquisitor
We have taken such measures that obedience may be rendered both to the
Holy Office and to the king. You have only to do as you are bidden.
(To Lothundiaz) Count Lothundiaz, as the first municipal officer of
Barcelona, you must offer to Don Ramon, in the name of the city, a
crown of gold in honor of his discovery, whose result will secure to
Spain the domination of the sea.
Lothundiaz (in astonishment)
To Don Ramon!
The Grand Inquisitor and Don Fregose
To Don Ramon.
Don Fregose
You must address a eulogy to him.
Lothundiaz
But--
The Grand Inquisitor
It is the wish of the Holy Office that you do so.
Lothundiaz (kneeling)
Pardon!
Don Fregose
What is that the people are calling out?
(A cry is heard, "Long live Don Ramon!")
Lothundiaz
Long live Don Ramon! Yes, indeed, and so much the better, for I shall
be avenged for the wrong which I have done to myself.
SCENE SECOND
The same persons, Don Ramon, Mathieu Magis, the landlord of the Golden
Sun, Coppolus, Carpano, Esteban, Girone, and all the people.
(All form a semicircle, in the centre of which is Don Ramon.)
The Grand Inquisitor
In the name of the king of Spain, Castile and the Indies, I must
express to you, Don Ramon, the congratulations of all upon the success
of your mighty genius. (He leads him to the arm-chair.)
Don Ramon
After all, he is but the hand, I am the head. The original idea is
superior to the work of realizing it. (To the crowd) In such a moment
as this, modesty would be an insult to the honors which I have
attained through midnight vigils, and a man should openly show himself
proud of his achievement.
Lothundiaz
In the name of the city of Barcelona, Don Ramon, I have the honor to
offer you this crown, due to your perseverance, as the author of an
invention which will give you immortality.
SCENE THIRD
The same persons and Fontanares (his garments soiled with the work of
his experiment).
Don Ramon
I accept these honors, on condition that they be shared by the
courageous artisan who has so well assisted me in my enterprise.
Faustine
What modesty!
Fontanares
Is this meant for a joke?
All
Long live Don Ramon!
Coppolus
In the name of the merchants of Catalonia, Don Ramon, we have come to
beg your acceptance of this silver crown, a token of their gratitude
for a discovery which is likely to prove a new source of prosperity to
them.
All
Long live Don Ramon!
Don Ramon
It is with the keenest pleasure that I see that commerce recognizes
the future developments of steam navigation.
Fontanares
Let my laborers come forth! You, the children of the people, whose
hands have completed my work, bear witness for me! It was from me only
that you received the models. Say now, whether it was Don Ramon or I
who originated the new power which the sea has felt to-day?
Esteban
By my faith, you would have been in a pretty fix without Don Ramon!
Mathieu Magis
It was two years ago, in the course of a conversation with Don Ramon,
that he begged me to furnish funds for this experiment.
Fontanares (to Fregose)
My lord, what strange delusion has fallen upon the people and
burgesses of Barcelona? I arrive here in the midst of the acclamations
with which Don Ramon is being greeted. Yes, I arrive bearing the
traces of the vigils and sweat of this great enterprise, and I find
you contentedly sanctioning the most shameful act of robbery that can
be perpetrated in the face of heaven and earth. (Murmurs from the
crowd.) Alone and unprotected I have risked my life on this
enterprise. I was the first who pledged its accomplishment to the
king, and unaided I have kept my pledge, and yet here in my place I
find Don Ramon--an ignoramus.
(More crowd murmurs.)
Don Fregose
An old soldier knows very little about scientific matters and must
accept plain facts. All Catalonia conceded to Don Ramon the priority
in this invention, and everybody here declares that without him you
would have accomplished nothing. It is my duty to inform his majesty,
the king, of these circumstances.
Fontanares
The priority! Where are the proofs of this?
The Grand Inquisitor
They are as follows: In his treatise on the casting of cannons Don
Ramon speaks of a certain invention called Thunder, made by Leonardo
da Vinci, your master, and says that it might be applied to the
navigation of a ship.
Don Ramon
Ah! young man, acknowledge that you had read my treatises!
Fontanares (aside)
I would sacrifice all my glory for one hour of vengeance!
SCENE FOURTH
The same persons and Quinola.
Quinola (aside to Fontanares)
Senor, the fruit was too fair, and a worm has been found in it!
Fontanares
What do you mean?
Quinola
Hell has belched back upon us, I know not how--Monipodio, all on fire
for revenge; he is on board the ship with a band of devils, and swears
to scuttle it, unless you guarantee him ten thousand sequins.
Fontanares (kneels)
Thanks, thanks for that. O ocean, whom I once longed to subdue, thou
art the sole protector that is left to me; thou shalt keep my secret
to eternity! (To Quinola) See that Monipodio steers for the open sea
and there scuttles the ship.
Quinola
What is this? Do I understand you aright? Which of us two has lost his
head?
Fontanares
Do as I bid you.
Quinola
But, my dear master--
Fontanares
My life and yours are equally at stake.
Quinola
Obey, without understanding why? For the first time I'll risk it.
(Exit.)
SCENE FIFTH
The same persons, with the exception of Quinola.
Fontanares (to Don Fregose)
My lord! Putting aside the question of priority, which can easily be
decided, may I be permitted to withdraw my name from this debate,
begging of you to accept the statement which is here drawn up and
contains the justification before the king our master?
Don Ramon
You acknowledge then my claim?
Fontanares
I will acknowledge anything you like, even to the point that O plus O
is a binomial!
Don Fregose (after consulting with the Grand Inquisitor)
Your demand is perfectly legitimate; we will forward a copy of your
statement, preserving here the original.
Fontanares
I have, then, escaped with my life. Let me ask all of you here
present, if you look upon Don Ramon as the real inventor of the vessel
which has been propelled by steam before the eyes of two hundred
thousand Spaniards?
All
We do.
(Quinola makes his appearance.)
Fontanares
Very good. Don Ramon has accomplished this prodigy. Don Ramon can
begin his work again. (A loud explosion is heard.) The prodigy is no
longer in existence. The employment of such a force is not without
danger, and the danger which Don Ramon had not foreseen, has
manifested itself, at the very moment while Don Ramon was receiving
your congratulations! (Cries in the distance; everybody rushes to the
balcony and gazes seaward.) I am avenged!
Don Fregose
What will the king say?
The Grand Inquisitor
France is all ablaze, the low countries in revolt, Calvin is stirring
up all Europe; the king has too much business on his hands to worry
himself about the loss of a ship. This new invention and the
Reformation would have been too much at one time for the world! Now
for some years the rapacity of maritime peoples has been checked.
(Exeunt omnes.)
SCENE SIXTH
Quinola, Fontanares and Faustine.
Faustine
Alfonso, I have done you much wrong.
Fontanares
Marie is dead, senora; I do not know the meaning of the words right
and wrong, nowadays.
Quinola
There is a man for you.
Faustine
Forgive me, and I will devote myself to your future.
Fontanares
Forgiveness! That word has been erased from my heart. There are
situations in which the heart either breaks or turns to bronze. I am
scarcely twenty-five years old, but to-day you have changed me into a
man of fifty. You have lost to me one world, now you owe me another--
Quinola
Let us turn our attention to politics.
Faustine
And is not my love, Alfonso, worth a world?
Fontanares
Yes, for you are a magnificent instrument of ruin and devastation. Yet
it will be by means of you that I shall crush all those who have been
an obstacle in my pathway; I take you, not for my wife, but for my
slave, and you shall serve me.
Faustine
Serve you blindly.
Fontanares
But without hope that there will be any return--need I say of what?
All here (he strikes his hand upon his heart) is of bronze. You have
taught me what this world is made of. O world of self-interest, of
trickery, of policy and of perfidy, I defy you to the combat!
Quinola
Senor?
Fontanares
What is it?
Quinola
Am I in it with you?
Fontanares
You? You are the only one who has still a place in my heart. We three
will stand together; we will go--
Faustine
Where?
Fontanares
We will go to France.
Faustine
Let us start at once; I know these Spaniards, and they are sure to
plot your death.
Quinola
The resources of Quinola are at the bottom of the sea. Be kind enough
to excuse his faults; he will doubtless do better at Paris. Verily, I
believe that hell is paved with good inventions.
Final Curtain.
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Resources of Quinola" ***
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