Deirdre of the Sorrows [18]
What noise is that? AINNLE -- behind. -- Naisi. . . . . Naisi. Come to us; we are betrayed and broken. NAISI. It's Ainnle crying out in a battle. CONCHUBOR. I was near won this night, but death's between us now. [He goes out. DEIRDRE -- clinging to Naisi. -- There is no battle. . . . Do not leave me, Naisi. NAISI. I must go to them. DEIRDRE -- beseechingly. -- Do not leave me, Naisi. Let us creep up in the darkness behind the grave. If there's a battle, maybe the strange fighters will be destroyed, when Ainnle and Ardan are against them. [Cries heard.
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NAISI -- wildly. -- I hear Ardan crying out. Do not hold me from my brothers. DEIRDRE. Do not leave me, Naisi. Do not leave me broken and alone. NAISI. I cannot leave my brothers when it is I who have defied the king. DEIRDRE. I will go with you. NAISI. You cannot come. Do not hold me from the fight. [He throws her aside almost roughly. DEIRDRE -- with restraint. -- Go to your brothers. For seven years you have been kindly, but the hardness of death has come between us. NAISI -- looking at her aghast. -- And you'll have me meet death with a hard word from your lips in my ear? DEIRDRE. We've had a dream, but this night has waked us surely. In a little while we've lived too long, Naisi, and isn't it a poor thing we should miss the safety of the grave, and we trampling its edge? AINNLE -- behind. -- Naisi, Naisi, we are attacked and ruined! DEIRDRE. Let you go where they are calling. (She looks at him for an instant coldly.) Have you no shame loitering and
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talking, and a cruel death facing Ainnle and Ardan in the woods? NAISI -- frantic. -- They'll not get a death that's cruel, and they with men alone. It's women that have loved are cruel only; and if I went on living from this day I'd be putting a curse on the lot of them I'd meet walking in the east or west, putting a curse on the sun that gave them beauty, and on the madder and the stone-crop put red upon their cloaks. DEIRDRE -- bitterly. -- I'm well pleased there's no one in this place to make a story that Naisi was a laughing-stock the night he died. NAISI. There'd not be many'd make a story, for that mockery is in your eyes this night will spot the face of Emain with a plague of pitted graves. [He goes out. CONCHUBOR -- outside. -- That is Naisi. Strike him! (Tumult. Deirdre crouches down on Naisi's cloak. Conchubor comes in hurriedly.) They've met their death -- the three that stole you, Deirdre, and from this out you'll be my queen in Emain. [A keen of men's voices is heard behind. DEIRDRE -- bewildered and terrified. -- It is not I will be a queen. CONCHUBOR. Make your lamentation a short while if you will, but it isn't long till
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a day'll come when you begin pitying a man is old and desolate, and High King also. . . . Let you not fear me, for it's I'm well pleased you have a store of pity for the three that were your friends in Alban. DEIRDRE. I have pity, surely. . . . It's the way pity has me this night, when I think of Naisi, that I could set my teeth into the heart of a king. CONCHUBOR. I know well pity's cruel, when it was my pity for my own self destroyed Naisi. DEIRDRE -- more wildly. -- It was my words without pity gave Naisi a death will have no match until the ends of life and time. (Breaking out into a keen.) But who'll pity Deirdre has lost the lips of Naisi from her neck and from her cheek for ever? Who'll pity Deirdre has lost the twilight in the woods with Naisi, when beech-trees were silver and copper, and ash-trees were fine gold? CONCHUBOR -- bewildered. -- It's I'll know the way to pity and care you, and I with a share of troubles has me thinking this night it would be a good bargain if it was I was in the grave, and Deirdre crying over me,
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NAISI -- wildly. -- I hear Ardan crying out. Do not hold me from my brothers. DEIRDRE. Do not leave me, Naisi. Do not leave me broken and alone. NAISI. I cannot leave my brothers when it is I who have defied the king. DEIRDRE. I will go with you. NAISI. You cannot come. Do not hold me from the fight. [He throws her aside almost roughly. DEIRDRE -- with restraint. -- Go to your brothers. For seven years you have been kindly, but the hardness of death has come between us. NAISI -- looking at her aghast. -- And you'll have me meet death with a hard word from your lips in my ear? DEIRDRE. We've had a dream, but this night has waked us surely. In a little while we've lived too long, Naisi, and isn't it a poor thing we should miss the safety of the grave, and we trampling its edge? AINNLE -- behind. -- Naisi, Naisi, we are attacked and ruined! DEIRDRE. Let you go where they are calling. (She looks at him for an instant coldly.) Have you no shame loitering and
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talking, and a cruel death facing Ainnle and Ardan in the woods? NAISI -- frantic. -- They'll not get a death that's cruel, and they with men alone. It's women that have loved are cruel only; and if I went on living from this day I'd be putting a curse on the lot of them I'd meet walking in the east or west, putting a curse on the sun that gave them beauty, and on the madder and the stone-crop put red upon their cloaks. DEIRDRE -- bitterly. -- I'm well pleased there's no one in this place to make a story that Naisi was a laughing-stock the night he died. NAISI. There'd not be many'd make a story, for that mockery is in your eyes this night will spot the face of Emain with a plague of pitted graves. [He goes out. CONCHUBOR -- outside. -- That is Naisi. Strike him! (Tumult. Deirdre crouches down on Naisi's cloak. Conchubor comes in hurriedly.) They've met their death -- the three that stole you, Deirdre, and from this out you'll be my queen in Emain. [A keen of men's voices is heard behind. DEIRDRE -- bewildered and terrified. -- It is not I will be a queen. CONCHUBOR. Make your lamentation a short while if you will, but it isn't long till
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a day'll come when you begin pitying a man is old and desolate, and High King also. . . . Let you not fear me, for it's I'm well pleased you have a store of pity for the three that were your friends in Alban. DEIRDRE. I have pity, surely. . . . It's the way pity has me this night, when I think of Naisi, that I could set my teeth into the heart of a king. CONCHUBOR. I know well pity's cruel, when it was my pity for my own self destroyed Naisi. DEIRDRE -- more wildly. -- It was my words without pity gave Naisi a death will have no match until the ends of life and time. (Breaking out into a keen.) But who'll pity Deirdre has lost the lips of Naisi from her neck and from her cheek for ever? Who'll pity Deirdre has lost the twilight in the woods with Naisi, when beech-trees were silver and copper, and ash-trees were fine gold? CONCHUBOR -- bewildered. -- It's I'll know the way to pity and care you, and I with a share of troubles has me thinking this night it would be a good bargain if it was I was in the grave, and Deirdre crying over me,