A to Z Classics - Complete Works Of Oscar Wilde (Best Navigation) (A to Z Classics)

That will be never seen again by you,

‘Woman, your mistress then returns this purse

Of forty thousand crowns, is it fifty thousand?

Come name the sum will buy me grace of her/

bianca

What, were there forty thousand crowns therein?

marta

I know it was all gold; heavy with gold.

bianca

It must be he, none else could give so much.

·133· maria

’Tis he, ’tis my lord Guido, Guido Bardi.

bianca

What said you?

maria

I, I said my mistress never

Looked at the gold, never opened the purse,

Never counted a coin. But asked again

What she had asked before, ‘How young you looked?

How handsome your lordship looked? What doublet

Your majesty had on? What chains, what hose

Upon your revered legs?’ And curtseyed I, …

bianca

What said he?

maria

Curtseyed I, and he replied,

‘Has she a lover then beside that old

Soured husband or is it him she loves, my God!

Is it him?’

·134· bianca

Well?

maria

Curtseyed I low and said

‘Not him, my lord, nor you, nor no man else.

Thou art rich, my lord, and honoured, my lord, and she

Though not so rich is honoured …’

bianca

Fool, you fool,

I never bid you say a word of that.

maria

Nor did I say a word of that you said;

I said, ‘She loves him not, my lord, nor loves

Any man else. Yet she might like to love,

If she were loved by one who pleased her well;

For she is weary of spinning long alone.

She is not rich and yet she is not poor; but young

She is, my lord, and you are young. [ Pauses smiling .]

·135· bianca

Quick, quick!

maria

There, there! ’Twas but to show you how I smiled

Saying the lord was young. It took him too;

For he said, ‘This will do! If I should call

To-night to pay respect unto your lovely—

Our lovely mistress, tell her that I said,

Our lovely mistress, shall I be received?’

And I said, ‘Yes.’ Then say I come and if

All else is well let her throw down some favour

When as I pass below/ He should be there!

Look from the balcony; he should be there!—

And there he is, dost see?

bianca

Some favour. Yes.

This ribbon weighted by this brooch will do.

Maria, be you busy near within, but, till

I call take care you enter not. Go down

And let the young lord in, for hark, he knocks. [ Exit Maria .]

·136· Great ladies might he choose from and yet he

Is drawn … ah, there my fear is! Was he drawn

By love to me—by love’s young strength alone?

That’s where it is, if I were sure he loved,

I then might do what greater dames have done

And venge me on a husband blind to beauty.

But if! Ah if! he is a wandering bee,

Mere gallant taster, who befools poor flowers …

[ Maria opens the door for Guido Bardi, and then withdraws .]

My lord, I learn that we have something here,

In this poor house, which thou dost wish to buy.

My husband is from home, but my poor fate

Has made me perfect in the price of velvets,

Of silks and gay brocades. I think you offered

Some forty thousand crowns, or fifty thousand,

For something we have here? And it must be

That wonder of the loom, which my Simone

Has lately home; it is a Lucca damask,

The web is silver over-wrought with roses.

Since you did offer fifty thousand crowns

It must be that. Pray wait, for I will fetch it.

·137· guido

Nay, nay, thou gracious wonder of a loom

More cunning far than those of Lucca, I

Had in my thought no damask silver cloth

By hunch-back weavers woven toilsomely.

If such are priced at fifty thousand crowns

It shames me, for I hoped to buy a fabric

For which a hundred thousand then were little.

bianca

A hundred thousand was it that you said?

Nay, poor Simone for so great a sum

Would sell you everything the house contains.

The thought of such a sum doth daze the brains

Of merchant folk who live such lives as ours.

guido

Would he sell everything this house contains?

And every one, would he sell every one?

bianca

Oh, everything and every one, my lord,

Unless it were himself; he values not

·138· A woman as a velvet, or a wife

At half the price of silver-threaded woof.

guido

Then I would strike a bargain with him straight»

bianca

He is from home; may be will sleep from home;

But I, my lord, can show you all we have;

Can measure ells and sum their price, my lord.

guido

It is thyself, Bianca, I would buy.

bianca

O, then, my lord, it must be with Simone

You strike your bargain; for to sell myself

Would be to do what I most truly loathe.

Good-night, my lord; it is with deep regret

I find myself unable to oblige

Your lordship.

guido

Nay, I pray thee let me stay

And pardon me the sorry part I played,

·139· As though I were a chapman and intent

To lower prices, cheapen honest wares.

bianca

My lord, there is no reason you should stay,

guido

Thou art my reason, peerless, perfect, thou,

The reason I am here and my life’s goal,

For I was born to love the fairest things …

bianca

To buy the fairest things that can be bought.

guido

Cruel Bianca! Cover me with scorn,

I answer born to love thy priceless self,

That never to a market could be brought,

No more than winged souls that sail and soar

Among the planets or about the moon.

bianca

It is so much thy habit to buy love,

Or that which is for sale and labelled love,

Hardly couldst thou conceive a priceless love.

·140· But though my love has never been for sale

I have been in a market bought and sold.

guido

This is some riddle which thy sweet wit reads

To baffle mine and mock me yet again.

bianca

My marriage, sir, I speak of marriage now,

That common market where my husband went

And prides himself he made a bargain then,

guido

The wretched chapman, how I hate his soul.

bianca

He was a better bidder than thyself,

And knew with whom to deal … he did not speak

Of gold to me, but in my father’s ear

He made it clink: to me he spoke of love,

Honest and free and open without price.

guido

O white Bianca, lovely as the moon,

The light of thy pure soul and shining wit

·141· Shows me my shame, and makes the thing I was

Slink like a shadow from the thing I am.

bianca

Let that which casts the shadow act, my lord,

And waste no thought on what its shadow does

Or has done. Are youth, and strength, and love

Balked by mere shadows, so that they forget

Themselves so far they cannot be recalled?

guido

Nobility is here, not in the court.

There are the tinsel stars, here is the moon,

Whose tranquil splendour makes a day of night.

I have been starved by ladies, specks of light,

And glory drowns me now I see the moon.

bianca

I have refused round sums of solid gold

And shall not be by tinsel phrases bought.

·142· guido

Dispute no more, witty, divine Bianca;

Dispute no more. See I have brought my lute!

Close lock the door. We will sup with the moon

Like Persian princes, that, in Babylon

Sup in the hanging gardens of the king.

I know an air that can suspend the soul

As high in heaven as those towered-gardens hang.

bianca

My husband may return, we are not safe.