Oscar Wilde: The Duchess of Padua

I think it must be here. [ Goes up to passer-by and doffs his cap .] Pray, sir, is this the market place, and that the church of Santa Croce? [ Citizen bows .] I thank you, sir.

Well?

Ay! it is here.

I would it were somewhere else, for I see no wine-shop.

[ Taking a letter from his pocket and reading it .] ‘The hour noon; the city, Padua; the place, the market; and the day, Saint Philip’s Day.’

And what of the man, how shall we know him?

‘I will wear a violet cloak with a silver falcon broidered on the shoulder.’ A brave attire, Ascanio.

I’d sooner have my leathern jerkin. And you think he will tell you of your father?

Why, yes! It is a month ago now, you remember; I was in the vineyard, just at the corner nearest the road, where the goats used to get in, a man rode up and asked me was my name Guido, and gave me this letter, signed ‘Your Father’s Friend,’ bidding me be here to-day if I would know the secret of my birth, and telling me how to recognise the writer! I had always thought old Pedro was my uncle, but he told me that he was not, but that I had been left a child in his charge by some one he had never since seen.

And you don’t know who your father is?

No.

No recollection of him even?

None, Ascanio, none.

Then he could never have boxed your ears so often as my father did mine.

I am sure you never deserved it.

Never; and that made it worse. I hadn’t the consciousness of guilt to buoy me up. What hour did you say he fixed?

Noon.

It is that now, and your man has not come. I don’t believe in him, Guido. I think it is some wench who has set her eye at you; and, as I have followed you from Perugia to Padua, I swear you shall follow me to the nearest tavern. [ Rises .] By the great gods of eating, Guido, I am as hungry as a widow is for a husband, as tired as a young maid is of good advice, and as dry as a monk’s sermon. Come, Guido, you stand there looking at nothing, like the fool who tried to look into his own mind; your man will not come.

Well, I suppose you are right. Ah! [ Just as he is leaving the stage with Ascanio, enter Lord Moranzone in a violet cloak , with a silver falcon broidered on the shoulder ; he passes across to the Cathedral , and just as he is going in Guido runs up and touches him .]

Guido Ferranti, thou hast come in time.

What! Does my father live?

Ay! lives in thee.
Thou art the same in mould and lineament,
Carriage and form, and outward semblances;
I trust thou art in noble mind the same.

Oh, tell me of my father; I have lived
But for this moment.

We must be alone.

This is my dearest friend, who out of love
Has followed me to Padua; as two brothers,
There is no secret which we do not share.

There is one secret which ye shall not share;
Bid him go hence.

Come back within the hour.
He does not know that nothing in this world
Can dim the perfect mirror of our love.
Within the hour come.

Speak not to him,
There is a dreadful terror in his look.

Nay, nay, I doubt not that he has come to tell
That I am some great Lord of Italy,
And we will have long days of joy together.
Within the hour, dear Ascanio.

Now tell me of my father? [ Sits down on a stone seat .]
Stood he tall?
I warrant he looked tall upon his horse.
His hair was black? or perhaps a reddish gold,
Like a red fire of gold? Was his voice low?
The very bravest men have voices sometimes
Full of low music; or a clarion was it
That brake with terror all his enemies?
Did he ride singly? or with many squires
And valiant gentlemen to serve his state?
For oftentimes methinks I feel my veins
Beat with the blood of kings. Was he a king?

Ay, of all men he was the kingliest.

Then when you saw my noble father last
He was set high above the heads of men?

Ay, he was high above the heads of men,

On a red scaffold, with a butcher’s block
Set for his neck.

What dreadful man art thou,
That like a raven, or the midnight owl,
Com’st with this awful message from the grave?