LUCREZIA. Please, please….
DOLPHIN. NO, I won t listen to anything more. (He walks with an agitated step up and down the stage. LUCREZIA stands with one hand resting on the back of a chair and the other pressed on her heart.) Do you mean to say you deliberately went and told her that I was only after her money? Oh, it’s too bad, too bad. It’s infamous. And I hadn’t the faintest notion that she had any money. Besides, I don’t want money; I have quite enough of my own. It’s infamous, infamous!
LUCREZIA. I know it was a horrible thing to do. But I couldn’t help it. How could I stand by and see you being carried off by that silly little creature?
DOLPHIN. But I cared for her.
LUCREZIA. But not as I cared for you. I’ve got red blood in my veins; she’s got nothing but milk and water. You couldn’t have been happy with her. I can give you love of a kind she could never dream of. What does she know of passion?
DOLPHIN. Nothing, I am thankful to say. I don’t want passion; can’t you understand that? I don’t possess it myself and don’t like it in others. I am a man of sentimental affections, with a touch of quiet sensuality. I don’t want passion, I tell you. It’s too violent; it frightens me. I couldn’t possibly live with you. You’d utterly shatter my peace of mind in a day. Oh, how I wish you’d go away.
LUCREZIA. But Sidney, Sidney, can’t you understand what it is to be madly in love with somebody? You can’t be so cruel.
DOLPHIN. You didn’t think much of my well-being when you interfered between Miss Toomis and me, did you? You’ve probably ruined my whole life, that’s all. I really don’t see why you should expect me to have any pity for you.
LUCREZIA. Very well, then, I shall kill myself. (She bursts into tears.)
DOLPHIN. Oh, but I assure you, one doesn’t kill oneself for things like that. (He approaches her and pats her on the shoulder.) Come, come, don’t worry about it.
LUCREZIA (throws her arms round his neck). Oh, Sidney, Sidney….
DOLPHIN (freeing himself with surprising energy and promptitude from her embrace). No, no, none of that, I beg. Another moment and we shall be losing our heads. Personally I think I shall go to bed now. I should advise you to do the same, Miss Grattarol. You’re overwrought. We might all be better for a small dose of bromide. (He goes in.)
LUCREZIA (looking up and stretching forth her hands). Sidney…. (DOLPHIN does not look round, and disappears through the glass door into the hotel, LUCREZIA covers her face with her hands and sits for a little sobbing silently. The nightingale sings on. Midnight sounds with an infinite melancholy from all the twenty campaniles of the city in the valley. From far away comes the spasmodic throbbing of a guitar and the singing of an Italian voice, high-pitched, passionate, throaty. The seconds pass, LUCREZIA rises to her feet and walks slowly into the hotel. On the threshold she encounters the VICOMTE coming out.)
PAUL. You, Signorina Lucrezia? I’ve escaped for a breath of fresh, cool air. Mightn’t we take a turn together? (LUCREZIA shakes her head.) Ah, well, then, good-night. You’ll be glad to hear that Miss Toomis knows all about Correggio now.
(He inhales a deep breath of air. Then looking at his dinner-jacket he begins brushing at it with his hand. A lamentable figure creeps in from the left. It is ALBERTO. If he had a tail, it would be trailing on the ground between his legs.)
PAUL. Hullo, Alberto. What is it? Been losing at cards?
ALBERTO. Worse than that.
PAUL. Creditors foreclosing?
ALBERTO. Much worse.
PAUL. Father ruined by imprudent speculations?
ALBERTO. No, no, no. It’s nothing to do with money.
PAUL. Oh, well, then. It can’t be anything very serious. It’s women, I suppose.
ALBERTO. My mistress refuses to see me. I have been beating on her door for hours in vain.
PAUL. I wish we all had your luck, Bertino. Mine opens her door only too promptly. The difficulty is to get out again. Does yours use such an awful lot of this evil-smelling powder? I’m simply covered with it. Ugh! (He brushes his coat again.)
ALBERTO. Can’t you be serious, Paul?
PAUL. Of course I can … about a serious matter. But you can’t expect me to pull a long face about your mistress, can you, now? Do look at things in their right proportions.
ALBERTO. It’s no use talking to you. You’re heartless, soulless.
PAUL. What you mean, my dear Alberto, is that I’m relatively speaking bodiless. Physical passion never goes to my head. I’m always compos mentis. You aren’t, that’s all.
ALBERTO. Oh, you disgust me. I think I shall hang myself to-night.
PAUL. Do. It will give us something to talk about at lunch to-morrow.
ALBERTO. Monster! (He goes into the hotel, PAUL strolls out towards the garden, whistling an air from Mozart as he goes. The window on the left opens and LUCREZIA steps on to her balcony. Uncoiled, her red hair falls almost to her waist. Her nightdress is always half slipping off one shoulder or the other, like those loose-bodied Restoration gowns that reveal the tight-blown charms of Kneller’s Beauties. Her feet are bare. She is a marvellously romantic figure, as she stands there, leaning on the balustrade, and with eyes more sombre than night, gazing into the darkness. The nightingales, the bells, the guitar, and passionate voice strike up. Great stars palpitate in the sky.
The moon has swum imperceptibly to the height of heaven. In the garden below flowers are yielding their souls into the air, censers invisible. It is too much, too much…. Large tears roll down LUCREZIA’s cheeks and fall with a splash to the ground. Suddenly, but with the noiselessness of a cat, ALBERTO appears, childish-looking in pink pajamas, on the middle of the three balconies. He sees LUCREZIA, but she is much too deeply absorbed in thought to have noticed his coming, ALBERTO plants his elbows on the rail of the balcony, covers his face, and begins to sob, at first inaudibly, then in a gradual quickening crescendo. At the seventh sob LUCREZIA starts and becomes aware of his presence.)
LUCREZIA. Alberto. I didn’t know…. Have you been there long? (ALBERTO makes no articulate reply, but his sobs keep on growing louder.) Alberto, are you unhappy? Answer me.
ALBERTO (with difficulty, after a pause). Yes.
LUCREZIA. Didn’t she let you in?
ALBERTO. No. (His sobs become convulsive.)
LUCREZIA. Poor boy.
ALBERTO (lifting up a blubbered face to the moonlight). I am so unhappy.
LUCREZIA. You can’t be more unhappy than I am.
ALBERTO. Oh yes, I am. It’s impossible to be unhappier than me.
LUCREZIA. But I am more unhappy.
ALBERTO. You re not. Oh, how can you be so cruel Lucrezia? (He covers his face once more.)
LUCREZIA. But I only said I was unhappy Alberto.
ALBERTO. Yes, I know. That showed you weren’t thinking of me. Nobody loves me. I shall hang myself to-night with the cord of my dressing-gown.
LUCREZIA. NO, no, Alberto. You mustn’t do anything rash.
ALBERTO. I shall. Your cruelty has been the last straw.
LUCREZIA. I’m sorry, Bertino mio. But if you only knew how miserable I was feeling. I didn’t mean to be unsympathetic. Poor boy. I’m so sorry. There, don’t cry, poor darling.
ALBERTO. Oh, I knew you wouldn’t desert me, Lucrezia. You’ve always been a mother to me. (He stretches out his hand and seizes hers, which has gone half-way to meet him; but the balconies are too far apart to allow him to kiss it. He makes an effort and fails. He is too short in the body,) Will you let me come onto your balcony, Lucrezia? I want to tell you how grateful I am.
LUCREZIA. But you can do that from your own balcony.
ALBERTO. Please, please, Lucrezia. You mustn’t be cruel to me again. I can’t bear it.
LUCREZIA. Well, then…. Just for a moment, but for no more, (BERTINO climbs from one balcony to the other. One is a little reminded of the trousered monkeys on the barrel organs. Arrived, he kneels down and kisses LUCREZIA’S hand.)
ALBERTO. You’ve saved me. You’ve given given me a fresh desire to live and a fresh faith in life. How can I thank you enough, Lucrezia, darling?
LUCREZIA (patting his head). There, there. We are just two unhappy creatures. We must try and comfort one another.
ALBERTO. What a brute I am! I never thought of your unhappiness. I am so selfish. What is it, Lucrezia?
LUCREZIA. I can’t tell you, Bertino; but it’s very painful.
ALBERTO. Poor child, poor child. (His kisses, which started at the hand, have mounted, by this time, some way up the arm, changing perceptibly in character as they rise. At the shoulder they have a warmth which could not have been inferred from the respectful salutes which barely touched the fingers.) Poor darling! You’ve given me consolation. Now you must let me comfort your unhappiness.
LUCREZIA (with an effort). I think you ought to go back now, Bertino.
ALBERTO. In a minute, my darling. There, there, poor Lucrezia. (He puts an arm round her, kisses her hair and neck. LUCREZIA leans her bowed head against his
