The Countess Cathleen (2 of 14)

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SCENE 1 (CONT'D)

(CATHLEEN, OONA, and ALEEL enter.)

CATHLEEN. God save all here. There is a certain house,
An old grey castle with a kitchen garden,
A cider orchard and a plot for flowers,
Somewhere among these woods.

MARY. We know it, lady.
A place that's set among impassable walls
As though world's trouble could not find it out.

CATHLEEN. It may be that we are that trouble, for we--
Although we've wandered in the wood this hour--
Have lost it too, yet I should know my way,
For I lived all my childhood in that house.

MARY. Then you are Countess Cathleen?

CATHLEEN. And this woman,
Oona, my nurse, should have remembered it,
For we were happy for a long time there.

OONA. The paths are overgrown with thickets now,
Or else some change has come upon my sight.

CATHLEEN. And this young man, that should have known the woods--
Because we met him on their border but now,
Wandering and singing like a wave of the sea--
Is so wrapped up in dreams of terrors to come
That he can give no help.

MARY. You have still some way,
But I can put you on the trodden path
Your servants take when they are marketing.
But first sit down and rest yourself awhile,
For my old fathers served your fathers, lady,
Longer than books can tell--and it were strange
If you and yours should not be welcome here.

CATHLEEN. And it were stranger still were I ungrateful
For such kind welcome but I must be gone,
For the night's gathering in.

SHEMUS. It is a long while
Since I've set eyes on bread or on what buys it.

CATHLEEN. So you are starving even in this wood,
Where I had thought I would find nothing changed.
But that's a dream, for the old worm o' the world
Can eat its way into what place it pleases.

(She gives money.)

TEIG. Beautiful lady, give me something too;
I fell but now, being weak with hunger and thirst,
And lay upon the threshold like a log.

CATHLEEN. I gave for all and that was all I had.
Look, my purse is empty. I have passed
By starving men and women all this day,
And they have had the rest; but take the purse,
The silver clasps on't may be worth a trifle.
But if you'll come to-morrow to my house
You shall have twice the sum.

(ALEEL begins to play.)

SHEMUS (muttering). What, music, music!

CATHLEEN. Ah, do not blame the finger on the string;
The doctors bid me fly the unlucky times
And find distraction for my thoughts, or else
Pine to my grave.

SHEMUS. I have said nothing, lady.
Why should the like of us complain?

OONA. Have done. Sorrows that she's but read of in a book
Weigh on her mind as if they had been her own.

(OONA, MARY, and CATHLEEN go Out. ALEEL looks defiantly at
SHEMUS.)

ALEEL. (Singing) Impetuous heart, be still, be still,
Your sorrowful love can never be told,
Cover it up with a lonely tune,
He that could bend all things to His will
Has covered the door of the infinite fold
With the pale stars and the wandering moon.

(He takes a step towards the door and then turns again.)

Shut to the door before the night has fallen,
For who can say what walks, or in what shape
Some devilish creature flies in the air, but now
Two grey-horned owls hooted above our heads.

(He goes out, his singing dies away. MARY comes in. SHEmus has
been counting the money.)

TEIG. There's no good luck in owls, but it may be
That the ill luck's to fall upon their heads.

MARY. You never thanked her ladyship.

SHEMUS. Thank her,
For seven halfpence and a silver bit?

TEIG. But for this empty purse?

SHEMUS. What's that for thanks,
Or what's the double of it that she promised?
With bread and flesh and every sort of food
Up to a price no man has heard the like of
And rising every day.


MARY. We have all she had;
She emptied out the purse before our eyes.

SHEMUS (to MARY, who has gone to close the door)
Leave that door open.

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