The King repents.
ONAELIA
Pray, that again my Lord.
CARDINAL
The King repents.
ONAELIA
His wrongs to me?
CARDINAL
His wrongs to you. The sense of sin
Has pierced his soul.
ONAELIA
Blessed penitence!
CARDINAL
Has turned his eyes into his leprous bosom
And like a king vows execution
On all his traitorous passions.
ONAELIA
God-like justice!
CARDINAL
Intends in person presently to beg
Forgiveness for his acts from heaven and you.
ONAELIA
Heaven pardon him. I shall.
CARDINAL
Will marry you.
ONAELIA
Umh! Marry me? Will he turn bigamist?
When? When?
CARDINAL
Before the morrow sun hath rode
Half his day’s journey, will send home his Queen
As one that stains his bed, and can produce
Nothing but bastard issue to his crown.
Why, how now? Lost in wonder and amazement?
ONAELIA
I am so stored with joy that I can now
Strongly wear out more years of misery
Than I have lived.
Enter King.
CARDINAL
You need not: here is the King.
KING
Leave us.
Exit Cardinal.
ONAELIA
With pardon sir, I will prevent you
And charge upon you first.
KING
’Tis granted, do.
But stay, what mean these emblems of distress?
My picture so defaced, opposed against
A holy cross! Room hung in black, and you
Dressed like chief mourner at a funeral?
ONAELIA
Look back upon your guilt, dear Sir, and then
The cause that now seems strange explains itself.
This and the image of my living wrongs
Is still confronted by me to beget
Grief like my shame, whose length may outlive time.
This cross, the object of my wounded soul
To which I pray to keep me from despair;
That ever as the sight of one throws up
Mountains of sorrow on my accursed head.
Turning to that, mercy may check despair
And bind my hands from wilful violence.
KING
But who has played the tyrant with me thus,
And with such dangerous spite abused my picture?
ONAELIA
The guilt of that lays claim sir, to yourself
For being, by you, ransacked of all my fame,
Robbed of mine honour and dear chastity,
Made, by your act, the shame of all my house,
The hate of good men and the scorn of bad,
The song of broom-men and the murdering vulgar,
And left alone to bear up all these ills
By you begun, my breast was filled with fire
And wrapped in just disdain, and like a woman
On that dumb picture wreaked I my passions.
KING
And wished it had been I.
ONAELIA
Pardon me Sir,
My wrongs were great, and my revenge swelled high.
KING
I will descend and cease to be a King,
To leave my judging part, freely confessing
Thou canst not give thy wrongs too ill a name.
And here to make thy apprehension full,
And seat thy reason in a sound belief
I vow tomorrow, ere the rising sun
Begins his journey, with all ceremonies
Due to the Church, to seal our nuptials,
To prive thy son with full consent of state,
Spain’s heir apparent, born in wedlock’s vows.
ONAELIA
And will you swear to this?
KING
By this I swear.
[Takes up Bible.]
ONAELIA
Oh, you have sworn false oaths upon that book!
KING
Why then, by this.
[Takes up crucifix.]
ONAELIA
Take heed you print it deeply:
How for your concubine, bride I cannot say,
She stains your bed with black adultery,
And though her fame masks in a fairer shape
Than mine to the world’s eye, yet King, you know
Mine honour is less strumpeted than hers,
However butchered in opinion.
KING
This way for her, the contract which thou hast,
By best advice of all our Cardinals,
Today shall be enlarged till it be made
Past all dissolving. Then to our council table
Shall she be called, that read aloud, she told
The church commands her quick return for Florence
With such a dower as Spain received with her,
And that they will not hazard heaven’s dire curse
To yield to a match unlawful, which shall taint
The issue of the King with bastardy.
This done, in state majestic come you forth,
Our new crowned Queen in sight of all our peers.
Are you resolved?
OMAELIA
To doubt of this were treason
Because the King has sworn it.
KING
And will keep it.
Deliver up the contract then, that I
May make this day end with thy misery.
ONAELIA
Here as the dearest Jewel of my fame
Locked I this parchment from all viewing eyes.
This your indenture, held alone the life
Of my supposed dead honour; yet behold,
Into your hands I redeliver it.
Oh keep it Sir, as you should keep that vow,
To which, being signed by heaven, even angels bow.
[Onaelia passes the document to the King.]
KING
’Tis in the lion’s paw, and who dares snatch it?
Now to your beads and crucifix again.
ONAELIA
Defend me heaven!
KING
Pray there may come Embassadors from France
Their followers are good customers.
ONAELIA
Save me from madness!
KING
‘Twill raise the price, being the King’s mistress.
ONAELIA
You do but counterfeit to mock my joys.
KING
Away bold strumpet!
ONAELIA
Are there eyes in heaven to see this?
KING
Call and try, here’s a whore’s curse
To fall in that belief, which her sins nurse.
Exit King, Enter Cornego.
CORNEGO How now? What quarter of the moon has she cut out now? My Lord puts me into a wise office to be a mad-woman’s keeper. Why, Madam!
ONAELIA
Ha! Where is the King, thou slave?
[Clutches Cornego.]
CORNEGO
Let go your hold, or I’ll fall upon you as I am a man.
ONAELIA
Thou treacherous caitiff , where is the King?
CORNEGO
He’s gone, but not so far as you are.
ONAELIA
Crack all in sunder, oh you battlements,
And grind me into powder
CORNEGO What powder? Come, what powder? When did you ever see a woman grinded into powder? I am sure some of your sex powder men, and pepper them too.
ONAELIA
Is there a vengeance yet lacking to my ruin?
Let it fall, now let it fall upon
me!
CORNEGO
No, there has been too much fallen upon you already.
ONAELIA
Thou villain, leave thy hold, I’ll follow him
Like a raised ghost, I’ll haunt him, break his sleep,
Fright him as he is embracing his new leman ,
Til want of rest bids him run mad and die,
For making oaths bawds to his perjury.
CORNEGO Pray be more seasoned, if he make any bawds, he did ill, for there is enough of that fly-blown flesh already.
ONAELIA
I’m left quite naked now; all gone, all, all.
CORNEGO
No Madam, not all, for you cannot be rid of me.
Here comes your Uncle.
Enter Medina.
ONAELIA
Attired in robes of vengeance, are you uncle?
MEDINA
More horrors yet?
ONAELIA
’Twas never full till now,
And in this torrent all my hopes lie drowned.
MEDINA
Instruct me in the cause.
ONAELIA
The King, the contract!
Exit Onaelia.
CORNEGO
That’s cud enough for you to chew upon.
Exit Cornego.
MEDINA
What’s this? A riddle. How? The King, the contract.
The mischief I divine which proving true,
Shall kindle fires in Spain to melt his crown
Even from his head. Here’s the decree of fate:
A black deed must a black deed expiate.
Exit Medina.
ACT II SCENE 1
ENTER BALTHAZAR, [HAVING been] slighted by the Dons.
BALTHAZAR Thou god of good apparel, what strange fellows are bound to do thee honour. Mercer’s books show men’s devotions to thee. Heaven cannot hold a saint so stately. Do not my dons know me because I’m poor in clothes? Stood my beaten tailor plaiting my rich hose, my silk stocking man drawing upon my Lordship’s courtly calf pairs of imbroidered things, whose golden clocks strike deeper to the faithful shop-keeper’s heart, than into mine to pay him. Had my barber perfumed my lousy thatch here and poked out me tusks more stiff than are a cats muschatoes , these pied-winged butterflies had known me then. Another fly-boat! Save thee illustrious Don.
Enter Don Rodrigo.
Sir, is the King at leisure to speak Spanish with a poor Soldier?
RODRIGO
No
BALTHAZAR No, Sirah, you, no! You Don with the ochre face, I wish to have thee but on a breach, stifling with smoke and fire. And for thy no, but whiffing gunpowder out of an iron pipe, I would but ask thee if thou would’st on, and if thou did’st cry no, thou should’st read Canon Law. I’d make thee roar, and wear cut-beaten-satin. I would pay thee though thou payest not thy mercer. Mere Spanish jennets!
Enter Cockadillio.
Signor, is the King at leisure?
COCKADILLO
To do what?
BALTHAZAR
To hear a soldier speak.
COCKADILLO
I am no ear picker
To sound his hearing that way.
BALTHAZAR
Are you of court sir?
COCKADILLO
Yes, the King’s barber.
BALTHAZAR
That’s his ear picker. Your name, I pray.
COCKADILLO
Don Cockadillio
If, soldier, thou hast suits to beg at court,
I shall descend so low as to betray
Thy paper to the hand Royal.
BALTHAZAR I beg, you whorson muscod ! My petition is written on my bosom in red wounds.
COCKADILLO
I am no barber-surgeon.
Exit Cockadillio.
BALTHAZAR You yellowhammer, why, shaver: that such poor things as these, only made up of tailor’s shreds and merchant’s silken rags and ‘pothecary drugs to lend their breath sophisticated smells, when their rank guts stink worse than cowards in the heat of battle. Such whaleboned- doublet rascals, that owe more to laundresses and seamsters for laced linen than all their race from their great grand-father to this their reign, in clothes were ever worth. These excrements of silk worms! Oh that such flies do buzz about the beams of Majesty, like earwigs tickling a King’s yielding ear with that court-organ, flattery, when a soldier must not come near the court gates twenty score, but stand for want of clothes, though he win towns, amongst the almsbasket-men! His best reward being scorned to be a fellow to the blackguard. Why should a soldier, being the world’s right arm, be cut thus by the left, a courtier? Is the world all ruff and feather and nothing else? Shall I never see a tailor give his coat with a difference from a gentleman?
Enter King, Alanzo, Carlo, Cockadillio.
KING
My Balthazar!
Let us make haste to meet thee. How art thou altered?
Do you not know him?
ALANZO
Yes Sir, the brave soldier
Employed against the Moors
KING
Half turned Moor!
I’ll honour thee, reach him a chair, that table
And now, Aeneas-like, let thine own trumpet
Sound forth thy battle with those slavish Moors.
BALTHAZAR My music is a Cannon, a pitched field my stage, Furies the actors, blood and vengeance the scene, death the story, a sword imbrued with blood, the pen that writes, and the poet a terrible buskined tragical fellow, with a wreath about his head of burning match instead of bays.
KING
On to the battle.
BALTHAZAR ’Tis here without bloodshed. This our main battalia, that the van, this the vaw , these the wings, here we fight, there they fly, here they insconce , and here our sconces lay seventeen moons on the cold earth.
KING
This satisfies my eye, but now my ear
Must have his music too. Describe the battle.
BALTHAZAR The battle? Am I come from doing to talking? The hardest part for a soldier to play is to prate well. Our tongues are fifes, drums, petronels , muskets, culverin and cannon. These are our roarers, the clocks which we go by are our hands. Thus we reckon ten, our swords strike eleven and when steel targets of proof clatter one against another, then ’tis noon that’s the height and the heat of the day of battle.
KING
So.
BALTHAZAR
To that heat we came, our drums beat, pikes were shaken and shivered, swords and targets clashed and clattered, muskets rattled cannons roared, men died groaning, brave laced jerkings and feathers looked pale, tottered rascals fought pell mell. Here fell a wing, there heads were tossed like footballs, legs and arms quarrelled in the air and yet lay quietly on the earth. Horses trampled upon heaps of carcasses, troops of carbines tumbled wounded from their horses, we besiege Moors and famine us, mutinies bluster and are calm. I vowed not to doff mine armour though my flesh were frozen to it and turn into iron, nor to cut head nor beard till they yielded. My hairs and oath are of one length for, with Caesar, thus write I mine own story: veni, vidi, vici.
KING
A pitched field, quickly fought. Our hand is thine,
And because thou shalt not murmur that thy blood
Was lavished forth for an ungrateful man,
Demand what we can give thee and ’tis thine.
BALTHAZAR
Only your love.
KING
’Tis thine, rise soldier’s best accord
When wounds of wrong are healed up by the sword.
Onaelia knocks loudly at the door.
ONAELIA
Let me come in, I’ll kill the treacherous King,
The murderer of mine honour, let me come in.
KING
What woman’s voice is that?
ALL
Medina’s niece.
KING
Bar out that fiend.
ONAELIA
I’ll tear him with my nails,
<
br /> Let me come in, let me come in, help, help me.
KING
Keep her from following me. A guard.
ALANZO
They are ready, sir.
KING
Let a quick summons call our Lords together,
This disease kills me.
BALTHAZAR
Sir, I would be private with you.
KING
Forebear us, but see the doors are well guarded.
Exeunt [King and Balthazar remain].
BALTHAZAR
Will you, Sir, promise to give me freedom of speech?
KING
Yes, I will, take it, speak any thing, ’tis pardoned.
BALTHAZAR You are a whoremaster. Do you send me to win towns for you abroad and you lose a kingdom at home?
KING
What kingdom?
BALTHAZAR
The fairest in the world, the kingdom of your fame, your honour.
KING
Wherein?
BALTHAZAR I’ll be plain with you. Much mischief is done by the mouth of a cannon, but the fire begins at a little touch-hole. You heard what nightingale sung to you even now.
KING
Ha, ha, ha!
BALTHAZAR Angels erred but once and fell, but you Sir, spit in heaven’s face every minute and laugh at it. Laugh still, follow your courses, do. Let your vices run like your kennels of hounds, yelping after you till they pluck down the fairest head in the herd, everlasting bliss.
KING
Any more?
BALTHAZAR Take sin as the English snuff tobacco, and scornfully blow the smoke in the eyes of heaven, the vapour flies up in clouds of bravery. But when ’tis out, the coal is black, your conscience, and the pipe stinks. A sea of rosewater cannot sweeten your corrupted bosom.
KING
Nay, spit thy venom.
BALTHAZAR ’Tis Aqua Coelestis , no venom. For when you shall clasp up these two books, never to be opened again, when by letting fall that anchor which can never more be weighed up, your mortal navigation ends. Then there’s no playing at spurn-point with thunderbolts. A vintner then for unconscionable reckoning or a tailor for unmeasurable items shall not answer in half that fear you must.
KING
No more.
BALTHAZAR I will follow truth at the heels, though her foot beat my gums in pieces.
KING
The barber that draws out a lion’s tooth
Curseth his trade; and so shalt thou.
BALTHAZAR
I care not.
KING
Because you have beaten a few base-born moors,
Me think’st thou to chastise? What is past I pardon,
Because I made the key to unlock thy railing;
But if thou dar’st once more be so untuned
I’ll sent thee to the galleys. Who are without there,
How now?
Enter [guards and attendants] drawn.
ALL
In danger, Sir?
Complete Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker Page 34