Читать книгу Hans of Iceland: A Play in Three Acts - Victor Hugo - Страница 6
ОглавлениеACT I
SCENE 1
The action takes place in Drontheim in Norway.
The stage represents a hall made completely of stone. Through a door in the rear can be seen a public square. Midstage, to the left is a grill with a small gate, above which reads: Room of the Dead.
AT RISE, several of the people are occupied looking through the bars of the grill. Notable among them are Kennibol, Maase and Olly. Spiagudry, seated on a stool at the right seems to be asleep.
OLLY:
Now that’s where love gets you, neighbor Maase. That poor Gath wouldn’t be there stretched on that black stone if she had only thought of patching the nets of her unfortunate father.
MAASE:
And her fiancée, Gill Stadt, that handsome young man that you see beside her wouldn’t be there, if, instead of making love to Gath, and seeking his fortune in the accursed mines of Roras where he was crushed by falling rocks, he had remained by his infirm mother who now weeps before the empty cradle of her child, grown into a big young man—and dead.
OLLY:
Gath drowned herself in despair at the death of her fiancée?
KENNIBOL:
Who said that? This girl, who I knew quite well, was indeed the fiancée of this young miner, but she was also the mistress of one of my comrades, a soldier from the garrison of Munckolm; and the day before yesterday she wanted to get into the fortress by stealth in order to celebrate with her lover the death of her betrothed. The boat that was carrying her capsized on a reef and she drowned.
OLLY:
How horrible! How can one take delight in spreading such absurdities?
MAASE:
It’s an infamous slander.
SPIAGUDRY:
(waking up)
Silence, driveling old witches.
OLLY:
Heavens, you hear him, the damned old soul?
MAASE:
What’s he want of us? This big cadaver who guards cadavers.
SPIAGUDRY:
Peace I tell you, daughters of Hell. If today is the Sabbath, hurry to take up your brooms; otherwise, they will fly off without you. (to Kenniobl) You were saying, my brave man, that this wretched woman?
OLLY:
The old wise guy! We are wretched women because our bodies, if they fall into his hands, bring him nothing besides the tax. Only thirty escalins, while he would receive forty for the miserable carcass of a man.
SPIAGUDRY:
Will you viper tongues quiet down! Tell me, my brave man, your comrade whose mistress was this Gath, doubtless killed himself in despair at having lost her?
MAASE:
Do you hear this old pagan? He would see one less among the living because of the forty escalins a dead body would bring him.
SPIAGUDRY:
Come on, don’t get angry, my sweet gossips. Mustn’t everyone in the world live by his profession?
KENNIBOL:
Well, old Satan, where do you intend to get with this friendly grimace that resembles so nicely the last outburst of laughter of a hanged man?
SPIAGUDRY:
Here I am. When the bodies they bring us have been found in the water, we are obliged to share half the reward with the fishermen. Therefore, my valiant friend, I would pray you to engage your unfortunate comrade not to drown himself but to choose some other type of death; the thing must be indifferent to him, he ought not to work harm, as he does to the unfortunate Christians who will give hospitality to his body if the loss of Gath pushes him to this act of despair.
KENNIBOL:
That’s where you are mistaken, my charitable and hospitable concierge of the dead. My comrade would have no satisfaction to be received in your appetizing inn, for at the moment he’s consoling himself with another beauty for the death of this one.
OLLY:
What is the wretch saying now?
MAASE:
You love rogues like this?
SPIAGUDRY:
Peace! One more time. Truly, the torture of Beelzebub is really frightful if he is required to hear such choirs if only once a week.
(uproar and rage of the women)
OGLIPIGLAP:
(entering)
Master Spiagudry, I announce a new pensioner to you.
SPIAGUDRY:
Marvelous! Where’s he coming from?
OGLIPIGLAP:
From the beaches of Urchtal.
SPIAGUDRY:
Fine! Fine! (rubbing his hands) Have him brought in through the small gate.
(goes out with his assistant.)
MAASE:
Doubtless it’s another victim of love or ambition.
KENNIBOL:
(looking through the bars of the grill)
By my saber! It’s an officer of my regiment. He appears to be a suicide.
OLLY:
Say rather he’s been murdered for he was found on the beach of Urchtal and it’s known Hans of Iceland wanders on those beaches.
MAASE:
Yes. And what’s more no one is unaware that the Icelander murders in a manner so diabolical that his victims are often taken for suicides.
KENNIBOL:
What sort of man is this Hans?
OLLY:
He’s a giant.
MAASE:
No. He’s a dwarf.
KENNIBOL:
No one’s seen him?
MAASE:
Those who see him for the first time see him for the last as well.
OLLY:
(mysteriously)
Hush! They say there are only three people who have ever exchanged human words with him. This reprobate Spiagudry, the widow Stadt and her son, the poor Gill that you see here.
KENNIBOL:
(still looking through the grill)
Oh, now I am certain that it is Captain Dispolsen, who was coming from Copenhagen and who was expected this morning at Munckolm. I recognize the steel chain that our state prisoner, Old Harald, gave him on his departure.
ORDENER:
(coming forward excitedly)
You are sure that this is Captain Dispolsen?
KENNIBOL:
Certain. On the glory of Saint Beelzebub, my patron.
ORDENER:
(leaving)
Poor Count! Unfortunate Harald! One friend remained to you; you’ve lost him and now only Ordener is interesting himself in you.
(goes out)
SPIAGUDRY:
Come, night is approaching, my old friends: vanish. Enough wagging your tongues, now you must wag your legs.
OLLY:
(mockingly)
Good evening, Doctor Spiagudry.
MAASE:
Good evening, old monopolist of cadavers.
KENNIBOL:
Good evening, neighbor. Carefully close up your morgue for fear someone will come to steal your dead from you.
SPIAGUDRY:
Neighbor? Say rather, your host. For I really hope that one of these days, I will rent you one of my stone beds for a week.
(Spiagudry, having closed the exterior gate, moves away to the right.)
BLACKOUT/CURTAIN
