, I hear each word
You utter. Did you hear him bid me give
His message? Did you hear my promise? I,
And only I, see Mildred.

GUENDOLEN. She will die.

TRESHAM. Oh no, she will not die! I dare not hope
She'll die. What ground have you to think she'll die?
Why, Austin's with you!

AUSTIN. Had we but arrived
Before you fought!

TRESHAM. There was no fight at all.
He let me slaughter him--the boy! I'll trust
The body there to you and Gerard--thus!
Now bear him on before me.

AUSTIN. Whither bear him?

TRESHAM. Oh, to my chamber! When we meet there next,
We shall be friends.
[They bear out the body of MERTOUN.]
Will she die, Guendolen?

GUENDOLEN. Where are you taking me?

TRESHAM. He fell just here.
Now answer me. Shall you in your whole life
--You who have nought to do with Mertoun's fate,
Now you have seen his breast upon the turf,
Shall you e'er walk this way if you can help?
When you and Austin wander arm-in-arm
Through our ancestral grounds, will not a shade
Be ever on the meadow and the waste--
Another kind of shade than when the night
Shuts the woodside with all its whispers up?
But will you ever so forget his breast
As carelessly to cross this bloody turf
Under the black yew avenue? That's well!
You turn your head: and I then?--

GUENDOLEN. What is done
Is done. My care is for the living. Thorold,
Bear up against this burden: more remains
To set the neck to!

TRESHAM. Dear and ancient trees
My fathers planted, and I loved so well!
What have I done that, like some fabled crime
Of yore, lets loose a Fury leading thus
Her miserable dance amidst you all?
Oh, never more for me shall winds intone
With all your tops a vast antiphony,
Demanding and responding in God's praise!
Hers ye are now, not mine! Farewell--farewell!

SCENE II.--MILDRED'S Chamber
MILDRED alone

He comes not! I have heard of those who seemed
Resourceless in prosperity,--you thought
Sorrow might slay them when she listed; yet
Did they so gather up their diffused strength
At her first