k you now--go glean
What evil lowers. I am riddled through
With strange surmises and more strange alarms!

[The COUNTESS OF MONTESQUIOU enters.]

Ah--we shall learn it now. Well--what, madame?

COUNTESS OF MONTESQUIOU [breathlessly]

Your Majesty, the Emperor Napoleon
Has vanished from Elba! Wither flown,
And how, and why, nobody says or knows.

MARIE LOUISE [sinking into a chair]

My divination pencilled on my brain
Something not unlike that! The rigid mien
That mastered Wellington suggested it....
Complicity will be ascribed to me,
Unwitting though I stand!... [A pause.]
He'll not succeed!
And my fair plans for Parma will be marred,
And my son's future fouled!--I must go hence,
And instantly declare to Metternich
That I know nought of this; and in his hands
Place me unquestioningly, with dumb assent
To serve the Allies.... Methinks that I was born
Under an evil-coloured star, whose ray
Darts death at joys!--Take me away, Count.--You [to the ladies]
Can stay and see the end.

[Exeunt MARIE LOUISE and NEIPPERG. MESDAMES DE MONTESQUIOU and
DE BRIGNOLE go to the grille and watch and listen.]

VOICE OF ALEXANDER [below]

I told you, Prince, that it would never last!

VOICE OF TALLEYRAND

Well, sire, you should have sent him to the Azores,
Or the Antilles, or best, Saint-Helena.

VOICE OF THE KING OF PRUSSIA

Instead, we send him but two days from France,
Give him an island as his own domain,
A military guard of large resource,
And millions for his purse!

ANOTHER VOICE

The immediate cause
Must be a negligence in watching him.
The British Colonel Campbell should have seen
That apertures for flight were wired and barred
To such a cunning bird!

ANOTHER VOICE

By all report
He took the course direct to Naples Bay.

VOICES [of new arrivals]

He has made his way to France--so all tongues tell--
And landed there, at Cannes! [Excitement.]

COUNTESS OF BRIGNOLE

Do now but note
How cordial intercourse resolves itself
To sparks of sharp debate! The lesser guests
Are fain to steal unnoticed from a scene
Wherein they feel themselves as surplusage
Beside the official minds.--I catch a sign
The King of Prussia makes the English Duke;
They leave the room together.

COUNTESS OF MONTESQUIOU

Yes;