class="GutSmall">ALBOVINE.

If he loves not her,
More fool is he than warrior even, though war
Have wakened laughter in his eyes, and left
His golden hair fresh gilded, when his hand
Had won the crown that clasps a boy’s brows close
With first-born sign of battle.

ROSAMUND.

No such fool
May live in such a warrior; if he love not
Some loveliness not hers.  No face as bright
Crowned with so fair a Mayflower crown of praise
Lacked ever yet love, if its eyes were set
With all their soul to loveward.

ALBOVINE.

Ay?

ROSAMUND.

I know not
A man so fair of face.  I like him well.
And well he hath served and loves thee.

ALBOVINE.

Ay?  The boy
Seems winsome then with women.

ROSAMUND.

Hildegard
Hath hearkened when he spake of love—it may be,
Lightly.

ALBOVINE.

To her shall no man lightly speak.
Thy maiden and our natural kin is she.
Wilt thou speak with him—lightly?

ROSAMUND.

If thou wilt,
Gladly.

ALBOVINE.

The boy shall wait upon thy will.

[Exit.

ROSAMUND.

My heart is heavier than this heat that weighs
With all the weight of June on us.  I know not
Why.  And the feast is close on us.  I would
This night were now to-morrow morn.  I know not
Why.

Enter Almachildes.

Ah!  What would you?

ALMACHILDES.

Queen, our lord the king
Bade me before thee hither.

ROSAMUND.

Truth: I know it.
Thou art loved and honoured of our lord the king.
Dost thou, whom honour loves before thy time,
Love?

ALMACHILDES.

Ay: thy noble handmaid, Hildegard.
I know not if she love me.

ROSAMUND.

Thou shalt know.
But this thou knowest: I may not give thee her.

ALMACHILDES.

I would not take her from the Lord God’s hand
If hers were given against her will to mine.

ROSAMUND.

A man said that: a manfuller than men
Who grip the loveless hands of prisoners.  Well
It must be with the bride whose happier hand
Lies fond and fast in thine.  Our Hildegard,
Being free and noble as Albovine and we,
Born one with us in race and blood, and thence
Our equal in our sole nobility,
Must well be won by noble works, and love
Whose light is one with honour’s.

ALMACHILDES.

Queen, may I
Perchance not win it?  I know not.

ROSAMUND.

Nay, nor I.
Soon may we know; they are entering toward the feast.

[The curtain drawn discovers a banquet, with guests assembled: among them Narsetes and Hildegard.

Re-enter Albovine.

ALBOVINE.

Thine hand: I hold the whitest in the world.
Sit thou, boy, there, beside sweet Hildegard.

[They sit.

Bring me the cup.  Queen, thou shalt pledge with me
A health to all this kingdom and its weal
Even from the bowl that here to hold in hand
Assures me lord of Lombardy and thine
By right and might of battle and of God—
The skull that was thy father’s: so shalt thou
Drink to me with thy father.

ROSAMUND.

Sire, my lord,
The life my sire, who gave thee up his life,
Gave me, and fostered till thou hadst given him death,
Is all now thine.  Thy will be done.  I drink
To thee, who art all this kingdom and its weal,
All health and honour that of right should be,
With all good things I wish thee.

[Drinks.

ALBOVINE.

Wish me well,
And God must give me what thou wilt.  Good friends,
My warriors and my brethren, hath not he
Given me to wife the best one born of man
And loveliest, and most loving?  Silent, sirs?
Wherefore?

ROSAMUND.

Thou shouldst not ask it.  Bid the cup
Go blithely round.

ALBOVINE.

By Christ and Thor, it shall.
What ails the boy there?  Almachildes!

ALMACHILDES.

King,
Nought ails me.

ALBOVINE.

Nor thy maiden?

ALMACHILDES.

King, nor her.

ALBOVINE.

Fall then to feasting.  Bear the cup away.
Some savour of the dust of death comes from it.
Sweet, be not wroth nor sad.

ROSAMUND.

I am blithe and fain,
Sire; and I loved thee never more than now.

ALBOVINE.

Nor ever I thee.  Now I find thee mine,
And now no daughter of mine enemy’s.

ROSAMUND.

No.
Thou hast no enemy left on earth alive—
No soul unslain that hates thee.

ALBOVINE.

That were much.
What man may say it? and least of all may kings.

ROSAMUND.

What hast thou done that man should hate thee—man
Or woman?

ALBOVINE.

Which of us may answer, Nought?

ROSAMUND.

Thou might’st have made me—me, my father’s child—
Harlot and slave: thou hast made me wife and queen.

ALBOVINE.

Thee have I loved; ay, and myself in thee,
Who hast made me more than king and lord, being thine.

ROSAMUND.

Courtesy sets on kings a goldener crown
That sits upon them seemlier.

ALBOVINE.

Courtesy!
Truth.  Hark thee, boy, and let thy Hildegard
Hearken.  Is she, thy queen, a peer of mine?

ALMACHILDES.

She wears no crown but heaven’s about her head—
No gold that was not born upon her brows
Transfigures or disfigures them.  She is not
A peer of thine.

ROSAMUND.

He answers well.

ALBOVINE.

He answers
Ill—as the spirit of shamelessness might