We are resolved.

   Marzio.    As to the how this act

Be warranted, it rests with you.

   Beatrice.    Well, follow!

   Olimpio. Hush! Hark! What noise is that?

   Marzio.      Ha! some one comes!

   Beatrice. Ye conscience-stricken cravens, rock to rest

40Your baby hearts. It is the iron gate,

Which ye left open, swinging to the wind,

That enters whistling as in scorn. Come, follow!

And be your steps like mine, light, quick and bold. [Exeunt.

SCENE III.—An apartment in the Castle. Enter BEATRICE and LUCRETIA.

   Lucretia. They are about it now.

   Beatrice.     Nay, it is done.

   Lucretia. I have not heard him groan.

   Beatrice.      He will not groan.

   Lucretia. What sound is that?

   Beatrice.    List! ’tis the tread of feet

About his bed.

   Lucretia. My God!

5If he be now a cold stiff corpse …

   Beatrice.     O, fear not

What may be done, but what is left undone:

The act seals all.

[Enter OLIMPIO and MARZIO.

                     Is it accomplished?

   Marzio.     What?

   Olimpio. Did you not call?

   Beatrice.    When?

   Olimpio.      Now.

   Beatrice.       I ask if all is over?

   Olimpio. We dare not kill an old and sleeping man;

10His thin grey hair, his stern and reverent brow,

His veined hands crossed on his heaving breast,

And the calm innocent sleep in which he lay,

Quelled me. Indeed, indeed, I cannot do it.

   Marzio. But I was bolder; for I chid Olimpio,

15And bade him bear his wrongs to his own grave

And leave me the reward. And now my knife

Touched the loose wrinkled throat, when the old man

Stirred in his sleep, and said, ‘God! hear, O, hear,

A father’s curse! What, art thou not our father?’

20And then he laughed. I knew it was the ghost

Of my dead father speaking through his lips,

And could not kill him.

   Beatrice.  Miserable slaves!

Where, if ye dare not kill a sleeping man,

Found ye the boldness to return to me

25With such a deed undone? Base palterers!

Cowards and traitors! Why, the very conscience

Which ye would sell for gold and for revenge

Is an equivocation: it sleeps over

A thousand daily acts disgracing men;

30And when a deed where mercy insults heaven …

Why do I talk?

[Snatching a dagger from one of them and raising it.

                  Hadst thou a tongue to say,

‘She murdered her own father,’ I must do it!

But never dream ye shall outlive him long!

   Olimpio. Stop, for God’s sake!

   Marzio.     I will go back and kill him.

35   Olimpio. Give me the weapon, we must do thy will.

   Beatrice. Take it! Depart! Return!  [Exeunt OLIMPIO

              and MARZIO.

                                                How pale thou art!

We do but that which ’twere a deadly crime

To leave undone.

   Lucretia.   Would it were done!

   Beatrice.     Even whilst

That doubt is passing through your mind, the world

40Is conscious of a change. Darkness and hell

Have swallowed up the vapour they sent forth

To blacken the sweet light of life. My breath

Comes, methinks, lighter, and the jellied blood

Runs freely thro’ my veins. Hark!

[Enter OLIMPIO and MARZIO.

                                                              He is …

   Olimpio.       Dead!

45   Marzio. We strangled him that there might be no blood;

And then we threw his heavy corpse i’ the garden

Under the balcony; ’twill seem it fell.

   Beatrice (giving them a bag of coin).

Here, take this gold, and hasten to your homes.

And, Marzio, because thou wast only awed

50By that which made me tremble, wear thou this!

[Clothes him in a rich mantle.

It was the mantle which my grandfather

Wore in his high prosperity, and men

Envied his state: so may they envy thine.

Thou wert a weapon in the hand of God

55To a just use. Live long and thrive! And, mark,

If thou hast crimes, repent: this deed is none.

[A horn is sounded.

   Lucretia. Hark, ’tis the castle horn; my God! it sounds

Like the last trump.

   Beatrice.  Some tedious guest is coming.

   Lucretia. The drawbridge is let down; there is a tramp

60Of horses in the court; fly, hide yourselves!

[Exeunt OLIMPIO and MARZIO.

   Beatrice. Let us retire to counterfeit deep rest;

I scarcely need to counterfeit it now:

The spirit which doth reign within these limbs

Seems strangely undisturbed. I could even sleep

65Fearless and calm: all ill is surely past.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.—Another apartment in the Castle. Enter on one side the Legate SAVELLA, introduced by a servant, and on the other LUCRETIA and BERNARDO.

   Savella. Lady, my duty to his Holiness

Be my excuse that thus unseasonably

I break upon your rest.