1'Anr
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 cAAAROORIE. cDOBBIMS
 
 THE DEAD CITY
 
 GABRIELE D'ANNUNZIO
 
 The Dead City 
 
 A Tragedy 
 
 by Gabriele d'Annunzio 
 
 Eros, unvonquered in strife * * * 
 -- Sophocles, 
 
 Rendered into English by Prof. G. 
 Mantellini. Illustrations from the 
 stage production of Eleonora Duse 
 made expressly for this work. 
 
 Second Edition 
 
 Laird & Lee, Chicago
 
 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1902, 
 
 By WILLIAM H. LEE, 
 
 In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at 
 Washington, D. C.
 
 College 
 Library 
 
 1902. 
 
 SKETCH OF LA DUSE 
 
 When "La Duse," in 1893, made her first tour 
 through the United States under the management 
 of Carl and Theodor Rosenfeld, playing' 'Camille," 
 "The Wife of Claudius," "Cavalleria Rusticana," 
 "Fedora," "Divorgons," "La Locandiera," and 
 other plays, she was simply the greatest trage- 
 dienne of Italy, where all people knew her name 
 and fame ; and where no one thought of compar- 
 ing another artiste to her. Since then ten years 
 have passed and her fame and glory have spread 
 all over the world. 
 
 Those who, know Eleonora Duse mention her 
 age and beauty. She is now thirty-eight years old, 
 but who can say whether she is beautiful or not? 
 On the stage she is beautiful, but she is homely 
 too ; she is tall and she is small ; she is young and 
 old; awkward and delicate; apathetic and nerv- 
 ous. She is whatever her part demands. What 
 no artiste before her possessed is hers. She has an 
 incomparable power over her nerves and muscles. 
 In sinking her personality in the poet's conception 
 she fascinates, almost hypnotizes us. But it is 
 hard, almost impossible, to suggest an idea of this 
 i
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 wonderful woman, who seems to have effaced the 
 boundary that separates nature from art. 
 
 Who is Eleonora Duse? 
 
 She was born at Vigcvano, a small town in 
 Lombardy. Her talent is hereditary, her father 
 and grandfather having been actors of no mean 
 ability. The grandfather, Luigi Dusc, was thor- 
 oughly legitimate in ,his work. He recited in 
 Venetian dialect, a new departure in those days. 
 The Duss established the Garibaldi Theater at 
 Padua. 
 
 The life of Eleonora Duse, the granddaughter, 
 has been one of bitter struggles against poverty 
 and unfavorable environment. But the practice 
 of the stage was her first school, her initiation into 
 artist life was her education; she is an actress 
 from infancy. Perhaps never in the days of her 
 childhood did Eleonora Duse say, "I want to be 
 an actress." Perhaps no sympton of that irre- 
 sistible desire which is the usual beginning of 
 every triumphant career, foretold to her the glory 
 that to-day sweetens the memory of her sorrowful 
 youth. 
 
 She was scarcely twelve years old when she was 
 working almost day and night upon the stage in 
 obscure theaters, those grotesque and sud asylums 
 of inferior companies. Her wages represented the
 
 SKETCH OF LA DUSE 111 
 
 most important item in the income of her not well 
 to-do family. Those were days of toil and suffer- 
 ing, when, weak from lack of sufficient food, she 
 had to undergo the exhausting fatigues of the 
 stage, and her chief reward was the applause of 
 an audience richer in emotions than in gold or sil- 
 ver. Nor was she compensated by being feted as 
 an infant wonder. Indeed, she was almost com- 
 pelled to conceal her youth from both manager and 
 public, lest it might produce a doubt in their minds 
 whether the repertoire of dramas and tragedies 
 were entirely suited to her tender years. The 
 pressing need of money weighed not only on her 
 genius but on her mind and spirits which, notwith- 
 standing the suffering of a life of toil, were natu- 
 rally gay, due to the open-air exercise and the 
 mirth and mischief of a noisy company. Still she 
 developed force and spirit. She combined the 
 manner of the adult woman with that of the 
 thoughtful child. Almost unknown to herself she 
 became absorbed in her part, and the woman inoc- 
 ulated the child with strong emotions, which 
 deprived her gestures, her face and her voice of all 
 childishness, thrilled her audiences and caused her 
 companions to wonder. The germ of a great 
 actress was growing in the little wandering come- 
 dienne.
 
 IV THE DEAD CITY 
 
 When representing Silvio Pellico's "Francesca 
 da Rimini," and "Caverina" in Victor Hugo's 
 "Tyrant of Padua," she divined rather than com- 
 prehended, the meaning of these two poets, but 
 she aroused a wild enthusiasm, which marked not 
 simply the girl prodigy, but a phenomenal promise 
 of future greatness. 
 
 After Victor Hugo she turned her attention to 
 Shakespeare, whom she understood perfectly. 
 Her "Juliet" is a masterpiece in blending sweet- 
 ness and passion. 
 
 At this time Eleonora Duse, as yet but little 
 known in Italy, made a tour of Dalmatia, but, as 
 before, in the minor theaters only. Even in this 
 strange land she was successful. On the pictur- 
 esque shores of the Adriatic she found and enjoyed 
 all the beauties of nature, but the turning-point 
 in her career had not been reached. 
 
 By a strange, whimsical fate she, the dreamer of 
 silent, sleepy, and most melancholy Venice was 
 first comprehended and recognized as a great 
 actress in Naples, the gayest and most beautiful 
 of Italian cities. In this metropolis where the 
 theater has most ancient and honorable traditions, 
 Eleonora Duse found an intelligent appreciation 
 of her genius. 
 
 After this, her incomparable success as a great
 
 SKETCH OF LA DUSE 
 
 tragedienne was assured. She won triumphs on 
 all the large stages of Italy, and finally, crossing 
 the Alps with an Italian company playing in that 
 language, she gathered new laurels and amazed 
 the severest French critics in Paris, arousing an 
 enthusiasm never equalled since the time of the 
 great Ristori. After France, she continued her 
 triumphant tour through Germany, Austria, Rus- 
 sia, Bulgaria and, as already mentioned, through 
 the United States. 
 
 She resuscitated Dumas' "La Femme de 
 Claude," and caused it to be applauded by the 
 public that had formerly condemned it. 
 
 She re-created jn an exquisite manner "Marguer- 
 ite Gautier, " that always fascinating heroine of 
 the same author. 
 
 At will she passes from nervousness to the 
 solemnity of philosophy, arbitrarily applied to the 
 theater; and from philosophy to the merry 
 coquetry of Parisian comedy, artistic as in "Fran- 
 cillon," risque as in "Divorgons." From Parisian 
 comedy she turned to the purely Italian art of 
 Goldoni, who discovered a new type of youth, of 
 happy and smiling beauty in the delicious sim- 
 plicity of her acting. 
 
 Eleonora Duse, the unerring portrayer of the 
 truth, has never renounced and never will
 
 VI THE DEAD CITY 
 
 renounce upon the stage that perfect charm 
 which Alexander Dumas in one of his brilliant 
 prefaces 'pronounces to be more necessary on the 
 stage than truth. 
 
 If Gabriele d'Annunzio, after having gained 
 fame as a psychological novelist, became a dra- 
 matic writer, it is to Duse that we owe his change 
 of methods. It was Duse's naturalistic art that 
 inspired d'Annunzio to write for her "Un sogno 
 d'unaNotte d'Estate'XA Summer Night's Dream), 
 "La Gioconda," "LaCitta Morta"(The Dead City) 
 and finally, "Francesca da Rimini," which no one 
 but Duse and perhaps Sarah Bernhardt could 
 interpret. 
 
 In "The Dead City," Eleonora Duse takes the 
 part of Anna, the blind woman, a part of renunci- 
 ation ; the part of a resigned soothsayer, as in "La 
 Giocouda" ; her task, as the poet Gabriele d'An- 
 nunzio expresses it, "is to speak of all the beauti- 
 ful things in the shadow of an antique statue." 
 And Duse speaks of these beautiful things with 
 the sweetest |music of her voice, which encircles 
 the beautiful phrases, as precious gems in a golden 
 setting, and makes them glitter in all their 
 splendor. . . . THE TRANSLATOR.
 
 DRAMATIS PERSON AE 
 
 A.LESSANDRO. 
 LEONARDO. 
 ANNA. 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 In Argolis " the thirsty " near the ruins cf 
 Mycenae " rich of gold ".
 
 ACT FIRST
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ACT FIRST 
 
 A large, light room, opening upon a loggia 
 ( piazza ) with a balustrade, looking toward 
 the ancient city of the sons of Pelops. The floor 
 of the loggia is higher than that of the room 
 by five stone steps built in shape of a trun- 
 cated pyramid \ as at the entrance of a temple. 
 Two Doric columns support the architrave. 
 Through the opening is seen the Acropolis 
 with its venerable Cyclopic walls broken by 
 the Gate of Lions. In each of the side walls 
 of the room there are two exits leading to the 
 interior apartments and to the staircase. A 
 large table is covered with papers, books, 
 small statues and vases. Everywhere, along 
 the walls, into the empty spaces, are crowded 
 statues, bas reliefs, inscriptions, sculptural 
 fragments: evidences of a re?note life, vestiges 
 of a vanished beauty. The presence of all 
 these white objects gives to the room a brilliant 
 and severe, almost sepulchral aspect, in the 
 immobility of the morning light. 
 ii
 
 SCENE I 
 
 ANNA, seated on the highest of the steps 
 leading up to the loggia, her head resting 
 against the shaft of a column, listcm in 
 silence to BIANCA MARIA, who reads to her. 
 THE NURSE is seated on a lower step, at the 
 feet of the listener, in a listless attitude, like a 
 patient slave. BIANCA MARIA is standing, 
 her back against the other column, dressed in 
 a kind of tunic, simple and harmonious like a 
 peplum. Holding in her hands an open book 
 Sophocles' ' 'Antigone, " she reads with a 
 slow and grave intonation, in which trembles 
 now and then a vague uneasiness, that does 
 not escape the notice of the hearer. The signs 
 of her disquietude and anxiety rouse the lat- 
 ter" s attention more and more.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 1 3 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, reads. 
 
 " O Eros, invincible in strife, 
 11 Eros, thou who hurlest disasters, 
 " Who in the soft cheeks 
 " Of the maiden liest in ambush, 
 "Who roamest beyond the sea and 
 [through the rustic cottages! 
 " Neither any among the Immortals can 
 
 [escape thee, 
 
 " Nor any of the short-lived mortals; and 
 [whoever has thee is mad. 
 "Thou drivest the misguided minds 
 " Of the just to ruin; 
 "And thou hast also to this strife 
 " Incited blood relations. 
 "The seductive glance from the eyes oi 
 
 [a lovely bride 
 
 " Wins the victory over the greatest laws. 
 "Even I am being carried beyond the 
 
 [pale of the law 
 " Seeing this; nor can I restrain 
 "Any longer the fountains of my tears 
 " Seeing Antigone on her way to 
 "The nuptial chamber that quiets all.
 
 14 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 "Antigone. 
 
 "Behold me, O citizens of my native 
 
 [country 
 
 " Entering upon the last journey, 
 " Looking at the splendor 
 " Of the sun for the last time, 
 " And hence forward never again! Hades, 
 [that stills everything, conducts me 
 "To the shore of Acheron alive 
 "And deprived of marriage. 
 " The nuptial hymn shall never be 
 'Sung for me; for I am to espouse Ach- 
 
 [eron . . . 
 
 The reader stops as if suffocat- 
 ing. The book shakes in her 
 hands. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Are you tired from reading, Bianca 
 Maria? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Perhaps a little fatigued. . . . This 
 dying spring is so hot that it causes
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 15 
 
 weariness and suffocation like mid-sum- 
 mer. . . . Do you not feel it too, Anna? 
 
 She closes the book. 
 ANNA. 
 Have you closed the book? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I have closed it. 
 
 A pause. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is there much light in this room? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Yes, very much. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is the sun shining on the loggia? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 It is descending on the column, and is 
 about to touch your neck. 
 
 ANNA lifts one hand to feel of the column. 
 There it is, I feel it. How warm the
 
 16 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 stone is! I seem to touch a living thing 
 . . . Are you in the sun, Bianca Maria? 
 Once upon a time, when I faced its rays 
 with mine dead eyes, the eyelids open, I 
 used to see something like a red vapor, 
 scarcely perceptible, or at times a spark- 
 ling similar to that issuing from the hard 
 flint, almost painful. . . . Now, nothing 
 any more: perfect darkness. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 And your eyes are ever beautiful and 
 clear, Anna; and in the morning they are 
 full of freshness, as if sleep were dew for 
 them. 
 
 ANNA covers her eyes with both hands, rest- 
 ing her elbows on her knees. 
 
 Ah, the waking, every morning, what a 
 horror! Almost every night I dream that 
 I can see, dream that by a miracle sight 
 has been granted to my. eyes. . . And 
 to awake always in darkness, always in
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 17 
 
 night. . . . Of nearly all things I have a 
 recollection, of the things I saw when 
 still in the light; I remember their 
 shapes, their colors, their most minute 
 particulars; and their perfect pictures rise 
 for me out of the darkness, as soon as I 
 touch them with my hands. But of my 
 own person I have only a confused recol- 
 lection as of one dead. A deep shadow 
 has fallen upon my image; time has 
 effaced it, as it effaces in us the pictures 
 of those who have departed. My own 
 image has vanished from me like the 
 images of my beloved dead. . . . Every 
 effort is in vain. I know well that the 
 vision I finally succeed in calling up, is 
 not my true self. Ah, how sad! You tell 
 her, nurse, how many times I have asked 
 you to conduct me before the mirror. 
 There I remained with my forehead 
 against the glass to recollect, held by I 
 do not know what insensate expectation.
 
 l8 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 . . . And how many times do I even 
 press my hands against my face as at 
 present to obtain its imprint in their 
 softness. Ah, at times I seem truly to 
 bear imprinted in my hands my faithful 
 mask, like those copied in plaster from 
 the dead; but it is a mask without life. 
 
 Slowly she uncovers her face 
 
 and stretches forth her Iwllow 
 
 hands. 
 
 Do you realize the horror of such 
 sorrow? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 How beautiful you are, Anna! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Last night I had a dream, strange, 
 indescribable. A sudden old age seized 
 all my limbs; I felt over all my body the 
 lines of wrinkles; I felt my hair falling 
 from my head upon my lap in large 
 masses, and my fingers were interlaced
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 19 
 
 like loose straw; my gums were toothless, 
 and my lips were drawn in over the gums, 
 and everything in me had become shape- 
 less and miserable. I was like an old 
 beggar woman whom I used to know, a 
 poor idiot whom I used to see every day 
 before the garden fence when I was still 
 at home, and my mother was yet alive. 
 Do you remember her, nurse? She was 
 called Simona, and always mumbled the 
 same song, hoping to make me smile. 
 . . . It was a strange dream! And it 
 corresponds to a painful sensation that I 
 have at times, when I listen to my life 
 slipping by. ... In silence and in dark- 
 ness, at times, I listen to my life hasten- 
 ing by with a roar so terrible, Bianca 
 Maria, that I would gladly die to hear it 
 no more. Ah, you cannot understand! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I understand, Anna. Even in the light,
 
 20 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 the passing hour imparts to me at times 
 an almost unbearable anxiety. It seems 
 that we are waiting for something that 
 will never happen. Nothing has hap- 
 pened, for a long time. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Who knows! 
 
 A pause. 
 I do not feel the sun any longer. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, turning toward the loggia 
 and looking at the sky. 
 
 . A cloud is passing, but a light one: a 
 golden cloud in the shape of a wing. 
 Every day the clouds float through the 
 azure sky arising below, from the gulf 
 of Argos, and moving toward Corinth. 
 I see them form and pass away. Some of 
 them are marvelous. Sometimes they 
 remain long upon the horizon, and in the 
 evening glow like funeral pyres. Yet
 
 ACT FIRST SCENE I 21 
 
 none of them lets fall a drop of water. 
 All the country is thirsty. Yesterday 
 pilgrims set out from Carvati for the 
 Chapel of the Prophet Elijah, to pray for 
 rain. Everywhere there is drought; and 
 the wind carries the dust of the sepul- 
 chres to a great height. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 You do not love this country, do you, 
 Bianca Maria? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 It is too dreary. Sometimes it seems 
 to me almost frightful. When my brother 
 and myself, for the first time, came up to 
 Mycenae, two years ago, it was the dawn- 
 ing of a burning August day. The plain 
 of Argos behind us was a sea of flame. 
 The mountains were tawny yellow and as 
 savage as lions. We ascended on foot, 
 silent, astonished, almost without breath,
 
 22 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 and with blinded eyes. From time to 
 time an eddy would rise from the edge of 
 the path, a column of dust and withered 
 grasses, and follow us noiselessly with the 
 step of a phantom. Seeing it approach I 
 could not repress an instinctive shudder, 
 as if those mysterious shapes could 
 renew the terror with which the ancient 
 crimes had inspired me. Upon the edge 
 of a big ditch Leonardo picked up the 
 skin of a snake and said in jest, "This 
 was in the heart of Clytemnestra," and 
 wound it around my hat like a ribbon. 
 Before my eyes the little shining tail 
 swung back and forth with the rustle of a 
 dry leaf. A horrible thirst burned my 
 throat. We looked for the fountain of 
 Perseus in the valley below the citadel. 
 So great was my weariness that as soon as 
 I put my hands and lips into the cool 
 water, I fainted. When I recovered my 
 senses, I appeared to be in dreamland,
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 23 
 
 out of this world, as though after death. 
 The wind raged and eddies of dust pur- 
 sued each other upon the height, disap- 
 pearing before the sun, which seemed to 
 devour them. A boundless sadness fell 
 upon my soul; a sadness never before 
 experienced, never to be forgotten. I 
 thought I had come to a place of exile, 
 from which there was no return; and 
 everything assumed, in my eyes, a funereal 
 aspect, which gave me a vague but pain- 
 ful presentiment. ... I shall never forget 
 that hour, Anna! But Leonardo, full of 
 hope and courage, supported me and 
 dragged me along. He was sure of finding 
 his princes, the Atridae, intact in the 
 buried sepulchres. He said to me, laugh- 
 ing: "You look like the virgin Iphi- 
 genia on r the point of being dragged to 
 the sacrifice!" But his gaiety and confi- 
 dence did not bring back my courage. 
 . . . You see, Anna, that every day hi*
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 expectation has remained a delusion. 
 This malignant soil that he turns over 
 without rest, has given him so far only the 
 fever that consumes him. If you could 
 see him, Anna, you would feel un- 
 easy. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It is true. His voice at times is like a 
 smothered flame. Yesterday, feeling his 
 emaciated, parched hand, I thought he 
 was ill. He was standing next to me 
 when you entered; he trembled like a 
 man in fear. While you were there, I felt 
 him quiver from time to time, as if your 
 words made him suffer. I have a very 
 singular intuition about such things, 
 Bianca Maria. My eyes are closed to 
 my soul, but it hears. It heard yesterday 
 those poor nerves that were suffering, ah, 
 so much pai-n. I wanted to speak to you 
 about this, Bianca Maria.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 25 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, with evident anxiety. 
 Do you believe that my brother is 
 really ill? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Perhaps he is only tired. His strength 
 is exhausted. His idea torments him like 
 a passion. Perhaps he does not sleep. 
 Does he? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I do not know, Anna. Sometime ago 
 he abandoned the room where he for- 
 merly slept, next to mine. Before that, 
 I knew that his sleep was a profound one 
 from his calm breathing. Now he is 
 farther away. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Perhaps he does not sleep. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Perhaps. His eyelids are inflamed and
 
 26 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 red. But he lives continually in the 
 midst of that irritating dust; he is always 
 there, bending over, groping in the ruins, 
 digging up the relics, breathing the exha- 
 lations from the sepulchres. Oh, what a 
 terrible will power he has. I am certain 
 that he will not take any rest until he has 
 wrung from the earth the secret that he is 
 seeking. 
 
 ANNA. 
 He seems to have a secret himself. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 What secret? 
 
 ANNA. 
 Who knows! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 For some time he has been greatly 
 Changed. He was so loving to me, once.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 27 
 
 I was everything to him, the only com- 
 panion of his youth. How often have I 
 seen him tired, but not as he is now. He 
 laid his very soul upon my knees, like a 
 child. But no longer. When I go near 
 him he seems to shrink into himself. 
 Formerly, when the intenseness of his 
 thought made his head ache, he would 
 wish me to hold my ringers upon his tem- 
 ples to quiet the painful throbbings, and 
 he was grateful to me, as for a delightful 
 medicine. But no longer. He seems to 
 avoid me. You said, Anna, that my 
 words yesterday made him suffer. . . . 
 
 ANNA, with a very pointed inflection. 
 
 Perhaps he feels that there is a change 
 in you, Bianca Maria. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, troubled. 
 
 i 
 
 In me?
 
 28 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, with the same inflection. 
 Perhaps he divines the cause of your 
 melancholy and is worried by it. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 The cause of my melancholy? 
 
 ANNA, veiling the pointedncss of her question. 
 You do not like this country, and you 
 desire to depart. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I am, now and ever, obedient to his 
 will. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 There is the sun again. Your cloud has 
 vanished. How warm it is! Almost 
 scorching! Give me your hand, please, 
 Bianca Maria. Help me to rise and 
 descend. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA extends her 
 hand, raises ANNA ami leads licr 
 down the steps. ANNA, still hold-
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 29 
 
 ing her hand in her own and 
 drawing near to her as if to listen 
 to the palpitation of her heart, asks 
 suddenly. 
 
 Did you see my husband this morning 
 before he went out? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, hesitating an instant. 
 Yes, I saw him, together with my 
 brother. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Do you know where he has gone? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 He had his horse saddled and took the 
 road to Argos, alone. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 He has not cared for his work for a 
 longtime. He is absent many long hours; 
 when he returns he is silent. Do you 
 remember, Bianca Maria, the first weeks
 
 30 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 after our arrival? Do you remember his 
 ardor? He, too, like Leonardo, had great 
 treasures to discover; but they were in 
 his own soul. It seemed as if this land 
 had, above all others, the power to exalt 
 his mind. The flow of poetry was so 
 abundant in him that he would pour it 
 out continually, almost with every word. 
 Do you remember? Now he is taciturn 
 and absorbed. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, almost with trepidation. 
 
 Perhaps he is meditating some grand 
 work. Perhaps he carries in him the 
 weight of some great idea still unshaped. 
 His genius may be about to give life to 
 some marvelous creation. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 He speaks freely with you, Bianca 
 Maria. Has he not revealed anything 
 to you?
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE I 31 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, always with slight excite' 
 
 ment in her voice. 
 
 What could he reveal to me that he has 
 not already revealed to you, dear Anna? 
 You are so near to his soul, so near! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I am near to his soul as a beggar is 
 near a door. Perhaps he has no more 
 to give to me. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, sweetly. 
 
 Why do you say such things? I see his 
 eyes when they turn toward you. His 
 look repeats constantly that he has noth- 
 ing dearer, and that he finds nothing 
 more beautiful. . . . How beautiful you 
 are, Anna! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 You seem to wish to console me for 
 something that I have lost. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Why do you say such things?
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, listening. 
 
 Do you hear? Alessandro is returning. 
 Look, nurse, from the loggia, and see if 
 he is coming. 
 
 THE NURSE, who has remained 
 seated upon the 'steps, inactive, all 
 this time, rises and ascends to the 
 loggia to look out. 
 
 NURSE. 
 There is no one on the road. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It seemed to me that I heard the steps 
 of the horse. Perhaps he is still at some 
 distance. It is late. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 From the window of my room I can see 
 the entire road to Argos. I am going to 
 see if he is on the way. 
 
 Exit through the second door to 
 the right.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE II 33 
 
 SCENE II 
 
 THE NURSE approaches ANNA, who has cov- 
 ered her face with her hands. 
 
 ANNA. 
 I feel like weeping, nurse. 
 
 THE NURSE takes her hands to 
 kiss them. 
 
 NURSE. 
 What has my daughter on her heart? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I do not know. Something that presses 
 like a knot; and then ... a vague 
 fear . . . 
 
 NURSE. 
 Fear?
 
 34 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Oh, I do not know. . . . Let me sit 
 down. . . . Stay near me! 
 
 She sits down. THE NURSE 
 kneels at her feet. She suddenly 
 bends her head toward THE 
 NURSE. 
 
 Look, nurse, if you can find any white 
 hairs. I must have some. Look well, 
 nurse; here upon my temples; hereupon 
 the back of my head. Have you found 
 it? Have you? Only one? Many? Are 
 there many? 
 
 NURSE who has put her fingers into her hair. 
 Not one. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Not one, really? Are you telling me 
 the truth? 
 
 NURSE. 
 Not one.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE II 35 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I am still young? Tell me, am I still 
 young? Tell me the truth! 
 
 NURSE. 
 So young, indeed. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Tell me the truth! 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 Why should I deceive you? You are as 
 white as these statues. No woman is as 
 white as you are. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It is true. So Alessandro told me the 
 first time he spoke to me, long, long ago. 
 Ah! That is why I became blind, like 
 the statues! . . . What did Bianca Maria 
 say about my eyes just now? Look at my 
 eyes, nurse, are they not like two 
 opaque stones?
 
 36 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 NURSE. 
 They are as clear as two crystals. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 They are dead, nurse; they are without 
 sight. Do they not cause you a slight 
 shudder, when they are fixed upon you? 
 Do they not frighten you a little? Tell 
 me the truth! 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 Ah, stop! They are still alive still 
 alive! Some day, suddenly, through the 
 grace of God, they will recover the light 
 they have lost. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Never more! Never more! 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 Some day, suddenly: perhaps to-mor- 
 row.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE II 37 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Never more! Never more! 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 Who knows the will of the Lord? Why 
 should the Lord have left your eyes so 
 beautiful if he had not wished to illumine 
 them once more? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Never more! 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 If truly hope were dead, why should 
 my heart tremble every morning when 
 you call me? Why should I turn toward 
 you with the same expectation every 
 morning when I open the window of your 
 room, to let in the light? 
 
 ANNA, with a deep sigh. 
 If it might be!
 
 38 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 You also, do you not dream every night 
 that sight has returned to your eyes? 
 
 ANNA. 
 Oh, dreams! 
 
 NURSE. 
 Believe in dreams! Believe in dreams! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Here comes Bianca Maria. Go, go, 
 nurse. 
 
 THE NURSE kisses her hands, rises and 
 goes out of the second door at the left, on her 
 lips a silent prayer.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 39 
 
 SCENE III 
 
 Re-enter BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is Alessandro coming? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I saw no one on the road from Argos. 
 In the distance I noticed a cloud of dust; 
 but it was a herd of goats. He may be 
 coining back across the fields. May be, he 
 went down to the fountain of Perseus. 
 
 She ascends the steps and looks 
 from the loggia, between the col- 
 umns, toward the sun. 
 The work is at white heat in the Agora. 
 Yesterday they found five funeral strata, 
 sure indications. A great cloud of dust 
 arises from the enclosure. It is a reddish 
 dust; in the sun it seems to burn. Ah! 
 It seems as if it must penetrate the blood
 
 40 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 like a poison. I am sure Leonardo is 
 there on his hands and feet, lying pros- 
 trate, digging with his own hands. He 
 fears that the blow of an iron might 
 break fragile things. 
 
 She turns toward the blind woman. 
 
 If you could see how tenderly he takes 
 
 every fragment out of its coat of earth. 
 
 Looking at him one would think that he 
 
 was about to peel a precious fruit, and that 
 
 he feared to lose a drop of its juice. . . . 
 
 A pause. She descends toward 
 
 the blind woman, witJi a s^vift 
 
 gliding motion, keeping in the 
 
 rays of the sun. 
 
 Would you like, Anna, to eat a sweet- 
 scented orange? Would you like to be in 
 a Sicilian garden? 
 
 ANNA, making a gesture in the air as if to 
 draw the young girl to her. 
 
 What a strange voice comes from your 
 lips, Bianca Maria! It seems like a new
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 4! 
 
 voice, as of one who was asleep and who 
 suddenly awakens. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Does my wish astonish you? Would 
 you not like to have a basket of fruit in 
 your lap? Ah, with what greed I would 
 eat! At Syracuse we used to walk 
 through the orange groves, looking 
 through the boughs at the glittering sea; 
 the trees bore upon their branches the 
 ripe fruit and the new blossoms, the 
 petals fell upon our heads like a fragrant 
 snow; and we bit into the juicy pulp as 
 one bites bread. 
 
 ANNA stretches out her hands again to draw 
 her to her while the other still keeps a 
 little away. 
 
 It is. there you would like to live. 
 There, there is joy! All your being asks 
 for joy, needs joy. Ah, how brilliant
 
 4? THE DEAD CITY 
 
 your youth should be to-day! The desire 
 of living is radiating from your person 
 like the heat of a fire-place. . . . Let me 
 warm my poor hands! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA approches her and sits at 
 her feet upon a low stool. As soon as 
 ANNA touches her cheeks ^ she }ias a visible 
 shiver. 
 
 Why are your hands so cold, Anna? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Your entire face throbs like a violent 
 pulse. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 The sun has set me on fire. In there at 
 my window I kept watching in the sun. 
 The stone of the sill was almost burning. 
 Here, too, the whole room is now flooded 
 by the sun. The sunshine reaches as far 
 as the feet of Hermes. We are sitting
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 43 
 
 on the bank of a golden stream. Stoop 
 down a little. 
 
 ANNA, touching her vaguely upon the face 
 and hair. 
 
 How you love the sun! How you love 
 life! I heard Alessandro tell you one 
 day, that you resembled Victory, unlacing 
 her sandals. I remember at Athens in 
 marble as fine as ivory, a delicate and 
 impetuous figure, which gave one the 
 desire to fly, to soar through the air for- 
 ever. ... I remember: her small head 
 stood out from the curve of her wings, 
 which hung in repose from her shoulders. 
 Alessandro said that the impatience to 
 fly was expressed in every fold of the 
 tunic, and that no other statue represented 
 more vividly the gift of divine swiftness. 
 . . . We lived for a time in the enchant- 
 ment of that youthful grace. Every day 
 we ascended to the Acropolis to look at
 
 44 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 it again. Is it true that you resemble 
 her, Bianca Maria? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, troubled by the strange 
 manner of the blind woman who continues 
 to touch her. 
 
 I have no wings. You look for them in 
 vain! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Who knows! The wings invisible, are 
 the ones that fly the furthest. Every vir- 
 gin can be a messenger. . . . 
 
 A pause. She continues to 
 finger BIANCA MARIA, ivlio 
 makes an involuntary movement 
 as if to draw away. 
 
 Will you not allow me to touch you? I 
 feel that you are beautiful, and I would 
 like to picture to myself your beauty. 
 Arc my hands repulsive to you?
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 45 
 
 BIANCA MARIA takes her hands and kisses 
 
 them. 
 
 No! No! Anna. But I cannot tell you 
 the sensation they give me. It seems as 
 if your fingers could see. ... I do not 
 know. It is like a gaze that persists, that 
 presses. . . . Each of your fingers is like 
 an eye that opens. . . . Ah, your whole 
 soul seems to descend to the extremities 
 of your fingers, and your flesh seems to 
 lose its human qualities. The color of 
 these veins is unspeakably. . . . 
 
 She places her lips upon the 
 
 liolloiv of ANNA'S left hand, 
 
 trembling. 
 
 Do you not feel my lips upon your soul? 
 
 ANNA, in secret despair. 
 They burn, Bianca Maria. They are as 
 heavy as if all the wealth of life was 
 gathered in them. How tempting must 
 your lips be! All the promises, and all 
 the persuasions must be in them.
 
 46 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 You disturb me. . . . My life is 
 bounded by a narrow circle, perhaps for- 
 ever. I was reading to you awhile ago 
 the Antigone. From time to time I 
 seemed to be reading my own destiny. I, 
 too, have consecrated myself to my 
 brother. ... I, too, am bound by a vow! 
 
 ANNA, with passionate and anxious tenderness. 
 
 The forces of your life are too grand to 
 be consumed in sacrifice. You must live. 
 . . . You must rejoice, bite the fruit, 
 pluck flowers, dear soul. I seem to feel 
 in you a glowing fire. All your blood 
 beats in your face so strangely. . . . O, I 
 have never felt such a strong pulsation. 
 . . . Your heart. . . . Your heart. . . . 
 
 She searches for BIANCA 
 MARIA'S heart, bending down to 
 listen to its beating. She speaks
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 47 
 
 in a low, almost mysterious voice 
 
 the following words. 
 
 It is terrible, your heart. ... It seems 
 to want the whole world. ... It is wild 
 with eagerness. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA 
 Oh, Anna! 
 
 She trembles and shrinks away 
 from the hands of the blind 
 woman as from slow torture that 
 enervates and exhausts. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Do not tremble! I am like a dead 
 sister of yours returned from the grave. 
 Once my blood, too, beat so; and my 
 desire, too, toward the immensity of life 
 was boundless. I know what you dream, 
 what you suffer, and what you expect. 
 . . ,. There is, there is happiness on 
 earth; there hangs over every head the 
 hour of joy. You devotedly follow your
 
 48 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 brother who lives amid ruins, and digs in 
 sepulchres; but you cannot renounce your 
 hour. An imperious force has suddenly 
 risen within you. You cannot repress it 
 any longer. If you should succeed in 
 cutting off its stem, a thousand sprouts 
 would rise from its roots. You must yield. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA hides her face 
 in the lap of the blind woman and 
 remains i?i this position, trembling. 
 
 Do not tremble. I am like a dead 
 sister of yours, who watches over you 
 from beyond. Maybe, I am for you like a 
 shadow; I am in another world. You see 
 what I do not see. I see what you do not 
 see. Therefore, you feel separated from 
 me by an abyss. You cannot yield your 
 soul to mine as you yield your head to my 
 lap. Is it not so? 
 
 She puts her hands upon the 
 hair of the reclining girl, caress- 
 ing it; then she drops them.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 49 
 
 How much hair! How much hair! It 
 is soft to the touch, like running, tepid 
 water. How much! How much! It is 
 marvelous! If it should come down, it 
 would cover you to your feet. Ah, it is 
 coming down! 
 
 The loosened hair falls upon the 
 shoulders of BIANCA MARIA and 
 down ANNA'S dress, in luxuriant 
 waves. The hands of the blind 
 woman follow its ripples. 
 
 It is a torrent. It covers you com- 
 pletely. It touches the ground. It 
 covers me also. How much! How 
 much! It has a perfume, a thousand per- 
 fumes. A torrent full of flowers. . . . 
 Ah, you are all beauty. . . You have all 
 the gifts! 
 
 She puts her hands upon her 
 temples, and upon her cheeks, con- 
 vulsively, with a gesture of an- 
 guish, as if feeling lost. Her 
 voice becomes veiled.
 
 50 .THE DEAD CITY 
 
 How could one who loved you renounce 
 you? How could you remain in the 
 shade? You who have been created to 
 give joy! Some part of you was asleep 
 in the depths, which now has awak- 
 ened. Now you know yourself, do you 
 not? I have watched your steps at times. 
 You move as if in tune with an inner 
 well-known melody. . . . Ah, if I myself 
 could pronounce the word of happiness 
 for you, Bianca Marial 
 
 BIANCA MARIA sobs, buried 
 under her hair, suffocating. 
 
 You are weeping? 
 
 She draws the hair against her 
 eyelids to feel the tears. 
 
 You are weepingl You ire weeping! 
 Ah, woe to us! 
 
 A pause. BIANCA MARIA sobs, 
 always in the same position. 
 ANNA turns restlessly toward one
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE III 51 
 
 of the doors. A great anxiety 
 shows in her face as she hears a 
 rapid step on the stairway* 
 
 Here is Alessandro! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA rises to her 
 feet, her face hidden in her hair 
 which covers her completely, 
 trembling and terrified in the tight 
 of tfa sun.
 
 52 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 SCENE IV 
 
 ALESSANDRO enters through the first door 
 to the right, carrying a bunch of wild flowers 
 in his hand, a little out of breath and heated. 
 He starts back at seeing BIANCA MARIA in 
 such a condition, and his confusion is apparent. 
 
 ANNA, her voice calm and soft again. 
 Where do you come from, Alessandro? 
 We have been waiting for you a long time. 
 Bianca Maria, from her window, watched 
 the road to Argos to descry your horse; 
 but you did not appear. Where do you 
 come from? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, in a clear, ringing voice, 
 with sober and simple intonation which re- 
 veals the strength of a spontaneous and deep 
 feeling in everything he says. 
 
 I have been riding through the country 
 at random. I crossed the Inachos, which 
 has not a drop of water in it. ... All
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 53 
 
 the fields are covered with little wild 
 flowers that are dying; and the song of 
 the larks fills the sky! It is marvelous! 
 I never heard such impetuous singing. 
 Thousands of larks, a countless mul- 
 titude. . . . They flew up from every- 
 where, darting toward the sky with the 
 speed of arrows; they seemed mad, van- 
 ishing in the light without re-appear- 
 ing, as if consumed by their own song or 
 devoured by the sun. . . . One fell sud- 
 denly at the feet of my horse like a 
 stone, and lay there lifeless, struck down 
 by intoxication from having sung with 
 too much joy. I picked it up. Here 
 it is! 
 
 ANNA, stretching out her hand and taking the 
 
 lark. 
 
 Ah, it is still warm. How soft and 
 delicate its throat is. It was singing a 
 little while ago! Look at it, Bianca 
 Maria.
 
 54 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA approaches tim- 
 idly, embarrassed by her hanging 
 hair. 
 
 You tremble. . . . She feels ashamed 
 of her hair, Alessandro. She was sitting 
 near me just now, when it became'unfast- 
 ened in my hands, and suddenly inundated 
 me. ... It is wonderful! She must be 
 entirely covered by it. You see her! You 
 see her! Are you standing in the sun, 
 Bianca Maria? Give her your flowers, 
 Alessandro! Give her your flowers! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA tries" to gather 
 
 her hair and coil it upon her he ad. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, astonished and perplexed, but 
 
 smiling, advances toward the girl. 
 Take these flowers, Bianca Maria. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA holds out her 
 hands, having gathered up her 
 hair confusedly t and uncovered 
 her face upon which appear tfie 
 traces of tears. 
 You have been crying?
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 55 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 She was reading Antigone to me, and 
 suddenly the sadness of it overwhelmed 
 her. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 You wept for Antigone/ 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Upon the steps of the loggia she was 
 looking at the clouds of dust arising from 
 the Agora; and the thought of her 
 brother caused her anxiety. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You were reading the story of the 
 watcher. . . . Antigone is never so beau- 
 tiful as under that tempest of fiery dust 
 in the arid plane, crying and imprecating 
 over the naked corpse of ker brother. Is 
 it not so? Sitting upon a hill against the 
 wind, so as to escape the odor of the 
 decomposing body, the watchers await
 
 56 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 with closed eyes the passing of the blind- 
 ing tempest; and she, undaunted in the 
 midst of the atrocious furnace, gathers 
 the dust with her hands and throws it 
 over the corpse. . . . Ah, I always see 
 her thus! .... She is not so beautiful 
 and grand when she leads Oedipus by the 
 hand, or when going to her death. Is 
 she? I should have liked to be here when 
 you read, Bianca Maria. I have never 
 heard you read. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Why not read a few pages more? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I have not the book. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Did you leave it upon the window-sill? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I left it. . . I do not know where, 
 Anna.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 57 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Will you read to me some day? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Whenever you wish. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Some day I should like to hear you 
 read Sophocles' Electro, in the shadow of 
 the Gate of Lions. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah, the invocation to light! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Some day I should like to hear you 
 read one of my poems. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Which one? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, with an air Qf uncertainty . 
 Which one?
 
 58 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 A pause. A confused noise 
 comes through the loggia. BIANCA 
 MARIA rapidly ascends the steps 
 and looks toward the Acropolis. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, growing excited. 
 They are the men in the Agora. ..They 
 are shouting with joy. . . . Perhaps they 
 have discovered a tomb; perhaps they 
 have found the king. . . . Leonardo! 
 Leonardo! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, ascending to her ill:, 
 Do you see Leonardo? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 No, I do not see him. . . . The dust 
 hides everything; the wind is stronger. 
 He must be there, on his knees under the 
 dust. . . . Leonardo! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Your voice cannot reach him. He can- 
 not hear you.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 59 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 They shout no longer. . . . Listen! 
 
 Her hair is falling, dishevelled, 
 from the top of her head again. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 They shout no longer. We hear nothing 
 
 more. 
 
 A pause. The two remain for 
 a while near each other, silent. 
 The wind blozvs BIANCA MARIA'S 
 hair toward ALESSSANDRO. 
 
 ANNA. 
 It is strange, this silence. 
 
 The two descend the steps, pen- 
 sive. Suddenly BIANCA MARIA, 
 feeling Jier hair pulled, utters a 
 slight cry. The blind woman 
 springs to her feet trembling. The 
 dead lark falls from her lap. 
 
 Alessandro! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, trying to laugh. 
 It is nothing, Anna. A little of Bianca
 
 60 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Maria's hair caught in the setting of my 
 ring and pulled out. . . . Did you feel 
 any pain? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Oh, hardly any. . . . 
 
 Laying the flowers upon a step, 
 she tries to arrange her hair. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Forgive me. I had not noticed. . . . 
 
 ANNA, with simulated simplicity. 
 Bianca Maria's hair is so soft! Did you 
 notice, Alessandro? I would like to have 
 it always in my ringers, like a spinning 
 woman. 
 
 She approaches BIANCA MARIA 
 unsteadily and leans upon her 
 shoulder in a caressing way. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, still trying to laugh. 
 Oh, I have never dared to touch it. 
 The wind blew it toward me. The rape
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 6 1 
 
 of the lock was an involuntary one; a few 
 threads of silk to tie scattered pages 
 together. . 
 
 He tries to disentangle the hair 
 from his ring 
 
 But they are inextricable. What knots 
 chance can tie! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, shivering. 
 Listen! 
 
 A clamor is heard again. 
 They are still shouting. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Some great sight. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Did you notice, Bianca Maria, how 
 uneasy and anxious Leonardo was this 
 morning? He seemed to be coming out 
 of a nightmare. . . . Perhaps he had 
 been visited in his dreams by the "King 
 of Men," and had wakened with some 
 great presentiment? Did not the ardor in
 
 62 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 his eyes pain you? I could not look at 
 him without suffering. I thought of him 
 constantly a long time in the fields. I 
 hoped he would come to meet me: he 
 would have heard the song of the larks 
 and picked some flowers with those 
 fingers of his, which have known nothing 
 but stone and dust for too long a time. 
 Ah, it is a long time since he began to 
 bend over, the grey, hard clay! .Fasci- 
 nated by the tombs, he has forgotten the 
 beauty of the sky. I must tear him away 
 at last from that accursed spot. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 You alone can do it. You know what 
 power you have over him. 
 
 ANNA, in a low voice. 
 He is ill, very ill. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA looks at her 
 -with a shiver, frightened and 
 dropping the bunch of flowers.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 63 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Truly, at times, he has the looks of a 
 man bewitched. The earth he digs in is 
 malignant; it seems that exhalations of 
 monstrous crimes still arise from it. The 
 curse which weighed upon the Atridae 
 was so horrible that it seems truly as if 
 some dreadful vestige of it still remains 
 in the dust which was once trod by them. 
 I understand how Leonardo, who lives a 
 most intense inner life, should be troubled 
 by it almost to frenzy. I fear that the 
 dead he is looking for, and does not dis- 
 cover, have been revived within himself, 
 and breathe within him with the tremen- 
 dous force infused in them by Aeschylus, 
 enormous and bloody as they appear in 
 the "Orestiad," ever pierced by the sword 
 and firebrand of Destiny. Ah, how many 
 nights have I seen him enter my room 
 and seat himself by my bed, with the 
 book that made him sleepless! How
 
 64 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 many nights he has watched with me, 
 reading those grand verses aloud, which 
 wearied him like cries, too immense for 
 human breath! With the touch of that ac- 
 cursed soil, everyday, every day, he must 
 feel his fever grow. All that ideal life with 
 which he has nourished himself must 
 have assumed in him the shape and the 
 body of reality. I think that at every 
 stroke of the pickaxe he must tremble 
 through all his bones, anxious to see 
 the face of an Atrides really appear, still 
 intact, with the visible signs of the violence 
 suffered, of the cruel slaughter. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Listen! Listen! 
 
 A new, prolonged clamor is 
 heard. BIANCA MARIA, agitated, 
 impatient, ascends to the loggia, 
 and looks toward the Agora in 
 the bright sunshine. 
 
 They have ascended the wall . . . two,
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE IV 65 
 
 three, four men, upon the wall . . . they 
 are shouting, shouting for joy. . . 
 They call to me, waving their arms. 
 . . .Look! Look! 
 
 ANNA has grasped ALESSAN- 
 DRO'S wrist tightly, and remains 
 at the foot of the steps, wild with 
 anxiety. BIANCA MARIA advan- 
 ces and leans over the balustrade 
 shouting. At intervals, between 
 her short phrases, she seems to 
 take in the signs and some of the 
 words of her brother, wlw is rap- 
 idly approaching. 
 
 Leonardo! I see Leonardo. . . . He is 
 there, he is there. ... I see him. . . . 
 Now he is in the Gate of Lions; he is 
 coining down running all white with 
 dust. . . . Some great event! Some great 
 discovery! . . . Brother! . . . Ah! he falls 
 down ... he struck his foot against a 
 rock. . . . My God! . . . He rises; runs. 
 . . . Brother! . . See him! See him!
 
 66 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 . . . The sepulchres. . . . He has dis- 
 covered the sepulchres ... all his 
 sepulchres. . . . God be praised! . . . 
 Ah, what joy, what joy! . . .. My brother! 
 , . . Here he is! . . . Here he is! He is 
 coming! 
 
 Sh? descends to the room, runs 
 to the door and opens it. 
 
 At last! At last! . . . Here he is! 
 . . . He enters! . . . He ascends the 
 stairs! ... At last all is joy, all is joy! 
 . Brother! Brother!
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 67 
 
 SCENE V 
 
 LEONARDO, enters by the first door at the 
 right, white with dust and dripping with 
 perspiration. His eyes are radiant in his 
 almost unrecognizable face. His excite- 
 ment prevents him from speaking; and his 
 hands, soiled with earth and stained with 
 blood, are trembling The whole room is 
 flooded with sunlight. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 The gold, the gold . . . the corpses 
 ... an immense amount of gold . . . 
 all the corpses covered with gold. . . . 
 
 His emotion suffocates him. 
 BIANCA MARIA and ALESSANDRO 
 stand near him breathless, affected 
 by the same excitement. ANNA, 
 standing alone and leaning upon 
 the edge of the table, bends forward 
 toward the voice of the newcomer.
 
 68 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, with pitying tenderness. 
 
 Be calm, be calm, Leonardo; take your 
 breath again. Rest a minute! . . . Arc 
 you thirsty? Do you wish something to 
 jrink? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Yes, give me a drink! I am dying with 
 thirst. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA goes to the 
 table, fills a glass with water and 
 hands it to him. He drinks it 
 ^vith avidity, in one draught. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, trembling. 
 Poor brother! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Sit down, I beg of you! Rest a min- 
 ute. . . 
 
 LEONARDO, ^W^/W/^ALESSANDRO'S shoulder 
 
 Ah, why were you not there? Why 
 
 were you not there? You, you ought to
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 69 
 
 have been there, Alessandro! The grand- 
 est and most wonderful vision that was 
 ever offered to mortal eyes; an apparent 
 hallucination; unheard of wealth; a terri- 
 ble splendor revealed, all of a sudden as 
 in a superhuman dream. ... I cannot 
 tell, I cannot describe what I have seen. 
 A succession of tombs: fifteen corpses 
 intact, one by the side of the other, upon 
 a bed of gold, their faces covered with 
 golden masks, their brows crowned with 
 gold, their chests enveloped in gold; and 
 everywhere, upon their bodies, at their 
 sides, at their feet, a profusion of golden 
 objects, numberless as the leaves fallen 
 in a fabulous forest: an indescribable 
 magnificence, one immense, dazzling view, 
 the most resplendent treasure that Death 
 has ever gathered in the darkness of 
 the earth, in centuries, in thousands 
 of years. ... I cannot tell, I can- 
 not tell, what I have seen. You, you
 
 70 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ought to have been there, Alessandro. 
 You alone would have been able to 
 picture. . . . 
 
 He stops an instant as if 
 oppressed by want of breath. All 
 are eagerly watching his feverish 
 lips. 
 
 In one instant this soul passed over 
 hundreds, thousands of years, breathed 
 in the frightful legend, palpitated with 
 the horror of the ancient slaughter. The 
 fifteen corpses were there, with all their 
 members, as if just deposited after the 
 killing, hardly burned by the fire 
 extinguished too soon: Agamemnon, 
 Eurymedon, Cassandra, and the royal 
 escort: buried with their garments, their 
 weapons, their diadems, their vases, their 
 jewels, all their riches. ... Do you 
 remember, do you remember, Alessan- 
 dro, that passage of Homer: "They lay 
 between the vases and the decorated
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 71 
 
 tables, and all the room was stained with 
 blood. And I heard the lamenting voice 
 of the daughter of Cassandra, whom the 
 perfidious Clytemnestra stabbed at my 
 side. ..." For an instant my soul has 
 lived an antique and violent life. They 
 were there, the murdered ones: the king 
 of kings, the enslaved princess, the 
 charioteer and the guests, there, under 
 my eyes for an instant, motionless. As 
 vapor vanishes, as foam melts away, as 
 dust is dispersed, like I do not know 
 what unspeakably evanescent and fleeting 
 thing, they all passed away in the silence. 
 It seemed to me that they were swallowed 
 by the same fatal silence that reigned 
 over their radiant immobility. I do not 
 know what happened. A mass of precious 
 things remains there, a treasure without 
 equal, the witness of a great forgotten 
 civilization. . . . You will see, you will 
 see!
 
 72 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, very softly, 
 What a dream! 
 
 ALESSANDO. 
 What a glory! What a glory! 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 You wrll see! The golden masks. . . . 
 Ah, why were you not there, at my side! 
 . . . The masks protected the faces from 
 contact with the air, and the faces must 
 have remained natural. One of the 
 corpses, surpassing in stature and majesty 
 all the others, was adorned with a large 
 golden crown, with the armor, the belt 
 and the golden spurs. Surrounded by 
 swords, spears, poniards, and cups, cov- 
 ered with numberless golden discs thrown 
 profusely upon the body like wreaths, 
 more venerable than a demi-god. I 
 was leaning- over him when he vanished
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 73 
 
 in the light; I was raising the heavy mask. 
 . . . Ah! Have I not, in truth, seen the 
 face of Agamemnon? Was he not the 
 king of kings, perchance? His mouth 
 was open, his eyes were open. . . . Do 
 you remember, do you remember in 
 Homer: "As I lay dying I lifted my 
 hand toward my sword; but the woman 
 with the dog's eyes went away and would 
 not close my eyelids nor my mouth . . . 
 at the moment when I was descending 
 into the home of Hades." Do you 
 remember? The mouth of the corpse 
 was open now, the eyelids were open. 
 . . . He had a large forehead, orna- 
 mented with a round golden band; the 
 nose was long and straight; the chin, oval; 
 and when I raised the armor I thought I 
 noticed the hereditary sign of the tribe 
 of Pelops, "the shoulder of ivory." . . . 
 Everything vanished in the light. A 
 handful of dust and a mass of gold. . . .
 
 74 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO, astonished and dazzled, 
 You speak like one coming out of a 
 hallucination, like one who is the prey of 
 a delirium. What you say is incredible. 
 ... If you have really seen what you 
 say, you are no longer a human being. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 I saw it, I saw it! ... and Cassandra! 
 How we loved the daughter, of Priam, 
 "the flower of the booty!" Do you 
 remember? How you loved her, with the 
 same love as Apollo! She pleased you, 
 deaf and dumb upon her chariot, with 
 her "look of a wild animal just taken," 
 owing to the Delphic fire which was 
 smouldering under her sibylline tongue. 
 Many a night her prophetic cries have 
 awakened me. . . . And she was there 
 just now, supine upon a bed of golden 
 leaves with numberless golden butter- 
 flies upon her garment, her brow bound
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 75 
 
 with a diadem, her neck ornamented 
 with necklaces, her ringers covered with 
 rings; and a golden pair of scales rested 
 upon her breast, the symbolic scales with 
 which the destinies of man are weighed, 
 and an infinity of golden crosses formed 
 of four laurel leaves surrounded her; and 
 her two sons, Teledamos and Pelops, 
 wrapped in the same metal, were at her 
 sides like two innocent lambs. . . . Thus 
 I saw them. And I was crying to you 
 aloud when she vanished. But you were 
 not there! You will see her wrappings, 
 you will touch her empty girdle. . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, impatient and excited. 
 I must see, I must run. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO holds him back 
 with his hand, urged by an irre- 
 sistible need of saying more, of 
 communicating to others all his 
 feverish excitement.
 
 76 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Marvelous vases, four-handled, orna- 
 mented with little doves, like Nestor's cup 
 in Homer; large heads of oxen, all of 
 solid silver, with golden horns; thousands 
 of plates wrought in the shape of flowers, 
 leaves, insects, shells, octopi, Medusas, 
 stars; fantastic animals of gold, ivory, 
 crystal; sphinxes, griffins, chimeras; small 
 figures of divinities with arms and heads 
 loaded with doves; little temples with 
 towers crowned with doves, their wings 
 spread; lion-hunts and panther-hunts 
 engraved upon blades of swords and 
 lances; ivory combs, bracelets, lockets, 
 seals, sceptres, wands. . . . 
 
 While he pictures these splen- 
 dors ANNA lets herself fall upon a 
 chair and covers her face with 
 her palms, leaning forward , and 
 her elbows upon her knees.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 77 
 
 ALESSANDRO, breaking away. 
 Let me go! Let me go! 
 
 LEONARDO, rising, very loud. 
 I go with you. . . . Let us go! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, embracing her brother and 
 beseeching him, her hair again falling 
 about her. 
 
 No, no, Leonardo, I beg of you. 
 Remain here awhile, rest a little, recover 
 at least your breath! You are too tired, 
 you are exhausted! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 I am going, I am going! 
 
 Exit by the door leading to the stairs. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, still holding her brother in her 
 
 arms, compassionately. 
 Oh, how weak you are, my poor 
 brother, my poor brother! You are wet 
 through. . . . The perspiration is mixed 
 with dust. . . . Your face is almost black 
 . . . and those poor eyes, those poor
 
 78 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 eyes! How inflamed they are! Your 
 eyelids are as red and swollen as if you 
 had been weeping a whole year. . . . Do 
 they not ache? Oh, how they must ache, 
 poor eyes! I will give you a lotion 
 I know, to lave them. You will take a 
 rest, won't you? You will rest now that 
 your wish is fulfilled. . . . You have cov- 
 ered yourself with glory; you were 
 splendid awhile ago when you entered, 
 you were resplendent from all that 
 gold. . . . 
 
 Her falling hair almost covers 
 him as she sinks against his 
 breast. With infinite tenderness 
 she ivipes his brow, and his eyes, 
 his cheeks, his neck with her hair ; 
 she enfolds him with her love. 
 Leonardo appears as if re- 
 pelled, rigid; with an extraor- 
 dinary expression of pain and of 
 terror upon his exhausted face of a. 
 deadlike pallor.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 79 
 
 Let me wipe the perspiration away, let 
 me. I cannot tell you the sorrow you 
 cause me. ... I do not know what to 
 say to you to relieve your weariness, to 
 calm your blood, to revive your color; I 
 do not know what balm, what draught. 
 . . . Ah, how many days, how many days 
 you have spent there, prostrate upon the 
 earth, in the excavations, swallowing that 
 cursed dust, tearing your hands on the 
 stones, without rest, without rest! Poor 
 hands! They are all torn, stained with 
 blood, the fingernails split, almost with- 
 out flesh, dry as flint. . . . Do they not 
 ache? Poor hands! I will give you an 
 ointment that I perfumed sweetly with 
 violets which will heal them in a short 
 time, and make them as soft and white as 
 they were once. ... I remember. You 
 used to have such fine and beautiful 
 hands. . . . How you tremble! How you 
 tremble!
 
 80 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA suddenly lifts her head, 
 You must feel like dying with weari- 
 ness. You have lived at such a tension, 
 like a bow ready to break! Not a vein in 
 you but trembles, and your muscles twitch 
 like cords unstrung. . . . You are suffer- 
 ing, you are suffering! 
 
 Struck by the remembrance of 
 the words spoken by ANNA, she 
 stops with an expression of an- 
 guish. Then she takes i?i her 
 hands her brother' s head, looking 
 sharply into his eyes. 
 
 You have nothing against me, have 
 you? I have done nothing to you, have 
 I? I have done nothing to cause you 
 pain. Tell me, tell me Leonardo! 
 Answer! 
 
 LEONARDO, in a faint voice, trying to smile. 
 Oh, nothing! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I never loved you as much as I do now,
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 8 1 
 
 brother. My tenderness for you has 
 never been so deep. You are my con- 
 tinual thought, you are everything to me. 
 Take me where you will, to the most 
 sterile desert, to the most desolate ruin; 
 and if you smile and are contented, I 
 shall be happy. I, too, will remain in 
 the midst of the dust; I, too, will tear my 
 hands upon the stones; I, too, will gather 
 the bones of the dead; but you must smile, 
 you must have a cheerful countenance. 
 . . . Do you remember, do you remem- 
 ber? At Syracuse you used to sing in the 
 midst of your work, and you seemed to 
 have in your soul the beauty of the statue 
 for which you were looking. I was pick- 
 ing the sweetest oranges to bring you; 
 and you did not wish to eat them unless 
 peeled by my fingers. Do you recollect? 
 When you were tired )^ou fell asleep with 
 your head upon my knees, in the shadow 
 of the olive trees; and I guarded your
 
 82 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 calm sleep, thinking of the statue you 
 were trying to find. Ah, how long, how 
 long have I not watched over your sleep! 
 You must need an infinity of sleep. . . . 
 You can no longer raise your eyelids. 
 ... Come, come to your room! Let me 
 help you. Let me be like a mother to 
 you! You must sleep. You must have a 
 long, deep sleep; you must have your 
 soul clarified like tranquil water. . . . 
 When you wake again you will see all the 
 gold you have discovered, as at the 
 bottom of your soul, and I will still be at 
 your bedside. Come, come! 
 
 He endeavors to draw away 
 from the sweet embrace as if from 
 unbearable torture. 
 
 I cannot bear to feel you tremble so! 
 Come! 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 I must go back there.
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE V 83 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 It is impossible. It is noon. Do you 
 not see! The sun is shining everywhere, 
 a sun that burns. . . . Have you not left 
 your men up there? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 I must return, I must return! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 It is impossible. You cannot go back 
 there as you are. . . . You would fall on 
 the way . . . Listen to your sister! You 
 look as if you were going to faint. . . . 
 Let me support you! 
 
 She presses him back and 
 twines her arms about his shoul- 
 ders, covering him tenderly with 
 her hair. He looks deadly pale 
 and desperate. ANNA rises silent- 
 ly and moves toward them, listen- 
 ing, while they go out through the 
 second door to the right. The 
 room is flooded with sunlight.
 
 84 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 SCENE VI 
 
 ANNA, alone, takes a few uncertain steps, 
 oppressed by a deep gloom. 
 
 ANNA, in a hollow voice, as if from within. 
 No one has spoken to me. I am in 
 another life. . , . And all that funereal 
 gold. . . . And that poor, trembling soul. 
 . . . And all that sweet life that is glow- 
 *ng in the beautiful creature. . . . 
 
 Her feet touch the bunch of wild 
 flowers, which have fallen from 
 BIANCA MARIA'S hands. 
 
 Ah, the wild flowers he picked for her! 
 
 She stoops, takes the whole bunch, 
 buries her face in it and remains 
 mute for a moment. 
 I would I could weep! 
 
 She takes a few steps more. 
 Nurse! Nurse!
 
 ACT FIRST, SCENE VI 8$ 
 
 THE NURSE, rushing from the second door to 
 the left. 
 
 Here! Here I am. 
 
 Takes one hand of the blind 
 woman and kisses it. 
 
 ANNA. 
 The hour? 
 
 NURSE. 
 It is noon. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Here, take these flowers and put them 
 in a vase of water. 
 
 NURSE. 
 
 They are all withered; they cannot re- 
 vive. 
 
 ANNA, letting the bunch fall. 
 Let us go. . . . 
 
 While going out, guided by the 
 nurse, she stops and turns around 
 as if remembering something.
 
 86 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Ah, look around there, nurse, look on 
 the floor. . . . 
 
 NURSE, bends down to look. 
 What have you lost? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Look there. ... It is a dead lark!
 
 ACT SECOND
 
 ACT SECOND 
 
 A room in the apartment of Leonardo. Along 
 the walls, which are painted a dark red, stand 
 large cases with several shelves, containing 
 the treasures found in the sepulchres of the 
 Agora; the jars, breastplates, masks, diadems, 
 swords and girdles of gold, glitter dimly in 
 the half-light. Upon tivo inclined tables 
 shaped like biers, rich ornaments, which 
 had covered the forms of Agamemnon and 
 Cassandro, are arranged so as to produce the 
 effect of the absent bodies. Some caskets 
 filled with gold, and a few vases of brass 
 containing ashes, are at the foot of the tables. 
 A closed door is on the right side. In the 
 background an open balcony looking toward 
 the plain of Argos and the distant mountains. 
 The h?ur of sunset approaches.
 
 SCENE I 
 
 BIANCA MARIA is discovered arranging the 
 marvelous objects. She stoops to take the 
 necklaces, bracelets, combs, buckles and little 
 idols from the caskets and arrays them upon 
 one of the tables about the golden mask of the 
 prophetess. Some spirals of golden thread 
 hang betiveen her fingers, small spirals which 
 were used to fasten the hair around the head. 
 She fastens them coquettishly in her own hair. 
 Alessandros voice is heard outside the door. 
 
 9
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Leonardo, are you there? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, trembling, hesitating. 
 My brother has just gone out ... I do 
 not know where. . . . 
 
 She goes to the door and opens 
 it. ALESSANDRO appears o?t the 
 threshold. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, almost timidly. 
 Ah, you are alone . . . alone in the 
 midst of gold ... I was looking for 
 Leonardo. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I do not know where he has gone . . . 
 Perhaps he descended to the fountain of 
 Perseus. . . . 
 
 They avoid looking at each 
 other.
 
 92 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO, making one step into the room. 
 
 Have you remained to watch the treas- 
 ure, Bianca Maria . . . What were you 
 doing? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I was replacing Cassandra's jewels 
 around her. See, that casket is full of 
 them. I promised my brother that every- 
 thing should be in order on his return at 
 nightfall. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Do you wish me to help you? It is 
 already late. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 It is late . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, advancing toivard the relics. 
 
 Strange! There seems to issue from 
 this gold an indistinct figure . . . The 
 twilight, or a night lamp, could deceive
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 93 
 
 the eye and re-create the entire form. 
 Certainly, Leonardo is aware of this illu- 
 sion. He must have seen more than once 
 the vision of Priam's daughter 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, sighing. 
 
 Ah, his eyes seem to see nothing else 
 but phantoms! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, softly. 
 
 I am not less sad for his sake than you 
 are, Bianca Maria. I was looking for 
 him, hoping ... Of late, when he is 
 with me, he seems to be continually 
 driven by an anxiety to reveal a secret to 
 me. I allow silence to fall upon us, and 
 wait, not any less anxious than he. His 
 lips swell, they seem ready to open. 
 But he abandons the idea, and they re- 
 main closed. I dare not question him, 
 fearing to drag from him a word that his
 
 94 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 soul would not yet tell me. And we 
 suffer together, silently. 
 
 A pause. 
 
 What are you thinking of, Bianca 
 Maria? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, shaking off her thoughts. 
 
 Will you not help me? My brother will 
 return soon. 
 
 She stoops over the casket and 
 at that moment ALESSANDRO 
 looks at her. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What have you in your hair? 
 
 He approaches her. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, in confusion. 
 Ah, the spirals. ... I put them on as 
 an experiment. I wish to show them 
 thus to Leonardo, who entertains some 
 doubt about their former use. 
 
 She starts to take them off.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 95 
 
 ALESSANDRO, with an unsteady gesture try- 
 ing to prevent her, without, however, touch- 
 ing her. 
 
 No, no. Why do you wish to take 
 them off? Leave them where they are! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, attempting to smile. 
 
 I must restore them to the dead prin- 
 cess, whom you loved so much. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 No, no! Keep them yet a while in 
 your hair! 
 
 In trying to prevent her from 
 taking them, off, he touches her 
 hand lightly. Both are troubled. 
 They look at each other with a 
 sort of restrained violence. A 
 pause. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, lowering her eyelids, softly. 
 You do not help me. . . . 
 
 A new pause. Both stoop over 
 the caskets of gold.
 
 96 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Look at the carving of this ring: a 
 woman, sitting, holding three poppies, 
 with three ambiguous figures standing 
 before her, and upon her head a double- 
 edged axe, and the brilliant disc of the 
 sun. Look at this other: a young woman, 
 holding out her arms, turning her head 
 backward; before her a man, also holding 
 out his arms. Look: the woman has 
 luxurious hair. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 She turns her head backward. . . . 
 
 A pause. BIANCA MARIA con- 
 tinues to arrange the ornaments 
 around the mask. ALESSANDRO 
 goes out on the balcony and re- 
 mains looking at the landscape for 
 a few instants. Both are strug- 
 gling against the anguish that 
 seizes them.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 97 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 This arid country has, in truth, the 
 feverish aspect of thirst personified. 
 Other lands soften and breathe when 
 night approaches. This one tells of the 
 torture of its thirst even at night. Up 
 to the last gleam of twilight you see the 
 beds of its dried-up rivers whitening dole- 
 fully. The mountains over there, do they 
 not look like a herd of enormous asses, 
 with their rigid backs rising one above the 
 other? One feels that down behind Pon- 
 tino the swamp of Lerna is steaming. 
 Look how inflamed Arachnaeus is. Almost 
 every evening its summit is red, in 
 memory of that fire which announced to 
 the scouts of Clytemnestra the fall of 
 Troy. From the mount of Ida to Arach- 
 naeus, what a long line of signal fires! 
 We were reading again yesterday of the 
 marvelous number of mountain pyres 
 kindled by Victory . . . And now you
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 may sift through your fingers the ashes of 
 him who announced his return by such 
 signs! You wear in your hair the orna- 
 ments of the royal slave whom he chose 
 from the spoils of war! 
 
 He moves again toward BIANCA 
 MARIA, looking at her. 
 
 And all that is simple, as you do it. 
 The abyss of time is filled, between you, the 
 living, and the belongings of the king and 
 the prophetess, that are in your keeping. 
 All this gold seems to belong to you from 
 time immemorial, for you are Beauty 
 and Poetry; and everything returns in the 
 circuit of your breathing, everything falls 
 naturally under your dominion. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, pale and trembling, resting 
 her back against the table of the golden 
 relics. 
 
 Do not speak to me thus!
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 99 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Why do you not wish me to speak to 
 you of the truth which you have revealed 
 to my spirit? Do you not think, Bianca 
 Maria, that to manifest internal truth, 
 when it demands expression, is necessary 
 for those who have resolved to live with- 
 out suffering and without lying? How 
 many times have we smothered in silence 
 the unexpected things which were 
 born in us, and rose to our lips! I can- 
 not think of it without regret and re- 
 morse. I seem to see them undulating 
 below the still water, sluggish and shape- 
 less. And they might have grown in us, 
 who knows into what new joys, new 
 pangs, new beauties, meeting each other 
 in the currents of our living voices. Ah, 
 woe to the one who hides, who dissfrvu- 
 lates, who smothers, who lies before life! 
 Why have we remained up to this time 
 without looking into each other's eyes?
 
 100 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Were we afraid to read shame in our 
 glances? Were we afraid to acknowledge 
 by looks what we already knew? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, zvith anguish. 
 We know what cannot be and can never 
 be. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Ah, another prohibition to life! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 We know that there are things stronger 
 taan death to separate mortals. Death 
 could not separate us as these do. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What are they? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 You know. Sacred things. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Ah, I would wither a thousand lives 
 that your lips might drink, Bianca Maria!
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Do not speak to me thus! . . . There 
 is, near you, bound up with yours, a life 
 far more precious than mine: a life 
 almost divine. She is so penetrating that 
 I have never been able to approach her 
 without trembling in every vein. Noth- 
 ing seems unknown to her, and nothing 
 strange. Every time I have been able to 
 force myself toward her, I have felt in 
 her I know not what mysterious beauty 
 that exalted and humiliated me at the 
 same time. And I have never wept as I 
 have upon those knees, with a weeping 
 that gave me so much relief and so much 
 pain. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You do not know what terrible and un- 
 expected sterility Time brings to the 
 highest human union. The most power- 
 ful roots remain buried and latent below
 
 102 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 the ground; their subterranean force be- 
 comes inert forever, produces neither leaf 
 nor flower. But do you not feel, when 
 your life is near mine, a mysterious 
 vibration that resembles the ferment of 
 spring? Your presence alone is sufficient 
 to give to my mind boundless fer- 
 tility. When we were upon the loggia the 
 other day, in the silence that followed 
 the outcry, and the wind blew your hair 
 toward me, my soul in a moment ex- 
 panded beyond all bounds, encompassing 
 an infinite number of new ideas; and 
 the dust of the sepulchres was for me a 
 flood of germs eager to sprout. We sit, 
 one l?y the side of the other, in a desert 
 far from the tracks of man, motionless 
 and mute as the country at dawn, yet 
 every breath of wind would waft to us 
 marvelous germs. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 In you, in you alone is all the power . . .
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 103 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 In you, in you are all those things 
 which men mourn without ever having 
 possessed them. When I look at you, 
 when I hear the rhythm of your breath, I 
 feel that there are other beauties to be 
 revealed, other possessions to be con- 
 quered and that there may be, in this 
 world, things one can do, as delicious as 
 the sweetest dreams of poetry. I do not 
 know how to tell you what I experienced 
 one day, standing beside you, at the first 
 appearance of my love and my desires. 
 It was an extraordinary feeling which I 
 can describe only by analogy with a re- 
 awakening of my distant adolescence . . 
 I remember that re-awakening as a joy- 
 ful birth, a glorious dawn in which I 
 was born to another life, infinitely purer 
 and stronger, and suddenly the hands of 
 Destiny, firmly clasped around my head, 
 were removed. I was sailing from Apulia
 
 104 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 toward the waters of Greece for the first 
 time. It was in the Gulf of Corinth, in the 
 Bay of Salona, at the anchorage of Itea 
 where I was to land and ascend to Delphi. 
 You know those places, you who have 
 wandered over all the shores consecrated 
 to Mystery and Beauty. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, as in a dream. 
 Salona! I remember: an azure bay, 
 with little hidden harbors like the cavities 
 of shells, and pink like shells, in the 
 evening. . . . Upon the caverned moun- 
 tains, among the rocks, on some patch of 
 reddish soil, waved a few meagre ears of 
 wheat, mixed in with tufts of aromatic 
 herbs. ... I remember: one evening the 
 stubble fields upon one mountain caught 
 fire. The light and serpentine flames ran 
 among the rocks with the rapidity of 
 lightning. I never saw such a quick and 
 bright fire. The breeze carried to us the
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 105 
 
 aroma of the burning herbs. All the sea 
 seemed perfumed with wild mint. Thou- 
 sands of frightened falcons circled above 
 that fire, filling the whole sky with their 
 cries. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 There it was, there it was! I had 
 fallen asleep upon the deck, my face 
 turned toward the stars, that August 
 night. The rattling of the chains awoke 
 me at sunrise, when the ship had been 
 made fast. You know, you know to what 
 distance, even in our day, Parnassus ex- 
 tends the sanctity of its ancient myth. 
 Your eyes, before which have passed the 
 most beautiful and the most august visions 
 of the earth, have certainly drunk in that 
 ideal light which encircles the Apollinean 
 mountain on summer mornings. Still 
 recumbent I saw nothing but the fabled 
 summits in the mute pallor of the sky;
 
 106 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 but from the shore came the chant of the 
 cocks: a lively and proud chant in un- 
 ceasing calls and unceasing answers, that 
 alone invaded the silence of the sublime 
 solitude. Ah, never, never shall I forget 
 the joyful promises that were made to my 
 new life, in that place and in that dawn, 
 by this inspiring chant! . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 It is true! It is true! I remember. . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Well then, the extraordinary emotions 
 of that far distant morning took posses- 
 sion of my spirit again in that generous 
 hour in which I discovered the power 
 that lies in you. Your lips were motion- 
 less, but from your very blood I could hear 
 a song arise that renewed those old prom- 
 ises. Ah, I knew it! I knew it! I knew 
 well that all the promises, sooner or later,
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I IOJ 
 
 would be fulfilled. For this I have waited 
 confidently. I have waited for my spirit 
 to obtain to perfect maturity that it might 
 be capable of the supreme sweetness. I 
 have enlarged its knowledge by every 
 means that it might be better able to appre- 
 ciate the greater value of every new gift. 
 I have led it to every fountain, I have 
 poured on it every fragrance, I have filled 
 it with every essence, in order that, in its 
 very fullness, it might feel more keenly its 
 insatiable nature. And I waited, I 
 waited! And you came like a messenger, 
 you appeared on my path at the moment 
 when I was turning back perplexed, 
 assailed by uneasiness on account of 
 the over-long delay. At other times I 
 had looked at you, had listened to the 
 sound of your voice; but in that moment 
 you appeared like a new creature slipping 
 suddenly out of a chrysalis that had hid- 
 den you. . . . Before, I had looked at
 
 108 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 you without seeing, I had listened to you 
 without hearing. Now I recognize you, 
 and you recall to me all the promises of 
 that distant morning. I will not renounce 
 one of them, even if I have to use vio- 
 lence to compel Destiny to fulfil! 
 them. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, writhing in agony. 
 Be silent, be silent! You speak as if 
 intoxicated. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, without further restraining 
 his ardor. 
 
 I need you, I need you! If ever the 
 shapes I have given to my thoughts have 
 appeared beautiful to you, if ever the 
 words of my poetry have seemed comfort- 
 ing to you, if ever you have recognized 
 any height in my intellect, I beg you, I 
 beseech you ... do not misjudge this 
 impulse that urges me toward you. My 
 life in this moment is like a river swollen
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 109 
 
 by the waters of spring, clogged with an 
 uprooted forest, that cannot find an outlet. 
 You alone are able to remove this imped- 
 iment; you alone, with a blade of grass, 
 with the stem of a flower in your little 
 hand. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Not I, not I! Your dream blinds 
 you. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You, you alone! I have met you in a 
 cTream as I meet you now in life. You 
 belong to me as if you were my own crea- 
 tion, made by my hands, inspired by my 
 breath. Your image is beautiful within 
 me, as an idea is beautiful in me. When 
 your eyelids quiver, it seems to me that 
 they quiver like my blood, and that the 
 shadows of your eyelashes touch the very 
 bottom of my heart. . . .
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, as if lost. 
 Be silent! Be silent! I feel like suffo- 
 cating. . . . Ah, I can live no longer, I 
 can live no longer! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You cannot live except in me, because 
 you are in my life, as your voice is in your 
 mouth. How long have I awaited you! 
 With what faith have I awaited you! I do 
 not ask what you have done in the years 
 during which we remained strangers to 
 each other, hidden from each other, in- 
 visible to each other, though at times to- 
 gether, though at times breathing under 
 the same sky. I know it, I know it! 
 You have immersed your soul in Mystery 
 and Beauty, you have drunk Poetry at the 
 most remote fountains, you have dreamed 
 your dreams in the glory of the loftiest 
 destinies ever accomplished. I know, I 
 know what you have done that I might
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I III 
 
 find the antique human soul present in 
 the freshness of your love. . . . 
 
 i 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, in utter confusion. 
 
 You exalt the most humble of all 
 creatures with your breath. I have only 
 been a good sister; everywhere I have 
 carried my simple tenderness for my 
 brother who labored. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 But did not another being live beside 
 the good sister? She breathed upon the 
 golden medals of Syracuse scarcely dug 
 out of the tarnishing soil, and the im- 
 mortal impressions became bright again 
 under the warmth of her fingers. She 
 knelt beside the trenches where lay the 
 prostrate statues, freed their faces from 
 the inert crust, and saw under the opaque 
 clay, the serene smile of a life divine. 
 At Marathon, on the battlefield, she read,
 
 112 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 
 
 with eyes full of tears, the names of the 
 fallen Athenians inscribed upon a heroic 
 column; and at Delphi she divined the 
 mystic melody of the paean engraved upon 
 the marble of a sacred shaft. Wherever a 
 vestige remained of the grand myths, or a 
 fragment of the beautiful imagery, into 
 which the chosen race transfigured the 
 forces of nature, she passed with her ani- 
 mating grace, journeying lightly the 
 length of the centuries, like the song of 
 the nightingale along a country strewn 
 with ruins. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Who was she? Am I to recognize my- 
 self in her? For you everything becomes 
 transfigured! I have only been a weak, 
 though willing helper; the joys and pains 
 of my brother were my joys and my 
 pains. My heart trembled when his heart 
 trembled.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 113 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Ah, what mystery, what beauty is there 
 that you do not reflect in your person? 
 You too, you too, like Cassandra, whose 
 ashes and whose golden ornaments you 
 have gathered, have put your foot upon 
 the threshold of the Scaean gate. Across 
 the strata of the seven towns, one built 
 on top of the other, your eyes have dis- 
 cerned the signs of the fatal fire, prophe- 
 sied by the indefatigable voice of her who 
 now lies there silent, in your shadow. 
 Has the illusion of time not yet disap- 
 peared for you? Is the distance of centu- 
 ries not yet abolished for you? It was 
 necessary that at last I should find in a 
 living and beloved creature, that unity of 
 life to which the whole strength of my art 
 aspires. You alone possess the divine 
 secret. When your hand takes the dia- 
 dem which adorned the brow of the 
 prophetess, the gesture seems to evoke
 
 114 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 the antique soul; and an ideal resurrec- 
 tion seems to magnify an act so simple. 
 There is in you a life-giving power of 
 which you yourself are unconscious. The 
 simplest of your acts suffices to reveal to 
 me a truth of which I was ignorant. And 
 love is like the intellect: it shines in pro- 
 portion to the truth it discovers. Tell me 
 then, tell me: what seems to you most 
 sacred, most worthy to be preserved 
 and exalted above any obstacle and 
 against any interdiction. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, powerless. 
 No, no ... You are intoxicated with 
 your own emotions. What you see in 
 me, is in your own eyes. Your words 
 create out of nothing the image you wish 
 to love. In you, in you is all the 
 oower. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What of it? What of it? All the power
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 115 
 
 that is in me would remain shut in and 
 would be wasted in a thousand little 
 whirls of emotion, if the divine voluptu- 
 ousness that is in you did not attract and 
 incite it to manifest itself in the form and 
 in the words of joy. Joy, joy, is what I 
 ask of you! The other day, when I gave 
 you the flowers, traces of tears were on 
 your face; but around you, in the sun- 
 shine, every single hair on your head 
 breathed joy impatiently. I must be free 
 and happy in the fullness of your love, to 
 find at last the celestial harmony sought 
 by more than one. I need you! I need 
 you! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, summoning all her strength. 
 Well then, tell me, tell me: what are you 
 going to do? What are you going to do 
 with me, with the people whom I love, 
 whom you love? Tell me! 
 
 A pause.
 
 Il6 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Let destiny be accomplished. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 But the sorrow? But the sorrow? Do 
 you not feel that a cloud of grief is upon 
 our heads, growing denser and crushing 
 us? Do you not feel that the beloved 
 souls nearest to us are suffering from 
 their divination of a sin, or from their ap- 
 prehension of a catastrophe which they do 
 not know how to meet? A moment ago 
 you reminded me of my tears. . . . Ah, 
 if I could only tell you all the anguish of 
 that day, if I could only tell you my 
 misery and my dismay! She knew, she 
 knew. I felt that she knew. Her hands 
 so full of life ah, too full of life! dug 
 into my soul as one searches a garment 
 for the most hidden folds. An unspeak- 
 able torture! My secret was in her hands, 
 and she plucked it as one plucks the
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I Il^ 
 
 petals of a cut rose. And yet I felt 
 in her I know not what sweetness, 
 mingled with her despair; and it seemed 
 to me that her heart was in turns con- 
 tracting like a knot and opening like a 
 flower, and that she would rise eagerly 
 toward life. . . . 
 
 A pause. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, hesitating. 
 You believe that she is sure? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 She is sure. 
 
 A pause. 
 
 And he? You do not think that he has 
 a suspicion? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Oh no! No suspicion lies in him. I 
 know him well.
 
 Il8 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 But the strange change in him, his 
 secret and almost savage sadness, his atti- 
 tude toward me. ... At times he fixes 
 upon me a glance I cannot bear. When I 
 go near him, when I take his hands, it 
 seems sometimes that a violent aversion 
 arises in all his being. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You are mistaken, Bianca Maria. He 
 has no suspicion, but his condition 
 troubles him strangely. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 His condition! Then you also think 
 that he is really ill? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 His nerves are strained by too long and 
 too fierce a tension. Dark imaginations 
 must torment his weakened spirit. Cer- 
 tainly there is something inexplicable
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 119 
 
 about him. . . . But he will speak to 
 me, he will reveal to me the hallucination 
 which pursues him; he will confess to me 
 his terror. A man cannot with impunity 
 uncover the sepulchres and look at the 
 faces of the dead; and of such dead! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 He will speak to me. Last night he 
 was about to speak . . . I will find him 
 to-night. You do not know where he has 
 gone? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I do not know. Perhaps to the foun- 
 tain of Perseus. That is the place he 
 prefers when he desires to be alone. The 
 water! The water! Ah, what in the 
 world is more beautiful than the water? 
 Everything here is dried up, everywhere 
 there is thirst, thirst! . . . There is the 
 only refuge; there is a sweet murmur that 
 soothes, that soothes the thoughts.
 
 120 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 She leaves the table, where iJie 
 golden relics are, moving toward 
 the balcony with a slowness al- 
 most of abandon. 
 
 The water! The water! How long 
 since I saw a large river flowing through 
 green meadows, a lake in a wreath of 
 woods, a waterfall whiter than snow. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, pale with emotion, stopping her 
 suddenly on her way, taking her hands. 
 
 Ah, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, and 
 sweet, indeed, and fresh, in truth, like 
 water that flows, like water that 
 quenches. . . . All your beauty, ah, it 
 seems all your beauty inundates my senses 
 like living water, like water that palpi- 
 tates, that trembles. . . . Ah, beautiful, 
 beautiful, for no one so beautiful as for 
 me! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, faintly. 
 Leave me! Leave me, Alessandro!
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE I 121 
 
 ALESSANDRO, as if intoxicated. 
 I feel the love well up in all your veins, 
 in your hair; I see it gush forth from 
 under your eyelids. ... I breathe the 
 aroma of the tears in your eyes. . . . 
 Your whole form vanishes into mine. . . . 
 You are all within me, like a nectar that 
 I have drunk. . . . 
 
 He leans over to kiss her lips. 
 She starts back amazed, scai'ccly 
 suppressing a cry. They remain 
 face to face, panting, unable to 
 speak. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, shivering. 
 Listen! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What is it? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Her voice. 
 
 Both stand listening for a moment.
 
 122 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 It is her voice, it is her voice. She is 
 looking for you; surely she is looking for 
 you. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Do not fear, do not fear. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 She knows everything, she understands 
 everything. ... It is not possible to 
 conceal . . . As soon as she crosses the 
 threshold she will hear our pulses beat. 
 It is not possible to hide. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, with sadness. 
 
 We need not hide anything from a soul 
 that deserves to hear the truth, Bianca 
 Maria. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 But the pain, but the pain. . . .
 
 ACT SECOND SCENE I 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 She is the slave of pain. It is not 
 given to us to do anything to set her free. 
 She is in another life. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 In another life! 
 
 She bows her head and moves 
 toward the door,
 
 124 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 SCENE II 
 
 ANNA, guided by THE NURSE appears upon 
 the threshold. Her whole manner expresses 
 grief, though she is strangely calm. 
 
 Bianca Maria! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, taking Iw hand. 
 Here I am. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Go, go, nurse. 
 
 THE NURSE retires. BIANCA 
 MARIA leads the blind woman 
 toward ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Alessandro! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 I am here, Anna. 
 
 The blind woman holds out her 
 hand to him. He grasps it, and
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 125 
 
 she remains for some momemts 
 in silence, standing between the 
 two. Then detaching herself from 
 him, she draws BIANCA MARIA 
 toward her. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Give me a kiss, Bianca Maria. 
 
 She kisses her on the mouth. 
 
 You seem to have been away from me 
 an endless time. . . . What have you 
 been doing? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA confused, hesi- 
 tates to answer. 
 
 What have you been doing? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, bewildered. 
 1 liave been here, almost all day, assist- 
 ing my brother. 
 
 ALESSANDRO goes to the bat- 
 cony and stands, leaning on the 
 railing, looking out upon the 
 country.
 
 126 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 This is the room of the golden rencsr 
 
 BIANCA MARIA 
 Tt is. 
 
 ANNA. 
 And of the ashes? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 And of the ashes. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Where are they? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Over there, in the copper vases. 
 
 ANN,A. 
 
 Take me there. I should like to touch 
 them. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, leads her to one of the 
 
 cinerary urns. 
 
 Here. Here are the ashes of Cassandra; 
 there the ashes of the King.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 
 
 ANNA, in a low voice. 
 Cassandra! She, too, could see. . . . 
 She always saw around her misfortune and 
 death. 
 
 She bends over the urn, takes 
 a handful of ashes and lets them 
 sift through her fingers. 
 
 How soft these ashes are. They glide 
 through your fingers like the sands of the 
 sea. . . . You were reading her words 
 yesterday, Alessandro. Amid the terrible 
 shouting there was a voice infinitely 
 sweet and sad. The old men compared 
 her to a "somber nightingale." . . . 
 What were her words when she remem- 
 bered her beautiful river? And when the 
 old men asked her about the love of the 
 god? Do you not remember them? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 He does not hear you, Anna.
 
 128 THE DEAD CITY. 
 
 ANNA. 
 He does not hear me ? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 He is on the balcony. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Ah, he is, on the balcony. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, turning to the balcony. 
 
 He is looking at the sunset. It is a 
 marvelous sunset. Behind the cape of 
 Artemisium the whole sky is on fire. The 
 top of Arachnseus burns like a pyre. The 
 red reflection reaches this far, and strikes 
 this gold. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 Take me nearer the relics. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, conducting her to one of 
 the tables. 
 
 Here are the remains of Cassandra !
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 129 
 
 ANNA, touching them lightly. 
 Is her mask here? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA guiding the hands of the blind 
 
 woman. 
 Here it is. 
 
 ANNA, touching the golden mask with her 
 
 fingers. 
 
 How large her mouth is. The terrible 
 work of divination dilated it. She cried, 
 imprecated, lamented without rest. Can 
 you imagine her with a silent mouth? 
 What could have been the form of her 
 grieving lips in silence? What stupor, 
 when she was silent, when the spirit 
 granted her a pause between two clamors! 
 To-night I should like to have you read to 
 me over again the dialogue between Cas- 
 sandra and the old men. Have you not 
 in your memory, her words when she 
 speaks of the god who loved her, and of 
 the elders who asked her if she yielded in
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 the struggle? She appears to me to blush 
 
 with shame at that moment "I 
 
 promised," she says, "I promised" . . . 
 Do you not remember her words? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, more and more troubled. 
 No, Anna. To-night I will read to 
 you . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 "I promised but I deceived him," she 
 says. She deceived the god, who took 
 revenge upon her. No one believed her 
 any longer! She was alone, on the top of 
 a tower, with her truth. 
 
 A pause. She continues to 
 feel of the relics. 
 
 You also, like Alessandro, love her, 
 this "somber nightingale"? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Her destiny was a terrible one. She 
 was a martyr. . . .
 
 ACT SECOND SCENE II 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 She was very beautiful; she was as 
 beautiful as Venus. Leonardo saw her 
 face under the golden mask! It is 
 strange, but it seems as if I also had seen 
 it. ... What color do you think were 
 her eyes? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Black, may be. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 They were not black, but they seemed 
 to be because the pupils were so dilated 
 with her prophetic ardor that they de- 
 voured the iris. I think, when she 
 paused, when she wiped the foam from 
 her livid lips, her eyes were soft and sad 
 like two violets. Such must they have 
 been before closing forever. Do you re- 
 member, Bianca Maria, her last words? 
 Do you not recollect them?
 
 132 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 To-night I will read them to you, 
 Anna. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 She speaks of a shadow that passes over 
 everything and of a damp sponge that 
 obliterates all traces. Is it not so? "And 
 over this," she says, "and over this I 
 grieve more than over all else." These 
 are her last words. 
 
 A pause. She holds in her 
 hands a golden pair of scales. 
 Listen! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 They are the falcons of the mountain of 
 Eubcea, screaming. 
 
 ANNA. 
 How they scream to-night! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 When the air is burning they scream 
 still louder.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 133 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Why do they scream? I should like 
 to understand the voices of the birds, as 
 the prophetess did. I did not know that 
 episode of her infancy, which Alessandro 
 told me. She was left one night in the 
 temple of Apollo; and in the morning 
 she was found stretched on the marble 
 wrapped in the folds of a serpent that 
 was licking her ears. After that she 
 understood all the voices of the air. She 
 would understand to-day the screaming of 
 the falcons. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, in ecstasy. 
 Cries of joy! Cries of joy! Such beauti- 
 ful and proud creatures, if you could see 
 them! They are full of vigorous and ag- 
 gressive life. They have the colors of the 
 rocks; brown wings, reddish body, a 
 whitish breast and grey head. Nothing 
 is more graceful and more ferocious than
 
 134 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 the little grey head, with its shining black 
 eyes in yellow circles. Day before yes- 
 terday when I was looking at them in 
 the sky, one of the guards shot one in the 
 breast with his gun. It fell almost at my 
 feet, and I picked it up. Though hurt 
 to death, it attempted to seize my hand. 
 Blood suffocated it and ran down its 
 beak; a sort of a sob shook it, while 
 the red drops fell one by one. The eyes 
 became dim, the claws contracted, the 
 little head sank upon its breast. Another 
 bleeding sigh. It was the last. There 
 remained in my hand only a clod. . . . 
 And that life, so free and so violent had, a 
 few moments before, throbbed in the sky! 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 How you speak of life and death, 
 Bianca Maria! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 Is Alessandro on the balcony?
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 135 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 He is. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 What is he doing? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 He is looking far away. 
 
 A pause. 
 
 ANNA. 
 What is this thing I have in my hands? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 It is a pair of scales. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Ah, a pair of scales! 
 
 She touches th<>. two scales. 
 Was it upon the breast of the dead 
 princess? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Upon her breast.
 
 136 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 In order to weigh destiny! But it is 
 not true, is it? It is not accurate. It 
 seems to me it inclines to one side. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 It is spoiled. One of the golden chains 
 that hold the two scales is missing on one 
 side. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 On which side? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, coming in from the balcony. 
 There is Leonardo! Leonardo is com- 
 ing! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Where from? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 From the fountain of Perseus.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE II 137 
 
 ANNA, laying down the scales. 
 Shall we go down to the fountain of 
 Perseus, Bianca Maria? Will you take 
 me there? We can sit upon the stone 
 near the pool for a little while and 
 breathe the refreshing perfume of the 
 mint and the myrtle that is so whole- 
 some. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I will go with you, Anna. Here is my 
 arm.
 
 138 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 SCENE III 
 
 LEONARDO enters and turns his searching, 
 troubled gaze upon each one. His manner 
 expresses incessant uneasiness and the painful 
 effort at self-control. 
 
 LEONARDO, going up to ANNA with signs of 
 
 affection. 
 Ah, you are here, too, Anna. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 Did you come from the fountain? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Yes, I came from there. . . . I go down 
 there almost every day toward sunset. 
 It is the hour when the myrtle becomes 
 as pungent as incense, and almost pro- 
 duces a stupor. To-night it is very 
 strong; it seems to permeate the water. 
 When I drank, I seemed to taste in the 
 water the essential oil. .
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE III 139 
 
 ANNA. 
 D : .d you hear, Bianca Maria? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Do you wish to go, Anna? Here is my 
 arm. 
 
 ANNA, taking the arm of her guide. 
 
 We are going down to the fountain. 
 . . . Alessandro, has the sun set? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, on the threshold of the balcony. 
 It has set. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Is there no more light? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Yes, there is still a little. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Why do the falcons scream?
 
 14 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 They cry until late; until the first 
 stars. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Good-bye. 
 
 She goes out with BJANCA MARIA.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 141 
 
 SCENE IV 
 
 ALESSANDRO remains on the balcony, his 
 back (gainst one of the jambs of the door, still 
 looking ajt the country. LEONARDO, with his 
 eyes, follows his sister as she leads the blind 
 woman over the threshold. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 What is that fire over there upon the 
 summit of Larissa? Look! One, two, 
 three fires. . . . Another fire there below 
 Lycone. Do you see? Do you see the 
 columns of smoke? They seem motion- 
 less. I\ot a breath of air is stirring. What 
 an enaiess calm! It is one of the most 
 beautiful and most solemn nights that I 
 have ever witnessed. 
 
 A pause. LEONARDO ap- 
 proaches his friend, places a hand 
 upon his shoulder with a frater- 
 nal gesture and remains silent.
 
 142 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Look at the color and the lines of the 
 mountains against the sky! Every time I 
 look at them in the evening, I feel for a 
 moment a, spontaneous adoration toward 
 their divinity. In no other land does one 
 feel as in this, that there is something" 
 sacred in the view of distant mountains 
 Is it not so? 
 
 LEONARDO, in an altered voice. 
 It is true. One must pray to the moun- 
 tains, they are pure. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 How pure they are to-night! Thev 
 seem to be made of sapphire. Aracb- 
 naeus only is still red; its top is always 
 the last to go out. But what are thos<* 
 fires? They multiply, they spread over 
 the hills, down to the plain. . . . Look, 
 below Larissa there is a wreath of them. 
 It is stransre that the columns of smoke
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 143 
 
 should be so white. They seem to be 
 illuminated by another light, by an invis- 
 ible moon, do they not? They are relig- 
 ious columns and perhaps they carry the 
 supplications of men. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Perhaps. Men implore for rain, for the 
 thirsty soil. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 This drought is terrible. 
 
 A pause. LEONARDO moves a 
 few steps into the room, where it 
 begins to grow dark around the 
 treasures, sparkling confusedly. 
 He is incapable of restraining his 
 agitation. He approaches the 
 table where lie the relics of Cas- 
 sandra. ALESSANDRO follows 
 him with an anxious look. 
 
 Ah, see if the jewels of Cassandra are 
 well arranged. Bianca Maria was putting
 
 144 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 them in order when I came to look for 
 you. I wished to help her; but then . . . 
 we talked . . . and the hour passed in a 
 moment. . . . We spoke of you too, 
 Leonardo. 
 
 LEONARDO, excited. 
 Of me? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Of you; of your secret. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, turning pale. 
 My secret? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, approaching his friend and 
 taking his hand gently. 
 
 What is the matter with you? Tell me, 
 what is the matter with you? Why do 
 you tremble so? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 I do not know why I tremble.
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 145 
 
 ALESSANDO. 
 
 Am I no longer the brother of your 
 soul? So many days I have waited for 
 you to speak to me, to confess to me your 
 trouble. . . . Have you no longer faith 
 in me? Am I no longer for you the one 
 who understands everything and to whom 
 you may tell everything? 
 
 LEONARDO, repressing the anguish which suf- 
 focates him. 
 
 Yes, yes, Alessandro, you are still the 
 one. What do I not owe you? What was 
 1 before knowing you, before communing 
 with your soul? What was I? I owe you 
 everything; the revelation of life. . . . 
 You have caused me to live by your 
 flame; you have brought to life around 
 me all things that were dead before. . . . 
 Ah, what would all that treasure be to me, 
 if 1 had not known you? Useless dross! 
 You, you alone have made me worthy to 
 witness a prodigy. ...
 
 146 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 And now? Now I can do nothing for 
 your happiness? 
 
 LEONARDO, confused. 
 
 I do not know the nature of my 
 trouble. ... I do not know what it 
 is. ... 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 My poor friend! For two years now, 
 two long years you have been here in this 
 arid country, at the feet of these bare 
 mountains, shut up in a ditch of the dead 
 city, delving in the earth, delving in the 
 earth with those frightful phantoms 
 always standing before your eyes in the 
 burning dust. . . . How is it that your 
 strength has not given out before this? 
 For two years you have been breathing 
 the murderous exhalations of the hidden 
 sepulchres, bent under the horror of the
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 147 
 
 most tragic destiny that has ever devoured 
 a human race. How have you been able 
 to resist? How is it you were not afraid 
 of losing your mind? You look like one 
 poisoned; and at times I have seen in 
 your eyes the glint of madness. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Yes, yes, it is true; I have been pois- 
 oned. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Why did you refuse to listen to me? 
 When you called me, when I came here, 
 you had already been taken with the 
 wicked fever. I foresaw the danger. . . . 
 I wished to tear you away from that fixed 
 idea, take you elsewhere, interrupt the 
 terrible work. Do you not remember? 
 We should have passed the spring at 
 Zante by the sea, not far away. . . . But 
 your obstinacy was unconquerable; the
 
 148 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 sorcery had already taken hold of you. 
 . . . But now you must leave without 
 delay. You must go to the water, to the 
 woods, to the green fields. . . . You need 
 the soothing embrace of a beautiful green 
 land; you must sleep, and your dreams 
 must sink .deep into green herbs; new 
 thoughts must enter into your soul, little 
 by little. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Yes, yes, you are right; we must leave 
 here, we must go far away. . . . But 
 where? Where? . . . And she also. . . . 
 She also, my sister, Bianca Maria . . . 
 should go with us. ... She, too, should 
 go with us. ... 
 
 ALESSANDRO, troubled, hesitating. 
 She too. . . . Do you not think that 
 she also is oppressed, that she also needs 
 to breathe, to live. . . . She grieves for 
 you, she weeps for you. . . .
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 She weeps? Weeps? 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 She fears that you love her no longer, 
 that you feel for her no more the tender- 
 ness of old. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, deadly pale and hoarse. 
 The tenderness of old. . . . She 
 weeps? She weeps? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, seizing his hands anew, almost 
 with violence. 
 
 What is the matter with you now? 
 What is it? Why do you tremble so? 
 
 LEONARDO, with a desperate impulse. 
 Ah, if you could only save me! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 I must, I will save you, Leonardo.
 
 150 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 You cannot, you cannot. ... I am 
 lost. 
 
 He takes a few aimless steps 
 about the room; goes toward the 
 balcony ; goes toward the door, 
 closes it and turns to A LESS AN - 
 DRO, staggering as if attacked by 
 a sudden fit of delirium. 
 
 What can I tell you? How can I tell you? 
 . . . Ah, it is horrible, horrible. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, struck by the gesture and the 
 
 words. 
 Leonardo 1 
 
 LEONARDO lets himself fall upon a chair and 
 presses his temples with the palms of his 
 hands. 
 
 A horrible thing! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, again taking his hands and 
 bending toward his face, in the sliade. 
 
 Do speak, do speak! Do you not see 
 that you are wringing my heart?
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 151 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Yes, I will speak, I will tell you. . . . 
 But do not look at me so close; do not 
 hold my hands. . . . Sit there. . . . 
 Wait. . . . Wait until it is darker. ... I 
 will tell you. ... I must tell you . . . 
 you . . . you alone ... a horrible thing! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, seating himself at a little dis- 
 tance and speaking in a low voice, oppressed 
 with anxiety. 
 
 Here, I will sit here. ... I am wait- 
 ing. ... I am waiting. . . . You are in 
 the shade. ... I scarcely see you. . . . 
 Speak! 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 How am I to tell it? 
 
 A pause. The two are sitting 
 opposite each other in the dusk, 
 brightened only by the light of 
 the golden treasure. When LEO- 
 NARDO resumes, his voice is hoarse
 
 152 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 and broken, ALESSANDRO listens 
 motionless, as if his whole being 
 were contracted with anguish. 
 
 Ah, you know her, you know her. . . . 
 You know how sweet, how tender, how 
 pure she is ... my sister. . . . You 
 know what she has been to me, during 
 the years of solitude and of labor. . . . 
 She has been the perfume of my life, the 
 rest and the refreshment, the advice and 
 the comfort, and the dream, and the 
 poetry, and everything. . . You know, 
 
 you know. . . . 
 
 A pause. 
 
 What other joys did my youth know? 
 What other woman crossed my path? 
 None. My blood ran without being 
 troubled. ... I lived as if under a vow; 
 I trembled only for the beauty of the 
 statues that I unearthed. . . . Our life 
 has always been as pure as a prayer, in 
 the solitude. . . . Ah, that solitude. . . .
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 153 
 
 How long, how long have we lived side 
 by side, brother and sister, alone, alone 
 and happy, like two children. ... I ate 
 the fruit upon which was the mark of her 
 teeth, and I drank the water from the 
 hollow of her hand. 
 
 A pause. 
 
 Alone, always alone, in places full of 
 light! . . . Now, imagine one who uncon- 
 sciously drinks a poison, a philter, some- 
 thing impure which poisons his blood 
 and contaminates his soul all of a sud- 
 den when his mind is at peace. . . . 
 Imagine such an incredible misfortune! 
 . . . Take an ordinary hour of your exist- 
 ence, an hour similar to many others; it 
 is a wintry day, lucid "and clear as a 
 diamond; everything is light, everything 
 is visible from near and far. You return 
 from your work; your mind relaxes; you 
 discover nothing strange in yourself, nor 
 in things; your breath is calm, your soul
 
 154 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 is at peace, your life passes as it did yes- 
 terday, in its continuity from the past 
 toward the future. . . . You return to your 
 home, filled with light and quiet as it was 
 the day before; you open a door, you 
 enter a room, . . . and you see her . . . 
 her, your innocent companion, asleep be- 
 fore the fire, tinged by the rosy flame, 
 her small naked feet exposed to the 
 heat. You look at her and smile. And 
 while you smile, a sudden and involun- 
 tary thought flashes across your mind; 
 an unclean thought, against which your 
 whole being rebels with trembling. . . . 
 In vain! In vain! The thought persists, 
 grows in strength, becomes monstrous, 
 dominates you. . . . Ah, is this possible? 
 . . . It enslaves you, permeates your 
 blood, and invades all your senses. You 
 are its prey, its miserable, trembling prey; 
 your whole soul, your pure soul is in- 
 fected; and everything in you is stained
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 155 
 
 with contamination. . . Ah, is it cred- 
 ible? 
 
 He jumps to his feet ', observing 
 that ALESSANDRO trembles in the 
 darkness. His whole body is 
 shaken as by a chill of fever. He 
 takes a few steps toivard the 
 balcony, then returns to his seat 
 again. ALESSANDRO' s eyes are 
 wide open and fixed upon him. 
 
 Now imagine my life here in this house, 
 with her and with that monster. Here in 
 the house, whether full of light or of 
 darkness, I alone with her! ... A des- 
 perate and secret struggle, without rest, 
 without escape, day and night, in every 
 hour and every moment growing more 
 atrocious as it drew toward me the unsus- 
 pecting pity of the poor creature. . . . 
 Nothing availed: neither the furious 
 work, nor the almost beast-like weariness, 
 nor the stupor which the sun and dust 
 caused me, nor the daily excitement of
 
 156 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 finding promising traces in the soil which 
 I turned up. Nothing, nothing served to 
 overcome the horrible fever, to interrupt 
 for some instants at least, the wicked 
 insanity. I have closed my eyes when I 
 saw her coming toward me from a dis- 
 tance, and my eyelids were upon my eyes 
 as fire upon fire. And while the throbbing 
 of my blood deafened my ears, I thought, 
 with an agony that seemed to be that of 
 death: "Ah, if upon re-opening my eyes 
 I could look at her as I looked at her 
 once, seeing in her only the saintly 
 sister!" And, to free my miserable soul 
 from this evil, my will-power shook it 
 with a violence and with the mad terror 
 of one who shakes his garments in which 
 a snake is hidden. Useless, ever useless! 
 She came to me with her usual step, I am 
 sure, but it seemed different to me, and 
 troubled me like ambiguous language. 
 And the uneasier and sadder she found
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 157 
 
 me to be, the sweeter she became. And 
 when her calm hands touched me, all my 
 bones trembled and shook with cold, my 
 heart stopped beating, my brow was 
 bathed in perspiration and my hair rose 
 as in deadly fear. . . . Ah, far worse than 
 death was the fear that she might guess 
 the truth, the terrible truth! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 The night! The night! If the light 
 was frightful, the darkness was more 
 frightful yet; the darkness warm with 
 breathing, the darkness which brings hal- 
 lucinations and delirium. . . . She slept 
 in the room adjoining mine. Every 
 evening, on the threshold, she offered her 
 cheek to me, before retiring; from her 
 bed she spoke to me at times, through the 
 wall. . . . Listening, I could hear her 
 regular breath in sleep, during my wake- 
 ful anguish. It was impossible for me to 
 sleep! It seemed that my eyelids would
 
 158 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 burn my eyes, that my eyelashes were 
 like pins over a wound. . . . And the 
 heavy hours died away, one after the 
 other; the dawn came, and with the dawn 
 came sleep -upon intolerable weariness, 
 and with the sleep, the dreams. . . . Oh, 
 the dreams, the infamous dreams, against 
 ivhich the spirit cannot defend itself! It 
 is better to lie awake, better to suffer tor- 
 ture upon the pillow as if upon the fire, 
 better to agonize in weariness. . . . Do 
 you understand? Do you understand? 
 When at last sleep falls upon your 
 misery, suddenly like a crushing shock, 
 when the poor flesh becomes dull and 
 heavy as lead, when all your being longs 
 to die, to die for a time, do you under- 
 stand? the desperate struggle against the 
 cravings of nature, in the fear of falling, 
 during sleep, an unresisting prey to the 
 repulsive monster. ... I wake up terror- 
 stricken, as if after a crime, my flesh
 
 ACT SECOND, SCENE IV 159 
 
 c.eeping with horror, not knowing 
 whether I have only been dreaming or 
 whether I am guilty of a mortal sin, more 
 tired than before, more miserable and 
 hating the light I who fear darkness, 
 with an instinctive desire to hang my 
 head and gaze upon the ground like a 
 dumb brute. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, in a suffocated voice, entirely 
 chafiged. 
 
 Stop! Stop! 
 
 He rises, convulsively, unable 
 to control his pain ; he goes to the 
 balcony, draws a deep breath, and 
 turns his face to the starry sky. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Ah, I suffocate you. Look, look at 
 the stars! Breathe, you who may do
 
 l6o THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO, softly, approaching him and' 
 touching his head with a trembling Jiand. 
 
 Stop now! Stop! Nothing more. . 
 
 He takes a few steps in the 
 darkness, staggering; goes toward 
 the door, opens it, looks out, closes 
 it again; then returns to LEO- 
 NARDO, whose face is bowed in his 
 hands, and touches his head. He 
 returns to the balcony. LEO- 
 NARDO rises and joins him. In 
 silence, side by side, they look at 
 the country, dotted with red fires, 
 in the calm, pure night.
 
 ACT THIRD
 
 ACT THIRD 
 
 The same room as in the first act. The 
 large loggia is open: through the opening 
 between the columns is seen the sky of 
 night, glittering with stars. A candle burns 
 upon the table loaded with relics. The si- 
 lence is profound. 
 
 163
 
 SCENE I 
 
 ANNA is seated near the steps ; the breezes of 
 the night fan her white face raised to the 
 stars, invisible to her. When she speaks, a sin- 
 gular indefinable animation thrills in her voice, 
 like a soft breeze. THE NURSE is kneeling 
 before her, sad and resigned. 
 
 164
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 165 
 
 ANNA, holding out her hands to the night. 
 
 A little breath of air comes from time 
 to time. ... A little wind is stirring, is 
 it not, nurse? Do you not smell the 
 myrtle? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 The wind rises from the earth. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 The earth is breathing. A while ago 
 when I went down to the fountain with 
 Bianca Maria not a breath of air could be 
 felt: none! It was a perfect calm, 
 without change. We did not speak a 
 word, lest we disturb it. The fountain 
 only wept and laughed. . . . Have you 
 ever listened to the voice of the fountain, 
 nurse?
 
 166 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 The water always says the same thing. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It does not, it does not. We did not 
 speak a word, Bianca Maria and I, and 
 the water said an infinity of things which 
 entered my soul like an eloquent plead- 
 ing. ... It has persuaded me to do the 
 one necessary thing, nurse. That good, 
 pure water that comes from the depths, 
 from the depths. . . . 
 
 THE NURSE, uneasily. 
 What are you going to do? What are 
 you going to do? 
 
 ANNA. 
 I wish to go away, go far, far away. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 You wish to go! Where?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 167 
 
 ANNA, brokenly and volubly. 
 You will know, you will know. . . . Do 
 not get excited; be tranquil, poor nurse. 
 I shall travel that road without you to 
 guide me. I shall no longer need to lean 
 upon you, my poor nurse. Light will be 
 granted to my eyes. . . . What did you 
 say the other day about my eyes? "Why 
 should the Lord have left them so beauti- 
 ful, if he did not mean to illuminate them 
 once more?" Do you see, nurse? I re- 
 member your words, and now I know that 
 my eyes are beautiful! 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 How you talk to-night! There is some- 
 thing behind your speech. . . . But I am 
 a poor old woman. 
 
 ANNA, seized by sudden emotion, places her 
 hands upon the shoulders of her nurse. 
 
 You are my dear old friend, my first 
 and my last love, nurse. I have still
 
 1 68 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 some drops of your milk in the blood of 
 my heart, dear nurse! Ah, your breast is 
 dry, but your kindness has become 
 greater every day. You led me by the 
 hand when my little feet did not know 
 how to take a step, and now you lead me 
 with the same faithful patience through 
 this horrible darkness. You are a saint, 
 nurse. I hold a paradise for you in ray 
 soul. . . . 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 Now you want to make me weep. . . . 
 
 \ 
 
 ANNA, throwing her arms around her neck. 
 Ah, forgive me, forgive I I must make 
 you weep. 
 
 THE NURSE, frightened, freeing herself from 
 the embrace and looking Kwtb. in the face. 
 
 Why, why do you speak so? Why do 
 you strangle me so?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 169 
 
 ANNA, trying to allay her anxiety. 
 Oh, no, no, . . . nothing, nothing. 
 ... I spoke so because I can now give 
 you no other joy, poor nurse, no other 
 joy. . . . 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 You are hiding nothing from me, are 
 you? You could not deceive your poor 
 friend, could you? You could not deceive 
 her. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, no. Forgive me. I do not know 
 what lam saying to-night, nor understand 
 my feelings. ... I am strangely talka- 
 tive. A while ago I felt so light, as if I 
 could fly; I felt almost merry: and I 
 talked and talked. . . And then sud- 
 denly sadness came over me and I gave 
 you pain. . . . Now I feel better, almost 
 well, after having embraced you, nurse.
 
 170 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 I wish you would hold me in your lap and 
 tell me of the little things of long ago 
 that you remember about me, about me 
 when my mother was living. . . . Do you 
 remember? Do you remember? 
 
 A pause. 
 
 Ah, why have I not had a son, the son 
 that he wished to have why? I should be 
 saved now. I should be safe! No mother 
 ever loved the offspring of her blood, as 
 I would have loved mine. Everything 
 else would have seemed nothing to me. 
 I should have continually poured the 
 sweetest part of my life into his. Con- 
 tinually I should have watched the little 
 divine soul in order to recognize, every 
 moment, the resemblance, the only resem- 
 blance; his affection would have been 
 dearer to me than the light. . . . But the 
 same Judge has made me blind and child- 
 less: an atonement for what sin, nurse?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I iyi 
 
 Tell me! What great fault has been com- 
 mitted? . . . 
 
 A pause, THE NURSE'S eyes 
 are full of tears. 
 
 How soon my mother left me! She had 
 me, she had me; she adored me, and still 
 she was not happy. . . . You know it, do 
 you not? You know it well. You know 
 why she died. You will not tell me, 
 nurse, why she died . . . and how she 
 died. 
 
 THE NURSE, troubled and hesitating. 
 It was a fever, a sudden violent fever 
 which carried her off in one night. Did 
 you not know that? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah no, no; it was not a fever. Why 
 have you never been willing to tell me the 
 truth?
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 Is that not the truth? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It is not, it is not! In the evening, my 
 mother stood at my bedside, and while I 
 was falling asleep, I felt her kisses upon 
 my face, and something warm, like tears. 
 . . . Ah, sleep was so strong, it conquered 
 the vague pain in my little heart; and in the 
 dying twilight of consciousness it seemed 
 that she let drop upon my face, upon my 
 neck, upon my hands, the leaves of the 
 rose which I had plucked that day from 
 the basin of the fountain in the garden. 
 That was the last glimpse that I had of 
 my mother. . . . Later you came to 
 waken me, and asked me if I had seen 
 her, and when and how she had left me; 
 and you were very excited. But I fell 
 asleep again, listening to tramping of 
 people passing through the garden as if
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 173 
 
 seeking something. And in the morning, 
 a little after dawn, you came again to 
 rouse me; you wrapped me in a cloak and 
 carried me in your trembling arms to 
 another house, where you spoke in a 
 whisper, where everybody spoke in whis- 
 pers and was pale. . . . And I never saw 
 her again. . . . And then when we 
 returned to our garden, you always kept 
 me away from the fountain, and whenever 
 you were there, your lips moved as if in 
 prayer. . . . 
 
 A pause. 
 
 Tell me the truth! Tell me the truth! 
 Why did she wish to die? 
 
 THE NURSE, disconcerted. 
 No, no ... you are mistaken, you are 
 mistaken. . , . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Shall I never know?
 
 174 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 You are mistaken. . . Ah, thus you 
 always seek to renew your sorrow! 
 
 ANNA, caressing her. 
 
 Forgive me! Forgive me! I have 
 caused you pain again! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 Do you smell the myrtle? Do you 
 notice how strong it is? 
 
 She gets up and, turning 
 toward the open loggia, inhales the 
 perfume and holds out her hands. 
 
 The wind has risen, it seems to tinkle 
 through my fingers like a crystal. Is the 
 door of my room open? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 It is. 
 
 ANNA. 
 All the windows are open?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 175 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 All. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 The wind passes like a perfumed river! 
 Where may Bianca Maria be? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 Perhaps in her room. Do you wish me 
 to call her? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, no. . . . Let her rest, the poor 
 thing! She nearly fainted at the fountain 
 from the strong odor of the myrtle. I felt 
 her stagger while we were returning. More 
 than once I had to support her. . . . See 
 how sure I am of myself, nurse! I led 
 her instead of her leading me. I think I 
 could go down and come up again 
 alone. . 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 But why do you speak so much of that 
 fountain?
 
 176 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 We are all attracted toward it as 
 toward a source of life. Is it not the 
 only living thing in this place where 
 everything is dead and burnt? It alone 
 quenches our thirst; and all the thirst 
 that is in us turns greedily toward its 
 freshness. If it were not, no one could 
 live here; we should all die of thirst. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 But why did we come to this accursed 
 place? The summer has burst in upon us 
 suddenly, like an inferno. We must flee. 
 When shall we go? 
 
 ANNA. 
 Soon, very soon, nurse. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 Truly, it is a place cursed by God. The 
 chastisement of Heaven is upon this 
 land. Every day processions ascend to
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 177 
 
 the chapel of the prophet Elijah, every 
 day. To-night the country is filled with 
 fires. But not a drop of rain falls. If 
 you could see the bed of the river! The 
 pebbles are as dry and bleached as the 
 bones of the dead. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 The Inachus! The other day Alessan- 
 dro crossed it ... that great day of the 
 golden treasure. . . . 
 
 Feeling her way, she seats her- 
 self upon the highest step. 
 
 Shall I tell you the fable of the river, 
 nurse? Listen! Once upon a time there 
 was a king called Inachus, the king of 
 the river; and this king had a daughter 
 called lo, so beautiful, so beautiful that 
 another king, omnipotent, the king of the 
 world, fell in love with her and desired 
 her. But his jealous wife changed the
 
 178 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 maiden into a heifer as white as snow, 
 and put her in charge of a shepherd who 
 was called Argus, and had a hundred eyes. 
 This terrible shepherd pastured the white 
 heifer down there, near the sea, in the 
 meadows of Lerna; and day and night he 
 spied incessantly upon her with his 
 hundred eyes. Then the king of the 
 world, bent upon liberating the maiden, 
 sent the prince Hermes to kill the cruel 
 custodian; and prince Hermes, having 
 reached the plain, began to play his flute 
 so sweetly that Argus fell asleep; and in 
 his sleep, with his sword, he cut off the 
 big head with its hundred eyes. But the 
 jealous wife sent a gadfly, that stung the 
 side of the heifer like a point of fire and 
 made her frantic with pain. With the 
 gadfly in her side, the frantic lo began to 
 run over the sands of the sea; and she 
 ran, and ran, and ran over all the earth, 
 through rivers and straits, and over the
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I 179 
 
 mountains, always with the gadfly in her 
 side, crazed with pain and terror, con- 
 sumed with thirst and hunger, sinking 
 with weariness, foaming at the mouth, 
 panting, lowing pitifully, without pause, 
 without rest. ... At last, in a far distant 
 land beyond the sea, the king who loved 
 her appeared, and with a single gesture, 
 barely touching her, calmed her, and 
 restored her to human form, and she gave 
 birth to a black child. And from this 
 black child, after five generations 
 descended the Danaides, the fifty 
 Danaides. . . . 
 
 She leans over toward THE 
 NURSE, whose head has sunk 
 upon her breast in slumber. 
 
 Are you asleep, nurse? 
 
 THE NURSE, shaking herself. 
 No, no. ... I am listening
 
 iSo THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 You are sleepy, poor nurse. At one 
 time it was you, who told me stories to 
 make me sleep. . . . Go, go and rest 
 yourself, nurse. I will call you. I am 
 expecting Alcssandro. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 No, I am not sleepy. . . But your 
 voice is so sweet. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is Alessandro in his room? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 He is. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I heard him close his door. ... I 
 heard the key turn. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 Do vou wish me to call him?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE I l8l 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, no! . . . Perhaps he desires to be 
 alone; he may be working. . . . 
 
 Listening. 
 Some one is coming up the stairs. 
 
 THE NURSE rises a?id goes 
 toward the first door on the right.
 
 182 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 SCENE II 
 
 Enter LEONARDO, hesitating. He appears 
 less oppressed by his trouble. He is dejected 
 but somewhat resigned; he has been weeping. 
 
 LEONARDO, approaching the blind woman 
 
 humbly. 
 
 You are here, Anna. . . . You are 
 alone. . . . 
 
 ANNA, rising and holding out her hands. 
 
 I was waiting for some one to come. 
 Alessandro is still in his room, and Bianca 
 Maria ... I think is resting. . . . She 
 came near fainting down there at the 
 fountain, overcome by the strong frag- 
 rance of the myrtle. . . . 
 
 Turning to THE NURSE. 
 
 Go, nurse. I will call you. 
 
 THE NURSE goes out through 
 the second door to the left.
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 183 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Ah, she nearly fainted. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 A dizziness. . . . She plunged her 
 hands into the water to recover herself. 
 I brought her back. . . . How well I can 
 find my way! I believe I could go down 
 alone and come up alone. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 You could not lose your way. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Not on that path. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Will you be seated, Anna? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, I should like to step out on the 
 loggia. The night must be marvelous. 
 
 LEONARDO guides her up the 
 steps. Both stop behveen the col-
 
 184 THE DKAD CITY 
 
 umns. ANNA leans against a 
 column, her face turned toward 
 the sky. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 It is marvelous; and so clear that one 
 can distinguish all the stones in the walls 
 of the Dead City. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 You call it dead, the city of the golden 
 treasure! It seems to me that for you, it 
 ought to be living with a life incredible. 
 I should think that you would see forever 
 what you alone have seen. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Ah, it is dead, dead indeed. ... It 
 has given me all that it could give. 
 To-day it is no more than a desecrated 
 cemetery. The five sepulchres are 
 nothing but five empty and shapeless 
 mouths.
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 185 
 
 ANNA. 
 They must be hungry again. . . . 
 
 A pause. 
 Are you looking at the stars? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 They never shone more brightly; their 
 scintillation is so rapid and so strong that 
 they seem near to us. The Big Dipper 
 almost frightens me. It flames as if it 
 had entered* the terrestrial atmosphere. 
 The Milky Way seems to wave in the 
 wind like a long veil. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah, at last you recognize the beauty of 
 the sky! Alessandro said that, fascinated 
 by the sepulchres, you had forgotten the 
 beauty of the heavens. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 To look at the stars, the eyes must be 
 pure
 
 l86 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Did not Bianca Maria give you the 
 ointment for your suffering eyes, which 
 she promised you? 
 
 LEONARDO, with a changed voice. 
 Yes, indeed, my eyes are beginning to 
 improve. . . . 
 
 ANNA, sweetly, trying to get nearer to his soul. 
 You have some grudge against your 
 sister, Leonardo. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, trembling. 
 I? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 More than once, Leonardo, more than 
 once I have noticed your excited state 
 when she was present, or when some one 
 spoke of her. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, trembling. 
 You have noticed.
 
 ACT THIRD SCENE II 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Have you no confidence in me? Do 
 you not think that my soul is fitted for 
 the truth? Do you not believe that I am 
 partly of the life beyond? Beyond the 
 beautiful and cruel life which the light of 
 day illuminates? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Of what truth do you speak, Anna? Of 
 what truth? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Of the truth that I know, that no one 
 can hide, that no one can change, that no 
 one can change. 
 
 A pause. LEONARDO, slwcked 
 and perplexed, looks at her fixedly, 
 his back against the other column. 
 
 I see that you are excited, full of anxi- 
 ety and fear. ... I know you are suffer- 
 ing. And you are not suffering alone,
 
 I<38 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Leonardo, we all suffer; and each of us 
 tries to hide it from the others; and each 
 is conscious of committing an offense 
 against the others, and against himself, 
 because he feels that his faith is shaken; 
 and we live without courage, doubting 
 and humiliated, while truth is seated in 
 the midst of us, and looks at us with 
 inflexible eyes. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 I do not understand you. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Oh, do not try to spare me! If you 
 recognize any nobility in my soul, if it 
 seems to you that I have been, so many 
 years, a neither unworthy nor useless com- 
 panion of the man whom you love and 
 admire above all others, if you think that 
 I am not undeserving of the fraternal 
 kindness that you have shown me at all 
 times, Leonardo, do not try to spare me;
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 189 
 
 do not show for me the pity which you 
 would have for a poor and weak creature, 
 afraid of pain! The air of the night 
 alone passes between us. This is the 
 moment for us to speak out all that is 
 most serious and strongest within us. 
 Any delay will be a weakness, a peril 
 perhaps. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, surprised and trembling. 
 I am amazed. . . . Your words were 
 unexpected. .. . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I have felt for a long time that you 
 were suffering; for too long a time have 
 I felt in my darkness. ... I cannot 
 express it, I cannot express it. ... I 
 feel as if a web of secret things were 
 being woven in silence ... an impal- 
 pable web, which, however, at times holds 
 me like a snare. . . . Ah, I cannot live 
 so. I cannot continue to live so; I can
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 live no longer if not in truth, for the 
 light of my eyes has gone out. Well, then, 
 let us tell the truth. I, I alone am the 
 cause of this misery. I no longer belong 
 to this beautiful and cruel world. I am an 
 impediment, an inert obstacle against 
 which so much hope and so much strength 
 hurl themselves and break into fragments. 
 . . . What crime is it then, if that dear 
 creature obeys, trembling and weeping, 
 the fate that ensnares her? Why should 
 you deprive her of your tenderness, when 
 everything that is human in her yields to 
 the greatest of human needs? Something 
 was slumbering in her which now has sud- 
 denly awakened, and she herself is fright- 
 ened by the power of that awakening, she 
 herself trembles at it and weeps. . . . 
 Ah, I know, I know how ardent the desire 
 to live is in her blood! I have held it in 
 my hands, I have felt it beat between my 
 fingers like a wild lark fresh and fragrant
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 191 
 
 with the morning air it drank in. All her 
 face, encircled by her hair, beat like a 
 violent pulse. I had never felt such a 
 strong pulse. The vital power that is in 
 her is incredible. She herself is afraid of 
 it, as of some unknown evil, as of a 
 frenzy going to overwhelm her. At times 
 she believes that she has smothered it 
 under the weight of her anguish, but sud- 
 denly it again overwhelms her, and a new 
 voice comes to her lips and she speaks as 
 if inspired. ... A while ago, before you 
 entered, standing by the ashes and the 
 golden treasure, she told me about a 
 wounded falcon, and the rushing of a 
 thousand wings was in her new voice. 
 
 A pause. LEONARDO listens 
 intently without stirring, as if 
 petrified. 
 
 What is her crime if she loves? Do 
 you not think, Leonardo, do you not think 
 that her youth has already been sacrificed
 
 192 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 at your side too long? Can your brotherly 
 love ask the sacrifice of her entire life? 
 She felt as if she were dying that morn- 
 ing, when she read the lamentation of 
 Antigone. ... It is not possible that all 
 her vitality should be consumed in sacri- 
 fice. She needs pleasure. She was made 
 to give and to receive pleasure. Would 
 you, Leonardo, would you have her 
 renounce her legitimate share of joy? 
 
 A pause. Her courage seems 
 to sink. 
 And he. . . . 
 
 Her voice dies on her lips. 
 LEONARDO shows extreme agony. 
 
 . . . How could he fail to love her? 
 He must indeed recognize in her the 
 living embodiment of his loftiest dream: 
 the goddess of Victory that is to crown 
 his life. What am I to him, but a heavy 
 chain, an unbearable burden? You know
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 193 
 
 what a profound aversion he has to all 
 inert grief, to all useless pain, to any pro- 
 hibition, to any obstacle that may hinder 
 the upward flight of noble forces toward 
 their highest development. You know 
 with what assiduous vigilance he looks 
 about him, and absorbs all that may 
 increase and accelerate the active force 
 of his spirit, to fit him for the works of 
 beauty that he is to accomplish. . . . Ah, 
 what am I, of what value is a poor, half 
 dead husk, as compared with the infinite 
 world of poetry that he carries within 
 him, and which, some day, he will re- 
 veal to humanity? What is my solitary 
 sadness, compared to the infinite grief, 
 which he can alleviate with the revelation 
 of his pure art? I am only half alive. 
 . . . I have already one foot in the 
 shadow. I need to take one step only, 
 one little step to disappear. . . oh, a very 
 little step! I know, I know all that gathers
 
 194 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 and twines around this, my remnant of 
 life, to render it more binding, the legiti- 
 mate tie, custom, prejudice, pity and 
 remorse. . . . I remember a stone column, 
 corroded and broken, on the shore of a 
 former port, filled with sand, where the 
 skeleton of a ship showed above the 
 water; I remember the useless wreck, 
 around which one could still see the 
 knots of the worn out cables, and rem- 
 nants of the old anchors. ... It was the 
 saddest sight to be found; and the open 
 sea, looked upon from that point of view, 
 was a promise unspeakably alluring. 
 
 A pause. She inclines her head 
 upon her breast for a moment, gath- 
 ering strength. Then she shakes 
 herself and holds her hands out to 
 LEONARDO, zvhom excess of emo- 
 tion prevents from speaking. 
 
 I lose what I love and save what I can! 
 Put your hands in mine, Leonardo.
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 195 
 
 LEONARDO moves toward her, 
 s taggering^ and joins hands. She 
 shivers at the contact. 
 
 They are colder than mine; they 
 are icy. 
 
 They descend the steps. 
 
 LEONARDO, in a iveak and broken voice. 
 
 Forgive me, Anna, if I do not know 
 how to answer you. . . . I will speak to 
 you to-morrow. . . . Promise me that 
 you will wait for me, that you will hear 
 me. ... I do not know, I cannot now. 
 . . . You understand me, Anna. . . . 
 Promise me that you will hear me to-mor- 
 row. . . . 
 
 ANNA, with a sigh. 
 
 What could you tell me? Alas, are not 
 my words already too many? Have I not 
 said already what had better remained 
 unsaid? Ah, life eludes us always, and 
 drags us along when we wish to fly from it.
 
 196 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 LEONARDO, with a last outburst of hope. 
 
 Are you certain, are you? Are you cer- 
 tain that he loves her, that she loves him? 
 . . . You are certain, Anna, of their love? 
 . . . You do not deceive yourself, do you? 
 It is not a doubt, a suspicion? . . . You 
 are sure . . . sure . . . 
 
 ANNA, struck by his tone. 
 
 And you? And you? Are you not 
 certain? 
 
 A pause. LEO N A R DO hesitates 
 to reply. 
 
 Why are you silent? Oh, still pity for 
 me? 
 
 LEONARDO, softly, anxiously watching the 
 first door to the lefl, as if afraid of some 
 surprise. 
 
 Alessandro. . . . Alessandro is there. 
 . . . You will see him, . . . Will you tell
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE II 197 
 
 him that you spoke to me . . . that you 
 told me all this? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, no. . . . Forgive me, Leonardo, 
 forgive me! ... To you, too, to you, 
 too, I ought to have been silent. . . . 
 Silence, ah how difficult silence is, even 
 for those who have renounced life. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 I shall see you again, to-morrow, I shall 
 
 speak to you, to-morrow. . . . Promise 
 
 me. ... I shall find you here to-morrow 
 
 at the same hour, shall I? Thanks, Anna. 
 
 He kisses her hands. 
 
 Thanks! Good-bye. 
 
 He turns toivard the second 
 door at the right. About to open 
 it, he stops in the act, shaken by 
 an uncontrollable trembling, he 
 goes to the door by which he 
 entered and disappears down the 
 stairs, as inflight.
 
 198 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, listening, makes a few steps in the 
 direction of the noise of the fleeing feet. 
 
 Leonardo! . . . He is going down the 
 stairs. . . . Leonardo! Leonardo! 
 
 She stops, breathless. 
 
 My God, my God! How he trembled 
 before that doorl
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 199 
 
 SCENE III 
 
 BIANCA MARIA enters through her door, 
 
 frightened. 
 
 Did you call Leonardo? What has hap- 
 pened? Where is Leonardo? Speak, 
 Anna! Where is he? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Do not be afraid. . . . He was here, a 
 little while ago; he was here, talking with 
 me, on the loggia. . . . And he went 
 away, I don't know why. ... I don't 
 know where he went. ... I called to 
 him because all at once I felt the desire 
 to go out with him. . . . The night is so 
 beautiful. But he did not hear me. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I was afraid. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Do not be afraid, Bianca Maria.
 
 200 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA 
 
 I was alone in the room of the treas- 
 ures, placing the jewels around Cassandra, 
 so that when he returned he would find 
 everything done. ... I was not very 
 tranquil, however. I had from time to 
 time a slight shiver. ... If you could 
 have seen, in the night, by the light of 
 the lamp, those golden masks! . . . They 
 took on a strangely life-like aspect. . . . 
 A sudden gust of wind put out the lamp 
 and I found myself in darkness; and at 
 that moment I heard you calling Leo- 
 nardo. ... I was afraid. . . . 
 
 ANNA 
 You child! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, dinging to ANNA -with a sud- 
 den motion. 
 
 There is a fear, a constant terror in my 
 heart, Anna, that I do not understand. 
 . . . I should like to flee; a mad impulse
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 
 
 to flee seizes me, I don't know where, I 
 don't know where. . . . But tell me, you 
 tell me, Anna, what I shall do! Help 
 me, you who are all kindness and all 
 strength, who know how to forgive and 
 how to defend! I plac-e my whole soul in 
 your hands. I place my life in your 
 hands, that are saintly, that are the truth, 
 that have been bathed in my tears. . . . 
 Tell me what I must do! 
 
 ANNA, gently caressing her. 
 Be calm, be calm. . . Do not be 
 afraid! Fear nothing! No one will hurt 
 you, poor soul! I am here, and I will 
 save you. Have faith, have faith! Wait 
 a little longer! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, with growing excitement 
 Anna, Anna, I do not wish to leave you 
 again; I would not like to be away from 
 you any more! I would like to flee with 
 you, go far away with you, and be always
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 at your side, at your feet, your faithful 
 slave, obeying your every wish, watching 
 over you as one guards a holy image, 
 praying for you, dying for you, as your 
 nurse, as your nurse. ... I feel perfect 
 devotion for you in my soul! No pain, 
 no pain would seem too heavy to bear in 
 serving you in your sorrow. If with all 
 my blood I could spare you these days of 
 anguish and of torment; if at the price of 
 a horrible death, I could destroy every 
 trace of these things, Anna, Anna, 
 believe me! I should not hesitate, I 
 should not hesitate. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah, dear one, all your blood and all 
 your tears could not revive a single smile. 
 All the bounty of spring could not make 
 a plant blossom again the root of which 
 is injured. Therefore, do not torment 
 yourself, Bianca Maria, do not complain
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 203 
 
 of things that are already accomplished, 
 that already belong to the past. I have 
 placed my days and my dreams outside 
 my own soul . . . the days that have 
 passed, the dreams that have vanished! 
 I wish no one to feel compassion for 
 me, no one to attempt to console me. 
 I should like to find a peaceful road for 
 my unsteady footsteps, some place where 
 dreams and pain would mingle, where 
 there would be neither noise nor curios- 
 ity, and no one to see or to hear. And I 
 should want never to speak again, 
 because in certain hours of life no one 
 knows which words it is better to say, 
 and which it is better to keep to one's 
 self And, I should like, Bianca Maria, 
 I should like you to have faith in me, as 
 in an older sister, who put herself out of 
 the way quietly, because she understood 
 all, and forgave all ... quietly . . . 
 quietly . . . not far ... not too far.
 
 2O4 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 . . . Come, come! You promised to read 
 to me, a while ago; you remember? 
 Find the book and let me sit down! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA leads her to a chair, kneels 
 before her, and takes her hands. 
 
 Listen, Anna, listen. Nothing is lost, 
 nothing is irreparable. It would be impos- 
 sible to utter more desperate words with 
 a sweeter voice than you have uttered. 
 . . . Ah, do you think I do not under- 
 stand you? Well then, nothing, nothing 
 is- lost; nothing irreparable has happened. 
 ... I do not know what sudden fear 
 drove me into your arms; I cried to you 
 to save me, to defend me . . . but against 
 a peril that I am ignorant of, against some 
 obscure danger hanging over me without 
 my being able to see it, to recognize it. 
 . . . I am weak; childless terrors can still 
 seize upon my mind of a sudden and 
 unsettle it. ... Listen, Anna, this is the
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 205 
 
 truth. Who could lie before your face? 
 . . . When you entered there in the room 
 of the golden treasure, and kissed me on 
 the lips, you felt that my lips were pure. 
 . . . They were pure then, they are pure 
 now. By the memory of my mother, by 
 the head of my brother, I swear to you, 
 Anna, that they will remain pure, thus 
 sealed by your own hands. 
 
 She presses upon her mouth the 
 hands of the blind woman. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Do not swear, do not swear! You 
 are sinning against life; it is as if you 
 were to cut down all the roses of the 
 earth, only to withhold them from 
 those that desire them. What does it 
 avail? What does it avail? Can you per- 
 haps cut down the desire? I felt that 
 your lips were pure, pure as the fire; but 
 a few moments before I had also felt two
 
 206 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 lives reaching out one for the other with 
 all their strength, and looking fixedly 
 across my immutable misery, as through a 
 crystal that was about to break. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 My God, my God! You are closing 
 every door around. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 One remains open! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, with a clear and firm into- 
 nation. 
 
 I will go through that. 
 ANNA. 
 
 It is your door, yours; the door of the 
 future. Have faith! Wait just a little 
 
 longer! 
 
 A pause. BIANCA MARIA bends 
 her head down in gloomy thought. 
 
 Do you smell the fragrance of the 
 myrtle? It is as intoxicating as heated 
 wine: in the freshness of the night wind
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 207 
 
 it preserves all its warmth. Do you smell 
 it? To me, too, it gave a dizzy spell 
 once. ... It was in the time of great 
 joy, so very long ago! We were going to 
 Megara, along the gulf of ALgina. You 
 know that shore? It was then as white 
 as salt, dotted with myrtles and with little 
 storm-twisted pine trees that were mirrored 
 in the calm water. To my ecstatic eyes, 
 the myrtle seemed a fire, burning with a 
 green flame, and the sea was as immacu- 
 late and fresh as the corolla of a flower 
 just, just opening. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, raising her head slowly. 
 
 What a sound your voice has, Anna! 
 It is so soft, it goes to the bottom of my 
 soul, like a melody. When you speak of 
 beautiful things, there seems to rise to 
 your lips the echo of I do not know what 
 song. Speak to me again of beautiful 
 things, Anna!
 
 2O8 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA 
 
 You tell me of your dream, Bianca 
 Maria. For what country would you like 
 to set out? For Syracuse? . . . When we 
 came here, we thought of spending the 
 spring at Zante Alessandro wished to 
 take Leonardo to Zante, for a rest. I do 
 not know the island; but one night, during 
 my first voyage, I saw it from a distance 
 and it seemed to me to be the Island of 
 the Blessed. It was near Myrtia. . . 
 Myrtia, sweet name! It ought to be your 
 name! ... It was the hour of sunset. I 
 remember: all around, all around were 
 grand, holy-looking hills, covered with 
 vineyards, so dense that they vied with 
 the even verdure of a meadow, but with 
 something listless about them, as the heat 
 of the day had wilted the tender shoots; 
 and here and there between the drooping 
 vines a mournful row of black cypress 
 trees. The round moon, thin like one's
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 209 
 
 breath upon a mirror, was gliding over 
 the pallid sky, between the tops of the 
 black cypresses. Through a depression 
 in the ground one saw, far away in the 
 sea, the divine form of Zante chiseled 
 in a mass of sapphire, by the most 
 delicate of sculptors, upon a rosy zone. 
 . . . Thus I see it still! There we ought 
 to have spent the spring. I believe there 
 you would have found your oranges to 
 bite like bread. ... I am thirsty. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 You are thirsty? What do you wish to 
 drink? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 A little water. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, rises, goes to the table^ and 
 pours water into a glass. 
 
 Here is the water
 
 210 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, after drinking. 
 It is almost tepid. ... I have always 
 longingly pictured to myself the delight 
 of drinking at the spring with my mouth 
 in the water, as the animals drink. . . . 
 One day I heard Alessandro drinking that 
 way in long draughts, and I envied him. 
 You must get down upon the ground, 
 mustn't you? And support 'yourself upon 
 your hands . . the whole face immersed 
 up to your forehead. Is that it? I should 
 like to try. . . . Have you ever tried it? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I always drink that way at the fountain. 
 It is most delightful. It feels as if the 
 whole face were drinking. The eyelids 
 flutter over the water like butterflies that 
 are about to drown. I have the courage 
 to keep my eyes open, and while the 
 water enters my throat, I discover at its 
 bottom some hidden marvel. I cannot
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 211 
 
 tell you what strange figures are formed 
 by the disposition of the gravel. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Your voice, now, is as fresh as a spring. 
 I really hear the water run over your 
 body, as over the statue of a fountain. . . . 
 
 A pause- 
 
 Do you not think, Bianca Maria, tha' 
 the statues at the fountains must be 
 happy? Through their immovable and 
 lasting beauty circulates an animated life 
 that continually renews itself. They 
 enjoy at one and the same time inertia 
 and fluidity. In solitary gardens they 
 look sometimes as if they were in exile, 
 but they are not, because their liquid 
 souls never cease to communicate with 
 the distant mountains, whence they came, 
 still asleep and enclosed in blocks of 
 shapeless marble. They listen astounded 
 to the words which arise to their lips out
 
 212 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 of the depths of the earth, but they are 
 not deaf to the conversations of the poets 
 and sages, who like to rest, as in a calm 
 retreat, in the musical shade, where the 
 marble immortalizes classic repose. Do 
 they not seem happy to you? I should 
 like well to be one of them, because I 
 have blindness in common with them. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Oh, Anna, you also possess in common 
 with them the virtue of calming anguish 
 and infusing forgetfulness! When you 
 speak of beautiful things, he who listens 
 to you forgets his trouble, and believes 
 that he can still live, and that life can 
 still be sweet. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Life can still be sweet. Fear nothing! 
 Everything passes away, all is naught. 
 . . . How does, how does Cassandra 
 speak of the things human? "No matter
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE HI 213 
 
 how adverse they are, a sponge soaked in 
 water wipes out every trace." Why do 
 you not read a little? You promised 
 me. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 What do you wish me to read? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 That dialogue between Cassandra and 
 the chorus of the elders. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA looks on the 
 table for the book of Aeschylus as 
 if under compulsion, almost with 
 reluctance. 
 
 Have you found the book? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, opening the book and turning 
 the leaves. 
 
 Yes, here it is. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Read a little.
 
 214 TI1E DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, reading* 
 
 ' ' Chorus. 
 
 " Thy fame oracular hath reach' d our ear: 
 " But certes we require no prophet here. 
 
 1 ' Cassandra. 
 
 "Ye gods! What crime is hatching? 
 
 [What fell blow, 
 
 " Mighty and strange? Mischief beneath 
 
 [this roof 
 
 " Is plotted; all incurable the woe, 
 "To friends unbearable! Help stands 
 
 [aloof. 
 
 ' ' Chorus. 
 " Dark are these oracles. . . . 
 
 ANNA, interrupting. 
 
 No, it is enough. Read no further! It 
 is too funereal. Let us take Antigone 
 again, at the place where you ceased 
 reading the other morning. Do you 
 remember? It was the passage where 
 Antigone was bending under her grief for 
 the first time. It seemed that her voice
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 215 
 
 was gilded like the top of a cypress at 
 sunset. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, looking for the book of 
 Soplwcles. 
 
 I cannot find it. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 You have, not seen it since then? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Ah, here it is. 
 
 She opens the book, looks for the 
 page and reads. 
 
 ' ' Chorus. 
 
 " So then, illustrious and lauded, 
 "Thou wanderest toward the hidden 
 [dwellings of the dead; 
 " Not consumed by devouring diseases, 
 " Nor as the allotted spoil of war. 
 " But free, but living, alone, 
 "Of all the mortals, thou descendest to 
 
 [Hades.
 
 2l6 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 "Antigone. 
 
 "I heard how of old most miserably 
 
 [perished 
 
 "The Phrygian stranger, 
 "The daughter of Tantalus, on the sum- 
 
 [mit of Sipilos; 
 "Whom like tenacious ivy 
 "The stony growth enveloped; neither 
 [the tears she sheds, 
 " So goes the story among men 
 " Nor the snows do ever cease; 
 " But forever do her weeping eyes bathe 
 
 [those crags. 
 
 " I am much like her, for a god brings to 
 
 [me sleep. . . . 
 
 ANNA, interrupting, 
 
 Ah, the statue of Niobe! Before dying, 
 Antigone sees a stone statue from which 
 pours a fountain of everlasting tears. . . . 
 Enough, Bianca Maria. Read no further. 
 It seems as if death were everywhere. 
 Close the book! Go out upon the loggia 
 and look at the stars. I am tired, very
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 217 
 
 tired; I wish that some god would bring 
 me sleep also. . . . 
 
 She rises and calls. 
 Nurse! Nurse! 
 
 A pause. No one answers. 
 Nurse! She does not hear me! Per- 
 haps she is asleep. She too is so tired, 
 poor old woman! I do not like to awaken 
 her. What is sweeter than profound 
 
 sleep! 
 
 A pause. 
 
 The stillness of this night is incredible. 
 The wind has fallen, there is not a 
 breath of air stirring. 
 
 She raises her hands up in the 
 air. 
 
 Perhaps Alessandro is also asleep. Do 
 you think so? He has not left his room 
 again. No more noise has come from his 
 room. He has closed the door. 
 
 A pause. 
 What arc you going to do nov;?
 
 2l8 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, vaguely, frightened. 
 I will wait for my brother. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Alone, here? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Alone, here. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Where can Leonardo be? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, trembling. 
 Where can he be? Why has he not 
 returned? 
 
 A pause. 
 I am afraid 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Do not be afraid. The night is sweet. 
 He will return soon. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I will wait for him. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Do you wish me to remain with you?
 
 ACT THIRD, SCENE III 219 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 No, no. . . . You are tired. One can 
 see by your face that you are too weary. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Will you lead me to the threshold, 
 only as far as the threshold? I do not 
 wish to awaken my nurse. I can easily 
 find my room by myself. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA takes her hand and leads her 
 
 to the threshold. 
 But everything is dark. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 For me, there is no change. 
 
 She leans forward into the dark 
 shadow, in the open door. 
 Do you hear the breathing ot my 
 nurse? It is not tranquil. It is a little 
 uneasy. May be she fell asleep in an 
 uncomfortable position. . . Poor nurse! 
 Dear, dear old soul!
 
 20 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 She listens again, then embraces 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Thanks. Good-night. Let me kiss your 
 two eyes. Good-night! Go and peace be 
 with you. Go out upon the loggia and 
 look at the stars. 
 
 She disappears in the darkness. 
 BIANCA MARIA folloivs her with 
 her gaze for some time ; then, 
 frightened, glances around as if 
 seized by intolerable anguish. 
 She takes a few steps toward the 
 loggia. At the foot of the steps 
 she again looks around with 
 frightened eyes, watching the 
 doors. Theft she asce?ids slowly. 
 When she has arrived at the last 
 step, she staggers, and leans 
 against a column; she remains 
 thus for some time looking out into 
 the night. Suddenly she slips 
 down at the foot of the column 
 with the noiseless lightness of a 
 falling veil, and thus sunk into 
 herself she bursts into tears.
 
 ACT FOURTH
 
 ACT FOURTH 
 
 The same room as in the first act. The 
 large loggia is open in the twilight. 
 
 933
 
 SCENE I 
 
 LEONARDO appears on the loggia^ looking 
 at the Dead City, over which falls the shadow 
 of evening. His manner is that of a man 
 who marshals all his forces in an extreme 
 resolution. His eyes burn in the earthy pal- 
 lor of his face as if inflarnmed by fever. He 
 speaks and moves conviilsively, as if in a sort 
 of lucid delirium. 
 
 124
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE I 225 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 The sepulchres. . . . She might fall 
 into one of them, the deepest one. . . . 
 No, no. . . . Even if she should remain 
 alive, she might suffer. . . . Ah horrible, 
 horrible! 
 
 He presses his temples with his 
 hands, with a gesture of horror 
 and madness. He descends the 
 steps, into the room, moves about 
 uncertain, vacillating, obeying the 
 fluctuations of his morbid fancy. 
 
 It is necessary then;, it is necessary. 
 ... It is necessary that she be no more, 
 that she be no more! . . . Ah, if she 
 could only flee, if she could only disap- 
 pear, if she were only far away, if her 
 room were empty. . . . Empty! It will
 
 226 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 be empty, it shall be empty to-night. 
 . . . Her breath, her breath. . . . 
 
 He drops upon a chair, passes 
 his hands over his face as if to 
 dispel a cloudy as if to see more 
 clearly. 
 
 There is no escape; there is no other 
 way out. I have thought of everything 
 have I? Everything has been well con- 
 sidered. He loves her. . . . And she 
 thinks of dying. ... It is the indelible 
 stain upon my soul. . . . An abyss has 
 suddenly opened. Everything has been 
 broken, everything has been rent asunder 
 at one blow, through her, through her! 
 She is there, so sweet, so sweet; and 
 through her all this evil. . . . None of 
 us can live any longer. We have ceased 
 to understand each other. The abyss 
 yawns between us, who were, before, one
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE I 227 
 
 single life, one single soul! . . . There is 
 no escape; there is no other way. 
 
 A pause. He rises, spurred by 
 his tormenting thoughts. 
 
 How accomplish it? How accomplish 
 it? She will be here in a little while. 
 . . . Ah, I shall see her, I shall speak to 
 her, I shall hear her voice. ... If at 
 least I could see in her the saintly sister 
 once more in the last moment! If, look- 
 ing at her for the last time, my eyes could 
 become pure once more! If I could clasp 
 her in my arms once more without this 
 trembling . . . this horrible trembling! 
 . . . He loves her, he loves her! Since 
 when? How? What has happened between 
 them? . . . Ah, my God, my God, every- 
 thing in me is infected, everything is
 
 228 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 contaminated . . . and this thirst which 
 destroys me! 
 
 He feels of his burning throat. 
 He looks for water, approaches the 
 table, fills a glass and drinks 
 with avidity. He trembles, as if 
 struck by a sudden thought. 
 
 Ah, the fountain! 
 
 A pause. He trembles, leaning 
 upon the table iinder the oppression 
 of the iwv thought, with his eyes 
 wide open and staring.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 22Q 
 
 SCENE II 
 
 BIANCA MARIA enters from the second 
 right hand door. Her manner reveals dis- 
 couragement and gloomy weariness. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 You here, Leonardo? I did not know 
 that you had returned. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, controlling his excitement. 
 Yes, I returned a short time ago. . . . 
 I was thinking of going to see you, but I 
 thought . . . you were asleep. . . . Were 
 you? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 No, I have not been able to sleep. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 How tired you must be! 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 And you?
 
 230 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Oh, I am accustomed to be awake. But 
 you! To wait for me until dawn, there, 
 seated upon a step! Why did you do 
 that? When I returned, when I saw you, 
 your face looked so wan, so ashy. . . . 
 
 In his voice thrills an unex- 
 pected tenderness. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 You have been weeping! 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 I did not suspect that you were here, 
 and you suddenly rose like a phan- 
 tom. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I am always like a phantom to you. I 
 frighten you. 
 
 LEONARDO, bewildered. 
 No, no. . . .
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 231 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, taking his hand. 
 Why did you run away last night? I 
 know that you ran away. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 I, run away? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Anna called after you, and in a 
 strangely altered voice. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 She called me? I did not hear. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 And you staid out all night, until dawn! 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 The night was so beautiful; and on 
 my way, the hours passed so rapidly. 
 The night of the solstice is short. I 
 wished to hear the song of the larks at 
 dawn. . . . Still, could I have known you 
 were waiting for me. . . .
 
 232 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I was waiting for you, weeping. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Weeping? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, unable to contain herself. 
 
 Yes, yes, pouring out all my tears for 
 you, for you. . . . Do you think that I 
 can live another day like this? Do you 
 think it possible for me to stand this tor- 
 ture any longer? Tell me at least what I 
 shall do. Take me away, take me away; 
 or arrange for us to be here alone. . 
 I am ready to obey you in everything. . . . 
 I wish to be alone with you, as before, 
 here or anywhere. Anywhere I will follow 
 you without a murmur. But quick! But 
 quick! To-morrow! If you are not will- 
 ing, if you delay, you will be responsible 
 for all that may happen. . . . Yours will 
 be the fault, Leonardo. Think of it well!
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 233 
 
 LEONARDO, deadly pale, looking into her 
 
 face, in a choking voice. 
 Then you love him? Tell me, tell me 
 how much do you love him? Desperately? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, covering her face. 
 Oh! Oh! 
 
 LEONARDO, almost beside himself. 
 And he. . . . Has he told you that he 
 loves you? When? When did he tell 
 you? Answer! Do you believe that he 
 cannot be cured of his love for you? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, still covering her face with 
 
 her hands. 
 
 Oh! Oh! What a question to ask of 
 me! 
 
 LEONARDO is about to speak again, but re* 
 strains himself. He moves away with 
 irresolute steps, looks at the doors, looks at 
 the loggia, then turns to his sister. 
 Forgive me! I am not angry with you. 
 
 You are blameless. ... A cruel destiny
 
 234 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 hangs over us; and we must submit to its 
 iron law. You are without fault. You 
 are pure; are you not, sister? And you 
 will remain pure; you will know no 
 shame. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, taking courage and throwing 
 
 her arms around his neck. 
 Yes, yes, brother. Tell me what we 
 shall do. I devoted my life to you when 
 we were left alone in the world; I ought 
 to live for you alone, in the future. Tell 
 me what we shall do! I am ready. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 I shall tell you. . . . But not here. . . . 
 Shall we go out? Shall we go and sit 
 down there ... by the fountain of 
 Perseus? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Let us go out. . . . But down there the 
 fragrance of the myrtle is so strong that 
 it made me ill last night.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 235 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 To-night it will not be too powerful, for 
 there is a wind blowing that will dis- 
 perse it. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Let us go. 
 
 LEONARDO seems unable to move, overcome 
 by excessive anguish. He glances around 
 despairingly, gazing at every object as if 
 he, too, were looking at it for the last time. 
 
 Do you not need ... to take some- 
 thing . . . from your room? . . . Do you 
 not wish to cover your head? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 No, the evening is warm. It is lighten- 
 ing over toward the bay. 
 
 LEONARDO, irresolute. 
 Perhaps ... it may rain. . . .
 
 236 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 May God grant it! But there was not 
 a cloud in the sky a moment ago. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 And to-day, do you know? a procession 
 started from Fichtia for the chapel of the 
 prophet Elijah. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I heard the chanting in the distance. 
 . . . Why do you look at me so? 
 
 LEONARDO, trembling. 
 I am looking at your weary eyes. . . , 
 They worry me. . . . Are you sleepy? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 No, I am not sleepy any longer. . . . 
 I will sleep later when everything is 
 settled. . . Let us go. You must tell 
 me. . . . But what are you thinking of ?
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 237 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Of what am I thinking? Oh, a strange 
 reminiscence. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA 
 What reminiscence? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Oh, nothing . . . something childish. 
 ... I was thinking of that snake-skin we 
 found on the road, ascending to Mycenaa 
 the first time ... a childish idea. ... I 
 do not know why it came back to my 
 mind. . . . 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 I kept it, you know! I put it between 
 the pages of a book, like a bookmark. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Ah, you preserved it. ... 
 
 He draws still nearer to his 
 sister, lowering his voice. 
 Tell me, tell me, how long since you 
 saw Anna?
 
 238 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 Several hours. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Is she there, in her rooms? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 I believe she is there. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Has she never spoken to you . . . has 
 she never spoken to you about these 
 things? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA, bowing her head in pain. 
 Yes, yes. . . . She knows; she suf- 
 fers. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 How so? How did she speak to you? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Like a sister, with the kindness of a 
 sister.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE II 239 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Did she forgive you? Did she kiss you? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 
 Yes. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, trembling, hesitating. 
 And he ... have you seen him . . . 
 since last night? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 No. . . . He is not here. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Did Anna tell you . . . where he went? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 To Nauplia. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 When will he return? 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 To-night, perhaps presently. . . . 
 
 A pausi.
 
 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 What are you looking at behind me? 
 
 She looks around, frightened, 
 as if to see if there is someone 
 behind her. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 Nothing, nothing. ... It seemed to 
 me that someone was about to enter 
 through that door. 
 
 He points to the door leading to 
 ANNA'S rooms. BIANCA MARIA 
 listens. 
 
 BIANCA MARIA. 
 May be Anna is coming now. . . . Let 
 
 us go. 
 
 She takes her brother' s hand 
 and begins to pull him toward the 
 door leading to the stairs. 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 Is Anna coming? 
 
 He follows his sister, turning 
 his head around and looking at 
 the second door to the left, which 
 opens.
 
 ACT FOURTH. SCENE HI 241 
 
 SCENE III 
 
 ANNA appears on the threshold, followed 
 by THE NURSE. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Who is going out through the staircase 
 door? 
 
 LEONARDO and BIANCA MARIA 
 disappear without answering. 
 
 Who is it, nurse? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 The brother and sister. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah, they are going down the stairs. 
 . . . Where are they going? 
 
 She advances toward the door, 
 THE NURSE accompanying her. 
 When she arrives at the threslwld, 
 she bends forward and calls to 
 them.
 
 242 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Bianca Maria! Leonardo! Where are 
 you going? 
 
 No one answers. 
 
 Bianca Maria! Where are you going? 
 Where are you going? 
 
 No one answers. 
 Go, nurse, run, overtake them. ... 
 
 THE NURSE goes out. The 
 blind woman, seized by a vague 
 anxiety, remains, listening, near 
 the door. 
 
 Where are they going? They did not 
 answer. . . . Yet they must have heard 
 my voice; they had but just descended. 
 ... It looks as if they were fleeing. . . . 
 Where to? ... How my heart beats! 
 
 She places her hand over her 
 heart and listens for THE NURSE' s 
 return.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE III 243 
 
 He is to speak to me, to-night . .. . at 
 this very hour. . . . What will he say to 
 me? It seems something important nas 
 been resolved upon. . . 
 
 She hears the step of THE 
 NURSE upon the stairs. 
 
 Nurse! You return alone? 
 
 THE NURSE re-enters, breathless. 
 
 I overtook them. . . . They told me 
 they were going to the fountain . . . 
 they would return in a little while. . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 Did they not hear me call them? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 They walked rapidly, as if in haste. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is it late? Is it night yet?
 
 244 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 One can hardly see. There is a warm 
 wind blowing, which raises the dust. It 
 is lightening toward the sea. 
 
 * 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is it going to storm? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 It is a mackerel-sky. ... It is lighten- 
 ing from a serene sky. 
 
 ANNA. 
 When will Alessandro return? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 This is the hour. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Let us wait.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE III 245 
 
 THE NURSE takes her to a seat 
 and sits near her upon a low stool. 
 They both remain silent for a long 
 time. ANNA is very alert and 
 stirs at every little noise. 
 
 Do you hear? Do you hear that noise? 
 Who is playing? It sounds like a flute. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 'Tis a shepherd passing by. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 How sweet it sounds. It sounds like 
 a flute. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 It is a flute made of a reed. 
 
 The blind woman listens for 
 some time. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 It is an old melody which it seems I 
 have heard, but I know not when.
 
 246 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 He has passed by here at other times, 
 this shepherd. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, it seems to me I heard it at a 
 time of which I have no memory. . . . 
 It is as if you were telling me now one of 
 those old fables of yours, nurse. How 
 many things, how many things there are 
 in the sound of a little reed! My heart 
 is full to bursting, nurse, as heavy as a 
 stone. . . . Do you think that they met 
 the shepherd? I mean Bianca Maria and 
 her brother. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 May be they did. 
 
 ANNA, anxiously. 
 
 How did they look? Did you look at 
 them closely? Did you look into their 
 faces? How did they look?
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE III 247 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 I hardly know. . . . How should they 
 have looked? 
 
 ANNA. 
 Were they excited? Were they sad? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 They looked as if they were in haste. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 But he, her brother. . . . Did you not 
 look him in the face? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 I did not get near to them. They kept 
 on walking. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Which one of the two was walking 
 ahead?
 
 248 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 They were holding each other's hands, 
 I believe. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Ah, they held each other's hands. . . . 
 And their steps were firm? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 They walked rapidly. 
 
 A pause. ANNA is thoughtful 
 and vigilant. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 And Alessandro does not return! 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 This is the hour. He must be nearly 
 here.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE HI 249 
 
 ANNA, rising impatiently. 
 Go out upon the loggia, nurse, and look. 
 THE NURSE obeys. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 What a hot wind! It is as if it came 
 from a furnace. ... I think I see a man 
 on horseback on the road. . . . 
 
 ANNA, with a start. 
 Is it Alessandro? 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 Yes, yes, it is the master. Here he 
 comes. 
 
 She descends the steps. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Go, nurse. Make sure that everything 
 is ready in his room. Do not come until 
 I call you. Is there still a little light 
 here?
 
 250 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 One can scarcely see any longer. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Bring a lamp. 
 
 THE NURSE goes out at the 
 left. ANNA listens anxiously for 
 the sound of ALESSANDRO'S steps 
 on the stairs.
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 251 
 
 SCENE IV 
 
 ALESSANDRO enters. He is so absorbed in 
 his painful thoughts that he does not notice 
 ANNA' s presence. He goes toward his rooms 
 without speaking. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Alessandro! 
 
 ALESSANDRO, startled, stops. 
 You here, Anna? I did not see you. It 
 is almost dark. 
 
 ANNA. 
 I was waiting for you. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 I tarried a little. Upon the road the 
 wind raised such a thick dust that it was 
 difficult to advance. It is the hot breath 
 of the desert. Night seems to descend
 
 252 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 like a fiery cinder. . . . Where is Leo- 
 nardo? 
 
 ANNA. 
 He went out a while ago with his sister. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, in an unsteady voice. 
 Do you not know where he went? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 He descended to the fountain of 
 Perseus. 
 
 THE NURSE enters, carrying a 
 lighted lamp, but token she is 
 about to place it on the table, a 
 gust of wind blows it out. The 
 door behind her closes violently. 
 
 THE NURSE. 
 
 Ah, it went out! I must close the stair- 
 way door. The wind is rising. 
 
 She goes to close the door, tJicn 
 returns to the table to light tJie 
 lamp again. ANNA'S
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 253 
 
 expresses an wide fined terror. She 
 listens in the direction of the open 
 loggia as if to discover distant 
 cries. THE NURSE goes out on 
 the leff, closing the door behind 
 her. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Alessandro! Come nearer, listen. . . . 
 ALESSANDRO approaches her, 
 uneasy. 
 
 Do you hear nothing? Do you not seem 
 to hear . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What? 
 
 ANNA does not answer. 
 It is the wind whistling through the 
 openings in the walls and beneath the 
 Gate of Lions. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Is a storm brewing?
 
 254 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO, ascending rapidly to the loggia. 
 No. The sky is entirely clear. The 
 stars are beginning to appear. The sickle 
 of the moon rests on the crest of the 
 Acropolis. The wind roars strangely in 
 the Dead City, engulfing itself, maybe, in 
 the cavities of the tombs. It sounds like 
 the roll of drums. Do you not hear it? 
 
 He desce?ids the steps. ANNA 
 grasps his arm, the piry of an 
 unconquerable terror. 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What is the matter, Anna? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 I am restless. ... I cannot overcome 
 the anxiety that chokes my throat. . . . 
 I think of those two down there. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, in extreme excitement, misun- 
 derstanding her. 
 
 What? You know. . . . You know 
 about it? ... About that terrible thing?
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 255 
 
 . . . Who, who could have told you. . . . 
 Leonardo, perhaps? Has Leonardo 
 spoken to you? How could he ... to 
 you. . . . 
 
 ANNA, bewildered. 
 
 Why, what do you mean? What are 
 you thinking of ? . . . No, no; he has not 
 spoken to me; he has told me nothing. 
 . . . I . . . I spoke to him last night, 
 here. ... I who knew, I who knew 
 already . . . oh, but without complaint, 
 without rancor, Alessandro. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 You spoke to him, of that horrible 
 thing! You had the courage to speak to 
 him about it, Anna! But how? How did 
 you know, tell me, how did you know? 
 How have you been able to penetrate his 
 secret, while even I, up to last night, 
 entertained not a shadow of suspicion! 
 Tell me, how did you know?
 
 256 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ANNA, more and more confused. 
 His secret! What do you mean? What 
 secret? Of what horrible thing are you 
 speaking, Alessandro? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, realizing his mistake, con- 
 founded. 
 I meant . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Is there something else? Is there some- 
 thing else? 
 
 ALESSANDRO, grasping her hands and con- 
 quering with an effort the emotion that suf- 
 focates him. 
 
 Listen to me, Anna, you who know 
 how to bear any burden of grief, you who 
 never have been afraid of suffering, and 
 who know all the bitterness of life. We 
 have reached a grave moment, very 
 grave. A tearing whirlwind is carrying 
 us to I do not know what destination. 
 We are the prey of mysterious and invin-
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 257 
 
 cible powers. You feel it, Anna, you feel 
 that a horrible knot has been tied about us, 
 and that we must cut it. We have avoided 
 speaking of it, up to this moment, 
 because to me, as well as to you, the 
 only way, worthy of us and of what 
 we have been, was to accept the in- 
 evitable in silence. But now the catas- 
 trophe has come. For each one of us the 
 moment has come to look Destiny in the 
 face. . . . Closing the eyes avails 
 nothing. Everything that is, is neces- 
 sary. I demand, therefore, of you, Anna, 
 the truth. What happened last night? I 
 demand the truth. 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 The truth. . . . Ah, it will not profit, 
 it will not profit! There are moments in 
 life when no one knows which words it is 
 better to utter, and which it is better to 
 bury. . . . Yesterday I asked Leonardo's
 
 258 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 forgiveness for having spoken, now I ask 
 your forgiveness, Alessandro. You said 
 well, you said well, silence alone is 
 worthy. To harm no one, silence should 
 not have been broken. But he was 
 there. ... So many times, so many 
 times I have felt that he was suffering, 
 suffering cruelly. ... I alone seemed to 
 be the cause of such great agony, I 
 alone the encumbrance! And I felt a 
 sisterly desire to comfort him, to do him 
 some good, to show him that everything 
 was understood and settled. . . . And 
 last night, 1 do not know what despera- 
 tion there was in him when he came near 
 me: I do not know what need of confi- 
 dence. ... It seemed that he had been 
 weeping, that something in his heart had 
 melted away. . . . The stars seemed 
 beautiful to him once more. . . . Then I 
 felt the need of doing him some good; 
 and I spoke to him. ... I spoke to him
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 259 
 
 of that poor creature and of you. ... I 
 wished to drive out of his soul all bitter- 
 ness, and all the unjust rancor against 
 that dear girl, who possesses no other 
 fault save that of loving and being loved. 
 . . . And I spoke to him of her, and I 
 spoke to him of you, without complain- 
 ing, without humiliating myself, but 
 giving him some hope. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO, entirely disconcerted. 
 Some hope! And he ... do you 
 believe that he already knew? Did it 
 seem to you, Anna, that he already knew? 
 ... It is impossible! Impossible! Only 
 a little while before, he had spoken to 
 me. . . . 
 
 ANNA, bewildered. 
 
 He did not know? . . . He did not 
 know? . . . 
 
 Thinking over his conversation 
 she seems to discover some clues
 
 260 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 she had not noticed before \ and to 
 grasp the truth all of a sudden. 
 Her exclamation is like a pent up 
 cry. 
 
 Ah, possibly! . . . He spoke of not 
 understanding. . . . Yes, yes. . . . He 
 said, "Are you sure? Are you sure?" 
 And then. . . . Ah, but now? There is 
 something else then, there is something 
 else? 
 
 ALESSANDRO moves about the 
 room uncertain, as one who seeks 
 a loophole, but does not find it. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, in a low voice, speaking to 
 
 himself. 
 After what he had revealed to me! . . . 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 Tell me the truth now, Alessandro! I 
 demand the truth of you. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, re-approaching her. 
 And what did he do? What did he do 
 then? Where did he go?
 
 ACT FOURTH. SCENE IV 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 He ran out, he fled. ... I know from 
 his sister that he came back this morning 
 at dawn. . . . She had waited for him 
 until then. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Flight, flight. ... It seems there is no 
 other way but flight. . . . 
 
 He moves about uncertain, not 
 knowing what decision to make. 
 
 Ah, when will we look into each other's 
 eyes again. . . . 
 
 ANNA, pressing. 
 But tell me the truth now! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 And they have gone out together. . . . 
 They went down to the fountain. . . 
 How long ago? 
 
 ANNA. 
 A few moments before you came back.
 
 262 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 
 Together . . . together . . . down 
 yonder. . . . 
 
 His excitement increases from 
 moment to moment. 
 
 And they were here with you before 
 going? . . . What did they say? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 No, I entered as they were descending 
 the stairs. ... I called after them, they 
 did not answer. ... I sent nurse to over- 
 take them. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 And then? 
 
 ANNA. 
 
 They told her they were going down 
 to the fountain for a while, to return pres- 
 ently. . . . But tell me, tell me! . . . 
 
 She grasps ALESSANDRO by the 
 arm as he is about to ascend to the 
 loggia. They ascend thus to- 
 gether and separate in the shade,
 
 ACT FOURTH, SCENE IV 263 
 
 toward the balustrade. After a 
 few moments ALESSANDRO comes 
 back alone. Obeying an instinc- 
 tive impulse, he runs to the door, 
 opens it and descends the stairs 
 precipitately. The blind woman 
 appears between the columns, 
 seized with terror when she starts 
 to follow her husband. 
 Alessandro! Alessandro! 
 
 No one answers. She gropes 
 about in the air and encounters one 
 of the columns ; supporting herself 
 by that, she descends the first step, 
 then the others. 
 Alessandro! . . . He is no longer here. 
 
 . . . I am alone. . . . Ah, Lord! Give 
 
 me light! 
 
 Following the hot current of the 
 wind, which enters through the 
 the wide-open door, she reaches 
 the threshold; holding to one of 
 the door jambs she makes one step 
 toward the stairway, and disap- 
 pears in the dark.
 
 ACT FIFTH
 
 ACT FIFTH 
 
 A wild and lonely spot in a hollow which 
 forms between the minor horn of the mountain 
 of Eubosa and the inaccessible side of the cita- 
 del. Myrtles grow luxuriantly between the 
 rough rocks and cyclopic ruins. The water 
 of the fountain of Perseus, gushing forth from 
 between the rocks, gatJurs in a shell-like cav- 
 ity, out of which it runs, to lose itself through 
 the stony ground. In the ancient solitude, 
 already wrapped in the mystery of night, is 
 heard the ceaseless gurgling of the springs. 
 
 267
 
 ONLY SCENE 
 
 Near the edge of the fountain, at the foot of 
 a bush of myrtle, lies the corpse of BIANCA 
 MARIA, supine, rigid, chaste. Her wet gar- 
 ments cling to the body ; her hair, soaked with 
 ^vater, covers her face in broad bands ; her 
 arms are stretched by her sides ; her feet 'are 
 joined together like the feet of the statues upon 
 ancient tombs. ALESSANDRO, seated upon a 
 rock, with his elbows on his knees and his 
 temples pressed between his hands, looks fix- 
 edly at the dead girl, silent in frightful im- 
 mobility. Upon the opposite side LEONARDO 
 stands, leaning against a great rock, which 
 he clutches from time to time with his fingers, 
 convulsively and in despair, as the fingers of 
 a shipwrecked sailor clutch the rock emerging 
 out of the abyss. In the deathlike silence is 
 heard the gurgling of the water and the inter- 
 mittent soughing of the wind in the bending 
 myrtles. Suddenly LEONARDO moves a^vay 
 from the rock, and kneels by the side of the 
 corpse of his sister, bending over as if to touch 
 her. 
 
 268
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 269 
 
 ALESSANDRO, stopping him with a quick 
 gesture and an imperious cry, 
 
 Do not touch her! Do not touch her! 
 
 LEONARDO, drawing back, without rising. 
 No, no, I will not touch her. . . . She is 
 yours, she is yours. . . . 
 
 A pause. He looks at the 
 corpse with superhuman intensity 
 of grief and love. A delirium 
 seems to assail him. His voice is 
 by turns hoarse and piercing, 
 almost unrecognizable. 
 
 Do you believe, do you believe. ... I 
 should profane her if I touched her? . . . 
 No, no. . . . Now I am pure: I am wholly 
 pure. ... If she should rise, she could 
 walk upon my soul as upon the immacu- 
 late snow. ... If she could revive, all 
 my thoughts of her would be like the 
 lilies, like the lilies. . . . Ah, who will
 
 270 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 be able to tell upon this earth of loving a 
 human creature as I love her? Not even 
 you, not even you love her as I do! . . . 
 No love equals mine, upon this earth. 
 . . . All my soul is a heaven for her de- 
 parted spirit. . . . 
 
 His voice, impetuous and 
 ardent, rises like a delirium that 
 increases, and falls with a thrill of 
 supreme tender?iess. 
 
 Who, who would have done for her 
 what I did? Would you have had the 
 courage to accomplish this atrocity, to 
 save her soul from the horror which was 
 about to overwhelm it? Ah, you loved 
 her, you loved her with all the strength of 
 your life, because she had fo be loved in 
 that way, but you do not know, you do 
 not know what a soul she possessed. . . . 
 All the gifts of the earth and all its beau- 
 ties beauties of which you have never 
 even dreamed! were in her soul.
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 
 
 It seemed that every morning when she 
 awoke, all the breezes of spring passed 
 over her soul, and_softened it and made it 
 bloom. ... It seemed every night as if 
 the sweetest things of the day remained 
 in her soul, and she mixed and prepared 
 them for me, offering them to me as one 
 offers a loaf of bread. . . . Ah, thus, 
 thus, for a long time she has nourished 
 me; with this bread she nourished me at 
 the close of my every day. . . . She 
 knew how to change the slightest smile 
 into great felicity. . . . The smallest of 
 my joys expanded infinitely in her soul, 
 infinitely, like a circle in calm water, 
 until it gave me the illusion of a great 
 happiness. . . . Ah, you do not know, 
 you do not know what a soul she pos- 
 sessed. . . . No other creature could be 
 her equal, on this earth. . . . There was 
 not a single bitter drop in all her blood. 
 ... A while ago. . . .
 
 272 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 He interrupts himself, starting 
 like a sick man, whose muscles 
 twisted by intolerable spasms. 
 
 .... A while ago ... all her tender 
 life was trembling in her hair under my 
 hand. . . . 
 
 He trembles so violently, lying 
 on the ground, that ALESSANDRO 
 rises and attempts to go to him, 
 but he seems iinable to move, and 
 falls back upon his stone. 
 
 Ah, when she bent over the water to 
 drink ... I heard the first draught flow 
 down her throat. ... It seemed to me 
 that she drank out of my heart, that in 
 that draught passed away all the pain 
 suffered, the whole shameful condition, 
 all knowledge, all memory, my entire 
 being. . . . Empty, empty I was, and 
 blind when I threw myself upon her. 
 . . . Death was riding my shoulders and 
 pressing me with his knees of iron.
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 273 
 
 . . . The world was destroyed. . . . 
 A thousand centuries ... a second. 
 . . . And I was there upon the stones 
 . . , And in the water, still agitated 
 from the plunge, her hair . . . the 
 hair around her head, half immersed. 
 . . . Ah, who, who would have done for 
 her what I did? ... I raised her, I saw 
 her face again. . . . "All her face en- 
 circled by her hair, beat like a violent 
 pulse" thus, thus, Anna spoke last 
 night: she who had held it in her hands, 
 who had felt it throb between her fingers; 
 and I saw her face again, which no longer 
 pulsated, her cold face dripping with 
 water. ... I lowered her eyelids over 
 her eyes. . . . Ah, sweeter than a flower 
 upon a flower. . . . And every stain 
 has disappeared from my soul, I have 
 become pure, all pure. All the holiness 
 of my first love has returned to my soul 
 like a torrent of light. . . . Another gift
 
 274 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 from her, another gift from her, through 
 death. ... To be able to love her again 
 thus, I killed her. In order that you 
 might love her thus under my eyes, you, 
 no longer separated from me, you, with- 
 out further cruelty and without further 
 remorse for this, for this I killed her. 
 . . . O my brother, O my brother in life 
 and in death, reunited to me, forever 
 reunited to me by this sacrifice that I 
 made for you. . . . -Look at her! Look 
 at her! She is perfect; now she is per- 
 fect. Now she may be adored as a being 
 divine. ... In the deepest of my sepul- 
 chres I will place her and around her I 
 will put all my treasures. . . . For you, 
 for you, all that which is resplendent, for- 
 ever for you all that which is pure. . . . 
 Beloved! Beloved! If we could but 
 relight, for one instant, with all our 
 blood, your pallid face, that you might 
 open, for one instant, your eyes, that you
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 275 
 
 might see us, that you might hear our cry 
 of love and grief . . . Sister! Sister! 
 
 He bends over the dead body, 
 calling her with a repeated heart- 
 rending cry, stretching his trem- 
 bling hands out toward the pallid 
 face, which rests, motionless, under 
 the wet strands of hair. Unable 
 to resist that cry t ALESSANDRO 
 rises, passes before the feet of the 
 corpse, goes near his friend, stoops 
 and places a hand upon his fore- 
 head to feel his fever, to calm the 
 delirium that seems the beginning 
 of madness. LEONARDO, at the 
 contact, shows some relief. His 
 contracted nerves relax a little ; his 
 voice falls. 
 
 Let me kiss her feet, her little feet. 
 
 He drags himself to the feet of 
 the dead girl, bows his head and 
 remains thus for some time. AL- 
 ESSANDRO also prostrates himself 
 next to him. During this pause 
 the sighing of the fountain is
 
 276 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 heard. LEONARDO raises his head 
 
 and remains with eyes fixed on 
 
 the motionless feet. 
 
 One day she was on the shore of the 
 sea, seated upon the sand, with her knees 
 under her chin; and dreaming her beauti- 
 ful dreams, she enveloped her supple 
 feet, like two tender leaves, in her flow- 
 ing tresses. The sea was sleeping be- 
 fore her like an innocent child, lightly 
 breathing. . . . 
 
 A pause. He shivers, struck 
 
 by another remembrance. 
 
 Ah, that cursed day, before the 
 fire. . . . 
 
 He covers his face with his 
 hands, and bends again to the 
 earth. 
 Forgive! Fogive! 
 
 A pause. ALESSANDRO, dis- 
 turbed, turns toward the rock in 
 the background, where the path 
 opens.
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 277 
 
 ALESSANDRO, rising suddenly to his feet. 
 A step! I seem to hear a step down 
 yonder, upon the path. . . . Listen! 
 
 LEONARDO also rises to his feet, 
 terrified. Both listen, breathless. 
 
 No. Perhaps I was mistaken. . . . 
 May be it was the wind in the myrtles. 
 . . . Some stone may have rolled 
 down. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 I do not know. . . . My heart beats 
 so, it deafens my ears. ... I hear 
 nothing more. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO goes to the rock in 
 the background and spies. Only 
 the faint gurgling of the water is 
 heard. 
 
 ALESSANDRO turns to his friend, who is 
 looking fixedly at the corpse, and shakes 
 him. 
 What shall we do now? We must carry 
 
 her away from here. . . . Where shall we
 
 278 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 take her? Shall we carry her into the 
 house now? And Anna . . . Anna . . . 
 What shall we tell her? 
 
 LEONARDO, bewildered, looking around. 
 
 Anna . . . Anna . . . she is waiting for 
 me, at this hour. . . . she promised me 
 . . . she promised . . . last night. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 What did she promise you? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 To wait for me, to wait for me. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 To wait for you? Where? What for? 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 She thought . . . she wished. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 She wished what? .
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 279 
 
 LEONARDO. 
 
 She wished to go away ... to disap- 
 pear. . . . 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 Ah! 
 
 A pause. Both look instinc- 
 tively toward the path between the 
 the rocks in the background. The 
 murmuring of the fountain is 
 heard. 
 
 What shall we tell her? What shall we 
 do, now? . . . Do you wish to remain 
 here? ... I am going . . . going . . . 
 to get . . . the shroud. . . . 
 
 LEONARDO, stricken with unconquerable 
 
 terror. 
 
 No, no, do not go, do not leave me. 
 . . . Let us remain here, let us stay! 
 
 ALESSANDRO. 
 But Anna . . . Anna. . . . 
 
 He starts and listens.
 
 280 THE DEAD CITY 
 
 Some one is coming, some one is 
 approaching. ... A step, I heard a step. 
 . Ah, if it were. . . . We must hide 
 her. . . . Let us carry her over there, 
 between the myrtles, in the thicket. . . . 
 Leonardo, do you not hear me? 
 
 He shakes LEONARDO, who 
 seems petrified. 
 
 Let us carry her over there, between 
 the myrtles. ... I will take her by the 
 shoulders. . . . Gently! Gently! 
 
 He leans over the upper part of 
 the body, while LEONARDO stoops 
 over to raise the lower limbs. 
 At this moment the voice of the 
 blind woman is heard in the 
 path. 
 
 ANNA, between the rocks, in the background, 
 still invisible. 
 
 Bianca Maria! Bianca Maria!
 
 ACT FIFTH, ONLY SCENE 281 
 
 The two men let go of the 
 corpse ; they rise, deadly pale, un- 
 able to move, terrified. 
 
 Bianca Maria! 
 
 The blind woman appears be- 
 tween the rocks, alone, groping 
 her way in the shade. As no 
 one answers, she takes a few steps 
 forward, with despairing anxiety. 
 
 Alessandro! Leonardo! 
 
 She advances toward the corpse, 
 and almost touches it with her 
 foot. The two men stand, unable 
 to make a gesture or to utter a 
 word. 
 
 ALESSANDRO, at the moment in which ANNA'S 
 foot is about to touch the corpse. 
 
 Stop! Stop! Anna! 
 
 ANNA has, however, already 
 felt the lifeless body against her 
 feet. She stoops over the dead
 
 28a THE DEAD CITY 
 
 girl, utterly distracted, feeling 
 about until she reaches the face 
 and the hair, still wet with the 
 death-giving water. She shud- 
 ders from head to foot at the 
 clammy touch, then utters a pierc- 
 ing shriek in which she seems to 
 exhale her soul. 
 
 ANNA. 
 Ah. . . I see! I see! 
 
 FINIS
 
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