_Con._ You treat poor Livio Unkindly, Margaret.
_Mar._ Now, if that’s the grief, We have threshed it out before.
_Con._ I shall not spare you, Till you are kinder.
_Mar._ Yet if I were kinder, And he should build a hope upon that kindness, Until it proved unkinder than unkindness?
_Mar._ No better than the others; Than Ventimiglia loves, or Chiaramonte, 411 Good Michael Rosso, or the impudent Blasco, Or my new courtier Ferdinand.
_Con._ He loves With all his heart. Life is as tedious to him As to the dark and dusty wheel, which jerks Behind the dial-face, until he see you; When for his joy you give him but disdain.
_Mar._ Thou didst not tell him thou wouldst speak for him?
_Mar._ Now I, Constance, have something fresh: A mystery.
_Mar._ Yes, a mystery. 420 Guess what it is.
_Mar._ Indeed, Guessing would never wind it.
_Mar._ I died to tell thee ere thou camest, and now I grudge it sadly. Yet, for the fresh mount ’Twill give thy thoughts, I’ll tell. ’Twas yesternight, Just on the stroke of one ...
_Mar._ Thou know’st the casement of my bedroom looks Across the court. There as I stood last night, 430 Watching the moon awhile, ere I shut out The sleepless splendour from my dreams, I heard A heavy step pass down the gallery. ’Tis Manuel, I thought, who goes to lie In the little chamber at the back,—for Philip Had his;—but, for some strangeness in the step Pricked my attention, and to content my thought, I lent my ear to the sound, until it reached The door at the end: there, standing by the window I saw him plain: ’twas he, but in his arms 440 A woman, fainting as I thought, or dead. Her arms hung loose, and o’er his shoulder thrown Her head fell back.
_Mar._ He could not carry a ghost. Besides, this morning I watched him: he took thither meat and drink, And locked the door, and strictly bade the servants They should not enter.
_Mar._ I have not so much as let him speak with me. He might forbid me: and, O my curiosity, I must know more.
_Con._ What dost thou think to learn? 450
_Mar._ I have neither guess nor hope; I lay awake An hour, and thought of fifty things, not one Of any likelihood. In all romance No lady in distress ere came at midnight To the house of the chief justice. I could wish This beauteous maiden were a young princess Fled o’er the seas disguised.